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West Didsbury CE Primary School

West Didsbury CE Primary School

PE and Sport

We provide a Physical Education curriculum that inspires all pupils to succeed and excel in physical activity.  This is achieved by allowing all children to participate in a range of physical activity on a daily basis in both indoor and outdoor environments.  Believing in the abilities of every child, we provide opportunities to excel in a range of physical activities to support their health and fitness, develop skills to build and shape their character and grow their team work and communication skills.  We aim for pupils to grow key sporting values which will be transferable in later life, becoming positive, active members of their community. 
 

A curriculum for life, for all

We are proud of the ambitious PE curriculum and broad variety of extracurricular sporting activity at West Didsbury CE.  The diverse opportunities in both the curriculum and extracurricular activities helps to ensure all children are equipped with a range of skills, knowledge and values to allow them to flourish in later life.  The curriculum ensures that children are able to participate in a range of physical activity, including first-hand experiences with inter and intra competitions and forest schools, to ensure a positive and engaging learning experience.  The curriculum content and design ensure that all children, whatever their social background, are supported to develop their communication, resilience and team work skills which are important to allow for success in later life.

 

Curriculum design

PE is not seen in isolation; it makes a valuable contribution to pupils’ personal development and children’s understanding of how to live active, healthy lifestyles. As such, there are strong links between our PE, PSHE and Science curricula. Through our careful selection of content and intelligent sequencing, our aim is that more children will believe that PE is for them and inequalities can be reduced.

Our spiral PE curriculum teaches skills progressively so each year, our children are prepared and equipped to succeed in the next.  The curriculum that is taught in each year group is designed to build towards specific end points, for example it is essential that pupils develop their fundamental movement skills (taught in EYFS and KS1) before applying them in game situations (taught in KS2). 

 

Our curriculum is broken down in to five key concepts: Dance, Gymnastics, Games, Athletics and Evaluating Performance. These concepts are revisited every year to embed prior learning and build on the skills acquired. Key aspects from science and maths are contextualised and woven into our PE curriculum.  Children’s science knowledge will develop, by understanding how the body works and the importance of a healthy life style as well as aspects of maths, such as recording information in tally charts, keeping score of games and using time.


Curriculum planning and sequencing

We ensure that our PE curriculum builds on previous learning and that it is, where appropriate, cross-curricular, to create a greater coherence and context for the children. PE is taught from Reception to Year 6 in twice-weekly sessions. 

Early Years

In our EYFS curriculum, PE is covered in the Physical Development Early Learning Goals.  Children in Reception have the opportunity to complete fine and gross motor activities in a range of high-quality learning areas both indoors and outdoors.  During this continuous provision time, children are able to develop fundamental skills and master basic movements which will assist them with their overall development.  Children in EYFS also participate in a weekly PE session.

Key Stage 1

In Key Stage 1 the lessons are taught by the class teachers and our expert sports coaches.  During these lessons, children will have opportunities to participate and perform in a range of physical activities to ensure they develop a range of skills such as;

  • fundamental movements including running, throwing, jumping, throwing and catching.
  • balance, agility and coordination.
  • applying fundamental skills in a range of activities.
  • participating in team games and developing simple tactics.
  • performing dances using simple movements.

Key Stage 2

In Key Stage 2 the lessons are also taught by class teachers and expert sports coaches. Children learn how to continue to apply and develop their broad range of skills such as;  

  • applying fundamental skills to an increasing range of activities and competitive sports.
  • developing and understand basic principles for attacking and defending.
  • performing dances using a range of movement patterns, developing flexibility, strength, technique, control and balance.
  • communicating, collaborating and competing with each other.
  • taking part in swimming lessons.
  • evaluating and recognising their own success.
     


Every class will also take part in forest school sessions. Our forest school provides children with the space to explore and take on new learning experiences, fostering resilient, confident, independent and creative learners. Forest school offers our pupils the opportunity to take supported risks appropriate to the environment and to themselves. The teamwork and collaboration skills that the children acquire in PE are reinforced in new contexts in forest school.

 As part of our staff’s own professional development we also have termly PE training delivered by a specialist PE consultant to enhance teacher’s own skills and confidence to help ensure high quality PE provision in gymnastics and dance.

 

 

Belonging to our local community

Participation in sport makes “our lives go better, not just longer.”
- Kretchmar, 2006

Sport is an immense part of our local culture and shared heritage in Manchester. We feel that it is important that our children have a strong sense of belonging to our locality and knowing the different sporting communities in the local area.  Throughout the year, year groups utilise our local sporting facilities such as the Etihad, the Northern Tennis club and Hough End, as well as taking part in numerous sporting competitions with other schools from cricket to football to cross country. We're extremely proud of our pupils' achievements in these competitions. Children are also given the opportunity to compete in our yearly sports day. Many of our pupils compete outside of school and we frequently celebrate their successes.

 

A broad and balanced curriculum

We passionately believe that the PE curriculum builds upon the skills and knowledge of a range of subjects as well as enhance important life skills such as team work and communication.  We ensure that in each and every lesson, children are reflecting upon their learning, carefully thinking through the values of passion, self belief, respect, honesty, determination and team work so that they can continue to grow and flourish in their communities. 

 

Clavering Primary School - CLAVERING SPORTS VALUES & CONDUCT

 

High ambitions

Throughout the PE curriculum at West Didsbury CE, there is an expectation of high standards and involvement within lessons.  We passionately believe that all children have talents, discovered or yet to be discovered. To ensure that all children have full access to the PE curriculum, sport premium funding is used to allow for a broad variety of experiences and high quality learning.  For children with SEN, our PE curriculum and the resources we use are adapted so that they have the opportunity to receive their full educational entitlement as well as have the opportunity to take part in all extra physical activities offered.  Our PE curriculum is designed so that all may be challenged to fulfil their potential.


Impact – how we measure what we teach

The impact of this PE curriculum is to enable children to flourish in physical activity as we as foster characteristics such as fairness and respect.  We are confident that all pupils will be enriched by the PE curriculum so that they can confidently use their acquired skills and knowledge, such as communication and collaboration, to become positive, active members in their families, friendships and communities.  The children’s learning journey in PE is assessed each term using the current assessment framework and reported on formally to parents at the end of each academic year.