Curriculum Overview

“Leaders ensure that all pupils receive an exceptional education…the curriculum is ambitious for all pupils.” 

Ofsted, May 2023

Our Vision and Ethos

Our curriculum is underpinned by our learning ethos of Resilience, Reflectiveness, Reciprocity and Resourcefulness, and reinforced by our unwavering commitment to an ambitious, knowledge-rich approach. We aspire for all students to leave us equipped with a deep and broad knowledge that empowers them to think critically, act ethically, and develop innovative solutions to the challenges of tomorrow. Through a curriculum that is both broad and rigorous, every student is given equitable access to the best that has been thought and said, regardless of their starting point. 

As an Academy with a specialism in Science and Enterprise, we draw inspiration from the great thinkers of the past, encouraging our students to see themselves as scholars who seek to extend their understanding of the world and contribute to new knowledge themselves. We recognise that the curriculum is a living canon, not a static list of content. As such curriculum leaders continually engage in professional dialogue about what to teach before considering how best to teach it, ensuring that our offer remains rigorous, meaningful and rooted in ‘powerful knowledge’. Through this approach, we nurture our students to be prepared not only to succeed in their next steps, but to shape the future with confidence and purpose. 

For more information about our curriculum, please contact the relevant subject lead via info@harrisbeckenham.org.uk or reach out to our main office

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Purpose of our curriculum

Our curriculum is an ambitious and challenging knowledge-rich curriculum which teaches depth and breadth across all subjects.  We ensure all students have access to a broad and balanced body of knowledge regardless of demographics and starting points.  The central place of knowledge within the curriculum is explicit within our Academy. The inventive design of our curriculum and the high-quality implementation of that curriculum are integral to what we do as an individual Academy and as a vital part of Harris Federation. To this end we have worked as a collaborative Multi Academy Trust. We harness the expertise from within Harris Academy Beckenham, working in collaboration with the consultants and network strands to develop a relevant, challenging and rich curriculum model. Whilst we offer personalised pathways for our learners at each key stage, all students have equal access to a broad and diverse curriculum. Our enrichment curriculum provides a further extension to our students’ learning, providing opportunities to further consolidate the 4Rs as well as enhance every child’s cultural capital.

Curriculum leaders constantly review and improve curricular choices by engaging in regular debate on ‘what’ to teach before considering ‘how' to teach it. We acknowledge that the curriculum is alive and needs nurturing, it is not a list of content but a canon that must be considered and amended constantly to ensure we teach the best that has been thought, said or written. Leaders set an ambitious intent for curriculum as we know that ‘powerful’ knowledge, which is specialised and takes its authority from leading academic institutions, gives students power in life.

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Our Curriculum Intent

Resilience, Reflectiveness, Resourcefulness and Reciprocity

At Harris Academy Beckenham, we intend for all students to: 

• Access a broad, knowledge-rich curriculum that promotes equity, raises aspirations, and improves life chances regardless of starting point. 

• Understand knowledge as powerful yet evolving, and see themselves as enquiring learners who actively shape their own educational journey. 

• Secure strong foundations in English and Mathematics, while developing expertise across a wide range of subjects through a carefully sequenced curriculum. 

• Communicate confidently and effectively through a focus on Writing, Oracy and Reading (WORD), enriched by wide cultural experiences and an ambitious Key Stage 3 curriculum. 

Our curriculum encompasses ‘what we teach’ in the broadest sense, drawing together: 

• The academic curriculum taught through discrete subjects 

• The personal development curriculum taught through tutor time, assemblies and Think Big Days

• The wider curriculum taught through educational visits and enrichment opportunities

• The ‘hidden’ or ‘cultural’ curriculum, taught through the day-to-day experience of being a student within the Harris Academy Beckenham community. 

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Curriculum implementation

How do students learn the curriculum at Harris Academy Beckenham?

Each subject has its own bespoke curriculum, designed by our subject specialist curriculum leaders to provide breadth, challenge, and powerful disciplinary learning. Subject teachers maintain their high levels of subject knowledge through regular, subject-specific training and self-study, and draw on further support from active engagement with subject associations and collaboration with the Harris Federation’s expert central teams of subject specialists. 

Each Subject Curriculum is developed with our six guiding curriculum principles in mind: 

• Rigour 

• Powerful Knowledge 

• Sequencing 

• Retrieval 

• Ambition 

• Inclusion 

More information about what we mean by these principles can be found in our Curriculum Policy.

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The HABE Way principles

Our approach in the classroom is underpinned by strong education research where teachers employ the “I do, We do, You do” model of instruction. We truly believe that the teacher is the expert in the room and through clear, direct effective instruction and modelling there is no limit to what our students can achieve.

High expectations: a culture for learning that is positive; routines established to allow learners to thrive

Effective feedback and recap: the start of the lesson supports effective review for both the learner and teacher

Quality of instruction: ‘I do’ allows learners to engage with knowledge that is skillfully presented in small steps

Checking for misconceptions/understanding: ‘We do’ allows learners to engage with appropriate models/activities to support understanding and set learners up for effective deliberate practice.

Deliberate practice: ‘You do’ allows learners to practice with success due to it being directly linked to the I and we do sections of the lesson.

Thinking Hard: Thinking is firmly pushed back to the learner without compromising the overall learning environment. The range of TH tools are deployed which further supports challenge, independence and excellence as evidenced in the quality of the outcome to the You do task.

Active monitoring: Frequent use of AfL to support understanding and check errors; a wide range of learners are involved, and a range of checks and responses made e.g., through skillful questioning/use of a visualiser/use of adapted models, circulating the room.

 

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The impact of our curriculum

Our formative assessments are designed to support students in achieving fluency in each subject. This means that in lessons pupils are questioned on prior knowledge in order to embed this knowledge in their long-term memory. This frees up their working memory to attend to current learning. We are particularly conscious of the role that literacy and vocabulary play in unlocking the whole curriculum. Our teachers explicitly teach the meaning of subject-specific language, and we expect lessons to contain challenging reading and writing. 

We also encourage all students to read widely and provide guided reading lists to students, parents and carers. Every student has an equal right to a challenging and enlightening curriculum. By teaching this curriculum well, and developing effective habits in our students, we bring out the best in everyone at HABE. 

The impact of our curriculum is measured through several means: 

• Outcomes for students at GCSE and A Level 

• Progress and attainment data for current year groups 

• Destination data 

• Attendance data 

• Behaviour logs 

• Engagement in enrichment activities 

• Progress towards the Gatsby benchmarks 

• Student voice 

• MER including learning drop-ins and work scrutiny 

 

 

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How can you learn more about our curriculum? 

Each subject has its own page on this website, a list of which can be found here.

On each page, you can find the Subject Curriculum Plan for each Year, which sets out the intended curriculum and the rationale for what subject leaders have chosen to teach and when. These documents provide a foundation for more detailed curriculum planning by setting out the knowledge and skills to be taught during a given period of time. 

The Personal Development and Wider Curriculum is detailed in the Personal Development section of the website, which can be found here.