""The general feeling of the school was lovely. It feels calm and content. All displays were well maintained.""
Teacher, visiting from a Multi Academy Trust

Curriculum

At St Anthony’s we are rightly proud of our curriculum. Our vision is that we are an inspirational school, remaining true to our spiritual mission:

"Learning, Growing and Living with Jesus"

 

Love underpins all that we do at St. Anthony’s. We value our children, our families and our staff. Our children feel secure and supported during every step of their learning journey. We have a vision for our children that expects excellence for them to succeed in being the best version of themselves. We foster a love of learning from the first day our children arrive at school, and we strive to develop life-long learners, who challenge themselves and develop a secure understanding of the foundations of learning in the core subjects.

We believe in developing the whole child and offer opportunities to learn in a variety of ways, underpinned by our Christian Values and Catholic Ethos, which form a solid foundation for all of our learning at St. Anthony’s. We celebrate the rich diversity of modern British life and our local community through our respect for other faiths and for people with no faith, linked to our explicit teaching of British Values. Our children develop a deep-rooted morality that they take with them through life.

We strive for excellence and deliver an ambitious curriculum that is based on the children learning distinct subject areas. The thread of our curriculum is to develop competent, confident readers and to that end, we include Disciplinary Literacy as a cornerstone of our curriculum pathway. To encourage oracy skills, we encourage a dialogic model, where children develop their speaking through encouraging learning conversations.

Children access a broad and balanced curriculum that is rich in experiential learning, where children will have the opportunity to visit a number of learning attractions throughout the year, such as museums and trips in our local area, as well as having in-school visitors to deliver workshops and experiences, across the curriculum. We have a range of subject specialists that teach as part of our team. We have a dedicated PE teacher, Music teacher, Computing teacher and French teacher (for some year groups). As we have our own minibus, we are able to offer more opportunities to our children to visit different places and to attend different clubs and fixtures.

We aim to develop independence and offer two residential trips per year in Years 5 and 6. Children will have the opportunity to experience new skills, to get out of their comfort-zone and to build bonds with their peers, as they become ready for secondary school. Spiritual growth is a fundamental part of our school ethos and children have the opportunity to attend a residential retreat in Year 6, where they will gain a sense of self and confidence.

As a Rights Respecting school, we feel that it is important to create a partnership between school and parents and carers. We aim to build strong relationships with home to ensure that children feel supported in all areas of their learning. We focus on the basic skills of phonics, reading and times tables and invite parents into school regularly to support them in understanding how we teach, to encourage supporting learning from home. We link the Rights of the Child with Article 18: Both parents share a responsibility for bringing up their child and should always consider what is best for the child. Governments must support parents by giving them the help they need, especially if the child’s parents work.

We support and welcome those newly arriving to the area and country. We have highly skilled bi-lingual staff and class teachers, which ensures that our young people with English as an Additional Language (EAL) are given every opportunity to succeed and excel.

We aim to develop every child’s God-given talent, through the offering of extra-curricular opportunities. Children have a variety of clubs offered to them throughout the year, from Library Club, offered at lunchtime and after school, by our Librarian, Miss Vella, to our Sports Clubs, such as Gymnastics, Football and Basketball, offered by our PE team and external providers. We offer choir and band practice, Rock Steady, Drama and Coding Club. We also offer Wrap Around Club until 6:00pm every day.

 

Please click here to see our Curriculum Policy

Please click on the relevant sections below to see what we are learning in each subject area and in each year group.
SPIRITUAL

The Catholic life of the school is built upon developing the spiritual awareness in each and every person in the school. It is enriched by weekly assemblies, specific R.E. lessons as well as timetabled meditation and reflection.

