Our Curriculum Vision – Think, Grow and Care

We aim to inspire our students towards personal accomplishment and fulfilment; to become the finest versions of themselves. Our curriculum therefore seeks to draw out of them their interests, talents, personal qualities and aspirations. It also seeks to draw out of them a strong sense of social justice and responsibility: to use all that is good within them to make a difference to the lives of others and to improve the world around them.

Our Curriculum Ambitions

Ambition 1: the curriculum leads students to academic accomplishment and fulfilment. It provokes thought, curiosity and scholarship, allowing students to delve into a rich variety of disciplines.

• It provides high levels of challenge, including opportunities for students to extend their learning beyond what is taught in lessons.
• It supports students in transferring essential knowledge to their long-term memory.
• It sequences learning so that students make links and connections within and across subjects.
• It removes the barriers, which prevent students from learning and achieving.

Ambition 2: the curriculum leads students to personal accomplishment and fulfilment, becoming happy individuals with social maturity and moral purpose.

• It helps students feel positive about who they are and teaches them how to enjoy healthy, safe and responsible lives.
• It helps them recognise the difference between what is right and wrong; to expand their range of social skills; to appreciate the range of cultural influences and to apply all of these things to the different contexts they encounter in their lives.
• It develops students’ self-discipline and work ethic through the PRIDe code (Prepared, Respectful, Involved and Dedicated).

Ambition 3: the curriculum leads students to appreciate their place in the modern world, revealing the opportunities it offers them and the responsibilities they owe to it.

• It reminds students of their duty to others, through service, teamwork, kindness and leadership.
• It secures high quality further education placements and prepares students for the world of work and a lifelong interest in learning.
• It makes students ready for life in modern Britain as active, responsible citizens who have well considered opinions about issues and a respect for the diversity of opinions on those issues.

Our Curriculum Offer

The Key Stage 3 curriculum in Years 7 and 8 is broad, encompassing the National Curriculum subjects of English, Maths, Science, Art, a Citizenship, Computing, Geography, History, ICT, MFL, Music, PE and Technology. In addition, the subjects of Drama, PSHE and RE are included. Technology is taught as one subject through a variety of project pathways, which encompass food and nutrition; textiles; systems and electronics; mechanical systems; plastics and timbers. All students have equal access to the subjects that comprise the KS3 curriculum.

At Key Stage 4, the curriculum could be described as “GCSE Plus”. Students choose their options in year 8 and begin Key Stage 4 in year 9. They are counselled on the individual choices as well as their overall combination of subjects; their choices are informed by assessment, aptitude, parental guidance and careers guidance. Our three year Key Stage 4 is best described as “GCSE Plus” because it provides students with curriculum experiences that go above and beyond study for GCSEs. It does this by:

A) Extending and enriching students’ subject knowledge beyond that specified by the exam board requirements.
B) Broadening students’ KS4 education beyond examination courses, with a continuous programme of personal, social, religious and health education, as well as from September 2021, timetabled enrichment “electives”.

The justification for a three-year KS4 is that it:

• Provides time for important pre-learning in those optional subjects that are not included in the National Curriculum and which are therefore not taught in years 7-8. This means that all students can develop the crucial conceptual understanding and cultural capital needed to fully access the knowledge and skills required by the exam specifications. The three-year KS4 curriculum also brings this benefit to those subjects which are taught for one hour per week at KS3 but which get 2.5 hours per week in our year 9 model for this important pre-learning and cultural capital work.
• Creates the space for students to study four options, rather than just three, as well as maintain timetabled lessons for RE, PSHE and Citizenship (RPS). Although the year 9 start to KS4 narrows the curriculum earlier than a year 10 start would, it means there is less narrowing across KS4, with students finishing KS4 having studied a wider range of subjects. This structure means that students have access a broader range of post-16 courses and keeps the curriculum “as broad as possible for as long as possible.”
• Enables teachers to enrich the curriculum and go beyond the requirements of the exam specifications. This increases students’ experience of each subject’s scope and means that they do not have a curriculum in years 10-11 which narrowly focuses them on passing exams.
• Offers all students the opportunity to pursue the English Baccalaureate, whilst also experiencing a broad curriculum. By creating space for a fourth option, students wishing to study the full Ebacc curriculum have half, rather than a third of their option choices free to pursue wider subjects. This includes those subjects, which draw parents to Wyvern because of our specialist tradition in them: technology and the arts.
• Enables leaders to plan a curriculum where the pace of learning facilitates deep learning. This ensures the curriculum is not just covered by teachers but understood by students: through talk, discussion, making mistakes and addressing misconceptions. The 3 year KS4 structure creates more capacity for responsive teaching, with teachers adapting the pace of learning and balancing the need to consolidate and extend.
• Creates time for students to regularly revisit key concepts, ensuring that essential information is stored in long-term memory and that students’ working memory is not overloaded when either studying new learning or in preparing for the exams at the end of year 11.

Across years 9-11, students follow a core curriculum of English Language, English Literature, Maths, Science, PE, RPS and either Computing, Geography, History, French, German or Spanish. The large majority of students choose to do several of these courses by filling one of more of their option blocks with them. Well over half follow the full Ebacc curriculum. Beyond this, there are opportunities for an even more academic curriculum: students can study Triple Science and/or dual MFL or dual Humanities; in fact just under half of all the individual options chosen are in Ebacc subjects. A high proportion of students are entered for higher tier Maths.

The KS4 curriculum is more ambitious than the National Curriculum, which stipulates that schools should offer at least one course in each of the arts, design technology, humanities and MFL. The Wyvern curriculum offers students a choice of five arts subjects (Art, Drama, Music, Music Technology and Photography), two design technology subjects (Food and Nutrition and Design and Technology). The design and technology course allows students to specialise in either fibres & textiles, electronic and mechanical systems and natural and manufactured timber), four humanities subjects (Citizenship, Geography, History and RE) and two MFL subjects (from French, German and Spanish). In total, over twenty optional courses are offered for students to study at KS4. These courses are not pre-set into option blocks for students to choose from. The blocks are recreated every year out of student choices. The flexibility this creates allows the college to personalise the curriculum, not just for groups but for individuals too who can combine GCSE courses with applied and vocational courses to suit their personal interests, talents and aspirations. All course combinations are checked for suitability to ensure the curriculum provides the right balance of support and challenge for each individual.

Options Process

In Year 8, students will make choices in relation to the optional subjects they are able to study in Years 9, 10 and 11. The website below provides more detailed information in relation to the core subjects that all students are required to study, and the additional options choices available. Information evenings and careers information are provided to parents and students in advance of the options process.

Click here to access the Year 8 Options information website