Dunkirk takes Action!
The Dunkirk Curriculum has been on a Journey that has seen Change and now we are taking action. Initially set as a 3 year cycle of whole school projects - Journey in Year 1, Change in Year 2 and Action in year 3, the consensus from staff that Action speaks louder than words! Dunkirk teaches the National Curriculum of England, but in a way that makes that curriculum meaningful for all pupils. Each term each year group covers a cross-curricular topic such as Around the World, Roaming Romans, Time Travel, Dragons vs Vikings and more. These topics cover statutory objectives from the History, Geography, Art and Design and Design and Technology Programmes of Study. The children learn key historical and geographical skills and knowledge and they apply what they have learnt through creative projects, having also been taught the art, design or technology skills needed to be able to showcase their understanding. For instance, Year 4 built a Roman town from boxes, and Year 3 designed a simple board game based on Viking Invasion. However, for our children to truly learn they needed to understand how does the historical learning from "then" apply to me "now"? And how does the geographical understanding of "there" apply to me "here"? And this is where we take Action! In the last project of each term each class takes what they have learnt in the earlier part of the term and applies it to the "here and now" by taking some sort of small action intended to make a noticeable positive impact on the community be that their school or family community, the local community or the wider community. The photos below show a taste of these Actions. It is purely by having worked on the Erasmus project that this lasting pro-social change to our curriculum has happened.