It is deepened by:

  • Daily prayer
  • Designated focus prayer area in each classroom
  • Whole school masses
  • Harvest and Reconciliation liturgies
  • Visits to St. Anthony’s Church to light candles for mothers/aunts/grandmothers in October
  • Participation in the Stations of the Cross in Church during Lent
  • Retreat days and an extended 3 day retreat for Year 6
  • The opportunity to be a prayer leader as a ‘Faith Ambassadors'
MORAL

All within the school are expected to respond appropriately to God’s command to ‘Love God and love one another’. This is demonstrated throughout the school in positive relationships where the behaviour policy is one that aims to develop the whole child through mutual respect, justice and fairness.

 It is promoted by:

  • Acknowledging the individuality of all
  • Developing all within the school to understand the Unicef Articles – Rights of each child
  • Having staff trained regularly on all aspects of the safeguarding of children
  • Ensuring all staff are appointed using ‘safer recruitment’ practices
  • Enabling children to understand that God loves them as they are
  • Promoting the importance of parents in the education of their children
  • Expecting all staff to act as good role models for the children
  • Protecting children from inappropriate influences
  • Employing staff to act as ‘Learning Mentors’ to assist children who have difficulties with positive behaviour
  • Giving children the chance to support one another as promoted by the reward system link to the Jesuit Values
SOCIAL

St. Anthony’s is an hospitable school where all are welcomed. It is inclusive, accepting that every child is unique and valued. The community stretches out to ensure children develop an understanding of wider issues affecting the local area and further afield.

This is done by:

  • Having an ‘open door’ policy where parents can meet the teacher regularly
  • A school council which works hand in hand with the eco warriors
  • Promoting a chaplaincy group
  • Providing parents with the opportunity to visit school to support their children’s learning through workshops and shared activities e.g. school disco, theme days
  • Strong parish and deanery links
  • Creating opportunities for children to ‘lead’ others in activities e.g. clubs
  • Monthly lunches shared by year 6 children with seniors from the parish
CULTURAL

St. Anthony's is a school blessed by families from many countries and cultures, an excess of 30 home languages are evident within the school which brings richness and diversity to the community. The home knowledge of children offers the school a uniqueness in developing a curriculum which incorporates their expertise and acknowledges their individuality. As a Catholic School we actively promote values, virtues and ethics that shape our childrens’ character and moral perspective, through the teachings of the Church. We are confident that our continued focus on the gospel values will give our children the necessary awareness of what it means to be a good British citizen today, and embed in them the building blocks for a successful and productive life.

It is promoted by:

  • Understanding the backgrounds of all our pupils and engaging parents in the life of the school
  • Ensuring the curriculum has breadth and inspires every child
  • Engaging with the democratic process with children at every opportunity e.g. voting for school council leaders, enabling school council members to interview new staff etc.
  • Being tolerant of each individual encouraging reconciliation when there is division
  • Using class charters as a means to promote the ‘rule of law’
  • Creating opportunities for children to link with other schools and institutions e.g. the O2 and massed choirs, sporting fixtures etc.
  • Ensuring all classes make visits to places of historical, geographical or spiritual interest 

Religious Education is taught throughout the school using the 'Come and See' programme.

“Come and See” is an invitation and a promise of life for everyone and is open to all. In response to the question ‘Where do you live?’, Jesus invited his disciples to ‘Come and See.’ They went with Jesus ‘and spent the rest of that day with him.’

We recognise that all children are at different stages in their journey of faith; for some children RE is catechesis and part of their formation in the faith. Those who receive the invitation to 'Come and see’ may also offer it to others. In the same invitation we remember that for some of our children RE will be evangelisation, the first opportunity to hear the good news. For more information on the programme please click here.

Religious Education is a core subject of the curriculum for Catholic Schools and as such teaching and learning in RE makes up 10% of curriculum time. As such it is taught rigorously with all the same expectations as other core subjects whilst maintaining a creative element and encouraging children to question and think at a high level.

What do the children learn?

Each term pupils study three topics, each lasting four weeks and following a common theme across the school. As the children move through the school this theme is developed further, appropriate to the pupils age and stage of learning. Please see table below for more information.

undefinedPlease find below some of the resources we use with the children.

