Design Technology
Intent:
At Howick C of E Primary School, our Design and Technology curriculum is designed to provide all pupils with a high-quality, ambitious, and inclusive education within a caring Christian community, where every child is valued and supported to flourish. The curriculum is broad, balanced, and language-rich, enabling pupils to develop the knowledge, skills, and understanding they need to succeed both in school and in the wider world.
Design and Technology is taught as a discrete subject across Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 and is rooted in the National Curriculum. Our intent is to inspire pupils to become creative, innovative, and reflective problem-solvers who understand how design and technology impacts everyday life and contributes to a rapidly changing, global society.
Pupils are taught to follow the design process of researching, designing, making, and evaluating, applying it to real-life, meaningful contexts relevant to their experiences. They learn to consider user needs, function, and purpose, and are encouraged to take risks, learn from failure, and refine their ideas through evaluation and feedback.
The DT curriculum is carefully sequenced and progressive, building on prior learning and developing pupils’ technical knowledge, practical skills, and subject-specific vocabulary over time. Pupils explore a range of materials, components, and techniques, including structures, mechanisms, textiles, electrical systems, and food and nutrition, ensuring they are well-prepared for the next stage of learning.
Through high-quality teaching and first-hand learning experiences, pupils develop the ability to work safely and confidently with tools and materials, collaborate effectively with others, and apply creativity and critical thinking to solve problems. The curriculum promotes equality and inclusion, ensuring that all pupils’ ideas are valued and that every child can achieve high standards in both designing and making.
Ultimately, our Design and Technology curriculum aims to develop resilient, resourceful, and enterprising learners equipped with the skills, knowledge, and values to make positive contributions to the world around them.
Implementation
At Howick C of E Primary School, Design and Technology is implemented through a carefully sequenced, progressive curriculum that builds pupils’ knowledge, skills, and technical understanding in line with the National Curriculum and Kapow Primary’s scheme of work.
Our curriculum is structured around the three stages of the design process: Design, Make, Evaluate, underpinned by technical knowledge, which includes the historical, contextual, and practical understanding required for each strand. Cooking and nutrition is taught as a distinct focus, covering principles, skills, techniques, diet, seasonality, and the origin of ingredients.
We follow Kapow Primary’s six key areas, revisited in a spiral curriculum to ensure progression and consolidation of learning:
- Cooking and nutrition
- Mechanisms (including simple mechanical systems)
- Structures
- Textiles
- Electrical systems (KS2 only)
- Digital world (KS2 only)
Within each key area, pupils respond to realistic design briefs and scenarios, considering the needs of others and developing creativity, technical skills, and reflective thinking. Units are carefully sequenced so that pupils revisit skills and concepts with increasing complexity, ensuring attainment targets are securely met by the end of each Key Stage.
Lesson design and teaching strategies include:
- Independent tasks, paired and group work
- Practical, hands-on making, computer-based tasks, and inventive challenges
- Differentiated guidance to ensure accessibility for all pupils, with opportunities to extend learning for higher-attaining pupils
- Knowledge organisers to build key factual knowledge and subject-specific vocabulary
To support high-quality delivery, teachers have access to Kapow’s comprehensive guidance, including lesson plans, videos, and CPD resources, ensuring strong subject knowledge and consistent progression across year groups. This support allows all pupils to benefit from a rigorous, engaging, and inclusive DT curriculum, where practical skills, creativity, problem-solving, and reflective thinking are consistently developed.
Through this implementation, pupils gain confidence in working with tools, materials, and digital systems, apply their knowledge in meaningful contexts, and are prepared to make positive contributions as innovative and enterprising citizens.
Impact
The impact of our Design and Technology curriculum is monitored through ongoing formative assessment, summative assessment, and pupil self-reflection, ensuring that learning is progressive, measurable, and meaningful. Teachers use unit-specific guidance, quizzes, knowledge catchers, and assessment tools to evaluate pupils against lesson objectives, inform planning, and provide appropriate challenge or support.
Aligned with the Kapow Primary scheme, pupils develop the knowledge, skills, and confidence to apply the design, make, and evaluate cycle across a range of contexts. Pupils build practical, technical, and creative skills across the six key areas, revisiting and consolidating skills in a spiral curriculum that increases in complexity as they progress through school.
