At St Willibrord’s, we want children to be curious about the world around them and to develop the knowledge, skills and confidence needed to think and work scientifically.
We follow the Kapow Primary Science curriculum from Year 1 to Year 6. The curriculum is designed as a carefully sequenced journey in which pupils revisit important scientific ideas and develop them with increasing depth, precision and independence.
Our Science curriculum develops learning through three interconnected strands:
Scientific knowledge and understanding – developing secure knowledge of scientific concepts and ideas.
Working scientifically – learning how scientists ask questions, investigate, gather evidence, analyse results and draw conclusions.
Science in action – understanding how scientific knowledge is used in everyday life and the wider world.
Across the curriculum, pupils develop both the scientific knowledge they need to understand the world and the disciplinary knowledge they need to investigate it.
Children build their knowledge through seven key areas of Science:
Plants
Animals, including humans
Living things and their habitats
Materials
Energy
Forces, Earth and space
Making connections
Important ideas are revisited across the school so that children can connect new learning to what they already know.
As pupils move through the school, they progress from observing, describing and asking simple questions towards planning increasingly independent investigations, controlling variables, analysing evidence and justifying conclusions using precise scientific vocabulary.
Children begin by observing and describing the world around them.
They learn about everyday materials, the human body and senses, different groups of animals, seasonal change and plants. They develop curiosity by asking simple questions and making careful observations.
Children begin to:
observe closely using their senses and simple equipment;
identify, name, compare and classify;
ask simple scientific questions;
carry out simple tests;
record what they notice;
use simple scientific vocabulary when talking about their learning.
Children develop their understanding of living things, habitats, plants, animals and materials.
They begin to explore relationships between living things and their environments and investigate how materials can be used for different purposes.
Children increasingly:
observe changes over time;
compare different conditions;
group and classify using scientific criteria;
carry out simple comparative tests;
collect and record data;
use their observations to answer questions;
explain what they have found using appropriate scientific vocabulary.
Children begin to explore scientific ideas in greater depth through learning about rocks, light, animals including humans, forces and magnets, and plant reproduction.
Their investigations become more systematic.
Children increasingly:
ask relevant scientific questions;
make predictions based on prior knowledge;
select appropriate equipment;
take measurements using standard units;
carry out comparative and fair tests;
record findings using tables, diagrams and charts;
identify patterns in results;
use evidence to support simple conclusions.
Children deepen their understanding through learning about digestion and food, electricity, states of matter, sound and the classification of living things.
They begin to make more deliberate choices about how scientific questions can be investigated.
Children increasingly:
choose appropriate types of scientific enquiry;
identify what should be measured or observed;
take increasingly accurate measurements;
record and present data in different ways;
identify patterns, similarities and differences;
draw conclusions from their results;
begin to identify possible improvements to investigations;
explain scientific ideas using increasingly precise vocabulary.
Children encounter increasingly complex scientific ideas through Earth and space, forces, materials, life cycles, reproduction and human development.
They develop greater independence in planning and conducting scientific enquiry.
Children increasingly:
plan enquiries to answer scientific questions;
recognise when variables need to be controlled;
select appropriate measuring equipment;
take repeated measurements where appropriate;
record data accurately;
use graphs and other representations to identify patterns;
use evidence to support or challenge scientific ideas;
draw increasingly detailed conclusions;
explain findings using secure scientific reasoning.
Children bring together and extend their scientific learning through evolution and inheritance, electricity, classification, light, circulation and health.
They are expected to work with increasing independence and justify their scientific thinking.
Children increasingly:
select the most appropriate type of enquiry;
identify and control variables;
make accurate and precise measurements;
decide how best to record and present data;
identify relationships and patterns within evidence;
evaluate the reliability of results;
use evidence to justify conclusions;
identify further questions arising from an investigation;
explain scientific ideas using increasingly precise and sophisticated vocabulary.
