Digitally literate children are empowered and inspired to embark on learning experiences that are underpinned with the knowledge and understanding that equips them to excel in the digital world.
They combine computational thinking and creativity to elegantly express themselves through their use of technology.
Computer Science is the core of our Computing curriculum, which has been spirally designed. This enables children to learn, revisit and deepen their knowledge and understanding of both computational thinking and programming concepts.
We structure progression within our curriculum into 4 strands: Computer Science, Information Systems, Digital Literacy and Online Safety.
Our younger children begin their understanding of Computer Science with digital and non-digital algorithms, before using their growing knowledge to program physical devices.
Our KS2 children are introduced to a full range of computational thinking and programming structures from the earliest possible opportunity. They spirally revisit concepts each unit and transfer their deepening knowledge across a range of contexts.
Our children learn how computers, software and the internet work.
They are able to solve real-world problems using their knowledge and understanding of information technology.
Our children create, use and combine digital content from a range of applications. They collect, analyse and present data and are able to use search technologies effectively.
Our children learn how to use technology safely, respectfully and responsibly.
In particular, they learn to recognise the opportunities the internet brings and the potential associated dangers.
Our children learn how to be discerning when evaluating digital content and how to report any concerns they have.
Our curriculum is designed so children progressively develop their cognitive processing of computational thinking concepts.
The key to enabling children to become proficiant computational thinkers is developing their logical reasoning.
Our children develop their algorithmic thinking, use of abstraction to remove unnecessary detail, make generalisations, decompose problems into smaller components and evaluate.
Debugging is a vital element that runs throughout computational thinking and specifically, programming.
As with computational thinking concepts, our curriculum is designed to progressively build our children's understanding of how to debug effectively.
Our children learn to use their logical reasoning to assist them in debugging their thinking and coding.
Our Computing curriculum dovetails with our PSHE curriculum to ensure a clear progression of knowledge and understanding within this vital strand of the curriculum.
With County Council approved internet service provision and filtering, our children are given a supportive environment to learn how to use the internet responsibly. We recognise this is a learning process for children and believe school is well placed to support children in making good choices to keep themselves and others safe online.
By the time children leave Year 6, they will have learnt to be respectful and responsible online citizens whilst having a critical eye when viewing internet content.
When programming, our children will have a deep understanding of the core concepts of Computer Science, having spirally visited them throughout KS2. These concepts are both practical (debugging, variables, functions & procedures, etc) and abstract (decomposition, abstraction, etc). They will be able to utilise computational thinking to write and debug programs, creating solutions to problems.
Children will be creators of content rather than simply consumers, whether this be their own website, creating spreadsheet simulations or combining assets in a presentation.
Our children’s enthusiasm, coupled with their resilience means they will have the foundations with which to confidently advance their computing learning in KS3.
Specifically for the Computer Science strand of the curriculum, knowledge organisers have been created to both support retrieval and also act as an aid memoire for children.
Below are example documents and support from our Computing curriculum intent. We prioritise Online Safety and Computer Science.
Underpinning our Computing curriculum are detailed progressions for Online Safety, Computer Science, Information Technology and Digital Literacy.
Our Big Ideas for Computing focus solely on Computer Science. Our Outcomes outline what children should be able to do by the end of each phase. In Computer Science, they permeate the detailed plans created to support teachers delivering an ambitious core of the Computing curriculum.
Online Safety Units start each year. Teachers then use their professional judgement to revisit elements during the rest of the year. Each year group has presentations that cover all elements in our Online Safety progression.
Each Computer Science unit of the curriculum has detailed planning to suport teachers. Information Technology and Digital Literacy specify objectives for each unit with Information Technology units also including flow spray diagrams to direct teachers.