'Come and See' Curriculum Review & Content 

Full Range of Regular Prayers

Inspection Report of Denominational Character and Religious Education - March 2018

Using effective planning and teaching, we aim to develop and extend pupils' knowledge and understanding of all mathematical concepts.

 

Maths learning at St. Anthony's strives to create a learning environment in which our children can confidently learn and achieve, independently, to the best of their ability. Our maths curriculum aims to provide children with the opportunity to develop a curiosity for maths, develop enjoyment and passion for the subject, allowing them to understand the world around them through mathematical reasoning.

A positive attitude to maths learning is encouraged by presenting it in an interesting and enjoyable way, allowing the children to actively participate in the learning process, thus creating a sense of achievement and confidence. We have a strong emphasis on the development of mental arithmetic and giving opportunities for our children to use and apply mathematics in real life situations.

Maths is taught through a daily Numeracy lesson which follows the principles of the Primary curriculum and id divided up into 7 strands:

1. Using and applying

2. Counting and understanding number

3. Knowing and using number facts

4. Calculating

5. Understanding shape

6. Measuring

7. Handling data

Mathematics is an interconnected subject in which children need to be able to move fluently between mathematical ideas. The programmes of study are organised into distinct areas, but pupils will make connections across mathematical ideas to develop fluency and competence in solving increasingly sophisticated problems. They will also apply their mathematical knowledge to science and other subjects.

The expectation is that the majority of pupils will move through the programmes of study at broadly the same pace. However, decisions about when to progress will always be based on the security of pupils’ understanding and their readiness to progress to the next stage. Pupils who grasp concepts rapidly will be challenged through being offered rich and sophisticated problems before any acceleration through new content. Those who are not sufficiently fluent with earlier material will consolidate their understanding, including additional practice, before moving on.

 

 

 

Writing is an important tool for learning and plays a vital role in all areas of the curriculum.

For children to become good writers they must enjoy what they are writing about. To help support this we use a range of books and resources to help engage the children and capture their imagination. We often set the scene in our classes using pictures, music and drama to evoke the atmosphere and get them excited about what they are writing about. The children are given many opportunities to write for different purposes and audiences. We aim for a high standard of presentation, and the children follow a cursive style of handwriting throughout key stage 2. 

Implementation

At St Anthony's we have adopted ‘The Write Stuff’ by Jane Constantine to bring clarity and consistency to the mechanics of writing and to enable our children to write effectively and coherently. As a school, all children from Year 1 to Year 6 learn to write through the Write Stuff approach, with Reception classes introducing this approach in the summer term. This approach was developed by teacher and leading English consultant, Jane Considine. It is a fun, creative and rigorous approach to develop children’s writing. This approach allows children to apply basic skills, vocabulary and grammar knowledge to write effective sentences, which are full of impact and keep the reader interested.

In The Write Stuff approach to writing, the children explore high level, rich vocabulary and are taught grammar in context through different writing lenses on the Writing Rainbow. There are three lenses used to support children with their writing:

Fantastics – ideas for writing
Grammaristics – tools for writing
Boomtastics – writing techniques

The Write Stuff is based on two guiding principles; teaching sequences that slide between experience days and sentence stacking lessons.

As part of the teaching sequence, teachers plan experience days; sentence stacking lessons and independent writing sequences. Experience days immerse children in experiences linked to their writing and drench them in vocabulary linked to the lenses in ‘The Writing Rainbow’. From the experience days, children take part in the sentence stacking lessons. Sentence stacking lessons focus on writing three sentences with focuses on lenses of the rainbow.

‘The Write Stuff’ follows a method called ‘Sentence Stacking’ which refers to the fact that sentences are stacked together and organised to engage children with short, intensive moments of learning that they can then immediately apply to their own writing.

An individual lesson is based on one plot point from the text, broken in to three learning chunks:

  • 1. Initiate section – a stimulus to capture the children’s imagination and set up a sentence.
  • 2. Model section – the teacher models a sentence that outlines clear writing features and techniques.
  • 3. Enable section – the children write their sentence, following the teacher’s model.

