This case study is unusual in a number of ways.
Firstly, it looks at a Unit of work in a primary school. The other case studies on this web site look at work in secondary schools. We hope that this study will be useful to both primary and secondary teachers and will support progression and continuity between KS2 and KS3, an area that Ofsted has consistently highlighted as weak.
Secondly, the work is described by both Robyn Mason-Holt (the primary school teaching assistant) and Paul Gardiner (who developed the original ideas for the Unit of work and organised a supporting course that Robyn attended).
Kislingbury is a village, four miles West of Northampton.
Kislingbury C of E primary school caters for children from Reception to Y6 and there are 126 pupils on role.
The school’s Ofsted inspection report of May 2000 states: “Kislingbury is a very good school. It is very well led and the governors, headteacher, and all the staff are determined that the pupils will meet the highest standards they are capable of reaching. Everyone works together as an effective team, the teaching is very good, and these are the main reasons that standards are so high. By the time the pupils are 11 their standards are well above average and steadily increasing.”
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I am Robyn Mason-Holt and I am a part-time teaching assistant at Kislingbury primary school. I am currently in the second year of a part time foundation degree in Education at Northampton University .
Design and technology is normally taught at Kislingbury by the class teacher. Typically it is organised in concentrated periods of half a term, and allocated two hours a week. We do this so that less time is wasted in getting things out and clearing up, and we also find that this helps the children to focus on the work.
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In 2005 I attended a three-hour course with Paul Gardiner which he organised as part of the support of the EiSS Hub at Finham Park School in partnership with SETPOINT Coventry/Warwickshire. The course was an introduction to the Revolution Education Cyberpet.
I had no previous experience of electronics and my previous experience of ICT was quite limited, so it was a considerable challenge.
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However, I and the class teacher agreed that it would be worth introducing Y6 to the Cyberpet because we felt that it was an experience they would not normally have at primary school, it would end the year on a ‘high’ and it would give the children a foretaste of secondary school design and technology where they would do projects involving electronics.
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