The curriculum delivered to our children at Shakespeare is centered on our top three priorities as a school. Our top three priorities are known as I.C.E.

Top Three Priorities (I.C.E)

Improving

Improving standards for all children. 

Closing

Closing gaps in attainment for all children, regardless of their background or staring points.  

Embedding

Embedding knowledge and developing skills in all curriculum areas for all children. 

For each subject we follow different programmes/schemes of learning which match or exceed the ambition of the National Curriculum. These programmes/schemes are then adapted or enhanced to meet our local context of our school community. 

The curriculum vehicle we follow for each subject taught in our school is listed below...

For further information about the curriculum for each subject, please click on the tabs on this page.

The United Learning Curriculum is the vehicle in which we teach the knowledge and skills in the majority of our wider curriculum subject areas. This curriculum is adapted to meet the needs of 'Shakespeare learners'. Teachers take the responsibility of driving the curriculum at Shakespeare to ensure that the specific needs of our learners are met. 

Why did we choose United Learning?

For a number of years, we followed a curriculum that was created and crafted by our teachers and leaders within the Learning Academies Trust. This curriculum was successful, laying secure foundations of knowledge for our pupils and was praised in numerous Ofsted inspections across the Trust. However, collectively as a Trust, we wanted something better. After robust and meticulous research and seeing curriculum's in practice across the country, we selected United Learning because it is a deliberately and purposefully sequenced curriculum rich in knowledge. It is written by experts and therefore enables our teachers to deliver expert lessons. The curriculum is highly ambitious and reaches beyond the National Curriculum. The package, which United Learning provides, allows teachers and leaders to collaborate with curriculum designers who are continuously reviewing and analysing the curriculum at an expert level – it never stands still and is continuously improved and adapted.

Specifically, as a school, selecting an ambitious curriculum which reaches beyond the National Curriculum was exceptionally important. It is important that we spark our children's curiosity, yield great knowledge and encourage a love of learning, which directly mirrors the six core principles of United Learning: entitlement, coherence, mastery, adaptability, representation and education with character.

We follow the United Learning curriculum when delivering History, Geography, Religion and Worldviews, Art and Design, Design and Technology and Science. 

6 Core Principles of United Learning Principles

Building on the Framework for Excellence (which sets out the principles which all United Learning schools work to), The United Learning Primary Curriculum has six core principles:

Entitlement

All pupils have the right to learn what is in the United Learning Curriculum, and schools have a duty to ensure that all pupils are taught the whole of it.

Coherence

Taking the National Curriculum as its starting point, our curriculum is carefully sequenced so that powerful knowledge builds term by term and year by year. We make meaningful connections within subjects and between subjects.

Mastery

We ensure that foundational knowledge, skills and concepts are secure before moving on. Pupils revisit prior learning and apply their understanding in new contexts.

Adaptability

The core content – the ‘what’ – of the curriculum is stable, but schools will bring it to life in their own local context, and teachers will adapt lessons – the ‘how’ – to meet the needs of their own classes.

Representation

All pupils see themselves in our curriculum, and our curriculum takes all pupils beyond their immediate experience.

Education with character

The United Learning curriculum - which includes the taught subject timetable as well as spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, our co-curricular provision and the ethos and ‘hidden curriculum’ of the school – is intended to spark curiosity and to nourish both the head and the heart.