This part of the unit is heavily scaffolded with lots of teacher input and modelling of vocabulary use, sentence construction and use of grammar with reference to the 3 writing lenses.

During the initiate section children ‘chot’ (chat and jot) down their ideas from stimulating resources, such as pictures, music and drama. The children are encouraged to use ‘kind calling out’ where they call out examples of vocabulary, adverbs, onomatopoeia etc.

During the Model section the teacher prepares children for writing by modelling the ideas, grammar and techniques of writing taken from the writing rainbow.
In the Enable section pupils write their own sentences, taking the opportunity to deepen the moment. ‘Deepen the Moment’ is where children are challenged to independently draw upon previously learnt skills and apply them to their writing during that chunk.
Following the sentence stacking, children are given the opportunity to show what they have learnt by planning and writing their own independent piece of writing. After they have written their independent piece, their work is marked by the class teacher who identifies different aspects of their written piece to be edited. There are 3 elements to the editing;

E1 Edit: The Revise

Edit Type 1: These are often ‘little’ adjustments or changes and tend to fall into one of these categories; Spellings Missing words or Punctuation

E2 Edit: The Rewrite

Edit Type 2: Children are asked to re-write a sentence if it doesn’t make sense, could be restructured or generally improved.

E3 Edit: The Reimagine

Edit Type 3: This is when a writer wants to add more sentences to develop an idea further. For this the children are shown how to use ‘editing flaps’.
Editing flaps are extra pieces of paper that stick onto their writing and show the additional sentences added into their work.

The Write Stuff provides a balance of narrative, non-fiction and poetry writing throughout each term.

Impact

Having followed the Write Stuff approach to developing their writing skills children should be able to

  • write for a range of purposes including diary entries, persuasive letters, stories, poems and recounts to name but a few.
  • use their vast knowledge of vocabulary to excite, inform or entertain the reader.
  • understand a range of punctuation and the effect it can have on the reader in both writing and reading.
  • understand and be able to use a range of grammatical devices.
  • understand the various sentence types that can be used to support different genres.
  • spell accurately using their phonetic knowledge and apply spelling rules.
  • to speak clearly, fluently and coherently, to be able to listen attentively with understanding, pleasure and empathy and contribute to group discussions.
  • be prepared for when they move on from St. Anthony’s to continue their education.

 

Please see below our writing pathways

Grammaristics Progression Across School

English/Progression-through-Genres-1-2.pdf

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-EYFS-Tracker-Statutory-Framework-for-the-Early-Years-Foundation-Stage.pdf

Foundation Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-1.pdf

Year 1 Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-2.pdf

Year 2 Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-3.pdf

Year 3 Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-4.pdf

Year 4 Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-5.pdf

Year 5 Performance of Writing Framework POW

English/Jane-Considines-English-Unit-Plan-Tracker-Year-6.pdf

Year 6 Performance of Writing Framework POW

 

A reading journey begins with ‘learning to read’ & moves on into ‘reading to learn’.

Reading Intent

Reading is fundamental in our modern society and shapes us as critical thinkers, learners and questioning citizens. Learning to read and reading to learn is the key to unlocking all areas of the curriculum and is the foundation for the future educational success for all children.  Reading feeds the imagination and opens up to a world of wonder and joy. We strive for all of our children at St Anthony's to discover the magic in reading, develop an appreciation for and love of reading and instil the habit of reading for pleasure. 

Reading Implementation

We provide a thriving reading culture for all children in our school.  Through effective teaching and intervention, children are equipped with the essential skills to ensure that they become competent fluent readers.  Beginning their reading journey with phonics in Early Years and Key Stage 1, using Little Wandle, provides children with a direct route to becoming novice readers.  They subsequently move to whole class reading lessons that focus on the development of vocabulary, comprehension skills and the immersion in a wide range of high-quality texts. These lessons also instil excitement and pleasure in reading.  This enjoyment in reading is further demonstrated by reading aloud (class readers) and various other strategies such as regular opportunities for rich book talk, visits from authors to inspire reading, our inviting library and children regularly witnessing their teachers as readers.

