Design Technology - St Charles' Catholic Primary School

Design and Technology at St Charles’ Catholic Primary School

At St Charles’ catholic Primary School, we want to encourage our pupils to develop a love of design and technology. We aim to build an awareness of the impact of design and technology on our lives and encourage pupils to become resourceful, enterprising citizens who will have the skills to contribute to future design advancements.

Intent

Design and Technology is an inspiring, rigorous and practical subject. It encourages children to learn to think and intervene creatively to solve problems both as individuals and as members of a team. Our progressive scheme of work aims to inspire pupils to be innovative and creative thinkers who have an appreciation for the product design cycle through ideation, creation, and evaluation. We want pupils to develop the confidence to take risks, through drafting design concepts, modelling, and testing and to be reflective learners who evaluate their work and the work of others. At St Charles’ Catholic Primary School, we use Kapow primary’s Design and technology scheme of work which enables pupils to meet the end of key stage attainment targets in the National curriculum and the aims also align with those in the National curriculum.

Implementation

The design and technology national curriculum outlines the three main stages of the design process: design, make and evaluate. Each stage of the design process is underpinned by technical knowledge which encompasses the contextual historical and technical understanding required for each strand. Cooking and nutrition has a separate section, with a focus on specific principles, skills and techniques in food, including where food comes from, diet and seasonality.

The national curriculum organises the Design and technology attainment targets under five subheadings or strands:

Design
Make
Evaluate
Technical Knowledge
Cooking and nutrition

At St Charles’ Catholic Primary School, Design and technology is taught using the Kapow Primary’s scheme of work. This scheme has a clear progression of skills and knowledge within these five strands across each year group.

Our DT-Progression-of-Skills shows the skills that are taught within each year group and how these skills develop to ensure that attainment targets are securely met by the end of each key stage.

Through kapow Primary’s Design and technology scheme, pupils respond to design briefs and scenarios that require consideration of the needs of others, developing their skills in six key areas:

Mechanisms
Structures
Textiles
Cooking and nutrition
Electrical systems (KS2)
Digital world (KS2)

Each of our key areas follows the design process (design, make and evaluate) and has a particular theme and focus from the technical knowledge or cooking and nutrition section of the curriculum. We follow a spiral curriculum, with key areas revisited again and again with increasing complexity, allowing pupils to revisit and build on previous learning.

The DT-Medium Term Plan shows when each unit is taught in each year group and that meaningful cross curricular links are made across subjects when and wherever possible

Lessons incorporate a range of teaching strategies from independent tasks, paired and group work including practical hands-on, computer-based and inventive tasks. This variety means that lessons are engaging and appeal to those with a variety of learning styles. Differentiated guidance is available for every lesson to ensure that lessons can be accessed by all pupils and opportunities to stretch pupils’ learning are available when required. Knowledge organisers for each unit support pupils in building a foundation of factual knowledge by encouraging recall of key facts and vocabulary.

St Charles’ Catholic Primary School understands that not every teacher feels confident delivering the Design and technology curriculum and every effort has been made to ensure that they feel supported by the Design and technology subject lead and by the use of Kapow Primary’s Design and technology scheme of work to deliver lessons of a high standard that ensures pupils’ progression.

Staff are encouraged to teach a weekly Design and Technology lesson. This helps ensure sufficient time is allocated to Design and technology and that the subject matter can be revisited frequently, helping improve the rates of progression the children make. One Design and technology topic per term is taught

Impact

At St Charles’ Catholic Primary School, the Design and technology scheme can be constantly monitored through both formative and summative assessment opportunities. Each lesson includes guidance to support teachers in assessing pupils against the learning objectives. Furthermore, each unit has a unit quiz and knowledge catcher which can be used at the start or end of a unit to measure pupils progress.

At the end of their learning journey at St Charles’ Catholic Primary School, the implementation of the Design and technology curriculum should enable pupils to leave primary school equipped with a range of skills to enable them to succeed in their secondary education and be innovative and resourceful members of society.

The expected impact will be that children:

Understand the functional and aesthetic properties of a range of materials and resources.
Understand how to use and combine tools to carry out different processes for shaping, decorating and manufacturing products.
Build and apply a repertoire of skills, knowledge and understanding to produce high quality, innovative outcomes, including models, prototypes, CAD, and products to fulfil the needs of users, clients, and scenarios.
Understand and apply the principles of healthy eating, diets, and recipes, including key processes, food groups and cooking equipment.
Have an appreciation for key individuals, inventions, and events in history and of today that impact our world.
Self – evaluate and reflect on learning at different stages and identify areas to improve.
Meet the end of key stage expectations outlined in the national curriculum for design and technology.

National Curriculum Requirements at Key Stage 1

Through a variety of creative and practical activities, pupils should be taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making. They should work in a range of relevant contexts, (for example the home and school, gardens and playgrounds, the local community, industry and the wider environment).

When designing and making, pupils should be taught to:

Design

design purposeful, functional, appealing products for themselves and other users based on design criteria
generate, develop, model and communicate their ideas through talking, drawing, templates, mock-ups and, where appropriate, information and communication technology

Make

select from and use a range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks, (or example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing)
select from and use a wide range of materials and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their characteristics

Evaluate

explore and evaluate a range of existing products
evaluate their ideas and products against design criteria

Technical knowledge

build structures, exploring how they can be made stronger, stiffer and more stable explore and use mechanisms, (for example, levers, sliders, wheels and axles), in their products.

National Curriculum Requirements for Food and Nutrition at KS1

As part of their work with food, pupils should be taught how to cook and apply the principles of nutrition and healthy eating. Instilling a love of cooking in pupils will also open a door to one of the great expressions of human creativity. Learning how to cook is a crucial life skill that enables pupils to feed themselves and others affordably and well, now and in later life.

Pupils should be taught to:

use the basic principles of a healthy and varied diet to prepare dishes
understand where food comes from.

In Key Stage 2:

Within key stage 2, key events and individuals that have influenced the world of Design Technology are teaching focuses that are to be covered.
The use of computer programmes and applications are also a key focus to be utilised by children in their design of their products.

National Curriculum Requirements at Key Stage 2

Through a variety of creative and practical activities, pupils should be taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making. They should work in a range of relevant contexts, for example, the home, school, leisure, culture, enterprise, industry and the wider environment.