Curriculum overview

Our curriculum empowers young people to make their contribution to the world, and enables them to make meaningful choices based on a strong portfolio of experiences and qualifications. We promote resilience in learning and character in order to create a community of successful, fulfilled and happy young adults.
 
Principles
 
The curriculum at WA is unashamedly inclusive and rigorous. We believe all young people have the right to a curriculum in which their entitlement today enables choices for tomorrow. The curriculum is structured and sequenced to ensure all young people make strong progress over their 5-7 years with us. We want every learner to leave us with a portfolio of qualifications that opens the door to university, their chosen apprenticeship or career.

We believe that a high level of literacy is key to unlocking student potential. We support this through our teaching practice across the curriculum and through a whole-school reading programme during tutor time. We also give additional English time to students who are not yet reading at their chronological age, so that they can quickly master this essential life skill and access the full curriculum.
 
We have dedicated CARES time, enrichment time and Community Days for our students to focus on emotional growth, developing cultural capital and defining their aspirations. This is supplemented throughout the year with visits, outside speakers and opportunities to learn in different ways.

Our curriculum has been designed with the following principles in mind:

• Content is rich, relevant and reflective of the diverse world we live in
• Learning is sequenced to enable young people to incrementally build knowledge and skills
• Literacy is explicitly delivered across the curriculum
• Learning is adapted to the specific needs of each individual
• A sustainable approach is supported through the curriculum
• Resilience is promoted for students by frequent (low stakes) assessment

In classrooms, this may look like:

• Carefully planned schemes of learning, developed by experts and tailored by teachers to meet the needs of their students
• 'DO NOW' tasks to help students recall prior learning
• Shared literacy and reading strategies, such as Inside Outside Beyond and whole class reading work
• Targeted support for students with additional needs, including additional adults, seating arrangements, and tailored learning strategies and resources
• Teaching that constantly responds to student understanding

In work produced, this may look like:

• Regular feedback addressing knowledge or skills gaps
• Opportunities for conscious practice by students
• Opportunities for self and peer assessment
• Opportunities to engage with exam-style content
• Home learning that promotes digital literacy in line with school strategy

For students, this experience may include:

• Consistent interactions with teachers who know them, and a consistent learning journey each year
• Regular feedback on progress (parents’ evenings, progress reports, assessment feedback, in-class feedback, marking)
• A clear sense of how curriculum content connects to different career options – how can you pursue this field of study? What might it lead you to?

Assessment at Walworth Academy is guided by two core principles:

• Assessment is key to progress.
• Effective assessment is regular, robust, recorded, responded to and used to close gaps in understanding

We use many forms of assessment at our academy:

• Each lesson: Teachers conduct frequent informal assessments to check for understanding. They also carry out live marking whilst young people complete work independently.
• Each week: Teachers hold quizzes on Showmyhomework to check and consolidate learning from that week.
• Every three weeks: Students complete assessments online using Showmyhomework to check learning from the previous 3 weeks.
• Each term: Students complete a more formal assessment to assess all learning up until that point.
• End of year: Students demonstrate their learning from the whole academic year in end-of-year assessments, sat in exam conditions. Families receive a graded report of these assessments.

Teachers use all these assessments to identify the most common gaps in learning and address them in their teaching, ensuring all students make rapid progress and no individual gets left behind.

Mock Examinations take place twice per year for year 11 and 13 as preparation for their upcoming formal exams. These examinations accurately reflect the conditions and content of full external examinations.