At Hill View Academy, we deliver a broad and balanced curriculum that is exciting, creative and meaningful using our PEAK values.
People and places – How we connect with people and how we understand our place in the world
Experiences – Providing a wide range of experiences and opportunities both inside and outside of school
Aspirations – Giving children a sense of aspiration and a chance to spark interest and passion
Knowledge and skills – Developing knowledge and skills through our broad curriculum offer to support children in the next phase of their education
We recognise the importance of communication, language and reading to access the rest of the curriculum successfully. We believe our exciting and innovative curriculum, which is underpinned by our building blocks of teamwork, relationships and confidence, enables all learners, irrespective of their starting points, to succeed academically, spiritually and emotionally. This unique curriculum offer, interwoven through equips learners for all stages of their education and beyond and is central to our vision here at Hill View Academy.Â
We believe that children should be skilled and articulate. We teach this through insisting on the ‘4R’s’ (Respect, Resilience, Responsibility and Reflection) in all that we do. We want our children to be proud of their achievements and we, as a school, recognise their successes in the widest possible sense.
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For further information on our curriculum, please contact us.
i-Challenge
Through the ‘i-challenge’ curriculum we provide access to a wide range of opportunities that promote pupils’ emotional, physical and intellectual development. Activities provide pupils with opportunities to develop the ‘building blocks’ of successful life skills, such as teamwork, resilience, responsibility and friendship. Through ‘i-challenge’ we focus on how children learn and this is underpinned by building relationships, building teamwork and building confidence.
Geography
Our geography curriculum aims to provide our children with quality first hand experiences whenever possible, creating excitement and wonder through studying the world beyond the classroom. Initially, our focus is on their immediate environment and the local landscape including hills, moors, crags and rivers. During our residentials, children are able to explore the wider environment, in a contrasting locality, to provide them with an opportunity to compare and contrast their understanding of geographical areas, both urban and rural. Through our carefully tailored curriculum, children will develop into explorers. We aim to enthuse children about the possibilities that their world has in store for them to explore. Our children will leave school with a sense of their place in the world, both culturally and physically, and a desire to enquire into the world around them.
History
Our history curriculum aims to provide our children with a sense of time through an understanding of people, places and objects. The children will learn about the experiences of others and of significant events from the past through quality first hand experiences, artefacts, historical texts and other primary and secondary sources. Our children will practise the building blocks of teamwork, relationships and confidence in order to gain a broad and balanced understanding of their local, national and world history. Our children will leave school with a chronological awareness of historical periods, an understanding of people and their impact on the world as we know it today.
Science
At Hill View Academy, we teach science in a way that ensures children have a concrete understanding of chemistry, biology, physics and geology. We believe science is not about having the right answer but instead is about a set of processes and skills which allow us to better understand, question and reason with the world around us. Our science curriculum follows the national curriculum and is progressive throughout the school so that each topic and skill can be built upon one year after another. In each year group there are a variety of investigations which involve tangible experiences that teach the children a range of scientific enquiry skills. We have constructed our curriculum, not only for the children to have a breadth of knowledge, but to have the depth also.
Music
We have a specialist from Musica Kirklees who teaches our music lessons. At Hill View Academy, we recognise the vital role of music in allowing curiosity, creativity and self –expression to develop alongside resilience, confidence and critical thinking skills. In addition to who class lessons we provide small group sessions for children who have a passion for music.Â
Computing
Through our computing curriculum we aim to give our pupils the life-skills that will enable them to embrace and utilise new technology in a responsible and safe way to ensure that pupils become digitally literate and digitally resilient. At Hill View Academy the safety of our pupils is paramount. We take online safety very seriously and we aim to give children the necessary skills to keep themselves safe online.Â
Art & Design
At Hill View Academy our Art curriculum has been designed to expose children to a rich and varied diet of creativity and Art history. We believe that high-quality Art lessons will inspire children to think innovatively and develop creative understanding. The Art curriculum provides children with opportunities to develop their skills using a range of media and materials. Children learn the skills of drawing, painting, printing, collage, textiles and 3D work.
Through a variety of creative and practical activities, pupils will have the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making.
