Nova Curriculum
Nova aims to provide an inclusive, purposeful and challenging curriculum that inspires children to learn the knowledge and skills they need to become global citizens who make a positive difference to our world.
Our Nova Curriculum is designed to be engaging and relevant for children. We have organised different subjects of the national curriculum in a thematic way into line of enquiry learning journeys. This is to enable children and teachers to make connections across the curriculum and to support language use across subjects to explore big ideas. We infuse our school curriculum with engaging experiences and activities that make learning meaningful and stimulate children’s interests and curiosity. In this way, we are able to develop both academic learning as well as character traits such as collaboration, communication, planning skills, courage and entrepreneurship.
Please follow the links below to learn more about our Nova line of enquiry questions, curriculum coverage and skills and knowledge progression in different subjects across the school:
2022-2023 Nova Curriculum Line of Enquiry Questions
EYFS Curriculum Planning 2021-2022
Follow these links for line of enquiry overviews for terms 1 & 2:
Year 1 How has travel changed over time
Year 2 What was it like to live in the Victorian times
Year 3 Would you prefer to live in Stone Age Britain or Ancient Egypt
Year 4 Who were the Romans and what was their legacy on Britain
Year 5 Why were European invaders such successful conquerors
Year 6 Britain in the 20th Century – What changes have we seen
Follow these links for line of enquiry overviews for terms 3 & 4:
Year 1 T3 How can we make traditional tales come to life
Year 2 T3 What makes Bristol brilliant
Year 3 T3 How can science educate and entertain
Year 4 T3 How has STEM changed the world
Year 5 T3 How have the ancient greeks influenced us
Year 6 T3 How has Earth evolved
Follow these links for line of enquiry overviews for terms 5 & 6:
Year 1 T5 Why is water precious
Year 2 T5 What makes Africa amazing
Year 3 T5 How can we care for the environment
Year 4 T5 What’s the most important thing about chocolate
Year 5 T5 What makes planet Earth unique
Year 6 T5 How can life be celebrated through animation
Nova Curriculum Intent
Here is our Nova Curriculum intent. You will find further details about subject intents and curriculum saved in subject pages.
Reading is at the heart of the curriculum and we are committed to children developing a love of reading through daily reading of a range of texts linked to children’s interests and the wider curriculum. The teaching of phonics, using systematic synthetic phonics, is given a high priority from the start of the Foundation Stage and through Key Stage 1. Children are taught how to decode and read fluently to enable them to understand what they have read. We teach specific reading comprehension skills using VIPERS (vocabulary, inference, prediction, explanations, retrieval and summarising).
Children are taught how to speak, read and write fluently so that they can communicate their ideas and emotions to others effectively. Children are given purposeful writing opportunities across the curriculum to apply their vocabulary, SPAG and writing skills.
We place an emphasis on children developing their mathematical fluency and recall of key number facts and times tables. This enables children to solve reasoning problems more easily. Children are given purposeful opportunities across the curriculum to apply their mathematical skills in meaningful contexts.
We have high expectations for our children in all subjects and aim for children to at least meet age related expectations to prepare them for their future school careers.
We are committed to the inclusion of all pupils through appropriate challenge and support so all children’s needs are met and they are equipped to overcome potential barriers to learning. Our school curriculum enables us to support our children to shine brightly, without limits and for them to help others shine too.
Our Nova ‘LEARN’ curriculum
L earning Journey
E ngaging
A uthentic
R igorous
N ova Curriculum
Learning journey:
At Nova Primary, we see learning as a journey, and the children as the intrepid explorers. At the start of each long term, the children will be given a broad ‘line of enquiry’ question to investigate and explore.
Launch – Each class will start with a ‘launch’; an event, experience, challenge, visitor or trip to ignite new learning.
Learning – Children build on their prior knowledge and learn appropriate skills, knowledge and vocabulary across a range of subjects. Teachers plan learning opportunities carefully and use assessment to ensure learning is sequential and builds upon children’s prior learning. Teachers use practice and retrieval strategies to help build children’s long term memory and fluency so that they know more and remember more.
Landing – A landing is a key event that allows children to demonstrate and celebrate their learning with others. Examples of landings include a performance, exhibition, purposeful piece of writing, display, themed event or play. Throughout their learning journey, children may have a few key ‘landing’ destinations to aim for using their skills and knowledge from across the curriculum.
Engagement through experiences and challenge:
Learning journeys are planned with pupils’ questions and prior learning at the heart. Learning opportunities encourage children to think critically, solve problems and share their learning with others. Our learning environments support high quality learning by promoting independence and celebrating excellence. A wide range of experiences, themed days and educational visits also engage pupils further in their learning.
Authentic:
At Nova we believe learning experiences should be relevant to the lives of our learners. Authentic visitors and experts help children see the purpose of their learning and how they can make a difference to the wider world. We have recently started using ‘States of Being’ characters to help children reflect on what they have experienced in lessons, what learning behaviours they have shown and to gain greater understanding of the disciplinary knowledge across different subjects. You can find out more about our States of Being here: States of Being – Nova Primary School
Rigorous:
We are committed to ensuring that all children receive their entitlement to the National Curriculum. This sets out the age-related knowledge and skills children should acquire over their primary schooling. Line of enquiries integrate the different areas of The Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum for Reception and the different subjects of The National Curriculum for Years 1 to 6. At Nova we have devised skills and knowledge progression documents for all subjects which break down the key skills, knowledge and vocabulary children learn within each phase. Subjects have common threads of learning that run through children’s learning journey through our school.
Nova curriculum:
Our priority is meeting the needs of our children and helping them develop their cultural understanding, social skills, self-esteem and resilience. This is why we aim to have spiritual, moral, social and cultural development at the core of our curriculum, underpinned by our school values of trust, friendship, discovery and success.
TRUST – In ourselves and in our school community
FRIENDSHIP – Showing kindness and learning together
DISCOVERY – Showing bravery to challenge ourselves, without limits, so that we can be our personal best
SUCCESS – A belief that with effort anything is achievable
Helen Thorpe, Deputy Headteacher, is our Curriculum Leader who you can speak to if you would like to find out more.
Governors take a role in monitoring our curriculum. Here is a summary report of the most recent governing board curriculum learning walk :
