Intent
At Brentnall Community Primary, we believe that a quality Science curriculum should develop children’s scientific knowledge, conceptual understanding, secure understanding of the world through scientific enquiry and the ability to ask and answer scientific questions. Science has changed our lives and is vital to the world’s future prosperity. We aim to inspire an appreciation of all aspects of science, including biology, chemistry and physics. We work hard to provide a rich and varied curriculum to challenge and meet the needs of our children. We believe all pupils should be taught essential aspects of the knowledge, methods, processes and uses of science. We recognise the importance of learning and to nurture a culture where children take pride in their work.
All children are encouraged to develop a range of skills including observations, planning and investigations, as well as being encouraged to question the world around them and become independent learners in exploring possible answers for their scientific based questions. As with all subject areas, we ensure that there are high expectations for all spoken language in our science lessons. Specialist vocabulary for topics is taught and built up, and effective questioning to communicate ideas is encouraged. Concepts taught should be reinforced by focusing on the key features of scientific enquiry, so that pupils learn to use a variety of approaches to answer relevant scientific questions. We actively encourage children to be respectful when questioning each other on their scientific discoveries.
Science in our school is about developing children’s ideas and ways of working that enable them to make sense of the world in which they live through investigation, as well as using and applying process skills. We facilitate the development of scientific vocabulary through the first-hand experiences that we provide to all of our children.
We believe that children need to develop a secure knowledge-base in science, which follows a clear pathway of progression as they advance through the primary curriculum. Scientific enquiry skills are embedded in each topic the children study and these topics are revisited and developed throughout their time at school. Topics, such as plants, are taught in key stage one and studied again in further detail throughout key stage two. This model allows children to build upon their prior knowledge and increases their enthusiasm for the topics whilst embedding this procedural knowledge into the long-term memory. We believe that this will give our children the tools they need to be successful and to participate fully as a member of society.