Reading VIPERS is our way of supporting children with their reading comprehension skills. All children will be working on VIPERS during class reading, whether it is reading as a class, in a small group, or one-to-one with an adult. It would be fantastic if parents could also refer to VIPERS when they listen to their child read at home. 

Up to the end of Year 2, the 'S' stands for 'Sequence'. Once children move into Year 3, the 'S' stands for 'Summarise', which is a more demanding skill.

If we ensure that children are competent in all of these reading skills, we are covering all of the National Curriculum requirements and enabling them to be strong, confident readers. This acronym is just a great way of helping children and parents to remember what these vital skills are.

 

EYFS - Y2

Y3 - Y6

Vocabulary

What does the word ..... mean in this sentence?

What does this word or phrase tell you about .....?

What do the words ..... and ..... suggest about the character, setting and mood?

Find one word in the text which means .....

Which word tells you that .....?

Infer

Why was .....? feeling .....?

What do you think the author intended when they said .....?

How can you tell that .....?

What impression of .....? do you get from

these paragraphs?

Predict

What do you think will happen next? What makes you think this?

What is happening? What do you think happened before? 

Do you think ..... will happen? Yes, no or maybe?

Explain your answer using evidence from the text. 

What does this paragraph suggest will happen next? What makes you think this?

Explain

Who is your favourite character? Why?

Is there anything you would change about this story?

Do you like this text? What do you like about it?

The mood of the character changes throughout the text.

Find and copy the phrases which show this. 

How does the author engage the reader here?

Why is the text arranged in this way?

Retrieve

How many .....?

What happened to .....?

How would you describe this story/text? What genre is it? How do you know?

Sequence

Summarise

What happened after .....? 

What was the first thing that happened in the story?

Can you summarise in a sentence the opening/middle/end of the story?

In what order do these chapter headings come in the story?

 Question Openers

VIPERS can be used on any text that a child is reading, as well as on pictures, picture books and films! When any adult is listening to a child read, all they have to do is think of questions about the book/picture/film that cover all of the VIPERS, and there are great examples below of how you can create your own questions using the following question openers. In conjunction with VIPERS, we use SOLO answer stems to support the children's answer responses, to enable them to answer questions making links to prior knowledge and understanding at a higher multi-structural or extended abstract level. 

Reading VIPERS is our way of supporting children with their reading comprehension skills. All children will be working on VIPERS during class reading, whether it is reading as a class, in a small group, or one-to-one with an adult. It would be fantastic if parents could also refer to VIPERS when they listen to their child read at home.

Reading Impact

Reading is a crucial component to children’s future educational success and achievements in life.  Children at St Anthony’s are improving in their performance in statutory tests in both phonics and reading, though more importantly, they leave us as competent fluent readers, who can both read to learn and read for pleasure, in order to offer them the best possible opportunities in life.  We strive to ensure that our children also leave us as ‘forever readers’ who are able to capture the magic of reading which will, in turn, develop their self-esteem and have a direct, positive impact on their future wellbeing.

 

Take a look at the following website for more exciting books for children for all year groups www.booktrust.org.uk/books/children/100-best-books

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-EYFS.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y1.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y2.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y3.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y4.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y5.docx

English/Reading/Reading-Long-Term-Planning-Y6.docx

Reading for Purpose Rubric

Vipers KS1 Question Stems

Vipers KS2 Question Stems

Solo Stems

Writing in your child's reading record

Supporting your child's reading at home

Top tips for encouraging reading at home

Recommended Reading Books

Bookworm

Reading Pathway

"Children need to be able to HEAR a whole word and SAY every sound that they HEAR."

