We take a holistic approach to physical education teaching. We have developed an exciting curriculum which engages the children in a wide variety of regular physical activities. Our diverse approach towards teaching PE gives the children the opportunity to develop skills throughout the key stages, as well as providing many opportunities for our pupils to reflect on their own performance within PE as well as providing peer feedback.

We inspire pupils to succeed and excel in a broad range of competitive sport and physical activities. These opportunities enable our pupils to develop key skills which gives them the knowledge to continue along a pathway to a lifelong participation in sport or physical activity if they wish to do so. Our termly focus provides a consistent structure for the children to work from and continually develop. We split up each term with a different unit of sports or physical activities.

We aim for our pupils to know the benefits that keeping active has on physical and mental health. We aim to achieve this by having strong cross curricular links with our PE curriculum. Some of these cross curricular links include a Science link which enables our students gaining knowledge about fitness tests and how to keep physically healthy. We also link a lot of our curriculum to developing our pupils’ growth mindset. We aim to give our pupils the best opportunity and know how to improve their intrinsic motivation with the hope of our pupils continuing to participate in sport and physical activity after they leave us. Finally, we also promote the knowledge of a lifelong participation in physical activity through our daily mile especially in year 5 and 6 because they do not have an afternoon break time. We try to encourage children to take part in the daily mile as this shows our children the importance of getting regular physical activity which can help them keep fit and healthy.

In term 1, we have a game based approach to teaching invasion games in KS2 and in KS1 we focus on developing a range of fundamental skills such as agility, balance, coordination and speed (ABC’s)  which the children can apply to a game scenario when they move up to KS2. The structure of a PE lesson includes a warm up which gives pupils the knowledge to prevent them from injuries when taking part in sport or physical activity. We would then introduce the learning objective (TBAT) which has a focus of developing a skill within the game, for example TBAT receive the ball in front of your opponent. Games lessons will include mini competitive games which solely focus on the skills being learnt allowing the children more of a chance to practice the skill. The children will then have another chance at applying the skill they have learned by playing a larger game. Lessons will include lots of opportunities for questioning and feedback from the pupils which furthers their knowledge and understanding. Lessons will finish with a plenary about what the children learned and the importance of applying the skill in game based approaches.

In term 2 we focus on gymnastics and dance which is supported through lots of demonstrations and the use of technology to enhance our pupils knowledge of the techniques being taught but most importantly how to keep them safe.

Finally, in term 3 our focus is athletics alongside striking and fielding games.

Throughout the year, we also pair these themes with swimming, circuit training in KS2 and outdoor adventurous activities. In addition to this, specific coaching is provided in line with the School Games competitions held during the year.

At the end of each unit, we assess our children based on the skills and knowledge they have developed using our end point document this could be in a skills based activity, game scenario or, in the case of dance and gymnastics, performing a routine. We take an approach of using teacher observations to assess the children throughout the unit of sport or physical activity and we use this to back up our final assessment. Other things we take into account are the fact that some children may compete externally and we can use these to assess our children. We also give our pupils as many opportunities as possible for them to self and peer assess their own performance as well as their peers. This develops our pupils’ ability to talk confidently using appropriate vocabulary about what it means to perform well in a range of sports and physical activities and finally, what it means to live a healthy lifestyle.