Computing

Intent

Technology is becoming an everyday part of life. At Westhouses Primary School, we hope to prepare our children for a future in an environment which is shaped by technology. Therefore, we want to model and educate our children on how to use technology positively, responsibly and safely.  We aim to encourage our pupils to be creators not consumers and our curriculum encompassing computer science, information technology and digital literacy reflects this. We want our pupils to understand that with technology comes choices, as a school we want to model and support these positive choices and highlight the risks that may possibly come by making incorrect ones.

We encourage staff to try and embed computing across the whole curriculum to make learning creative and accessible for all children. We want children to become fluent with a range of tools to best express their understanding. We want children to feel comfortable and confident with using and exploring these tools independently by the time they reach Upper Key Stage 2.

Implementation

The computing curriculum at Westhouses Primary aims to equip children with the knowledge, skills and understand they need to thrive in the digital world they will be a part of both today and in the future. The curriculum can be broken down into three strands: computer science, information technology and digital literacy.

NCCE – Computer Science and Information Technology

At Westhouses Primary School, our scheme of work for computing is the ‘Teach Computing’ Curriculum and covers all aspects of the National Curriculum. This scheme was chosen as it has been created by subject experts and based on the latest pedagogical research. It provides an innovative progression framework where computing content (concepts, knowledge, skills and objecties) has been organized into interconnected networks called learning graphs.

We have also introduced the use of Seesaw throughout school, and this has played a key role during home learning as children can access work through this app at home. By using this app, we can collect and store work in one place, it allows children to save work produced on Ipads. Homework is also being set through this app and parents can see the work that children have saved in their learning journals.

Project Evolve – Digital Literacy and Online Safety

A key part of the computing curriculum is ensuring that children are accessing technology safely and responsibly. Children have a right to enjoy childhood online, to access safe online spaces and to benefit from all the opportunities that a connected world can bring them, appropriate to their age and stage.

Children develop this awareness and responsibility through the use of the ‘Project Evolve – Education for a Connected World’ framework. The framework aims to support and broaden the provision of online safety education, so that it is empowering, builds confidence and creates a positive online environment.

Computing is taught every week, either as a stand-alone lesson or embedded into the wider curriculum. This is dependent on the area of focus for that specific half term.

Children have access to a range of hardware: computers, laptops, tablets, programmable equipment (crumbles, BeeBots, Tactile readers, dataloggers) and software that they need to develop knowledge and skills of digit systems and the applications.

Impact

We encourage our children to enjoy and value the curriculum we deliver. We want children to discuss, reflect and appreciate the impact computing has on their learning, development and well-being. The quality of children’s learning is evident on Seesaw, a digital platform where pupils can share and evaluate their own work, as well as their peers. Much of the subject-specific knowledge developed from our computing curriculum equip pupils with experiences which will benefit them in secondary school, further education and future workplaces. We want children to be confident using technology, but also recognise the impact and implications it can have if used inappropriately.