Learning is a change to long-term memory and everything we have stored in our long-term memory is knowledge. 

Our Curriculum

At Fulwood and Cadley Primary School, our curriculum is ambitious, inclusive and carefully designed to ensure that every child has the opportunity to succeed.

Our curriculum is underpinned by the National Curriculum and has been developed specifically for our children and our school community. We aim to provide a broad, balanced and engaging curriculum that develops knowledge, skills, curiosity and a lifelong love of learning.

Learning is carefully sequenced so that children build on what they already know and make meaningful connections within and across subjects. Alongside strong academic foundations, we provide rich experiences through high-quality texts, educational visits, visitors, fieldwork, practical learning and opportunities beyond the classroom.

We want our children to become confident, resilient and increasingly independent learners who are able to think deeply, ask questions, solve problems and make informed choices about their learning.

Our curriculum reflects our school values and our belief that every child should be encouraged to:

“Wish it, Dream it, Do it, Be Unique.”

How Our Curriculum Works

Our curriculum is organised through a carefully planned two-year rolling programme, ensuring full curriculum coverage and clear progression for all pupils, including those taught within mixed-age classes.

Building on Prior Learning

Learning does not begin and end with individual lessons. At the start of each unit, teachers identify and revisit the knowledge and skills children have developed previously. New learning is then carefully built upon these secure foundations.

Throughout a unit, children are encouraged to retrieve previous learning, make connections and use what they already know to help them understand increasingly complex ideas.

Big Questions

Each curriculum unit is driven by a purposeful Big Question. This gives children a clear focus for their learning and encourages them to think deeply about the knowledge and skills they are developing.

Learning builds progressively across the unit towards answering the Big Question. At the end of the unit, children are given opportunities to demonstrate and present their learning in meaningful ways. Wherever appropriate, children are encouraged to make choices about how they communicate their answer, promoting creativity, independence and ownership of their learning.

Curriculum Threads

Important concepts and ideas are revisited throughout our curriculum through carefully identified curriculum threads. These help children make connections between different units, year groups and subjects and develop increasingly sophisticated understanding as they move through school.

Developing Independent Learners

We explicitly teach children how to become independent learners. Rather than immediately relying on an adult when they encounter difficulty, children are encouraged to help themselves first by drawing upon the resources available to them.

These may include their working walls, previous learning, books and classroom resources, iPads and carefully selected curriculum loan boxes from the library.

Teachers model how and when these resources can be used so that children gradually develop the confidence, resilience and independence to make decisions about their own learning.

An Inclusive Curriculum

Our curriculum is ambitious for all pupils. Teachers identify potential barriers to learning and make appropriate adaptations so that every child can access, participate in and succeed within the curriculum.

Support is carefully considered so that children receive what they need while maintaining high expectations and opportunities to develop independence.

Learning Beyond the Classroom

We believe that some of the most memorable learning happens through first-hand experiences.

Educational visits, visitors, fieldwork and enrichment opportunities are therefore carefully planned to complement classroom learning and bring the curriculum to life.

Experiences have been mapped across our two-year curriculum cycle. This includes day visits within Cycle B and opportunities for residential experiences within Cycle A, with our residential programme supported by Fussell Travel.

These opportunities enable children to apply their learning in different contexts, develop confidence and independence, experience new places and build memories that extend beyond the classroom.

Finding Out More

Below you can view our Curriculum Policy and Annual Curriculum Overviews, which provide further information about what children learn throughout the school.

If you would like any further information about our curriculum or would like to know more about what your child is learning, please contact the school.