Pupils are supported to:
- Understand the functional and aesthetic properties of a wide range of materials and resources
- Use and combine tools and techniques to shape, decorate, and manufacture products
- Build and apply a repertoire of skills, knowledge, and understanding to produce high-quality, innovative outcomes, including models, prototypes, CAD, and products that meet user or client needs
- Understand and apply principles of healthy eating, diet, and cooking, including key processes, food groups, and equipment
- Develop awareness of key historical and contemporary inventions, designers, and events that impact the world
- Recognise the social, environmental, and community impact of design decisions
- Self-evaluate and reflect on learning at multiple stages, identifying areas for improvement
Our curriculum ensures pupils meet the end-of-key-stage expectations for Design and Technology outlined in the National Curriculum, leaving Howick as confident, creative, enterprising, and resourceful learners. Through carefully sequenced lessons, meaningful design briefs, and hands-on experiences, pupils are prepared to succeed in secondary education and contribute positively as innovative, reflective, and responsible members of society.
Design and Technology
Long Term Overview and Our Curriculum Explained
Progression of Skills and Knowlegde
Our DT curriculum is intentionally cumulative and progressive, ensuring pupils revisit and build upon prior learning in a structured, sequential way. This approach enables children to develop increasingly sophisticated technical knowledge, practical skills, and creative problem-solving abilities, preparing them for success in later Key Stages and beyond.
The Early Years Foundation Stage and National Curriculum
Our Curriculum Coverage
Early Years Foundation Stage
In addition to our Kapow Learning, Design Technology takes place in the classroom daily as part of our discovery time. Design and technology in the early years can enable children to make sense of the world in which they live. Children do this by making, changing and modifying (or designing) things for themselves. Design and technology enables children to gain knowledge and understanding of their world. Design is not just about drawing, but about thinking. Creating a biscuit or designing a new Lego structure require no drawing, but both involve some experience, some imagination and a willingness to change and modify ideas. Technology, on the other hand, is about doing - making something for a purpose. It involves putting ideas into practice and having an awareness of the possibilities and limitations of different materials. Children need to experience at first hand the consequences of the decisions they have made, rather than quickly being shown by an adult how to get it 'right'. Purposeful making involves creativity, imagination and fun - as well as making mistakes.
.
National Curriculum
Class 2
Class 3
Class 4
Whole School
Our fabulous children had the opportunity to take part in a Lego Coding day with Junior Stem. Together they design, made and evaluated their moving Lego structures. A huge thank you to Nick at Junior Stem for inspiring our wonderful bunch!
https://www.juniorstem.co.uk/primary-school-workshops/
Skills:
- Designing
- Programming
- Creativity and Problem Solving
Kapla was so much fun! It was wonderful to see how the children could build upon their design as well as problem solve.
Extra Curricular Activities: Cooking Club
The children have been enjoying making lots of delicious and healthy foods! Over the last couple of weeks, we have enjoyed making home made pizzas, berry crumble and cookies! Well done to our super chefs for designing and making these fabulous delicious treats.
Information for Parents
How can I encourage learning at home?
- Get your child to sort objects by different criteria. You could do this by getting them to help to set the table or organise shopping items to be put away. For older children, encourage your child to think of the different food groups and consider the importance of a balanced diet.
- When talking to your child, look for opportunities to notice and discuss materials around them – utensils in the kitchen, tree barks on a walk, soft furnishings in the bedroom. You could compare materials and discuss suitability.
- While speaking, use the language of designing and making, for example words such as ‘join', ‘build' and ‘shape'. And use evaluative and comparative language – ‘longer', ‘shorter', ‘lighter', ‘heavier' and ‘stronger'.
- Encourage and support the use of a range of tools, such as scissors, hole punch, stapler, glue spreader, rolling pin, cutter and grater. As children grow older they will become more independent. Why not encourage your child to make lunch?
Be Brave, Be Bold, Be a Dreamer!
Do you love D.T?
There are lots of projects that you can complete at home. Here is a link to a webpage with lots of ideas: https://www.theschoolrun.com/5-home-design-and-technology-projects-primary-children
Please remember to always get permission from an adult before completing any projects!
If you decide to complete a D.T project at home, please remember to bring in a picture or your finished product. Dojo points will be given to those creative entrepreneurs that decide to continue their learning at home.
Designers of Past and Present
Remember you can achieve anything you put your mind to! Just like you, these artists and designers started with passion for seeing beyond the impossible.
