‘Whether you want to uncover the secrets of the universe, or you want to pursue a career in the 21^st  Century, computing is an essential skill to learn’ Professor Stephen Hawkin

We believe that computing capability is an essential skill for life and enables learners to participate more readily in a rapidly changing world. The skills we learn in computing are transferable across the curriculum; they are taught in computing lessons, but then used across subjects, just as we do with reading and writing.

In line with the National Curriculum, we aim to provide a high-quality computing education that equips pupils to use computational thinking and creativity to understand and change the world. The core of computing is computer science, in which pupils are taught the principles of information and computation, how digital systems work, and how to put this knowledge to use through programming. Building on this knowledge and understanding, pupils are equipped to use information technology to create programs, systems and a range of content. Computing also ensures that pupils become digitally literate – able to use, and express themselves and develop their ideas through, information and communication technology – at a level suitable for the future workplace and as active participants in a digital world.

As with all our subjects, our curriculum design interrelates different strands of knowledge:

Substantive knowledge represents the technical content and vocabulary that is taught in each year group. In planning, this knowledge is the content we want pupils to know and remember.

Themes are used to represent the methods or conceptual frameworks used within the discipline. In our computing our themes include:

• Computer Sciences
• Information Technology
• Digital Literacy

Disciplinary knowledge is broken into key categories of knowledge such as coding, presenting data etc… and is vertically integrated into progression sequences across key stages so that we can ensure progression and provide opportunities for pupils to build, revisit and deepen their knowledge and understanding over time.