Teaching and Learning - Our philosophy

At Sharp Lane Primary School, we believe all our pupils can achieve their very best. We aim to capture and nurture the imagination of young minds! Lessons are stimulating and pacy and pupils are active in making decisions about how and what they are learning.

Lessons and the curriculum are designed to expect pupils to secure their year group’s learning and to have plenty of opportunities to deepen and stretch that learning. We plan so our pupils can make meaningful and exciting connections between their experiences and a growing understanding of the world we live in. We build upon what we believe is a natural curiosity to question, explore and make sense of the world and each other. 

At Sharp Lane Primary School, we believe that the best learning takes place when:

• Pupils are empowered to develop skills of autonomy and independence. We consistently develop,from a very young age, their skills, attitudes and habits as effective learners. Our pupils are taught to understand how they are learning and we have embedded our own pupil friendly approach to securing skills and how to then deepen this learning through practice and application.

• Pupils learn best when learning is purposeful and task based and reflects the principles of creativity (invention, imagination and communication). Our activities foster curiosity and enthusiasm for learning. We ensure that all our learning offers opportunities for collaboration.

• Pupils are carefully and appropriately challenged. Our pupils want to be challenged and our staff ensure they always are.

• Pupils learn best when teaching reflects four key aspects of highly effective learning – Feedback, Autonomy, Challenge and Engagement.
• Pupils learn best when assessment feeds back into teaching. This principle is within each and every lesson, across sequences of lessons and across each yearly programme of study. There is provision for support, repetition and extension of learning for each child, at each starting point of learning.
• Pupils learn best when the learning environment is ordered, the atmosphere is purposeful and children feel safe and emotionally ready for learning.

• Pupils learn best when there is a strong link between home and school where pupils’ Home Learning activities are purposeful, effective and contribute to their progress.

A mastery curriculum

At Sharp Lane, we approach all learning with the belief that ALL pupils can understand a particular concept or skill or achieve an expected standard. Some pupils are capable of going beyond. Our curriculum is designed to ensure that no pupils are left unchallenged. All pupils are taught the objectives for the National Curriculum for each subject for their particular year group. Lessons ensure that all pupils secure, or master, these objectives so that they are:

• consistent
• fluent
• flexible (seen and used in different contexts, different representations)
• committed to the long term memory (as a result of practice and use)
• secure so the learner can reason with it and apply it to solve problems

Pupils spend time becoming true masters of content and applying and being creative with new knowledge and skills in multiple ways. Learning is taken at a steadier and deeper pace, ensuring that no child is left behind, as well as providing deeper and richer experiences for children who are very capable of deepening their learning even more and achieving higher than the national expectation for their age group.

We do this by making sure that:

• Teachers plan lessons and weekly sequences to develop detail and depth.
• Lessons have excellent pupil support through feedback and speedy interventions to make sure that all pupils are keeping up on a daily basis.
• That all lessons allow pupils to make decisions about their learning and have opportunities to be extended and challenged further and more deeply.
• That pupils have the space and time to understand, practice, apply and experience their learning.
• That all learning opportunities ask all pupils to be active, collaborative and cognitive.
• All pupils are entitled to additional support to ensure that they do not fall behind or if they are capable of going deeper.
• Learning has resources that support all children to make progress from initial understanding through to deeper learning and application- both within school and at home.