Our Curriculum
At St Anne’s, we endeavour to deliver a curriculum that is engaging, inclusive and rich in real life experiences. Our curriculum is underpinned by our Catholic ethos. We believe our children should be happy, healthy and valued individuals who are ready for the next stage in their education.
Our curriculum:
- supports children to understand God’s creation and helps them to become the person God calls them to be
- instils a love of learning within all children
- promotes positive mental health and wellbeing
- ensure all children to thrive
- promotes curiosity, independence and risk-taking
- is broad and balanced
- builds on prior learning
- enables children to know more, remember more and do more
- supports children to become respectful citizens
- is relevant and personalised to our context
- ensures children have secure literacy, communication and mathematical skills
Curriculum Approach
We view the early years foundation stage (from pre-school groups to the end of the Reception year) as a crucial stage in a child’s education. Consequently, we work closely with nursery schools and parents to ensure that children make a smooth start to their life at St Anne’s. In the foundation stage, children experience a lot of self-directed learning and make extensive use of our outside area.
We structure our curriculum through learning journeys which fully meets the requirements of the national curriculum. These learning journeys are flexible, respond to the individual needs of all children and are progressive throughout the school. Our learning journeys have been created alongside Dimensions (a curriculum provider) and are further supplemented with other schemes. Our curriculum is meaningful and memorable and promotes both British values and respect for protected characteristics.
We have high expectations for all of our children and ensure that all necessary support is put in place to enable every child to thrive. We are delighted that all our 2022 end of Key Stage 2 data significantly surpassed national figures and that we were in the top 20% of schools in almost all areas.
Assessment of learning is ongoing and carried out in a variety of ways. Children are supported to identify their next steps and targets to focus on. We encourage and support parents to be fully involved in their children’s learning.
Enrichment
Our curriculum is designed to promote a variety of cultural capital opportunities enabling children to experience their learning in a variety of different ways. We know that first hand learning experiences play a key role in children’s learning. As such, we include as many trips, visitors and workshops into the curriculum as possible to make learning come alive for the children. We also have residential trips in Years 4, 5 and 6 which enable children to develop a range of outdoor skills, including independence, team-work and resilience.
We are very proud of being in Banstead and our curriculum reflects this. To enable our children to be active members within the community, we incorporate a variety of opportunities for them to develop their role within the local community. This includes attending Mass at St Ann’s church, performing at the Banstead May Fair, working with the Epsom & Ewell Foodbank and visits to nursing homes.
Extra-Curricular Opportunities
We offer a range of clubs at St Anne’s including multi-sports, art, karate, performing arts, football and netball. These clubs give children a chance to shine in different areas and develop a range of skills. Clubs, which are available during and after-school each day, enable children to mix with a wider range of age groups, develop social and communication skills and encourage them to try something new.
Parental Involvement
At St Anne’s, we see working with parents as invaluable. We know that when working together, the children’s learning can be enriched and extended. Communication is important. Each week, year groups send an email to parents detailing information their child’s learning for the week and how this learning can be consolidated and developed at home. We deliver a variety of workshops to parents throughout the year to share how they can support their child at home with their learning. Parents are also very welcome to get in touch with their child’s class teacher if they would like further information on the curriculum.
