Science
Intent Statement
It is our intent at Shaw Cross Infant and Nursery school to offer all of our children an engaging and comprehensive Science curriculum, which aims to build on their natural curiosity and develop their knowledge and understanding of the world around them. In an increasingly scientific world, we appreciate that it has never been more important to equip the children with both the skills and qualities they need to think scientifically. We therefore encourage the children to be inquisitive learners, who question and explore what they observe happening around them and share their own thoughts and opinions about this.
Whilst it is our primary role as teachers to impart knowledge and understanding to the children in our care, we also understand that it is the children’s qualities as learners that will determine the progress that they make across every subject and not purely what they have learned. For this reason, we strive to develop the Characteristics of Effective Learning and Secrets of Success in each of our children. In order to truly succeed and make the scientific breakthroughs that we have seen in recent decades, scientists need to question, make links, try new things, persevere, imagine and work hard. If our children are to become the scientists of the future, we must ensure that they develop such qualities themselves.
Developing ‘Respectful, Resilient and Reflective’ learners is paramount to everything that we do at Shaw Cross. We therefore ensure that throughout all of our teaching, including Science, we are developing these qualities in the children. Our focus on plants and animals, throughout our Science curriculum, develops within the children an appreciation and respect for the natural world, as well as an understanding of the importance of protecting and caring for it. Open ended experiments that create opportunities for the children to think of their own ideas and make predictions based upon their own reasoning, develop the children’s resilience and foster the confidence for them to be wrong. Our cross curricular approach in Science, ensures that that the children become increasingly more reflective, as they make links with both their prior learning and the knowledge and skills that they are acquiring in other areas of the curriculum.
Our school mission is to ‘Work together nurturing and valuing children’ and as practioners, this is something that is always at the forefront of our minds, both when teaching and interacting with the children in our care. We are becoming increasingly more aware as a society of the positive impact that spending time outdoors and around nature has on our wellbeing. We therefore ensure that as much of our Science teaching and exploration as possible takes place outdoors, where the children are able to reap the benefits to their health and wellbeing, as well as to their learning. We are extremely fortunate to have such large, diverse school grounds at Shaw Cross, in which the children can take part in both organised and spontaneous scientific enquiry. The children do not have to look far in order to see different plants and flowers, animal habitats or evidence of the changing seasons and this really inspires their learning. We capitalise on local facilities to develop our scientific work further, such as Fairburn Ings Nature Reserve and the Yorkshire Wildlife Park.
A wide range of research shows that a child’s vocabulary is the best predictor of their future success and that there are particularly strong links between a child’s vocabulary and their literacy skills (an area of development at Shaw Cross). We therefore ensure that during all Science lessons, we strive to develop the children’s scientific vocabulary as well as their knowledge. New scientific language is taught and previously introduced language is built upon, as topics are revisited as the children progress through school.
At Shaw Cross we endeavour to ensure that the Science curriculum we provide will give the children the skills and enthusiasm to further develop their Science knowledge and understanding, as the progress into the next stage of their education.
Science Implement Statement
To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in Science at Shaw Cross, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the school, enabling the children to embed their learning over time. Detailed Science planning ensures that full coverage is given to Understanding the World in the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework (2021) and the National Curriculum programmes of study for Science (2021). Progression maps and topic overviews are used to enhance planning and ensure that all teachers are aware of a year group’s prior knowledge before they plan in more detail. This ensures that the children’s knowledge and understanding is developed and built upon rather than repeated. In Key Stage 1, we use the Pzaz scheme as the main framework for our curriculum, and link this through our cross-curricular approach to our curriculum design.
The progression maps used in Science also include a vocabulary bank, clearly stating what key scientific vocabulary the children should already know on entering a new year group and what vocabulary they need to learn in order to develop a secure understanding of the different scientific concepts they are to learn about that year. In order to develop our children’s speech and language development, some vocabulary is pre-taught, whilst other vocabulary is displayed on visual prompts or class working walls. This vocabulary is then continually revisited and repeated to ensure that it is embedded and that the children are confident using it independently in variety of contexts.
