Design & Technology
Our Vision for Design & Technology
At St Matthew’s we believe that Design and Technology plays an important role in children’s development. It provides an opportunity to nurture creativity and innovation through design, and by exploring the designed and made world in which we all live and work.
Design and Technology also supports the teaching in other curriculum areas. It can help put these subjects into context in a fun and inspiring way, so that they are more readily understood.
Our Design & Technology Curriculum
At St Matthew’s we use the Design and Technology Association’s Projects on a Page scheme. These carefully designed projects are based on universal principles of effective teaching and learning in D&T. They enable the subject to be taught in an imaginative way whilst also ensuring that there is complete coverage of the national curriculum programmes of study. In D&T we develop children’s skills and knowledge in design, structures, mechanisms, electrical control and a range of materials, including food.
EYFS
Our children’s D&T education begins in the Early years. In the areas of Physical Development, Understanding the World, and Expressive Arts and Design, children develop the prerequisite skills for D&T. Over time, they explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, and learn how to handle equipment and tools effectively. They have many opportunities to use what they learn to represent their ideas in original ways. For example, they may create their own open-ended products that support their imaginative play such as making castles and cars out of large blocks. They may also create a variety of Lego structures or design, and make junk models using recyclable materials.
KS1
In KS1, the children complete one project per term where they are taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to design, make and evaluate a variety of different products. In year 1, they begin by exploring and using mechanisms to create a moving storyboard, building structures and preparing a fruit snack in cooking. In year 2 they explore a different aspect of mechanisms (wheels and axels), prepare a pizza in cooking and investigate templates and different joining techniques in textiles.
KS2
In KS2, the children continue to build on these skills. Through a range of different termly projects, they learn how to strengthen, stiffen and reinforce more complex structures, develop an understanding of how to use more complex mechanical systems in products, and understand and use electrical systems. The curriculum is carefully planned so that projects that cover a same technical area build on the skills learnt in an earlier project. For example, in Year 4 the children use 2D shapes to make a 3D product (a phone case), whereas in Year 6 they learn to combine different fabric shapes to make a leaver’s waistcoat. The also learn about key individuals in the world of design and technology, and begin to apply their understanding of computing to program, monitor and control their products.
Design & Technology
