Our Curriculum

Holly ParkAt Holly Park we follow the National Curriculum. This curriculum focuses on essential core subject knowledge and skills.

The National Curriculum is only a part of a school’s overall curriculum.

Here is the Whole School Curriculum Map 2024-25 This outlines what will be taught in each subject across the year.

Termly curriculum newsletters can be found on the Year Group pages.​

Early Years Foundation Stage

At Holly Park we have outstanding provision in the Early Years and Foundation stage. Our Nursery and Reception classes are bright and lively environments where children make excellent progress in their learning through a balance of self initiated play and adult led activities. Children have free-flow access to both indoor and outdoor provision.

The KS1 and 2 Curriculum

In Years 1 and 2 we continue the implementation of an ‘integrated day’, which aids transition from the Early Years and feeds into the cross curricular approach we take when implementing the National Curriculum.

At Holly Park we are constantly developing our provision to meet the needs of our pupils. Children here experience a fun and innovative curriculum where areas of learning are taught via different ‘topics’. Teachers creatively link subjects together to build exciting units of work and plan activities to challenge and motivate their pupils whilst following a progression of skill.

A full broad and balanced curriculum is on offer here. We ensure that statutory curriculum requirements are adhered to, but each teacher has the freedom to take their own approach as to how best to deliver their lessons, ensuring optimum learning and progress for their cohort of pupils. This means the school is constantly buzzing with fresh ideas and enthusiasm as the excellent team of teaching staff work effectively together, while pupils proactively engage with their learning.

Pupils are encouraged to develop the Holly Park Learning Skills as they progress through the school.

The 6 Learning Skills are: Commitment, Creativity, Self Management, Reflection, Enquiry and Team work. You can find out more about them here.

We also Promote British Values at Holly Park

We also promote a wider curriculum which includes The World of Work, First Aid, Rights Respecting schools, Forest Schools and SMSC . These are promoted throughout our curriculum in lessons, in competitions, fund raising, assemblies, concerts, shows, trips and visits, visitors to the school etc

Our Holly Park Curriculum Intent:

  • Teaches the essential skills of English and Mathematics across the curriculum.
  • Is based on both Knowledge and Skills
  • Recognises the varied starting points and backgrounds of our pupils
  • Is inclusive of all of our pupils
  • Is unique to our school and our pupils

In summary our Curriculum Intent is based upon four main principles:

Creativity:

  • Is inclusive, exciting and engaging.
  • Stimulates creative thinking and problem solving.
  • Nurtures and celebrates children’s individual talents across a variety of subjects.
  • Promotes Cultural Capital
  • Uses an imaginative, fun and creative approach
  • Fosters a love of learning
  • Encourages practical and real life experiences
  • Links to the work and skills of famous people as positive role models

Ambition:

  • Teaches the essential skills of English and Mathematics across the curriculum.
  • Develops effective communication skills
  • Supports the vast majority of children to reach the expected end points of each phase
  • Is broad and balanced.
  • Teaches resilience and the ability to persevere.
  • Is well sequenced, progressive and memorable.
  • Prepares children for the next stage of their education.
  • Encourages children to have pride in their learning
  • Uses technologies effectively and purposefully

Curiosity:

  • Reflects our diverse community.
  • Promotes all forms of equality and fosters greater understanding of and respect for people of all faiths and those of no faith, races, genders, ages, disability and sexual orientations
  • Fosters enthusiasm and a love of learning.
  • Prompts children to ask questions and find out more
  • Makes links between different subjects and prior learning
  • Encourages children to make links and connections to help make sense of the world

Health:

  • Supports British Values and our school values.
  • Encourages a mentally and physically healthy lifestyle.
  • Nurtures and supports social and emotional development.
  • Encourages collaboration with others
  • Prepares children for life in modern Britain
  • Keeps pupils safe from the dangers of abuse, sexual exploitation, radicalisation and extremism.
  • Supports children to have high standards of behaviour and respect for themselves and their community
  • Ensures that the Rights of the Child are respected

