Computing Intent

At St Mary’s Catholic Primary School, we teach the national curriculum through a high-quality computing program that provides pupils with the skills needed to adapt to an ever-changing technological world. We teach our pupils how to use the Internet and email safely and responsibly, both in school and outside the school environment. Computing at St Mary’s guides pupils to being confident creative and independent learners who can understand and apply the fundamental principles and concepts of computer science, including abstraction, logic, algorithms and data representation.

 

At St Mary’s it is our intent to ensure children will:

 

• Be enthusiastic, inquisitive, lifelong learners: the Computing program provides pupils with the skills to face an ever-changing technological world. Pupils develop resilience as they learn a new way of doing things. Computing skills are imperative in enabling pupils to be confident, creative and independent learners and it is our intent at St Mary’s that pupils are provided with the opportunity to achieve this.

 

• To be strong communicators: pupils learn to communicate through different computing programs to a wide range of audiences, utilising technology (especially social media) to model positive use and communication with others.

 

• To be well-rounded, independent and resilient learners with aspirations: pupils will develop their computational thinking and creativity that will enable them to become active participants in the digital world.
   
• To develop and use their God given talents by being creative: pupils develop their basic computing skills to develop new talents in coding, programming and design.

 

• To be responsible citizens who are eager to make a positive contribution to their community and wider society: pupils will have a strong understanding of how to stay safe online and knowing when to report unsafe behaviour. They learn how to value a sense of worth in themselves and others through learning positive online behaviour and how to express themselves in a different ways.

 

Computing Implementation
 

We provide our pupils with high-quality education in Computing using the Teach Computing scheme throughout the school which provides coverage in line with the national curriculum.  

 

Teachers have created clear and concise curriculum maps that outline the computing skills children will develop; showing the progression of concepts and skills throughout the year groups.

 

Computing is taught once a week with teachers providing their pupils with fun and engaging lessons that foster a love for computing: developing curiosity, creativity and computational thinking.

St Mary’s computing curriculum covers the three core areas of computing:
 

• Computer Science
• Information Technology
• Digital Literacy

 

Computing Science is the foundation of the computing curriculum, teachers develop pupil’s understanding and use of programming and coding (including creating and debugging programs) and from this, Pupils develop a range of skills such as computational thinking, logical reasoning and decomposition. They learn about how computing systems work and analyse and solve problems.

 

Information technology enables pupils to create a range of programs, systems and content, building on their knowledge and skills from computer science. Pupils will have the opportunity in their computing lessons to use search technologies effectively and design and create a range of programs, systems and content that accomplish given goals.

 

Digital Literacy enables pupils to become creative, confident and competent with information and computing technology where pupils are able to develop their ideas and express themselves, becoming digitally literate whilst developing and understanding of how to use technology safely and respectfully.

 

Pupils have access to computing hardware such as laptops and Ipads, where they are taught how to use a computer safely, successfully and independently from KS1. From KS2, our pupils are proficient in navigating computers and Ipads and are able to access and use different programs such as Powerpoint and Word as well as using the internet carefully.

 

We place a great deal of emphasis on internet safety, and in addition to having it integrated into our curriculum, we plan for wider curricular connections and opportunities for online digital safety. When internet safety issues arise within school, we address these and communicate with parents to inform them of the social media issues and provide information and support.

 

There are opportunities for cross-curricular; pupils use laptops and Ipads in other areas such as History, English, RE and Art where they will carry out research on a topic or to create a piece of work using a particular program or software.

 

Computing Impact

 

The success of the computing curriculum is evident through the class floor books as well as pupil voice. The floor books at St Mary’s demonstrates clear progression of the pupils’ knowledge and understanding and their application of computing skills. Pupils are able to talk confidently about their learning using subject specific vocabulary with enthusiasm.

 

Pupils leave St Marys with a secure understanding of the three core areas of computing that enable them to be successful in navigating a computer system and the internet safely. Pupils will have a strong and comprehensive knowledge of the implications of technology and digital systems which is vital in a society where technologies and trends are rapidly evolving.

 

Important of all, pupils will apply the British values of democracy, tolerance, mutual respect, rule of law and liberty when using digital systems.

 

Enrichment

 

 

 

 

 

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On Wednesday 21st February, our school welcomed the team at OpenView Education to teach our children about internet safety.

In reception, year 1 and year 2, children were learning about:

• How to be safe online through various role-playing activities.

In years 3 and 4, children were learning about

• How to be safe online,
• Cyberbullying
• The importance of always talking to a trusted adult
• Ensuring they report or block anyone who is asking for personal information

In years 5 and 6, children were role-playing how to protect themselves and their friends on the internet and social media. 

 

STEM Club

In STEM club, the selected pupils were using Minecraft Education as a tool to design and create their own Church for the school. Children had to think about the type of structure they wanted to build and how they could utilise the space they had effectively. 

 

Year 1 - BeeBots

Year 1 children have been using BeeBots as a way to learn about giving commands and sequences. Children have been able to program the BeeBots to move forwards and backwards.