Intent

Technology is becoming an everyday part of life. At Mickley Village Primary School, we hope to prepare our children for a future in an environment which is shaped by technology. Therefore, we want to model and educate our children on how to use technology positively, responsibly and safely.  We aim to encourage our pupils to be creators not consumers and our curriculum encompassing computer science, information technology and digital literacy reflects this. We want our pupils to understand that with technology comes choices, as a school we want to model and support these positive choices and highlight the risks that may possibly come by making incorrect ones. We want children to become fluent with a range of tools to best express their understanding. We want children to feel comfortable and confident with using and exploring these tools independently by the time they reach Upper Key Stage 2.

Implementation

At Mickley Village Primary School, our scheme of work for computing is the ‘Teach Computing’ which covers all aspects of the National Curriculum. This scheme was chosen as it has been created by subject experts and based on the latest pedagogical research. It provides an innovative progression framework where computing content (concepts, knowledge, skills and objectives) has been organized into interconnected networks called learning graphs.

A key part of the computing curriculum is ensuring that children are accessing technology safely and responsibly. Children have a right to enjoy childhood online, to access safe online spaces and to benefit from all the opportunities that a connected world can bring them, appropriate to their age and stage.

Computing is taught every week, either as a stand-alone lesson or embedded into the wider curriculum. This is dependent on the area of focus for that specific half term.

Children have access to a range of hardware: laptops, tablets, programmable equipment (e.g Beebots) and software that they need to develop knowledge and skills of digit systems and the applications.

Impact

We encourage our children to enjoy and value the curriculum we deliver. We want children to discuss, reflect and appreciate the impact computing has on their learning, development and well-being. Much of the subject-specific knowledge developed from our computing curriculum equip pupils with experiences which will benefit them in secondary school, further education and future workplaces. We want children to be confident using technology, but also recognise the impact and implications it can have if used inappropriately.