Technology
Intent
The core intent of our curriculum is to build knowledge, skills, and confidence through technological activity, and to encourage ‘an appetite for further learning’ through achievement. The D&T curriculum is intended to respond to the needs of our students based on geographical location as well as enhancing wider opportunities to maximise their career potential and to build resilience in this pursuit, especially for those students who may be more challenged in a purely academic context. To achieve this, we focus strongly on practical skills and competence, while actively encouraging students to solve problems using their initiative, creativity and technical knowledge when undertaking all technological activities.
In Food and nutrition, by investigating the relationship between diet, nutrition, and health, as well as the impact of a poor diet, students will be actively encouraged to develop a multitude of cooking skills to develop the knowledge required to become self-sufficient, both now and later in life.
The sequencing of our KS3 curriculum is intended to add more complex and challenging content through successive years, and to ensure students experience the full breadth of subjects and principle technological content, allowing for informed decisions in option subject choices, which intrinsically link with KS3 modules. In both KS3 and KS4, students are encouraged to recognise that Design and Technology provides transferable skills across many other subjects, demonstrating the practical application of academic knowledge. In addition to helping students to develop a more creative and innovative approach to designing and manufacturing, they are encouraged to reflect upon current issues such as environmental and economic factors associated with the designing of products, systems and associated career paths.
In Design and Technology, we strive to enable students to achieve the very best examination results possible; however, our curriculum goes beyond what is taught in lessons and is examinable. Ultimately, we aim to direct and inspire students to careers that stem from our material areas, and we are proud of the large number of pathways followed which mirror Design & Technology or Food content.
Implementation
The Design & Technology curriculum focuses heavily on planning and design to ensure our schemes of work facilitate the best and most appropriate education for our students. We are committed to developing our schemes of work to embed challenge, and to encourage independence and resilience, while developing relevant skills and knowledge suited to the needs of JSTC students. Our schemes of work enable us to define the core knowledge our students need to master, as well as encouraging creativity and the development of skills within a specialist context.
Our curriculum delivery is also designed to encourage students to develop a sense of pride in their achievements, and a desire for self-improvement through the completion of work. Content, knowledge and skills are clearly defined in our schemes of work and knowledge organisers, with specific focus on materials and processes that are applicable to our cohort, and recognised as relevant by parents.
In Design & Technology, we implement our curriculum through a variety of creative teaching approaches and tasks, and choose to deliver our KS3 curriculum using a subject rotation system in each year of KS3. The rationale for this system of delivery is our belief that students at JSTC develop skills, knowledge, and progress more rapidly, when subject content is delivered by a teacher who specialises in their own field, and who encourages and inspires students through a clear passion in their own subject area. Our curriculum at KS4 is designed to provide students with a broad and balanced range of subject options, which facilitate pathways that our students at JSTC, and their parents, see as appropriate to their futures.
Impact
The Design and Technology department believe that the aims and objectives of our curriculum intent and implementation is successfully demonstrated and evidenced in a wide variety of contexts.
The quality of teaching and learning in Design Technology has been praised consistently during lesson observations by both external and internal observers, with lessons in the department being continuously rated from good to outstanding.
GCSE & vocational examination results in all Technology subjects e.g. Engineering, Textiles, Graphics & Food have been consistently good over a long period, with many students exceeding their expected target grades. In KS3, students regularly meet or exceed their flightpath levels (targets), and the quality of work produced is often outstanding and inspirational to students.
The student voice demonstrates that Technology is an extremely popular subject, enjoyed equally by both boys and girls. This popularity and success of the subject at KS3 is further reinforced by the number of students who select Technology as an option subject (many choosing two Technology options), which is consistently 70% of the year group on average. Post 16 pathways, such as trades, are very popular with our students, and often choices directly link to Technology based subjects.
