Design Technology

Design and Technology at St Augustine’s Catholic Primary School

Vision:

At St Augustine’s we want our children to love Design and Technology. It is dynamic and multidimensional subject and our D&T curriculums will provide opportunities for children to solve real and relevant problems, allowing them to develop essential everyday skills and unlock their potential to be the designers and innovators of tomorrow.

Intent:

Our D&T curriculums will encourage children to learn, think and intervene creatively to solve problems both as an individual and as part of a team. Design and Technology will allow all St Augustine’s pupils to put their learning from other areas of the curriculum into practice and will work to enhance and deepen their understanding of those areas, including Maths, Computing, Science, and Art.

At St Augustine’s, we acknowledge that Design and Technology is an important part of our broad and balanced curriculum. Design and Technology gives children the opportunity to develop creative and practical skills, knowledge and understanding of designing and making functional products. Children develop skills of curiosity, exploration and discovery.

The intention of the Design and Technology curriculum is for children to build and apply knowledge, understanding and skills in order to design products for a specific purpose. We intend to make products using developed technical and practical skills and develop an understanding of the importance of making on-going changes and improvements during the making stage. Children are encouraged to use problem solving skills to solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts as individuals and part of a team. Children will develop an understanding of critiquing, evaluating and testing ideas and products. It is intended that children will develop crucial life skills within cooking and nutrition. They will understand and apply the principles of nutrition and learn how to prepare and cook basic dishes using a range of techniques. This will promote an enjoyment and passion for healthy cooking which is a crucial life skill that enables pupils to feed themselves and others affordably and well, now and in later life.

DT overview

Implementation:

The teaching and implementation of the Design and Technology Curriculum at St Augustine’s is based on the National Curriculum which provides a well-structured approach to this subject. Teachers will follow the CUSP scheme of work when teaching Design and Technology lessons. Design and Technology skills are built upon each year as children progress through the school.

DT lessons follow our Teaching and Learning model. Every lesson focuses on an element of DT skills. Each lesson, children are encouraged to recall learning from the previous lesson. Teachers explain and model effectively through demonstrating key skills and how to create the finished product.

The CUSP Design and Technology curriculum is organised into blocks with each block covering a particular set of disciplines, including food and nutrition, mechanisms, structures, systems, electrical systems, understanding materials and textiles. Vertical progression in each discipline has been deliberately woven into the fabric of the curriculum so that pupils revisit key disciplines throughout their Primary journey at increasing degrees of challenge and complexity. In addition to the core knowledge required to be successful within each discipline, the curriculum outlines key aspects of development in the Working as a Designer section. Each module will focus on promoting different aspects of these competencies.

Design and technology implementation:

Children will learn about and experience the areas of designing, making, critiquing and applying knowledge.
Lessons will contain elements of procedural, conceptual and fundamental knowledge.
Lessons are sequenced to activate prior learning and develop fluency and automaticity of skills.
DT will be taught discretely and lessons will focus on one of the areas of discipline (eg. structures).
Teachers provide effective modelling to develop and support children’s knowledge.
Key vocabulary is explicitly taught and is modelled by teachers.
Children are taught about great designers and their impact in relation to their learning.
Children engage in discussions and debate centred around design and its quality.
The content of the curriculum is not reduced for SEND pupils apart from in exceptional circumstances. Instead, teachers adapt how it is delivered so that they progress through the curriculum.

Impact:

Pupil’s leave St. Augustine’s with an awareness of designers and how things are made. This equips them to be informed of and contemplate a career in design. They leave school equipped with a range of Design and Technology skills. Pupils will develop key skills to support them through Secondary education and to support them in daily life activities.

The formative assessments of children’s learning in Design and Technology are an ongoing monitoring process of children’s understanding, knowledge and skills. The assessment is used to inform differentiation, support and challenge required by the children. Pupils will be able to: