Design & Technology

Intent

The National Curriculum states that schools should aim to ‘develop the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly technological world’. Children should also ‘build and apply a repertoire of knowledge, understanding and skills in order to design and make high-quality prototypes and products for a wide range of users. In addition they should have opportunity to ‘critique, evaluate and test their ideas and products and the work of others’ as well as ‘understand and apply the principles of nutrition and learn how to cook’.

The ability of children to appreciate and interpret what they observe, communicate what they think and feel, or make what they imagine and invent, is influenced by the quality of their art, craft and design education. The National Curriculum states that through Design and Technology pupils should, ‘learn how to take risks, become resourceful, innovative, enterprising and capable citizens. 

Our Design and Technology curriculum at Farncombe School enables pupils to acquire and develop the knowledge, skills and vocabulary to become successful designers and makers. Our programme of study immerses the pupils in memorable, engaging and meaningful projects enabling them to develop, apply and embed their skills. 

Implementation

At Farncombe we encourage adventurous work inside and outside the class room on small and large scale projects e.g. building walls with mud cement in our Forest school or small group focussed work designing and building model playground equipment. Links to home encourage children to discuss their ideas and source materials with parents and carers e.g researching their favourite vegetables when exploring stir fries in Year 1.

Progression through the year groups 

In 4 carefully constructed units of study based around Textiles, Mechanisms, Structures and Cooking we ensure coverage and progression throughout the school. All children including the lowest 20 % are able to focus on:

• observation and evaluation of existing products

• exploring materials and techniques

• communicating their ideas through talking, drawing, templates and models

• evaluating and refining their products

• linking D.T to other areas of the curriculum where appropriate e.g. designing and making model vehicles as part of our Jubilee topic in Year 2, researching, preparing and cooking ingredients for a Chinese stir-fry as part our Geography topic in Year 1.

In EYFS DT is explored though the areas of ‘Expressive Art and Design,’ ‘Understanding the World’ and ‘Technology’. The children are encouraged to think about a range of products and explore a variety of materials and simple techniques to begin to make their own versions. These are; junk model moving vehicles as part of mechanisms, woven place-mats as part of textiles, simple small world playground equipment as part of structures and fruit salad as part of cooking. The emphasis is very much on talking about their ideas, explaining how they would like their model to look and reflecting on how well their finished product works using simple language and adult prompts.

In addition to the 4 units they have a variety of opportunities to explore the DT process through continuous provision in construction and model making, malleable materials and 
imaginative play. They are encouraged to think creatively and use resources available in original ways both inside and outside the classroom including Forest School. 

In Year 1 teachers build on the knowledge and skills gained in DT during Early Years. Children design their product thinking about who might use it. These products are: playground equipment for a small world person, a book mark for a child, a moving picture as part of a story in a book and a Chinese stir fry for themselves. The children design their product using a simple template, model or labelled drawing. When making their product the children select the correct tools and equipment from a larger range and in addition begin to explain their choices, using more technical language and key vocabulary e.g. stronger, stiffer, more stable, pivot, lever. This encourages a more consistent critical thinking approach throughout the process.  When evaluating we encourage the children to refer back to the initial project design and evaluate how well they have completed it. We also begin to encourage the children to share their work with others and ask and answer questions about each other’s work.

In Year 2 the children plan, design, make and evaluate their work at a more detailed level. When designing, the children follow a design criterion and describe their design using pictures, diagrams, models, words and where appropriate ICT. The children are encouraged during their making stage to think about the end user they are creating their project for and why it is suitable for them. These products are a: technicolour coat for a Joseph ‘doll’ in the Bible story, a wheeled model vehicle, playground equipment for a Lego figure, and an original cake recipe inspired by Roald Dahl’s The Twits. Once the project is complete, the children move on to reflect back on their design criteria to evaluate and critique their own work and the work of their peers. They may amend their models and products based on these evaluations. 

In addition to these units, opportunities across the KS1 curriculum are maximised to reinforce elements of the evaluate, plan, make and refine process e.g. crafts linked to topic work such as paper lanterns for our China topic, half termly cross-curricular cooking for all children and weekly Forest school sessions for every year group. 

If you walked into a D.T. lesson at Farncombe Infant School you might see children looking at existing products and finding out what they are made of, how they work and who might use them. You may then see small groups of children exploring a range of materials, techniques and resources as they research and inspire their own product ideas.  A subsequent lesson may see children drawing a simple design with labels to represent their individual idea.  

Later in the process you might see small groups of children working with an adult to use their designs to join, cut, fold, cook, sew or assemble their chosen product. Another lesson may show children talking or writing about how their product worked and how they might improve it.