Our curriculum intent at a glance: Our Curriculum Intent Evidenced

In more detail:

Our staff understand that our children come from a variety of backgrounds. They are aware that many of our pupils have English as an additional language, that we have children from a variety of ethnic minority backgrounds and various religions and that the percentage of children from disadvantaged backgrounds and with SEND is in line with national. We recognise that our mobility is increasing and that our children come from our close locality, which includes children from very varied socio economic backgrounds, however many are from low socio economic backgrounds. Lots of our children have no access to outside space in their home environments.

The Cultural Capital of many of our pupils is very low.  Increasing numbers of our pupils and their parents have emotional and social difficulties. Many of our children have little home support or resources to support their learning. With these facts in mind, our teachers recognise that our curriculum therefore needs to embrace varying viewpoints and beliefs, encourage debate and discussion, be based on the global dimension, give children a good basic skill set and equip them for life and learning beyond Holly Park. With this in mind, we encourage our own Holly Park skills (and Enabling Enterprise Skills) of – Creativity, Team work, Self-Management, Enquiry, Commitment, Reflection, Problem Solving, Leadership, Aiming High, Staying Positive and Listening Carefully.  We feel these are important skills, as we want to teach our children ‘HOW’ to learn.

Many of our children enter our school in nursery with little prior knowledge of English (verbal and fine motor skills) They have limited life experiences outside of the home. Many have little experience of interacting with others. Annually we have several children who clearly have SEND but these have not been recognised.  Children who join us as in year admissions generally come with no English, behaviour issues, SEND or have been out of the education system for a significant amount of time. As a result, our children need to be challenged in their schooling; learning from failures and celebrating successes.

At Holly Park, we have designed our curriculum with pupils’ learning at the centre. We recognise that a curriculum has to be broad, balanced and offer pupils opportunities to grow and make progress as individuals as well as learners from whatever their starting points may be. We intend to offer our pupils new and exciting experiences through extra-curricular activities and enrichment activities that are designed to build resilience, confidence and self-esteem. 

Our curriculum is intended to be cross curricular with in depth learning opportunities so that our children can make links and transfer knowledge between subjects. We intend for our curriculum to be empowering, enabling pupils to develop their interpersonal skills, creativity and independence. Holly Park provides a rich ambitious learning environment, both inside and outside the classroom, which is conducive to high quality teaching and learning and builds a rich cultural capital for all learners. It is our school’s policy to maximise the potential of all pupils, including identifiable cohorts of pupils such as: disadvantaged, English as an Additional Language, summer born, SEND pupils and academically more able pupils, including those who are gifted and talented.  We aim to accelerate the learning progress of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable pupils in order to diminish the difference in progress and attainment between them and their peers. The curriculum also makes provision to enable pupils to work at greater depth within age related expectations. This is supported at all levels in the school.

We want our children to achieve well in the next stage of their life. Our curriculum is designed to prepare children for opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of future life, and we strive to do so by offering a broad and balanced curriculum from the children’s first days in the Nursery through to the end of Year 6. In addition, we actively promote British values to ensure pupils are well prepared for life in modern Britain. Through a combination of learning techniques, we aim to ensure pupils enjoy learning and feel prepared for life after school. We want all children to achieve their very best and to become successful adults. Enabling Enterprise offers skills that will be needed in the work place and offers children the chance to consider  broader issues such as Democracy, the environment and profit and loss. Disadvantaged children are given opportunity to experience this at a deeper level with trips to the work place. We intend to offer careers fairs to our upper juniors.

