Computing

At Denaby Main Academy, we believe that every child should have the right to a curriculum that champions excellence; supports pupils to achieve to the very best of their abilities. We understand the immense value technology plays not only in supporting the Computing and whole school curriculum but overall in the day-to-day life of our school.

The intent of our computing curriculum is to help pupils become independent, creative, safe, respectful and problem-solving digital citizens with a broad and transferrable skillset. We aim to make computing fun for pupils, inspiring them to develop skills beyond the classroom and building an awareness of all the opportunities the subject provides.

Our curriculum is designed to meet the expectations of the national curriculum programmes of study for Key Stages 1 and 2; it has been designed to make sure pupils learn computing skills from the three recognised aspects of computing within each year of their primary education. This means that pupils will build upon skills and concepts they established from the previous year and develop them further in the current and subsequent year.

For example, pupils will learn how to program keyboard or touch screen inputs in Year 3 to control a sprite in Scratch, then develop this further into a racing game in Year 4 using conditions and variables. Before introducing random variables in Year 5 to make the game unpredictable.

The three aspects are:

Computer Science – this covers programming (both block-based and text-based), including computational thinking using web-based software such as Scratch. Pupils across Key Stage 1 and 2 will write code to program physical and on-screen objects, interactive games and use text-based language, such as HTML and Python by the end of Key Stage 2.
Information Technology – this covers the use of applications to create digital content, including document creation and editing, video making, digital art, graphic design, animation, 3D modelling and website building.
Digital Literacy – covers skills to find, evaluate, utilise and share using technologies and the Internet. This includes important e-safety and internet research skills, as well as an understanding of computer networks in Key Stage 2.

Our computing lessons are built with step-by-step, easy to follow video tutorials and challenges for both teachers and pupils to access. This has many advantages including:

Pupils develop independent learning skills with opportunities to continually review and revisit the skills covered.
The pupil activity codes help teachers provide pupils with specific activities, meaning pupils can access resources and content suitable for their individual ability and needs.
The pupil activity packs are available across Key Stage 1 and 2. Key Stage 1 pupils learn how to apply the skills they learn in the tutorials to their own work. Key Stage 2 pupils apply and develop the skills they learn in the tutorials into their own projects, improving and evaluating their work.

The Embed stage of units provides pupils with cross-curricular projects, helping apply computing skills across the Key Stage 1 and 2 curriculum.

Each unit includes different resources to capture and track pupil learning:

Downloadable assessment grid for each activity pack to track pupil understanding of each skill.
Printable ‘unplugged’ challenge sheets/cards for pupils to demonstrate their understanding of key vocabulary and the application of skills.

The teacher view of each pack includes advice and tutorials that cover how pupils can save their work or, in some cases, how it can be captured in the software being used