PSHE
Our responsive PSHE programme is at the centre of the school curriculum, providing opportunities to teach concepts, knowledge, language, strategies and skills that enrich the wider curriculum. Here at Hill View Academy, we are preparing our pupils to be able to flourish and thrive with the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of life in modern day Britain. We use the SCARF programme from CORAM life education. Our adaptive and inclusive curriculum meets the needs of all our pupils, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) by adapting teaching and learning to suit all children and all abilities. We ensure that our curriculum fosters gender equality and LGBT+ equality by ensuring the quality of an inclusive and diverse curriculum. External visitors are used within our PSHE programme. They are carefully selected and enrich learning, provide expert input and act as role models throughout our PSHE provision. Our i-challenge curriculum further enhances our children’s PSHE learning by giving them access to a wide range of opportunities that promote their emotional, physical and intellectual development.Â
RE
The Hill View Academy R.E curriculum recognises the importance of developing our pupil’s as individuals so they can grow up to be responsible citizens. It develops our values, behaviours, knowledge and understanding of religions and beliefs. The Hill View Academy RE curriculum is based on the Local Agreed Syllabus for Calderdale, Kirklees and Leeds produced by SACRE.Â
Physical Education
Our Vision is to provide high quality physical education and school sport through personal challenge and competition that will lead to life-long participation. Hill View Academy aims to inspire all children to develop a love of physical activity and sport. Through quality physical education, whole school values and a whole child approach, we aim to nurture confident, resilient children who will strive for their personal best. We listen to our children’s wants and needs and provide them with a broad range of active experiences and clubs. We want to aid our children in obtaining the values and skills to celebrate and respect the success of others, as well as celebrating their own successes. We aim to ensure that our delivery of physical education allows all children to have skills and mindset to leave primary school with the capabilities to be successful in their sporting challenges and active lifestyles at secondary school and beyond. We strive to educate both our children and families to develop a greater understanding of how to live healthy lifestyles and make healthy choices. We are dedicated to ensuring healthy minds, as well as bodies and will continue to support our children’s well-being.
Curriculum Maps
Reading & Phonics
Reading is a huge part of life at Hill View Academy. We foster a love of reading and encourage children to read and enjoy a wide variety of books to nurture a lifelong love of reading. We put all our efforts into making sure that children develop a love of books as well as simply learning to read.Â
We start by teaching phonics to the children in the Reception classes using the Letters and Sounds programme. Children follow a detailed programme for teaching phonics with the aim of them becoming fluent readers by the end of Year 2. Children who have difficulty in retaining what they have been taught are helped with intervention in small groups. During your child’s time in school you will be offered the opportunity to attend workshops which help you to understand the way we teach phonics in school and how the children are tested in Year 1.
Reading Scheme
Our school reading scheme contains a wide variety of books from many published schemes: Oxford Reading Tree, Project X, Songbirds and Cambridge Reading Adventures, amongst others. We have books that can be decoded entirely using phonics but most require children to use a range of reading strategies. The books have been carefully ranked and increase in difficulty until children are fluent at that level. The aim of our scheme is to develop fluent, confident readers who understand what they have read. The scheme contains books form different genres so that children get used to reading stories, poems, play scripts, fiction and non-fiction.Planners are sent home with reading books with a reading record on each page. We encourage parents to read with their child each night to foster a love of reading and to develop key reading skills.
Here is a link to the ELS website for more information – https://essentiallettersandsounds.org/ssp-programme/
Development
All children from Upper Foundation Stage take part in Text Study. Text study-based reading sessions run 5 sessions per week. These are planned by all teachers to teach a range of skills and techniques which enable children to comprehend the meaning of what they read and develop their understanding of the vocabulary used by authors. These will include focus on a range of areas including deduction, inference, authorial and literal. Through careful planning our pupils are challenged to read and write vocabulary that deepens their knowledge and intellect and prepares them for future academic success.
Curriculum
Reading is a fundamental part of the school curriculum. Each class has a dedicated reading area and well stocked class libraries that have many genres of books appropriate to age. Every effort is made to encourage children to read for pleasure whether that be a story book, magazine, newspaper or other print.Â
In English lessons, children analyse texts and some of our topic are based around books and stories many of which have been selected from Pie Corbett’s reading spine. These are a collection of classic books and essential reads that help children engage at a deeper level and enter the world of a story.
School Initiatives
Every year we celebrate our love of reading on World Book Day. Children and teachers alike have a great day dressing up as their favourite characters and enjoy a range of activities based on different authors and their most famous stories!
We also have a Scholastic Book Fair every year and children visit with teachers and parents.
Maths
At Hill View Academy we strive for all our children to become successful problem solvers and resilient mathematicians. We want the children to have a strong and secure mathematical knowledge that will give them the foundations for later life. To do this we use the Concrete Pictorial Abstract (CPA) approach to teach mathematical concepts. This enables children to solve problems in a variety of ways. By following the stages of CPA the children develop a deep understanding that they can reason with and explain.
You can support your children’s learning in Maths using the following links below!
Website Links
