Intent

At St Mark’s, we aim to instil in pupils a curiosity and fascination about history that will remain with them for the rest of their lives. Design and Technology develop children’s skills and knowledge in design, mechanisms and a range of materials, including food. It encourages children to think creatively and collaboratively, thus allowing them to work together and build on their ideas and make connections with several concepts. 

The children at St Mark’s will be taught Design and Technology in a way that ensures the progression of skills and follows a sequence to build on prior learning. Through teaching D&T it offers pupils with creative-thinking, decision-making skills and problem-solving that are necessary for other areas of the curriculum.

Implementation

We follow the National Curriculum in England 2014 framework for Design and Technology as the foundation for curriculum planning. We build on children’s prior learning and follow a Design and Technology skills for progression map which covers the skills and concepts the teachers should follow whilst teaching Design and Technology in their classroom.

At St Mark’s, we make Design and Technology an enjoyable learning experience. All year groups will have a Design and Technology lesson which corresponds to the year group's theme. The pupils at St Mark’s carry out design and technology projects throughout the academic year and will have to think, decide and plan, as well as make and create. For children, having to think about the purposes and users for their products, enables them to create quality products which have purpose and meaning.

Impact

The impact of using the resources and variety of materials in Design and Technology lessons and across the school will allow pupils to have a deeper understanding of the world and the purpose of the objects around them. Whilst D&T lessons are being taught the use of technical vocabulary will be implemented, which will be used by all learners. Whole-school and parental engagement will be improved through the use of Design and Technology-specific home learning tasks.

St Mark’s wants to ensure that D&T is enjoyed by pupils and teachers, encouraging engagement with learning which will continue to build skills and understanding into the future.

In terms of teacher assessment, the impact on learning can be measured through key questioning built into lessons, peer assessment, self-assessment and summative assessments which are aimed at the next steps in learning.