Wherever possible, Science is taught as part of half termly, class topics across school, ensuring that the children develop a broad and deep knowledge and understanding of what they are learning about. This cross-curricular approach also enables the children to make links between what they are learning about in science and their other subjects such as maths, literacy and geography. Science teaching is introduced early on at Shaw Cross, with our youngest children in Nursery being given the opportunity to explore different scientific concepts in the provision as part of their development in the Understand the World area of the Early Years curriculum. This is then built upon in Reception, where the children have a designated Science area where they can begin to create their own experiments using the range of resources available to them. Children are also introduced to some Science teaching, through whole class and small group investigations and experiments on concepts such as floating and sinking and melting and freezing. Developing these scientific foundations in the Early Years then ensures that by the time the children progress into Key Stage One, they are already equipped with a sound basis of scientific vocabulary, key skills and scientific understanding, which they can then build on as they move onto more challenging work in Key stage 1 and beyond.
Science lessons across school are planned to be practical and enquiry based in order to give the children relevance and context for their learning. This approach also enables the children to develop their Working Scientifically skills, encouraging them to think and work like scientists in order to perform tasks such as making careful observations, carrying out simple tests and explaining results.
At Shaw Cross, we encourage the children to extend their scientific knowledge, by taking their learning outside of the classroom and getting their parents and carers involved. Each year, as a whole school, we take part in The Big Garden Birdwatch, where the children use their scientific knowledge to identify different birds, observe how many there are and what they are doing, provide appropriate food for the birds and build them safe and secure homes. Reception also invite parents and carers to join in with their Sustainability Week, where they think of small changes that they can make such as turning off lights or walking to school, in order to help look after the planet. Across school, the children take part in Science focused educational visits at the end of each year, where they are given the opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge they have developed throughout the year to real world contexts, as well as take part in valuable experiences that many of our children would never normally have the opportunity to do.
Science Impact Statement
Our evolving Science curriculum at Shaw Cross provides the children with an exciting, engaging and high quality Science education that builds the foundations for them to become confident and competent scientists, as they progress through school and beyond. The curriculum is carefully planned by our teachers in line with our knowledge and skills progression documents, to ensure that it meets the individual needs of each year group and builds upon prior knowledge.
Teachers at Shaw Cross have high expectations of all children and work closely with them in order to ensure that irrespective of their ability, they reach their full potential and develop the knowledge, skills, characteristics and qualities that will ensure that they become successful lifelong learners.
When our children move on from us, we want to ensure that they are equipped with:
- A broad and deep knowledge and understanding of a range of scientific concepts
- A variety of scientific skills that they can apply to different scenarios that they are faced with
- A rich vocabulary which enables them to articulate their thoughts and ideas
- An understanding of how vital Science is to modern life and the desire to further develop their knowledge and understanding in this area
We closely measure the impact of our Science curriculum by using formative assessment to track the children’s progress across each scientific unit, as they move throughout school. Whilst this assessment ensures that all children develop a broad understanding of the different scientific areas of learning, it also enables us to identify the depth of each child’s understanding, which gives us a clear indication of the level that they are working at and highlights any areas for development. Class discussions, book and work scrutiny and evaluation sheets also help class teachers to determine the children’s understanding whilst lesson observations and learning walks help the Science Coordinator to ensure that high quality Science lessons are taught across school.
Science at Shaw Cross is currently an evolving subject where we are building on existing strengths and enhancing these with wider opportunities to immerse our children in scientific enquiry. Our pupils attain inline with national outcomes and we continue to strive to ensure that our children move on from us as determined, knowledgeable and skilled scientists, that may one day have a real impact on the scientific world!
We ensure all children have access to the content of the EYFS curriculum and the National Curriculum for science.
Click here for the EYFS curriculum.
Click here for the Year 1 curriculum.
Click here for the Year 2 curriculum.