DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY
Intent
At Maltby Lilly Hall Academy, we aim to allow children to use their imagination and creativity to design and make a range of products within a variety of contexts. Children will build and apply the knowledge and skills needed to design high quality products with a critical approach. They are given the opportunity to understand nutrition and how to cook.
We aim to nurture creativity and innovation of design by exploring and being critical of the world we live in. Throughout their time at Maltby Lilly Hall Academy, children will be encouraged to take risks when designing and making their products through engaging, purposeful and vocabulary rich design and technology lessons. The children will design, construct and evaluate models according to a brief. The level of design criteria, practical skills required and the evaluation process used is in alignment with the curriculum as the children move through school.
Implementation
Design and technology gives children the chance to explore their ideas whilst developing skills and their understanding of designing and making functional products.
Using individual creativity and imagination, pupils design and make products that solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts, considering their own and others’ needs, wants and values.
Children experience a design and technology curriculum that encompasses a range of skills and builds upon that of the previous year. This is achieved through fun and engaging lessons that spark a love of design in all pupils; all children will participate and excel in their learning. Ultimately, they will be proud of their achievements within design and technology.
D&T is taught regularly whilst ensuring links to current topics are paramount. Staff have the freedom to ‘block’ D&T if required, thereby completing a whole D&T project in a day or two. DT skills focus on the following model:
• Researching (including audience and purpose of the product).
• Designing
• Making (and testing)
• Evaluating
In EYFS, D&T is mainly taught through aspects of the Development Matters Curriculum. The type of product to be made is looked at along with its purpose and other existing products. Children then follow the cycle of designing, making, testing and evaluating.
In KS1, D&T includes the children looking at the type of product that they are going to make, they then research existing products and what they are used for and the features that the product needs for its purpose. The children will then design, make and evaluate their own product, building on skills obtained in EYFS.
In KS2, pupils build further on their skills and are given a brief for their product which they will research looking at key features and checking what would suit the potential audience. They then investigate how the product is made and follow the design, make, test, evaluate cycle.
Children will be given opportunities wherever possible to work with and meet people who work in different sectors across the community and nationally to broaden experience and aspiration.
Impact
Children learn how to take risks and be critical. They will become resourceful, innovative and capable citizens, whilst utilising a range of communicative skills to express and present their designs. Through challenge and refining their ideas, they will embrace improvement and become more ambitious as a result. Children will deepen their understanding and independence within other subject areas as well as extending skills beyond their design and technology lessons.