At St Laurence, Design and Technology is used to inspire children to create innovative designs which solve real and relevant problems within a variety of different contexts. Children are encouraged to identify real and relevant problems, critically evaluate existing products and then take risks when designing and creating solutions to the problems. Design and Technology gives children opportunities to reflect, evaluate and improve on prototypes using design criteria throughout to support this process. It also allows children to evaluate key events and individuals who have helped shape the world, showing the real impact of design and technology on the wider environment.

Design and Technology activities are taught in a variety of ways across St. Laurence Junior Academy, sometimes in blocks of taught time or as part of a topic. Teachers link projects with other subjects across the curriculum throughout the school. For example, a lot of our Design and Technology has been incorporated into St. Laurence’s long-term planning of Science or History and Geography topics. These links can be seen on our whole-school planning grids.

By the end of Key Stage 2, children are taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making.

Children will complete at least 3 in-depth design and technology projects each year which link to their topic work where possible. One of these projects will be part of the ‘cooking and nutrition’ aspect of the DT curriculum.

Through revisiting and consolidating skills, lesson plans and resources help children build on prior knowledge alongside introducing new skills, knowledge and challenge. Revision and introduction of key vocabulary is built into each lesson so that children are given opportunities to repeat and revise this knowledge.