The end point of the pupil journey at Holly Park needs to ensure that children can see links and make connections in learning and have real life reasons for learning. We hope that pupils will be motivated by achievement both at the end of their time at the school and in the future so that they will have a positive attitude towards themselves, others and their environment. We aim to develop resilience in our pupils, so they are willing to take risks in their future learning, accepting that making mistakes is an important part of the learning process.  By the end of their time at Holly Park we want pupils to have gained good basic skills, have a strong moral, cultural, emotional, spiritual and social purpose, develop healthy minds and healthy bodies and be rounded individuals who believe in their own potential.  We want our Holly Parkers to have high standards of behaviour and tolerance by developing respect and responsibility for themselves and others, take an active part in their community and have a desire to go on learning throughout life. We hope they will have self-esteem, self-confidence, self-discipline and will be responsible.

Our curriculum promotes enjoyment of learning through debate, creativity, purpose and relevance.  Discussion, communication skills and vocabulary are very important and are planned for within our curriculum so that children can achieve well. Through our school’s curriculum, we seek to promote the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school.  The Creative Curriculum at Holly Park has been developed to engage children fully in their own learning by adopting an imaginative, practical and cross-curricular approach, as we believe this results in the optimum learning outcomes.

We aim to have a curriculum, which is broad and balanced and provides a wide range of opportunities for pupils to learn. The range of subjects helps pupils acquire knowledge, understanding and skills in all aspects of their education, including linguistic, mathematical, scientific, technical, human and social, physical and artistic learning. The curriculum provides continuity and progression and creates a culture of high expectations, with challenge. We supplement the formal curriculum with extra-curricular opportunities for pupils to extend their knowledge and understanding and to improve their skills in a range of artistic, creative and sporting activities.

The curriculum promotes all forms of equality and fosters greater understanding of and respect for people of all faiths and those of no faith, races, genders, ages, disability and sexual orientations, It keeps pupils safe from the dangers of abuse, sexual exploitation, radicalisation and extremism. It contributes to pupils’ behaviour and welfare, including their physical, mental and personal well-being, safety and spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. 

The curriculum recognises the crucial role that parents play in their child’s education. 

The curriculum works in tandem with the Holly Park values.  It provides skills-based as well as knowledge-based learning and ensures continuity and progression within the school and between phases of education.  We want our pupils to learn more than mere facts and content, we want them to acquire the skills to be good learners (our Holly Park learning Skills and our Enabling Enterprise Skills) Our curriculum encourages a respect for the school and its environment so that learning is a positive and pleasurable experience for all.

Our curriculum is stimulating and exciting

Through our stimulating and exciting curriculum, we develop a love for learning. Our planning is informed by what our children already know and want to know Curriculum days and special weeks provide a fun way to immerse the children into the theme.

Our curriculum is broad and balanced

Across the school, we teach a wide range of subjects which allow the children to develop their knowledge and interests in different areas of the curriculum. In order to allow deeper learning across subjects and progression of key skills throughout each year group. Where appropriate, we make cross curricular links between different subject areas, while also teaching more discretely where necessary.

Our curriculum is well sequenced, progressive and memorable

The skills that we teach are progressive and grow over time. We ensure that we build on the previous learning to sequence our planning and teaching of each curriculum subject. We provide our children with memorable experiences in order to secure long term memory.

Our curriculum involves everyone

We are proud of the inclusive nature of our curriculum and cater to the needs of all of our children.  As a school, our sense of our rich and diverse community is strong and is included within our curriculum.​

Our staff understand that our children come from a variety of backgrounds. They are aware that many of our pupils have English as an additional language, that we have children from a variety of ethnic minority backgrounds and various religions and that the percentage of children from disadvantaged backgrounds and with SEND is in line with national.

We recognise that our mobility is increasing and that our children come from our close locality, which includes children from very varied socio economic backgrounds, however many are from low socio economic backgrounds. Lots of our children have no access to outside space in their home environments. The Cultural Capital of many of our pupils is very low.  Increasing numbers of our pupils and their parents have emotional and social difficulties.