By the end of Year 6, pupils should be able to draw upon both their scientific knowledge and their understanding of scientific enquiry when approaching unfamiliar questions and problems.
Working scientifically is taught throughout the Science curriculum and is always connected to the scientific knowledge being studied.
Children experience a range of scientific enquiry approaches, including:
observing over time;
identifying, grouping and classifying;
pattern seeking;
comparative and fair testing;
researching using secondary sources;
collecting, presenting and analysing data.
Practical investigation is an important part of Science at St Willibrord’s.
Practical activities are not taught as isolated experiences. They are used to help pupils understand scientific ideas, test predictions, gather evidence and develop increasingly secure scientific reasoning.
As children progress through school, they take greater responsibility for deciding how questions should be investigated and how evidence should be collected, presented and interpreted.
Children are encouraged to see Science as something that affects their everyday lives and the wider world.
Through the curriculum, pupils explore how scientific knowledge is applied to real-life situations and develop an understanding of the contribution scientists make to society.
Where appropriate, children learn about scientists from a diverse range of backgrounds and consider how scientific discoveries and developments have influenced the world around them.
Scientific vocabulary is taught explicitly within every unit.
Children are expected to hear, understand and increasingly use precise scientific language when discussing and recording their learning.
Teachers revisit vocabulary from previous learning and give pupils regular opportunities to use key terms when:
asking and answering questions;
describing observations;
making predictions;
explaining scientific ideas;
discussing results;
drawing conclusions.
This helps pupils move from everyday language towards increasingly accurate scientific explanation.
Our curriculum is designed so that pupils regularly return to important scientific ideas.
Teachers provide opportunities for children to retrieve knowledge from previous lessons, units and year groups and use this knowledge to understand new learning.
Kapow's Making Connections units provide opportunities for pupils to bring together knowledge and working-scientifically skills from across the year.
Through retrieval and repeated application, pupils become increasingly able to explain how different scientific ideas connect.
Science begins in the Early Years through Understanding the World.
Children are encouraged to be curious about the world around them through exploration, observation, discussion and first-hand experience.
Our indoor and outdoor provision gives children opportunities to explore:
plants and growth;
animals and living things;
different materials;
weather and seasonal change;
the natural environment.
Adults encourage children to notice, question, compare, predict and explain what they observe.
Children also begin to develop important scientific vocabulary and learn to communicate their ideas.
These experiences provide the foundations for the Science curriculum in Key Stage 1.
Our Science curriculum is ambitious for all pupils.
All children are supported to study the same important scientific ideas, with teaching adapted where necessary to remove barriers to learning.
Support may include:
explicit teaching and revisiting of vocabulary;
visual prompts and dual coding;
practical resources and models;
carefully structured questions;
sentence stems and scaffolds;
oral explanation;
reduced recording demands where appropriate;
alternative ways for pupils to demonstrate scientific understanding;
additional opportunities to revisit prior learning.
Adaptation is designed to support access to the intended curriculum rather than reduce its ambition.
Pupils who demonstrate secure understanding are challenged through increasingly sophisticated reasoning, independent enquiry and application rather than simply being moved onto content from a later year group.
Assessment is part of everyday Science teaching.
Teachers use a range of evidence to identify what pupils know, understand and can do. This may include:
questioning and discussion;
practical investigation;
pupil explanations;
written work;
observations;
quizzes;
beginning and end-of-unit assessment activities;
pupil voice.
Assessment is used to identify misconceptions, adapt subsequent teaching and determine whether pupils can recall and apply important scientific knowledge.
Teachers consider whether pupils can:
remember important scientific concepts;
use scientific vocabulary accurately;
explain rather than simply describe;
apply knowledge in a different context;
use appropriate working-scientifically skills;
interpret evidence and draw conclusions.
Assessment information is reviewed through the school's wider monitoring and assessment processes.
Our long-term curriculum plans show the Science units taught in each year group and how learning is sequenced across the school.