Physical Education
Our PE curriculum aims to inspire all students to succeed and excel in competitive sport and other physically demanding activities. We provide opportunities for students to become physically confident whilst also encouraging a positive approach to their health and fitness. Through our varied PE curriculum, students develop character and embed values such as fairness and respect. Our curriculum ensures that all students have the opportunity to excel in a broad range of activities, engage in a range of competitive sports and activities and ultimately lead healthy, active lives. Students practise key life skills such as teamwork, problem solving and resilience to help them to become well-rounded individuals who have strong personal foundations to make informed decisions about their futures.
Students are provided with opportunities to build on and embed the physical development and skills learnt in KS2. We aim for students to become more competent and confident in their techniques and to be able to apply these across a wide range of sports that we offer. We aim to develop students’ confidence and maintain interest to motivate them to get involved in exercise, sports, and activities out of school and in later life.
“For me, learning how to believe in myself came when I started reading books; it showed me how to explore the possibilities within myself. When I was younger, I had a dream of playing football for England, but I wasn’t quite sure how to get there. Books helped me figure out how to dream big, how to chase my dream, and how to develop a champion mindset, which I practise every single day.” - Marcus Rashford.
Students are offered a wide range of both competitive and non-competitive activities at KS3. We use a range of different active learning strategies to give students the skills and knowledge they need to become independent and co-operative learners who can reflect and develop their own and others’ performance. Students are given opportunities to practise coaching and officiating skills to embed knowledge, improve confidence and develop sporting values such as tolerance and respect. We have a multi-use sports hall that allows us to offer indoor games such as handball, basketball, football, netball, and badminton. Our outdoor facilities include netball courts, a large field, and an artificial pitch, allowing us to offer sports such as football, hockey, rugby, netball, striking games, and athletics.
In Key Stage 4 all students receive one hour of ‘core PE’. During core PE students are offered a range of opportunities and they are given the chance to choose which activity they wish to do. Students are encouraged to take part with enthusiasm to develop their personal fitness whilst also improving their health and wellbeing. In addition to core PE, students will be able to choose OCR Cambridge Nationals in Sports Studies as one of their options. Through this course students will develop their understanding of issues affecting people’s participation in sports, and the role of sport in promoting values as well as developing their practical sports and leadership skills.
An important aspect of our PE department is our commitment to offering many extracurricular activities. We provide opportunities for our students to attend extracurricular clubs and represent the school at inter-school sporting fixtures. We have successful teams in football, netball, basketball, handball, cricket, rounders, and athletics. We also enter local tournaments for badminton, sports hall athletics, swimming, and girls’ football. We believe that all students should have the opportunity to participate in competitive sport.