2020 was a challenging year for schools and the challenges are continuing into 2021. The NASUWT teaching union has called for the introduction of the new school curriculum to be delayed to help teachers and students recover from the pandemic.
A recent survey by Impact Wales shows that 54.5% of primary teachers think that not enough schools will be ready in time.
Despite this, as it currently stands, the process will not be delayed, and the new Curriculum for Wales needs to be in place in schools across Wales from September 2022.
How should you approach preparation for the Curriculum for Wales?
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The Welsh Government’s ‘Curriculum for Wales - The Journey to 2022’ was published in October 2022 and sets out consistent expectations for the process of designing your curriculum and preparing to implement it from 2022 onwards.
You are urged to see the new curriculum not as an additional burden, but as an important solution for many of the challenges we are now facing. Using the Curriculum for Wales approaches will help you to adapt and become more flexible to changing conditions during COVID-19. This is not the same as your wider preparation for the Curriculum for Wales, but it does help you to become more familiar with the new curriculum and over time learning will become more consistent with the principles and ethos of the curriculum for Wales.
Welsh Government recognise that the response to COVID-19 has had a significant impact on your preparation for the new curriculum and state that you need to focus on 2 key aspects:
Key Aspect 1 - Adapt your current curriculum and teaching to changing circumstances and prepare for a range of scenarios.
Key Aspect 2 - Prepare for the rollout of the new curriculum in 2022.
Key Aspect 1 - What should learning look like?
As we move towards our new normal, you will need to address gaps in learning as well as ensure your learners develop further. You need to prioritise key learning; deciding what learning is critical to your learners and their progression in the time you have left.
It is impossible for you to teach everything before the end of the school year and to try and ‘catch up’ is not an effective way forward. Likewise, you can’t just start with the planned curriculum for summer and hope for the best. You need to identify and secure firm foundations before moving onto new learning.
How do you prioritise learning?
Firstly, you need to decide what the purpose of your learning is, focusing on what is important for your learners.
You need to consider:
Your vision - What is your ambition for your learners? What knowledge and skills do you want them to develop?
What challenges are your learners facing? How you can help them to overcome them?
What are the essential building blocks for learning in each area?
The four purposes of the Curriculum for Wales are the starting point and aspiration for every child and young person in Wales and therefore will be useful to inform discussions about curriculum purpose.
Discussions around identifying the purpose of learning and the steps needed to achieve this are an essential part of this process. One of the most useful teaching experiences of my career was moving down to Y2 to teach from Y4, and working with a teacher who had moved from Reception up to Y2. Our different starting points made for interesting discussions and really honed our understanding of where learners were coming from, where they needed to be, and the steps needed to get them there.
When the focus is on the purpose of learning rather than achieving objectives, it eliminates the need for tick sheets and coverage highlighting, enabling everyone to work towards the same goal, moving learners on from where they are.
The descriptions of learning in the new curriculum can also help you to prioritise learning. They are not objectives or criteria to be directly assessed against so shouldn’t be ticked off or highlighted for coverage, but they do provide guidance on the pace of progression and are useful to inform curriculum design and learning and teaching.
You may find this document useful to inform discussions about prioritising learning for the Maths and Numeracy AoLE. Try to prioritise key topics rather than trying to teach everything and address linked topics together.
