Published by Focus Education
About the Curriculum
The Learning Challenge concept is built around the principle of greater learner involvement in their work resulting in a meaningful curriculum which promotes high standards.
The Learning Challenge curriculum is an approach to structuring and delivering the curriculum; often described as an approach for ‘intelligent schools’. It is under-pinned by a secure pedagogical framework which weaves together the critical elements of curriculum, teaching & learning and assessment.
The Learning Challenges curriculum is not an ‘off the peg’ scheme of work. It requires teachers to actively think what their curriculum needs to include in order to meet the needs of their children in their context – leading to high standards in all areas of the curriculum.
The Learning Challenge website provides a range of user-friendly tools which will help teachers plan their curriculum. These tools allow teachers to focus on the way they want to deliver rather than what they need to deliver. The Learning Challenge tools can be used to support schools who wish to deliver an entirely thematic curriculum and those who wish to deliver a subject-based curriculum (and anywhere in between the two).
The key drivers of the Learning Challenge approach are:
- Planned around the distinctive needs your children
- Enquiry based to promote curiosity
- Outcomes driven to raise standards
- Embeds the application of basic skills
- Allows writing to be meaningfully embedded
- Cross-curricular (where meaningful)
- Interesting for the teacher as well as children
- Integrates empowering learning (‘learn to learn’)
- Underpinned by latest thinking about quality learning and brain-based learning
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Learning Challenges
Learning Challenges hold the key to the format of this curriculum.
The design of the curriculum is based around a series of prime and subsidiary learning challenges – all expressed as questions.
Pre-Learning Tasks
Pre Learning activities, tasks or challenges are an important part of the Learning Challenge Curriculum because they ensure that learners are involved in the planning process.
The Wow Effect
To ensure that learners are immediately ‘hooked’ by the theme they are exploring, the learning challenge curriculum considers that the introduction to each new theme be given careful consideration. The idea is to create a very powerful stimulus that immediately grabs the learner.
Outcome and Reflection
A critical part of the learning challenge approach is ensuring that children understand what they are working towards, i.e. knowing the bigger picture. Reflection helps to cement the learning.
Community Learning Challenge
Many children grow up knowing little about their locality of their community and its heritage. This strand may help schools ensure that their curriculum weaves the locality into learning experiences.
Subject Challenges
At the heart of the learning challenge approach is challenge. It is easy to lose sight of the levels children should and are working at. It is also a tall order for a primary teacher to have the levels for all subjects in their head.
Applying Basic Skills
The learning challenge approach promotes high standards across the curriculum. Feedback from inspection evidence tells us that the most successful schools ensure that children practise their basic skills in many contexts.
Planning and Assessment
Planning and assessment are dealt with as one element within the learning challenge curriculum. The tools on this website are all linked to national curriculum levels to help teachers think proactively about assessment levels whilst planning.
Early Years
The Learning Challenge approach is based on many of the fundamental principles in the EYFS curriculum, i.e. a degree of child initiation and enquiry based learning.
Sample Resources
Sample Resources
Annual Planner Examples
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Focus Education is not endorsing or recommending these photo’s and video’s. They have been uploaded to this website as an example in which other schools are using the Curriculum Learning Challenge in their settings.
Reflection Video 1
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Key Skills Planning Tool
We are currently in the process of working with partner schools to devise and trial an interactive planning tool built around the Learning Challenge approach. More details to follow…