At Barcroft Primary School, we use a wide selection of resources to support our teaching of the National Curriculum. We use 'Teach Computing', which has a range of software that addresses all the key aspects of the curriculum and immediately engages the children’s interest. It is easy to use in school and provides pupils with well-structured and engaging lessons. The lessons delivered show clear progression from Year 1 to Year 6, allowing the children to build on previous learning. To support our Teach Computing curriculum, school have recently purchased Crumbles and MicroBits for lessons that teach pupils the key skills needed to become confident programmers. E-Safety is taught in every lesson, key questions are asked at the beginning of lessons and where possible scenarios link to E-Safety. At Barcroft we use Project Evolve for stand-alone E-Safety lessons and children take part in Safer Internet Day each year.

Alongside these provisions, we also deliver lessons using Barefoot Computing for children in Early Years.

Through the delivery of Computing we cover:

Computer Science: where children learn the main concepts: logic, evaluation, algorithms, patterns, decomposition and abstraction.

Information Technology: where children use laptops, Chromebooks and iPads to create content such as: movies, word processed documents, presentations, spreadsheets, pictograms, story books, databases and animations.  

Digital Literacy: where our children learn to stay safe whilst using technology for example what makes a strong password and how to be respectful online.

Mr G Bunce

Computing leader

How we support children with SEN

How do we ensure all children can access Computing lessons?

We ensure that we vary our teaching styles to suit the children in the class through visual aids for demonstration, hands on learning, auditory clips as well as discussion and simplification of language where needed. Access to word banks through various activities support our children along with informative displays in the classroom and some video demonstrations. Tasks are differentiated where appropriate and instructions are simplified and broken down.

Some lessons are carried out without the use of a computer/iPad or Chromebook so that the task can be broken down further and children can gain a deeper understanding of the task that they are presented with. Lessons are differentiated into smaller objectives to help children to understand the bigger objective, ensuring that all the little steps in between are achieved and progression is followed.

How does Computing at Barcroft Prepare children with Special Educational Needs for the future?

Computing prepares children with special educational needs for adulthood in a number of ways. Computing builds on preferred learning skills as our children use alternative methods for recording their work e.g. creating videos and slideshow presentations along with spell checker to gain confidence and achieve success. Our use of motivating tasks from coding, to videos and animations to stimulate interest and enthusiasm that build on various different subjects and activities, making the wider curriculum more accessible. The children enjoy using the software we have as it is exciting and provides hands on learning- all of which helps to equip pupils with the confidence and skills to use digital tools and technologies throughout their lives.

How we challenge more able pupils

How do we challenge pupils in computing lessons?

At Barcroft, children that are more able are challenged through questioning and can move onto a more complex task using the skills they know to apply them in different contexts. For example in coding we use Discovery Coding, which presents several levels to move through, the children could create their own game using coding.

More able pupils will be able to tackle tasks independently and will be able to investigate their own ideas using a range of resources confidently and effectively.

More able children will be confident modelling to others how to do things using different technology such as computers, laptops, I-pads, Chrome Books, Digital Cameras, Bee Bots, Visualizers, playing the role of teacher.

When presenting their work more able children will be proficient in using a range of programs including Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Publisher and Microsoft PowerPoint. They will be able to explain logically what they are doing and how to others so they can develop their computing skills.

What jobs can Computing lead to in the future for more abled pupils?

Being more able in Computing can lead to many jobs in the future such as:

· Software Developer

· Website designer or developer

· Games developer or designer

· Computer Sales Support

· IT Technical Support Officer

· Office/Admin /School Business Manager

· Applications Programmer

· Systems Analyst

· Systems Programmer

· Multimedia Programmer

· Database Administrator

Useful websites:

• Teach computing - https://teachcomputing.org/
• Project Evolve - https://projectevolve.co.uk/
• Barefoot Computing - https://www.barefootcomputing.org/
• Safer Internet Day - https://saferinternet.org.uk/safer-internet-day/safer-internet-day-2023

Please use the link below to view the Computing Policy: