At Halifax we believe it is vital that children receive a broad and balanced curriculum that encourages them to become independent thinkers and creative problem solvers. Topic lessons, consisting of history and geography, aim to build on the skills children develop in English and Maths as well as providing further opportunities for children to use their creativity and imagination. We strongly believe that all children have their own set of strengths and talents and we hope to use topic lessons as an opportunity for children to discover and use these.

Topics last for at least a half term, with many covering a whole term to ensure children have enough opportunities to build their knowledge and understanding. Children have one topic lesson a week which will be history or geography focused; these lessons aim to provide children with a variety of engaging experiences and opportunities that are relevant to them and allow them to develop the skills they need, not only to succeed in school but indeed in life. Topics often start with an exciting entry point to familiarise children with what they will be learning. This may involve, dressing up, acting and improvisation or making things. The work that the children complete during a unit then aims to provide them with enough knowledge to produce something using all the skills they have developed and which shows how much they have learnt. There are also a number of opportunities for children to go on related trips or have in school experiences during a unit to either build on or consolidate what they have discovered.

We aim to make topic lessons as relevant and hands-on as possible so that children can begin to think more independently and come up with their own understanding of the way the world is. Topic lessons intend to be as cross curricular as possible, incorporating art, DT, science and computing into history and geography lessons so that children can draw on their experiences in the real world. To allow this to happen, we ensure that all topic lessons are focused on children developing skills, whether it be using a map and grid references, or using sources or artefacts in history to learn about the past. We hope that this will encourage children to become logical thinkers who can use questioning and research skills to develop their own understanding and interpretations. These skills gradually progress as children move up through the school to ensure that children can draw and build on their previous learning.

If you explore further throughout this section you will find an outline of the topics covered across the school during the year and the individual sections for each year group should give you an idea of all the exciting things that have been going on.