St. Anthony’s School and Nursery follows the ‘Little Wandle’ programme when teaching and learning phonics. The programme was produced by the DFE which teaches the children that sounds and letters have a relationship, concentrating on activities to promote speaking and listening skills, phonological awareness and oral blending. This starts during the Early Years Foundation Stage, with the aim of producing fluent readers by the time they leave Year 2.

Phonics is taught through six phases starting with phase one and continues through the school until each child has successfully completed all six phases, with children being assessed at the end of each phase.

 

Phase

What Do They Learn?

Phase One

(Nursery)

In Phase 1, the activities are split into seven aspects which include Environmental Sounds, Instrumental Sounds, Body Sounds, Rhythm and Rhyme, Alliteration, Voice Sounds and Oral Blending and Segmenting.

Phase Two

(Reception)

In Phase 2, the children learn 19 letters of the alphabet with one sound (phoneme) for each letter. The children begin to blend sounds together to make words and learn to segment words into separate sounds. The children also start to read simple captions.

Phase Three

(Reception)

The remaining 7 letters of the alphabet are taught, one sound (phoneme) for each letter. Graphemes such as sh, ng, oi, are taught as they represent the remaining phonemes which are not covered by single letters. The children read captions, sentences and questions.

Phase Four

(Year 1)

There are no new phonemes or graphemes taught in this phase. Children recap prior learning and learn to blend and segment longer words with adjacent consonants e.g. swim, clap.

Phase Five

(Year 1)

The children now move onto the 'complex code.' Children learn that there are more graphemes for phonemes (ways to write the sounds) and that there are different ways to pronounce the phonemes they have already learnt.

Phase Six

(Year 2)

Phase 6 has a clear focus on spelling, including prefixes and suffixes, doubling and dropping letters.

 

The Phonics Screening Test

The Phonics Screening Check is an assessment at the end of Year 1 to confirm whether individual children have learnt phonetic decoding to an appropriate standard. It enables schools to identify children who need additional help, so ensure they are given support to improve their reading skills. Children who do not 'pass' the check in Year 1 are able to retake it in Year 2.

It is a Statutory Requirement to carry out the screening check. The check is a short, simple screening check which consists of a list of 40 words and pseudo words (non-words), which the child reads one-to-one with their class teacher. For more information please click on the link below.

https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/at-school/primary-school-assessment-tests/year-1-phonics-screening-check/

Physical Education

"Creating healthy and active young people"

At St. Anthony's Catholic primary school we value sports and what it can bring to our young people, from social skills and lifelong values. We can use sports as a vehicle to mold each child into a healthy, independent and positive person. 

Our PE lessons are where each child will start their learning journey into sports so we want this to be a positive experience for all and this is what we strive for every day. We do this by having layered activities for children to choose from so they can decide which challenge they are ready for and a clear progression to achieve the lessons overall objective. 

We also focus lessons on our fundamental movement skills which are agility, balance and coordination and we believe this underpins every sport we play. 

  • Agility - ability to move quickly and easily.
  • Balance - an even distribution of weight enabling someone or something to remain upright and steady.
  • Coordination - that you have control over the movements of your body. 

Our teachers also look to develop the skills and ability of our children through the use of RealPe. Teachers create an environment that allows pupils to focus on learning. The teaching materials teachers select – in a way that does not create unnecessary workload for staff – reflect the school’s ambitious intentions for the course of study and clearly support the intent of a coherently planned curriculum, sequenced towards cumulatively sufficient knowledge and skills for future learning and employment.’

In addition to what we offer during lessons, we also deliver a variety of sporting clubs in both the morning, after school and school holidays.  In these clubs we cover the following sports – football, netball, basketball, hockey, athletics, badminton, tennis, cricket and many more.

 

TEN TEN

 

 

Our new Scheme for PSHRE is Ten Ten, which is endorsed by our Diocese. Through this scheme we explore all concepts of Personal, Social Health and Relationship Education, through the lens of our Catholic ethos. 

Please see below the overview documents. 

PSHRE CURRICULUM MAP

OVERVIEW DOCUMENT