At Simonside Primary School, we understand the importance of technology in a rapidly changing society. Therefore, we aim to develop a curriculum that ensures that pupils become digitally literate and are able to use technology to express themselves and develop their ideas at a suitable level for the future workplace and life in an ever increasing digital world.
It is the aim that all children will be able to leave our school understanding how to analyse and work with programs and algorithms, understand how the internet works and able to judge the reliability of information they find, apply their digital literacy skills to create content across a number of programs and connect the skills they have learnt in computing across other subjects in the curriculum.
Our curriculum
The computing curriculum at Simonside Primary divides learning into key areas where the children learn a range of skills and apply them in new and interesting ways. All of our classes (Reception to Year 6) cover the same units each year, learning and applying new skills and vocabulary from what they have learned the year before.
Computer Science and Coding
Computer Science and Coding is a fundamental element of our curriculum as it develops the children’s understanding of how technology around them works and it’s purpose, as well as how they can begin to make technology work themselves. This begins with the basics of algorithms and simple programming into programmable toys such as VEX 1,2,3 and BeeBots. We develop this understanding through the school with the use of our LEGO ESSENTIALS and SPIKE equipment where the children go on to develop their understanding of STEM by building and programming their own robots using the LEGO. The children develop from basic directional algorithms to using block coding and further onto swift coding and learning skills such as coding variables and programming using sensors.
Media Production and Digital Literacy
All children in our school develop their use of multimedia production each year: from reception learning how to take simple photos to year 6 using a range of filters and editing tools to create their own portfolios of photography. The children work with a range of tools to create and present their work which is taught through computing and then applied across the rest of our curriculum. The children will learn everything from how to change the font and colour of text to creating presentations that use animations, videos, images and other skills.
Internet Safety
At Simonside Primary, we believe that the internet and digital devices have a great part to play in children’s education although we are very aware of the dangers it presents. Through our Computing Curriculum and our PSHE Curriculum we teach the children about the dangers of internet as well as ways in which to keep them safe and ensure that they themselves become responsible users of the internet now and in the future.
