Intent

At Star Academy, our curriculum is rooted in our core belief: “Desire to learn, learn to achieve.” We place every child at the heart of our provision, ensuring they receive the highest quality education—one that nurtures curiosity, fuels ambition, and opens the door to a lifetime of learning and opportunity.

Our intent is to offer all children, regardless of their starting points or backgrounds, a rich, inclusive, and inspiring curriculum that enables them to thrive. We aim to foster a genuine love of learning, raise aspirations, and develop confident, articulate, and resilient young people who are well prepared for the next stage of their education and life beyond.

By placing a strong emphasis on language development, reading fluency, and broad real-world experiences, our curriculum equips pupils with the knowledge, skills, and cultural capital they need to succeed. It opens windows to the wider world, broadens horizons, and empowers every child to recognise their potential and take pride in their achievements.

Learning at Star Academy is creative, purposeful, and ambitious. Our nurturing and respectful environment enables children to flourish academically, socially, and emotionally. Through carefully sequenced learning and high-quality teaching, our pupils develop into well-rounded individuals who:

  • Show a love for learning and the resilience to overcome challenges

  • Read fluently, write effectively, and apply maths with confidence

  • Are independent, inquisitive thinkers who explore and question the world around them

  • Take pride in their efforts, show ambition, and set high expectations for themselves

  • Are compassionate, respectful, and caring members of the community

  • Demonstrate responsibility, confidence, and a strong sense of citizenship

  • Express themselves clearly and thoughtfully, with the ability to reason, debate and reflect

Through this approach, we are committed to transforming lives—helping each child at Star Academy to achieve their very best.

Implementation

At Star Academy, we implement a rich and ambitious curriculum designed to ensure that every child has the knowledge, skills, and understanding to thrive both now and in the future. Grounded in the National Curriculum, our programmes of study are carefully structured into a comprehensive, sequential model that promotes progression, depth, and connectivity across subjects and year groups.

Our curriculum is purposefully designed so that children do not view learning in isolation. We create meaningful cross-curricular links that enable pupils to make connections across subjects and apply their knowledge and skills in different contexts. Subject disciplines are woven together through carefully designed themes and contexts, allowing for repeated exposure, reflection, and deeper learning. This approach supports our pupils to know more, remember more, and do more.

To ensure deep immersion and mastery, we block-teach key foundation subjects including science, history, geography, art, and design technology. This focused, immersive approach enables children to explore and retain knowledge at greater depth, while other subjects such as English, mathematics, PE, and RE are taught weekly to maintain consistency and ongoing development.

Our history curriculum exemplifies our commitment to thoughtful sequencing and knowledge building. In Key Stage 1, pupils begin with events close to their own lives, moving backwards through time to develop their understanding of the ‘place value’ of history. In Key Stage 2, history is taught in chronological order, supporting children to develop a clear sense of historical context and continuity.

The implementation of each subject is supported by:

  • Clear medium-term plans that build progressively on prior knowledge

  • Carefully crafted lesson sequences that scaffold learning within and across units

  • Responsive teaching practices that adapt to individual pupil needs

We ensure that teachers build on what pupils already know and can do, making deliberate connections across topics. Our use of spaced repetition, high-quality resources, and explicit vocabulary instruction ensures that children can recall and apply learning with increasing independence and fluency.

Quality First Teaching is the cornerstone of our implementation model. Our staff have high expectations and a shared commitment to delivering excellent teaching every day. This is underpinned by:

  • High-quality lesson design with clear, focused objectives

  • Consideration of prior learning to build strong foundations

  • Effective modelling, questioning, and scaffolding to support all learners

  • A strong emphasis on pupil engagement, interaction, and independence

  • Positive reinforcement to motivate and celebrate success

  • An expectation that children take responsibility for their learning and develop resilience

To support every child to reach their full potential, lessons are carefully tailored to meet a range of needs, ensuring that pupils—regardless of background or starting point—access the full breadth of the curriculum.

Cultural Capital and Personal Development

Alongside academic excellence, we are committed to developing the whole child. Our curriculum is designed to build cultural capital and prepare pupils to become respectful, responsible, and aspirational citizens. Through PSHE, RE, assemblies, and our values-based curriculum, children are equipped with the attitudes, life skills, and character traits needed to navigate the wider world with confidence.

Measuring Impact

To make sure our curriculum is working well, we carefully monitor a range of information to understand how children are progressing, how engaged they are in learning, and how well they are developing personally and academically. This includes:

  • Checking children’s progress and attainment regularly through assessments

  • Using ongoing teacher feedback to support learning in real time

  • Tracking attendance and behaviour to ensure children feel safe, included, and happy

  • Monitoring which children are taking part in clubs and wider opportunities

  • Listening to what children tell us through pupil voice activities and questionnaires

  • Asking for feedback from parents and carers

  • Observing lessons and reviewing children’s work across all subjects

  • Holding regular curriculum and book reviews to ensure consistency and high standards

  • Working with other schools and staff to moderate and share best practice

We believe that success is not just about test scores—it’s about how well children learn, how much they enjoy school, and how prepared they are for life in modern Britain. By looking at a broad picture of each child’s journey, we can make sure our curriculum supports all learners to “desire to learn and learn to achieve.”

English Reading

  • Early Years & KS1 – Little Wandle Phonics & Reading
  • From Y2 to Y6 Grammasaurus Reading 
  • Whole school reading scheme online Big Cat Collins Book
  • Whole class Pie Corbett Reading Spines

English Writing

  • Literacy Counts Ready Steady Write
  • Colourful Semantics
  • ATT Way Spellings
  • Kinetic Letters Handwriting
  • No More Marking 
  • Grammarsaurus

Maths

  • White Rose Maths
  • Concrete/Pictoral/Abstract approach
  • Third Space Four Operation Fluent in Five retrieval practise questions
  • Tentown

ICT

  • Purple Mash

Modern Foreign Languages

  • Language Angels – KS2 Spanish

Music

  • Charanga

PE

  • Get Set for PE

PSHE

  • Jigsaw
  • Votes for Schools

History, Geography & Science

Grammasaurus 

Whole school overview:

STA Master Curriculum