Curriculum

The National Curriculum (2014) is operational across the whole school and teachers plan engaging and relevant programmes of study with the statutory frameworks to ensure coverage across all subject areas.

As a result of the mixed age classes, we deliver a carefully sequenced rolling programme of Year A and Year B which can enable pupils to be taught age-appropriate knowledge and skills but with common topic and themes, allowing for an interconnected journey through the primary phase.

When designing our ambitious, knowledge-rich curriculum, we have taken into account the local context of our school, building in opportunities to learn from their unique, rural environment and utilising the extensive school grounds and forest area to develop and extend experiences.

We are a Lyfta Global Development School. At Holly Meadows, we recognise that some children may have more experiences and opportunities to access different types of capital such as languages, beliefs, traditions, travel, interests, literature and clubs. We strive to provide access to and recognition of as many different life options and experiences around the world as possible. We facilitate this in part by threading 'Lyfta time' through our curriculum themes as well as school assemblies. Use of this inspirational online tool, with 360 degree environments around the world, allows children to reflect upon and recognise their own cultural capital, as well as demonstrating alternative ways of being and living, challenging stereotypes and preconceptions. 

Children are given the opportunity to enhance their learning by being involved in popular events such as Number Day and World Book Day as well as creating opportunities to develop understanding and promote thinking by being involved in Earth Day and Refugee Week. An exciting programme of Forest School education is available to children at Holly Meadows, which helps to build confidence, resilience, independence and a range of life skills too. We welcome visitors into school to enhance learning, ranging from our local MP and the Mayor, as representatives from local groups and charities such as King’s Lynn as classical musicians and professional dancers. We value the arts and dedicate time to developing high quality drama, music, dance, public-speaking and performance skills. It is wonderful to see children grow in confidence when they are given opportunities to perform in front of an audience. 

The PE curriculum is rich and diverse at Holly Meadows. Children get to use the extensive grounds to participate in the Daily Mile as well as a broad range of activities to build stamina and communication such as OAA, (Outdoor Adventurous Activity) Balance-ability and off road cycling 'Bike-ability', using our own set of cycles and equipment. A recent addition to our extensive school grounds is a 500m by 2m cycle track, funding by the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL).

We make use of the PIXL Primary assessment and teaching resources for English and Maths across the year groups from Year 1 to Year 6. PIXL provides tracking and target setting information for teachers that is regularly shared with the pupils and their parents. It identifies through regular assessments, the standard that the children are working at, their targets to aim for and the progress they are making towards those targets. These resources and support we receive from our PIXL CPD package helps us to identify those children who are not reaching their expected levels and signposts the focus needed for the support that will help them to improve.  It also provides a skills assessment that helps us to identify gaps in knowledge in the basic Mathematics and English skills and ensures we can track progress on a weekly basis.

More details are available within our Curriculum Policy as well as our Marking, Assessment and Feedback Policy.

 Please see our Long Term Curriculum Maps for 2023-2024 located on individual class pages.

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