Many of our children have little home support or resources to support their learning. With these facts in mind, our teachers recognise that our curriculum therefore needs to embrace varying viewpoints and beliefs, encourage debate and discussion, be based on the global dimension, give children a good basic skill set and equip them for life and learning beyond Holly Park.

With this in mind, we encourage our own Holly Park skills (and Enabling Enterprise Skills) of – Creativity, Team work, Self-Management, Enquiry, Commitment, Reflection, Problem Solving, Leadership, Aiming High, Staying Positive and Listening Carefully.  We feel these are important skills, as we want to teach our children ‘HOW’ to learn.

We aim to have a curriculum, which is broad and balanced.

We want children to:

  • Gain good basic skills – can solve problems, challenge themselves and reflect on their learning
  • Have a strong moral, cultural, emotional, spiritual and social purpose
  • Develop healthy minds and healthy bodies and know how to stay safe
  • Are rounded individuals who believe in their own potential and have resilience to persevere and communicate effectively
  • Will be good citizens of the future who understand the principles of British Values.
  • Have high standards of behaviour and tolerance by developing respect and responsibility for themselves and their community
  • Take an active part in the life and work of the school and have a desire to go on learning throughout life
  • Have high self esteem, self confidence, self discipline and take responsibility
  • Are excited by their learning, ask questions, are curious and take pride in their learning

We aspire to have a curriculum that:

  • Is broad and balanced and provides a wide range of opportunities for pupils to learn. The range of subjects helps pupils acquire knowledge, understanding and skills in all aspects of their education, including linguistic, mathematical, scientific, technical, human and social, physical and artistic learning.
  • Provides continuity and progression
  • Creates a culture of high expectations and encourages individual talents
  • Ensures breadth and balance and challenge and problem solving
  • Creates cultural capital with extra-curricular opportunities for pupils to extend their knowledge and understanding and to improve their skills in a range of artistic, creative and sporting activities
  • Prepares pupils positively for life in modern Britain and promotes the fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect for and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs and for those without faith
  • Promotes all forms of equality and fosters greater understanding of and respect for people of all faiths and those of no faith, races, genders, ages, disability and sexual orientations
  • Keeps pupils safe from the dangers of abuse, sexual exploitation, radicalisation and extremism.
  • Contributes to pupils’ behaviour and welfare, including their physical, mental and personal well-being, safety and spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.
  • Fosters a love of learning in pupils who are resilient to failure.
  • Encourages pupils to be curious, interested learners who seek out and use new information to develop, consolidate and deepen their knowledge, understanding and skills.
  • Takes account of individual differences and need
  • Provides  a positive and stimulating learning environment that is stimulating and engaging and as practical as possible making links with other subjects
  • Recognises the crucial role that parents play in their child’s education
  • Works in tandem with the Holly Park values.
  • Empowers learners to develop their own questions and lines of enquiry and encourages communication skills
  • Provides skills-based as well as knowledge-based learning
  • Sets up imaginative learning opportunities that encourage learners to experience life beyond the classroom
  • Promotes partnership between pupil, parent/carer, teacher and community
  • Ensures continuity and progression within the school and between phases of education
  • Fosters teaching styles which will offer and encourage a variety of relevant learning opportunities
  • Accelerates the learning progress of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable pupils in order to diminish the difference in progress and attainment between them and their peers
  • Makes provision to enable pupils to work at greater depth within age related expectations
  • Encourages a respect for the school and its environment so that learning is a positive and pleasurable experience for all

Our curriculum is structured so that skills and knowledge build from phase to phase and is carefully planned for. 

We consider carefully the transition from one phase to another. There is a good breadth and coverage to our curriculum, which is supported by enrichment days and weeks and extra-curricular activities. We want to make learning fun, practical and exciting to ensure that it is embedded in the long-term memory. There is a spiral curriculum so that topics and concepts are repeated but find out first about prior knowledge and moves on from this point to extend learning. This also helps to commit learning to memory.