Design and Technology (DT) at Eastway
DT Intent
At Eastway, we aim for our DT curriculum to be:
- Well Designed and Delivered, fulfilling the requirements of the National Curriculum. We lay the foundations needed for successful learning through the robust delivery of our Easter Matters Early Years Curriculum which is tailored to pupil's needs
- Knowledge-Rich so that children build deep knowledge in DT that they return to and build upon as they move through school
- Closing the Gap: we carefully check children have the prior learning they need to be successful in a lesson and take action to support them fill any gaps they may have. We also check how well they are acquiring new knowledge in the lesson to adapt the lesson to their needs and provide additional support or challenge for children who need so that all children achieve our ambitious learning focus.
- Bring Learning to Life as children have real-life experiences of DT in their world
- Develop children as active, independent learners who are Ready, Respectful, Responsible
- Love learning about DT!
DT Implementation at Eastway
To achieve these aims, we have carefully mapped out exactly what children learn in each year group, the summary of this is shown below:
More importantly, we have mapped out exactly what knowledge will be covered in each year group so that children can recall what they have already learned and build upon it. This helps your child change their long term memory of key ideas in DT as ideas are regularly returned to and deepened.
Our progression of knowledge maps children's learning all the way from EYFS to KS3 so that we can be confident we are preparing your child well for the knowledge they will need when they go to secondary school
In each unit of work, children work through the following process:
- Exploring - explore skills and techniques. Introduce ‘product’ project.
- Designing – pupils record what they want their product to look like, what they will need, how they will create it
- Making – pupils are provided with resources required to make their design
- Evaluating – pupils will evaluate what went well and what didn’t’ they will reflect on what they liked and didn’t like. In key stage 1 they will evaluate against their brief and gather feedback from peers also.
In our DT lessons at Eastway, you will see:
- Children learning new skills, with adults modelling how to use equipment safely is essential
- Children being taught technical vocabulary to use when talking or writing about the DT product
- Children making choices and creating pieces with individuality and originality. Children may use examples to develop their own ideas, but are not limited to copying
- Children given time to explore and experiment with ideas and techniques without the pressure of having to create a specific, ‘finished’ piece.
- Children encouraged to work with increasing accuracy when measuring and working with tools
DT Impact
To check your child has learned what we have intended them to, we set short tasks within lessons to see how much your child has understood and adapt our lessons from their to meet their needs. We use knowledge checkers with key facts for each lesson to help focus children's minds on the important parts of the lesson and to assess whether they have understood these.
To get a picture of what your child is retaining over time, we use the prior learning checks at the beginning of each lesson, complete quizzes at the end of each week, look at the work they have completed in their books and complete end of unit impact summaries. These reviews of learning are completed by their class teacher, our DT lead and our SLT
We will let you know how your child is getting on in DT in their end of year report and will give you opportunities to see their work in booklets and the products they have made throughout the year. If you would like any further information, please contact your child's class teacher or contact the school office.
