Vision for Physical Education

Our vision for Physical education at St. Edward’s Primary School and Nursery is to ensure children have a wide range of opportunities to become physically confident and competent. PE will provide a platform for the development of social skills as well as encourage all children to become life-long, successful participators in sport and physical activity.  

Intent

Physical education at St. Edward’s focuses on ensuring all children develop a deep knowledge, understanding and range of skills, particularly fundamental skills. This will enable children to sustain and enjoy a positive, active lifestyle. We also want to teach children how to cooperate and collaborate with others as part of an effective team, understanding fairness and equity of play to embed life-long values. Our curriculum aims to improve the wellbeing and fitness of all children through the curriculum but also through a wider range of opportunities such sport clubs and events.

Implementation

Our scheme of work for Physical education is adapted from the ‘Cambridgeshire’ scheme of work and covers all aspects of the National Curriculum. This scheme was chosen as it provides clear learning objectives and progression within each unit. Each lesson is structured in differentiated in a way that allows all children to succeed, be challenged and make progress.

Within an academic year, all children will take part in gymnastics, dance, athletics and games units which are progressive year on year. This allows all children the opportunity to consolidate and build upon learning. There will be a greater focus on fundamental skills in Key Stage One to ensure children have the knowledge, skills and confidence to apply these skills to team games and activities. In Year Four, children take part in a three week of swimming lessons lead by external coaches who ensure children work towards National Curriculum expectations.

Children are invited to attend sport clubs that are provided by external providers, such as PAFC and Plymouth Patriots, and clubs that are provided by members of staff such as dance and multi-skills. Throughout the academic year, children will also be invited to attend competitive sporting events within the local area. Children also have the opportunity within the school day to move and be active as they have access to the on-site bike track, outdoor gym equipment and the weekly personal best challenge and activities lead by our sport leaders.

Impact

• Children will have the knowledge and skills to be confident and successful life-long learners in sport and physical activity
• Children are confident enough to be able to take responsibility for their own health, fitness and safety.
• Children are able to apply a wide range of necessary fundamental skills to competitive games and activities.
• Children live happy and healthy lives, utilising the skills they have acquired from taking part in our physical education curriculum.
• In regard to swimming, we would expect children to meet baseline government expectations which is to swim at least 25 metres, use a range of strokes effectively and perform safe self rescue. We use the data to see which children need to complete ‘top up swimming lessons.

Physical Education in the Early Years

In Early Years, all activities are guided by the physical development area of the Early Years Framework. Children begin their journey at St Edward’s by practising their fundamental movement skills, such as skipping, hopping, standing on one leg, throwing, catching and balancing, and these are applied through a range of activities including dance, gymnastics and ball games. Children are also provided with a range of daily activities to develop their fine and gross motor skills as they learn how to hold a knife and fork, practise zipping and unzipping their coats and using one handed tools such as scissors.

As children progress through the Early Years, they focus on further developing and refining these fundamental skills, progressing to a more fluent style of moving with more control. Children begin to use the skills they have learnt as a platform to develop more complex skills such as passing and kicking, as well as using a range of apparatus safely to work on their agility, balance and coordination. Children also begin to develop a deeper understanding pf physical health wellbeing by exploring subjects such as healthy eating and personal hygiene.

The focus, development and revisiting of fundamental skills provides our children with the confidence and competence to access more complex activities such as small games, athletics and dance and gymnastic sequences as they enter Key Stage One.