Curriculum Intent
We have spoken to a number of education and training providers about the new OfSTED Education Inspection Framework and one underlying theme is the need to understand in more detail what is “curriculum intent”.
First of all, let’s remind ourselves of what is OfSTED’s working definition of a curriculum:
The curriculum is a framework for setting out the aims of a programme of education, including the knowledge and skills to be gained at each stage (intent); for translating that framework over time into a structure and narrative, within an institutional context (implementation) and for evaluating what knowledge and skills pupils have gained against expectations (impact/achievement).
OfSTED has also set out that curriculum intent is “a framework for setting out the aims of a programme of education, including the knowledge and understanding gained at each stage”. So we have to ask a few questions about the state of your current curriculum intent:
- Do you know what the objectives are for the programme you are delivering?
- What are the learning outcomes or apprenticeship standards that need to be achieved?
- What do you want your learners to know or be able to do by the end of the learning / apprenticeship programme?
- How are you going to measure the effectiveness of your delivery?
- How are you going to set out the sequence of your curriculum?
- Have you aligned your curriculum to other frameworks / objectives?
We have already written about how OfSTED is going to inspect the curriculum and education and training providers need to be very clear that the Quality of Education judgement is going to be a core area of “discovery” during inspections.
What does Stedfast do?
Stedfast has been designed to support education and training providers in developing delivery programmes and curriculum planning. Organisations can easily show their curriculum intent, implementation and impact. Let’s take a look at how this is done.
Year 4 Maths Example
In this very basic example, we will use a Year 4 Maths programme. The first step is to create the assessment plan. This ensures that the objectives and outcomes are identified.
National curriculum requirements can be added to assessment plans
Users then set out what learning or assessment activity will be delivered and measured. This is where the user can start to plan to measure the success of delivery.
It sets out what learners should know or be able to do by the end of the learning / apprenticeship programme?
Measures are used to set the curriculum intent
In the curriculum planning module users can now start curriculum activities and sequence the delivery.
Users can easily design the curriculum implementation and sequencing
Users can the also see how the curriculum has been mapped and ensure that all outcomes have been covered by curriculum activities.
Curriculum mapping is used to identify gaps in the delivery
Curriculum Planning Explained
This short 5 minute video gives an overview of curriculum planning with Stedfast.