Intent
Riversdale Primary School uses the Kapow! Spanish scheme and resources to ensure we offer a relevant, broad, vibrant and ambitious foreign languages curriculum that will inspire and excite our pupils using a wide variety of topics and themes.
Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme of work aims to instil a love of language learning and an awareness of other cultures. We want pupils to develop the confidence to communicate in Spanish for practical purposes, using both written and spoken Spanish. Through our scheme of work, we aim to give pupils a foundation for language learning that encourages and enables them to apply their skills to other languages, facilitates further language study and opens future opportunities to study and work abroad.
Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme of work supports pupils to meet the National curriculum end of Key stage 2 attainment targets (there are no Key stage 1 attainment targets for languages). The curriculum aims to provide pupils with a firm foundation of language learning. For this reason, we have carefully planned and sequenced when to teach the three building blocks of a language system, known as our Kapow Primary knowledge strands:
Pupils connect these building blocks of knowledge to create meaning in a variety of contexts, allowing them to develop their skills in the following strands:
Ample opportunities are provided to ensure that children practise new learning across all four modalities.
Implementation
Through Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme, pupils are given opportunities to communicate for practical purposes around familiar subjects and routines. The scheme provides balanced opportunities for communication in both spoken and written Spanish. Pupils first develop confidence and accuracy with oral skills then increasingly apply their knowledge to extended reading and writing as they progress through Key stage 2.
The Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme is a spiral curriculum, with key skills, grammar and vocabulary revisited with increasing complexity, allowing pupils to revise and build on their previous learning. Cross-curricular links are included throughout our Spanish units, allowing children to make connections and apply their language skills to other areas of their learning.
Lessons incorporate a range of teaching strategies from independent tasks, paired and group work including role-play, language games and language detective work. Our scheme of work focuses on developing what we term ‘language detective skills’ and developing an understanding of Spanish grammar, rather than committing to memory vast amounts of Spanish vocabulary.
Each unit is based on a specific theme with a motivating end outcome which gives the children a context and clear purpose for their learning. Guidance for adapting the learning is available for every lesson to ensure that lessons can be accessed and enjoyed by all. To help pupils retain their Spanish learning, we provide information on incorporating Spanish into the classroom environment every day in our ‘During the week’ sections.
Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme has been created with the understanding that many teachers do not feel confident delivering the full language curriculum and every effort has been made to ensure they feel supported to deliver lessons of a high standard that ensure pupil progression.
Strong subject knowledge is vital for staff to be able to deliver a highly effective language curriculum. Accordingly, each unit of lessons includes multiple teacher videos to develop subject knowledge and support ongoing CPD. Lessons include sections to explain key grammar and language points to the teacher before the lesson, together with key vocabulary and a pronunciation sound guide. Lesson presentations include sound files, supporting teachers who are less confident with their own pronunciation to deliver the lesson and support the children's learning. In addition, there is also a comprehensive series of phoneme videos to build teachers’ and pupils’ speaking confidence.
Curriculum Progression
At Riversdale Primary School we believe in the importance of all children developing a deep understanding of the various aspects of Moden Foreign Languages, including Language Comprehension and Language Production. We believe in embedding the substantive knowledge and disciplinary skills into their long-term memory, and as such, we have selected a well planned and carefully mapped curriculum.
You can find a copy of the 2024-25 Spanish Progression Document here.
As the school understands the importance of building a clear and sequential curriculum in order to provide pupils with the opportunity to develop and consolidate the related knowledge and skills, we have utilised the advice and guidance of Kapow to develop a long-term timetable for the Spanish curriculum. You can find this here.
Lesson Delivery
All children are taught by a qualified specialist teacher, who is a native Spanish speaker, in dedicated lessons that take place weekly. We structure the timetable in such a way as to ensure pupils are building on knowledge and skills throughout the year, rather than in blocks, and use retrieval practices to move knowledge from pupils’ working memory to their long-term memory. Pupils are given the opportunity to explore a varied range of topics.
Pupils are provided with a Knowledge Organiser designed by Kapow that:
Useful Resources
The links below are useful resources to support the Spanish Curriculum.
Curriculum Policies
Here's a quick link to some useful information for parents and carers, including home learning apps and the school's communication app.
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