We aim to encourage children to learn and think about the uses and effects of past and present designs in a rapidly changing technological world. We provide pupils with a breadth of creative experiences that encourage to apply their knowledge to real life experiences to embed skills for the world.

From Early Years to Year 6, pupils have regular opportunities to engage with the Design Technology ideology of ‘Design, Make, Evaluate’.

Evaluation underpins all areas of our Design Technology curriculum offer where children learn how to critically analyse the effectiveness of the products they design and make. We cover all aspects of the curriculum including Mechanisms, Textiles, Structures, Electrical Systems and Food Technology.

In Early Years, pupils explore a wide range of design and making strands including tasting and cooking food, building structures from a variety of materials and using simple tools to cut, join and strengthen creations.

In KS1, pupils build upon the skills they have discovered in EYFS to begin to follow a simple design criteria for a user in mind. Through the use of designers and crafts people such as Rob Janoff, pupils are able to apply their knowledge to a real world context. Pupils are encouraged to discuss their decision making and justify the reasoning behind a choice of tools, material or design.

In KS2, the knowledge they have developed begins to become refined as pupils are given opportunities to create their own design criteria through the use of research and surveys. They continue to critically evaluate their own decision making and are exposed to a wider variety of choices to deepen their skills and analysis of success and failure. Each product links to a real life context or a topic studied in History or Geography. Pupils are able to use their knowledge of past and present technology in order to inform their decision making and learn from the past.

The First Lego League is another important strand of our Design and Technology offer which links to our Computing Curriculum. This hugely successful programme has recently been introduced to pupils from EYFS to Year 6. All pupils learn skills linked to the Core Values: Teamwork, Inclusion, Innovation, Impact, Discovery and of course Fun! The programme has proved popular and engaging for all pupils and this has created a real buzz about school as pupils discuss their success and discoveries along the way. Because the FLL has a theme, all pupils feel a shared sense of purpose as they work towards creating solutions to real life problems which link to our ever changing technological world. The impact of the programme can be seen in our Year 5 and 6 Lego League team’s success at the regional finals where we have been awarded the Judge’s Award for two years running.