Design and Technology (DT) at West Wycombe School 

Design and Technology (DT) at West Wycombe School allows children to develop creativity, problem-solving skills, and practical knowledge through hands-on projects. Pupils explore designing, making, and evaluating products using various materials and techniques. The curriculum encourages innovation, teamwork, and resilience, helping children apply their learning to real-world challenges while fostering a love for design and engineering.

Intent

Our Design and Technology curriculum is designed to inspire pupils to think creatively and innovatively while developing an appreciation for the product design process, from initial ideas to creation and evaluation. We encourage pupils to take risks, experiment with design concepts, and refine their ideas through modelling and testing. By fostering reflective learning, we support children in evaluating both their work and that of others. Through this approach, we aim to enhance their understanding of the role of design and technology in everyday life and equip them with the skills to become resourceful, enterprising individuals who can contribute to future advancements in the field.

Implementation 

The National Curriculum for Design and Technology outlines three core stages of the design process: design, make, and evaluate. Each stage is supported by technical knowledge, which includes the contextual, historical, and technical insights needed for each aspect of the subject. Cooking and nutrition are treated separately, focusing on key principles, skills, and techniques related to food, such as its origins, diet, and seasonal considerations. The curriculum sets out the attainment targets for Design and Technology under three main categories: Design, Make, and Evaluate.

Through our DT units, pupils respond to design briefs and scenarios that require consideration of the needs of others, developing their skills in the six key areas of: Cooking and nutrition, textiles, mechanisms, structures, electrical systems (KS2 only) and the digital world (KS2 only). Each unit is clearly presented in our progression of skills document and demonstrate how these skills develop to ensure that attainment targets are securely met by the end of each key stage, building on prior learning. Creativity and discussion form key parts of our lessons, enabling children to critically think about their products and evaluate them successfully.

Each of our key areas follows the design process (design, make, and evaluate) and centres on a specific theme or aspect from the curriculum's technical knowledge or cooking and nutrition sections. The DT curriculum adopts a spiral approach, revisiting key topics with increasing complexity, which enables pupils to build on their prior learning as they progress.

Our lessons employ a variety of teaching strategies, including independent tasks, paired and group work, hands-on practical activities, computer-based tasks, and creative challenges. This diversity ensures that lessons remain engaging and cater to various learning styles. Topic-based booklets for each unit support pupils in consolidating factual knowledge by encouraging recall of key facts and vocabulary.

Impact

By the time our pupils leave West Wycombe, they should be fully equipped with a range of skills to enable them to succeed in their secondary education and be innovative and resourceful members of society. They should:

• Demonstrate an understanding of the functional and aesthetic properties of a range of materials and resources.
• Understand how to use and combine tools to carry out different processes for shaping, decorating and manufacturing products.
• Build and apply a repertoire of skills, knowledge and understanding to produce high quality, innovative outcomes.
• Understand and apply the principles of healthy eating, diets, and recipes, including key processes, food groups and cooking equipment.
• Recognise where our decisions can impact the wider world in terms of community, social and environmental issues.
• Self-evaluate and reflect on learning at different stages and identify areas to improve.
• Demonstrate strong outcomes, meeting the end of key stage expectations outlined in the National curriculum for Design and Technology.

Links Between Topics:

The progression of topics from Reception to Year 6 demonstrates a clear development of skills and concepts across different areas of Design and Technology:

• Exploration and Creativity: Reception focuses on experimenting with materials, tools, and techniques, laying the foundation for later structured projects. Children explore textures, colours, and forms, which underpin later work in textiles, structures, and mechanisms.

• Cooking and Nutrition: Beginning with simple healthy smoothies in Year 1, the curriculum develops towards more complex tasks, such as designing balanced meals (Year 2) and adapting recipes for seasonality (Year 3). By Year 6, children create full menus considering dietary requirements.

• Textiles: Early stages involve basic joining techniques (pinning, stapling, glueing in Year 1), progressing to sewing (running stitch in Year 2, cross-stitch and applique in Year 3). By Year 5, they use blanket stitch for stuffed toys, and in Year 6, they make more complex textile items, like a waistcoat, selecting appropriate materials.

• Mechanisms and Mechanical Systems: Starting with simple moving stories in Year 1, pupils progress to moving monsters (Year 2) and pneumatic toys (Year 3). By Year 5, they create pop-up books with different mechanisms, showing a deeper understanding of movement.

• Structures: The development moves from making simple pavilions (Year 4) to designing and constructing a playground (Year 6), demonstrating increasing complexity in structural design.

• Electrical Systems: Introduced in Year 4 through torches, this marks a shift towards integrating electrical components into projects.

Overall, the curriculum builds on prior knowledge, gradually increasing in complexity and independence, ensuring children develop practical skills alongside creativity and problem-solving abilities.