Key Stage 3

As with every other stage in education, we believe that Key Stage 3 needs to be broad, balanced and rich. It must engage students in familiar subjects, but allow them to explore new ones, too. Our curriculum at this key stage is informed by our wider curriculum model, which you can read about by clicking the link to the document below:

Secondary-School-Curriculum-Model.pdf

The table below illustrates each of the subjects we offer in Years 7-9:

We believe Key Stage 3 should challenge our students appropriately, sharing the big picture of ‘what’ we are learning and ‘why’ we are learning it, whilst also allowing them to take the next steps towards becoming subject experts.

Through working closely with our local primary schools and reviewing a range of assessment data on our incoming cohorts, we make sure we are absolutely clear about our students’ substantive and disciplinary knowledge when they arrive with us. We use this information to inform our Year 7 curriculum, through which we aim to address their deficits and build upon their many strengths. Through this process, we prepare our students for Year 8 - and, successively, for each new year or stage in their education. We continually reflect on our students' strengths and deficits, ensuring our students are ready for transition points between year groups, but also to ensure that we adapt the curriculum to suit their needs whenever this may be relevant.

We have designed our Key Stage 3 curriculum in each subject area according to the values, aims and principles in our curriculum model. The links at the bottom of this page will allow you to explore the features of each of our different subject areas, including how they deliver both substantive and disciplinary knowledge; how they address deficits from Key Stage 2 and prepare students for Key Stage 4; and how students are assessed throughout this course of study.

In each year of Key Stage 3, we have established benchmarks for progress in each of the subject we teach. These benchmarks are the means by which we determine whether students are ready for progression to the next stage of the curriculum in each subject, and are based upon both substantive and disciplinary knowledge in each subject. Typically, we would expect students who are making good progress to be ‘competent’ by the end of Year 7, ‘confident’ by the end of Year 8, and ‘detailed and accurate’ by the end of Year 9. These expectations form the basis of our KS3 assessment grids, which are the means by which students are assessed. You can view our assessment grids for each subject using the links provided below.  

Click here to view further information on our curriculum intent at Key Stage 3Click here to view information on each of our subjects at Key Stage 3