The St Thomas' Lighthouse Curriculum

Through collaboration with our school community, we have developed our Lighthouse Curriculum which has six main strands: Excellence, Experiences and Life Skills, Celebrating Diversity, Christian Values, Reading and Vocabulary and Knowledge Rich & Academic. 

These main strands underpin our curriculum and encompass everything we aspire to achieve by the time our pupils leave us at St Thomas'.

Curriculum Intent Statement

Through our rich and balanced academic curriculum, we aim to broaden horizons and open doors to all that life has to offer, allowing our children to experience life in all its fullness.

With a rigorous and progressive knowledge-based curriculum, our pupils will leave St Thomas’ with the extensive knowledge and thinking skills needed to enable them to lead fulfilling lives with the highest of aspirations. Our ethos of excellence permeates our whole curriculum, inspiring our pupils to be the very best version of themselves.

Reading and vocabulary are at the heart of our curriculum, enabling our pupils with the keys needed to unlock their future successes.

We believe that a rich, academic curriculum and a wealth of life experiences go hand in hand. Therefore, through our curriculum, we will open our pupils’ eyes to the world around them by offering valuable and inspirational opportunities (our Five Be Experiences).  We want our pupils to experience life outside of their own locality and to understand the diversity of the world in which we live: opening their eyes to the endless possibilities of the lives that lay ahead of them. 

Our core Christian Values underpin our whole curriculum, allowing our children to develop the moral compass required to make positive choices in life.

Our Six Core Strands

Excellence  

At St. Thomas’ we believe ‘Excellence’ permeates all aspects of our school life. We encourage everyone to aspire for excellence, knowing that excellence is not about being the best, but doing OUR best. We believe that our curriculum equips and enables our children to achieve their full potential and our pupils will leave St. Thomas’ with the extensive knowledge and skills needed to enable them to lead fulfilling lives with the highest of aspirations.  

I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13 

Experiences and Life Skills 

We believe a curriculum should open our eyes to the endless possibilities of the lives that lay ahead.  Experiences and life skills are woven into the curriculum and are enhanced with our planned programme, which we call our ‘5 Be Experiences’. These experiences and life skills have been identified through careful consultations with all key stakeholders to give our children the very best opportunities which will equip them with the cultural capital and skills for life.   

I have been young and now I am old, Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken Or his descendants begging bread. Psalm 37:25 

Celebrate Diversity  

Our curriculum is designed to enable our pupils and community to experience life outside of our locality and to understand and celebrate the rich diversity in the world we live in.  

There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is without meaning. 1 Corinthians 14:10 

Christian Values  

Our Christian values of compassion, friendship, peace, responsibility/service, thankfulness and respect, which are rooted in the gospels of Jesus, underpin our whole curriculum. These help our children to develop a moral compass to make positive choices in life and a difference to the world we live in. 

Jesus said, ‘Come follow me, life your lives the way God wants you to.’ 

Reading and Vocabulary 

At St. Thomas’ we say that reading and vocabulary are at the heart of our curriculum as we passionately believe fluent and confident readers who are articulate, are best equipped to go on to succeed in life. We want our children to develop a life-long love of reading and form excellent habits of reading widely both for pleasure and information. As well as prioritising the teaching of phonics and early reading, we also provide children with opportunities in every lesson to learn through reading. As a Voice 21 school, oracy and vocabulary is explicitly taught in all lessons and contexts, enabling our pupils to become confident and articulate learners.  

The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. John 6:63 

Knowledge Rich and Academic 

Our knowledge-rich curriculum aims to inspire pupils and promote excellent outcomes for all including the most disadvantaged. The curriculum content has been carefully chosen by subject experts and is organised in a coherent way, ensuring children can build on their knowledge from year to year. In this way, the knowledge in the curriculum is cumulative, constructing firm foundations from which children can progress and develop deeper conceptual understanding and subject-specific skills over time. Curriculum coherence ensures that teaching does not jump from topic to topic, but enables children to develop knowledge over time, as well as a love of subjects. subject content is crucial to this approach; the rich content of the curriculum inspires children and plants the seeds for a lifetime of learning. Our Core Knowledge Curriculum at our school prepares our pupils for moving on to our secondary school and for leading their lives as citizens in modern Britain.

Teach me knowledge and good judgement for I trust your commands. Psalm: 119:66 

What does the knowledge curriculum look like at St Thomas? 

Foundation subjects are taught discretely and delivered with a focus on the acquisition and application of knowledge. The curriculum is sequenced so that blocks of knowledge are built on and revisited as appropriate. Our children will be immersed in rich knowledge from the onset with a focus on vocabulary. Lessons will begin with retrieval of previous knowledge to ensure that children remember what has been previously taught, as what has not been remembered, has not been learned. In every lesson, children will build upon their knowledge from previous lessons and even previous year groups. Children will gain rich and challenging knowledge throughout the lesson with opportunities to work independently and apply their understanding, often making their own links across the curriculum. Lessons follow a similar structure so our children are used to the routines and expectations. 

Please click on the icons below to find out more about individual subjects.

Enrichment Opportunities

At St. Thomas Primary School, we believe in providing a rich and varied educational experience for all our students. That's why we offer a broad range of enrichment activities designed to support and enhance the curriculum. Our "Five B's Experiences" ensure that every year group benefits from exciting trips and visits that complement their learning. Additionally, we offer a wealth of extracurricular clubs delivered by both teachers and external experts. From art and drama to fencing and reading, there is something for everyone, and all children have the opportunity to participate. These activities not only broaden our students' horizons but also foster a love for learning beyond the classroom.

To look at the range of enrichment opportunities we provide, please click the link below: 

Teaching & Learning 

In order to support the delivery of our curriculum, we have developed our approaches to teaching and learning and created our bespoke 'Teaching and Learning Toolkit'. Our evolving toolkit provides an evidence-informed approach to ensure that the pre-determined identified in our curriculum becomes sticky and is effectively retained over time for all learners. It is based on academic research and cognitive science, such as Daniel Willingham’s Memory Model, Ebbinghaus’ Forgetting Curve and Rosenshine’s Principles of Instruction. This research underpins the chosen teaching techniques that are outlined in this toolkit.

In addition to our 'Teaching and Learning Toolkit', we have created our unique common lesson framework, which sets out a structure for each lesson. This again has been developed with teachers and is underpinned by academic research and the our knowledge of how we know children learn. 

Knowledge Organisers

To support with the children's retention of knowledge over time, every unit of work within our planned programme of work has a bespoke knowledge organiser, which directly links to the pre-determined knowledge identified within our curriculum. This identified essential knowledge, including what we call 'core knowledge', as well as important vocabulary. These can be used to support with home learning as well as a useful resource within lessons. At the start of every half term, we will send home a set of knowledge organiser, which we encourage children and parents to use and refer to at home. We also send home suggestions of how these can be used to support with children's retention of knowledge. All of our knowledge organisers can also be found on our school website - please see the link below.