’The first to help you up are the ones who know how it feels to fall down’
The world is evolving at an exponential rate and as educators, we are teaching students to pursue careers that don’t currently exist. To prepare students for tomorrow’s world, we need to look carefully at the concepts and skills that are universal. In this week’s Secondary Blog, Alice Curwood (Head of Curriculum PE) and Lewis Keens (Director of Sport) share how the KLASS Values are being built into our students’ learning experience in Year 7 PE.
A concept curriculum is an approach to curriculum design that moves away from subject-specific content and instead emphasises ‘big ideas’ that span multiple subject areas or disciplines. A conceptual approach offers an alternative to the traditional sport and skills-based approach to PE curriculum design and delivery. By using a ‘think, feel and act’ model, we structure our Distance Learning lessons to unravel the current knowledge our students hold and question their preconceptions of how the world works.
During the first half term of Distance Learning in PE, our Year 7 students have been working together to explore our KLASS value of ‘respect’, with physical activity and sport as the vehicle for learning. Using the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics as our foundation, students have experienced adapted challenges, discriminatory competitions and inclusive sports such as Boccia, to explore and make sense of our conceptual question: what is the relationship between respect, empathy and discrimination?
In the acquiring phase, students identify examples and non-examples of a concept before entering into discussions around their understanding of each, sharing their own definitions and experiences. Students then connect their knowledge, finding links and relationships between the key and anchoring concepts to gain a better understanding of how and why the concepts interact.
Finally, students display a deep understanding through knowledge transfer. In our ‘respect’ unit this understanding is assessed by creation and presentation of an inclusive game for their peers to play. A game that is fair and equal for all players. We know PE and sport can bring about wonderful examples of KLASS Values in action, but engaging students through PE during distance learning is an exciting new journey and a learning process for both staff and students alike!
The level of engagement, discussion and enthusiasm amongst our students so far has been fantastic and we look forward to turning our attention to ‘connectedness’ next.
Wishing you all a wonderful weekend,
Maria Osowiecki
Secondary Principal
