Curriculum Enrichment

 

At Birchfield, it is important to us to make sure that our children, throughout their journey with us, will experience a wide range of different experiences and opportunities that help to raise our children's aspirations, promote pride in achievements that move beyond our curriculum. For us, education is not just restricted to the core subjects and shouldn’t be restricted to the classroom. Therefore, we plan plenty of exciting enrichment opportunities which enhance our curriculum at Birchfield, embed learning and life skills and of course create wonderful memories for our children to look back on. 

Enrichment activities provided for our children can vary from being a whole school experience where they take part in immersive, themed curriculum days or enjoy and experience a range of workshops like Art. Throughout our teaching and learning,  we also provide further opportunities to enhance children’s learning wherever possible. These include:

Whole School Themed Days 

 

      

Throughout the academic year, we plan and deliver a range of themed days/weeks that extend the skills and knowledge of the curriculum. These include: Online Safety Day,  Arts Week, Religious Education Experience Days, World Book Day, Black History Day,  Mini-enterprise Week (Year 6), Science Days and Topic Themed Days linked to curriculum directly. 

We continually look for opportunities where we can promote whole school learning and encourage themed days to happen regularly each term to promote our links with parental engagement. 

Birchfield Experiences

A good education is the springboard for lifelong learning and an understanding and appreciation of others. At Birchfield, we recognise that learning is not just confined to the classroom; learning can occur anywhere!

Therefore, at Birchfield, we interweave the development of a child’s cultural capital at the heart of our broad and balanced curriculum. Cultural capital can be defined as the accumulation of essential knowledge needed to be educated citizens to engender an appreciation of human creativity and achievement.

It is through this understanding that we have developed a list of experiences to empower children’s learning and deepen their knowledge of both curriculum and non-curriculum content. In short, the development of additional experiences for our pupils will strengthen the fabric of their learning and allow them to navigate through school with a deepened sense of security and happiness.

As a school, we have carefully selected the experiences that will be contextually important to the children. These chosen experiences and activities have been incorporated into our curriculum to enrich learning and enhance the children’s understanding of the world that we live in. Below is a small selection of activities that children will encounter throughout their journey at Birchfield.

In addition to these experiences, we also offer residential visits that take place in Year 3 and Year 5. The programme takes our children to Magdalena Farm in Year 3 to be immersed in outdoor adventures and experiences, where they will take part in adventurous activities such as looking after livestock, hiking and low ropes and being away from home without Mum and Dad. In Y5, we offer a city visit to Bath and Bristol or London, where your child will experience historical museums, visit and enjoy a theatre performance and experience the sights and sounds of being in the city. 

Check back with us soon to see our updated version of our Birchfield Experiences 

Outdoor Learning 

As a school, we are very fortunate in being able to now offer our own out door learning area in addition to 'Hummer Woods'. 

Sessions are designed around the needs of the group to ensure that they are learner-led.  Many areas of the National Curriculum are intrinsically covered in the Forest Schools experience. Teamwork skills are developed through games and activities.  Individual skills and self-esteem are heightened throughout activities such as hide and seek, shelter building, tool skills, lighting fires or environmental art.  Each activity develops intra and inter-personal skills as well as practical and intellectual skills.

Autumn Term - Winter Gardening with Mr Critchell 

Spring Term - 

Summer Term - 

Check back with us soon as we are currently up dating this provision 

After School Clubs 

At Birchfield, our learning continues beyond the classroom and the normal school day as we offer a variety of extra-curricular clubs after our school day has ended. There are a variety of clubs on offer to children, as you can see from the list below, some are offered exclusively to particular year groups (based on age requirement etc) whereas others are open to all year groups – these details will be shared on the club letters that are emailed out towards the end of the term. We will ensure that our service is fully inclusive in meeting the needs of all children.  

We ask that you please ensure your child has the correct kit/clothing as failure to provide this will result in your child not being able to take part. This is especially important for sports clubs. In wet weather, classroom sessions will be held instead.

We expect all our children to behave in extra-curricular clubs as they would during the school day. Should they not do so, they may lose their place. They will receive a written warning before their place is withdrawn.

Children must be collected promptly at the stated finishing time. If a child is late being collected, their place will be at risk. If somebody else is collecting your child, please ensure they are aware of the collection door, finishing time and have your password.

 

 

Birchfield School Choir

Our KS2 school choir, is a vocal ensemble that is taught throughout the whole year. Our school choir has been built to allow children with a love of singing to join an additional group where they can apply a range of taught musical skills as they continue to create and experience music as a musical ensemble. This is a school club that runs within the school timetable and is an additional enrichment club to their weekly music lessons and singing assemblies. 

Computer Coding Club

   

Cross-Country Club

Dance Club

At Birchfield, we currently run two clubs for KS1 and KS2. Our dance clubs are fun and educational with a focus on improving stamina, co-ordination, core strength and dance technique. Each week the children develop their mobility skills with practise of key dance skills before using and applying a range of dance skills through the rehearsal of a dance. 

Football Club

Our football club runs for KS2 children and are inclusive of both a boys and girls football teams. When it comes to selecting players for the school team, who take part in inter-school matches with local schools, children must consistently demonstrate that they are an ‘Always’ person with regards to their behaviour in school and must maintain their attendance at the club each week.

Multi-Skills CLUB

Our multi-skills club runs for KS1  children and are inclusive of both a boys and girls. This club aims to support the development of basic ball skills and build stamina for physical activity, whilst teaching the children with the foundations of different movements in PE. 

Netball Club

STEAM Club

Educational Visits and Class Residentials 

At Birchfield, we pride ourselves on delivering high quality trips that are fully risk assessed with reference to activities and individual cohorts. Every planned educational trip and visitor will directly link to the theme/topic that the children are learning about as well as a phase end of year residential trip for Years 3 and Year 5.  

We encourage our teachers to offer as many out of classroom learning opportunities as they can because we recognise that they help to enrich the curriculum and improve educational attainment; boosts self-esteem and motivation; develops key skills; assists in developing and enhancing social skills of all our children whilst promoting health, fitness, fun and enjoyment. 

Furthermore, the out of classroom opportunities we provide help to build stronger links between schools and communities and broaden a child’s horizons and their knowledge of the world around them.

Homework

Although homework can inform parents about children's current class work and stimulate their learning, we are not a school where homework dominates home and school life; we accept that not every activity will capture children and parents’ imagination and that weekends can sometimes be busy. We believe that homework should be enjoyable and manageable for all concerned and that if it becomes a chore or a source of conflict it ceases to be a constructive aspect of teaching and learning. In our classes, we do not specify amounts of time that must be spent on a task, preferring individual children and families to set their own routines.

Our expectation as a school is that homework tasks are short and provide revision for key skills taught previously in the classroom. These include one Math and one English task that reflects the year groups expectations. 

Additional homework projects are optional and restricted to having one themed homework for a term. These optional, non-core homework projects ensure that our children develop a deeper and wider breadth of understanding across the curriculum and provide an opportunity for your to extend and support your child's learning at home.