Curriculum Vision – How should the school’s curriculum look to the school’s pupils?
Teachers have created a curriculum that gives full consideration to the local area and is rooted skilfully in the culture and local area of the valley. One element of this is the way they have succeeded in using the local area as a basis for the learning at the beginning of each theme. The school’s new vision for the curriculum focuses on improving pupils’ skills while taking pride in their local area, heritage and community culture. Teachers focus on the local elements to inform the pupil’s voice and the learning activities. Following research by staff and parents about the local area, classes have been named after local peaks and mountains. A cluster project was undertaken, entitled ‘Cynefin’, and new facts and historical information were discovered about the local area. This reinforces pupils’ self-respect and pride in their local area.
Activities
A collection of themes was formed across the school that began with a local element – be that famous people, a particular landmark or a learning base in the town. An example of this is the Carn Llechart stone circle, which was a starting point to inspire the Celts theme for pupils, which included a walk and activities around the historic site. This ensures that pupils have strong ownership of their curriculum. ‘Cwm Cerddorol’ (Musical Valley), ‘Cariad@Gwm’ (Love of the Valley), ‘Croesi’r Bont’ (Crossing the Bridge) and ‘Trydanu Tawe’ (Electrifying the Swansea Valley) are further examples of themes that blend living elements of the local area into pupils’ activities and experiences. These experiences include an ambitious art project based on local dialect and original poems by the pupils. Visits to the town include workshops in the local arts centre, Riverside Park, Gwrhyd Mountain electricity project and the local Welsh language centre, ‘Tŷ’r Gwrhyd’. The consistency of these weekly visits strengthens pupils’ awareness of their local roots.
Professional learning
The school’s leaders conducted research into the areas of learning experience to implement the vision for ‘Trysorau Tawe’. As a result, training days were held where the vision for each area of learning and experience was presented to all staff, for example by giving each class a unique local name. Some were found by looking at old digital maps, for example Ynys-gelynen, Nant y Gaseg and Mynydd Marchywel.
The school is also part of the ‘Cynefin’ cluster project, which collates themes and online resources across the cluster to enrich the curriculum offer of local schools. The county’s Welsh language officer has also created rich oral programmes (Drilio Disglair, Sgleinio ein Sgwrsio and Blociau Bendigedig), which promote literacy skills through the ‘Trysorau Tawe’ curriculum.
