Year 8 Currciulum Booklet
Introduction
We have many parents and carers asking us what more can they do to support their child’s learning.
In this booklet, you will find information about:
· what your child will be learning in each subject this term
· how you can support your child’s learning at home.
Your child’s planner contains lots of useful information including: timing of the college day, term dates, uniform, policies on mobile phone and internet use, home-school agreement, our Learning Charter; as well as a record of the homework and independent learning tasks your child is set.
Please check and sign your child’s planner every week. There is also space in the planner for you to write comments and notes to the staff.
Contents
p.2 – Introduction and contents
p.3 – English and maths
p.4 – Science and Computing and ICT
p.5 – French and Spanish
p.6 – Geography and Personal and Social Enterprise
p.7 - History and Religious Studies
p.8 – Drama and Music
p.9 – Physical Education
p.10 – Art and Textiles
p.11 – Product Design and Food Technology
p.12 – Supporting your child to become an independent learner
English
In Year 8, the Canterbury Tales unit allows students to engage with challenging texts that have shaped our language. They will also have the chance to write their own non-fiction texts based on these fantastic tales.
The novel unit gives pupils an opportunity to immerse themselves in literature, discuss a host of themes related to it, such as childhood, equality & friendship, and engage in a full range of reading, writing and speaking & listening activities which will develop both their literacy and critical thinking skills.
Both the Creative Writing and Writing to Argue/Persuade units allow students to develop their writing skills to prepare them for the demands of GCSE English. They also ask students to use their imaginations and are skills that they can use in a range of situations in daily life. In Media, students will create their own media texts and will develop an understanding of the key principles in the subject.
Through studying Much Ado About Nothing, pupils will appreciate the relevant and universal themes of love, family and betrayal, as well as creating their own written texts inspired by the shocking events in the play. Students will learn through a range of Royal Shakespeare Company inspired activities.
Autumn 1 / Autumn 2The Canterbury Tales - Transformative Writing / Novel
- Buddy
- The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
Spring 1 / Spring 2
Creative Writing- Writing to Describe / Media
Summer 1 / Summer 2
Writing to Argue/Persuade / Much Ado About Nothing-
Shakespeare
All students are formally assessed each half term and throughout lessons; this highlights their strengths and targets. Students will receive a homework project related to each half term’s theme which they are expected to spend at least 1 hour on per week.
Maths
Mathematics in Year 8 is taught in themes building upon the themes studied in Year 7. Assessment and feedback happens throughout the theme with a main assessment at the end.
In theme 5, Risk, students explore probability and the mathematics associated within.
In theme 6, Household DIY, students investigate Area and Perimeter, Transformations, Sequences and Graphs.
In theme 7, Money, Money, Money, students explore percentages, real life graphs and scatter graphs.
In theme 8, Package Design, students investigate Approximations and Errors, Volume and Surface Area, Constructions and Loci and Angles.
To help with their learning, students will be given weekly homework tasks which are connected to the work they are doing in class. These are designed to extend and develop students understanding of the content they are learning.
Students also have access to online resources to help with their mathematics, including the schools VLE and the extremely useful websites MyMaths and MangaHigh. Details of how to access these websites have been given to the students and they should already be making use of them.
Science
KS3 science is made of 4 main areas:
Be happy, be ambitious, make a differencePage 4
Be happy, be ambitious, make a differencePage 4
Biology Chemistry
Physics Thinking scientifically
The Course:
Autumn Term· Atomic structure and Periodic table
· Health and lifestyle
· Motion and pressure / · Acids, bases and salts
· Adaptation and inheritance
Spring and Summer Terms
· Waves 2 (light)
· Metals and acids
· Photosynthesis and gas exchange
· Materials / · Food chains
· Webs and ecosystems
· Earth and atmosphere
· Space
If your child has more than one science teacher they may learn topics in a slightly different order
Assessment:
KS3 is teacher assessed through end of topic tests, and banded progress tasks which assess such skills as planning and carrying out a practical, recording results, drawing graphs, conclusions and evaluations.
How parents can help:
· Make sure you check that your child is revising for each topic test.
· Make sure your child is working on and completing the homework activities given to them.
· Talk to your child about their teacher feedback and how have they improved their own work.
· Watch wildlife/science programmes on TV or YouTube.
· Give your child access to the KS3 Bitesize website in order to revise.
· Buy your child a KS3 revision guide.
Computing and ICT
Course Overview
Having developed their key software skills in Year 7, during Year 8 students will be building on their skills and knowledge from units already undertaken to reinforce their understanding. The purpose of the units is to engage and challenge students whilst being fun and creative but, more importantly, to progress through the new Computing and ICT Curriculum. Units will be as follows:
What this offers
Over Year 7 and 8 students will have experienced Computing and ICT units. They can use their experience and decide to take Computing or ICT (or both) as an option for Year 9, 10 and 11. This will award them a GCSE qualification (or equivalent) upon successful completion of the course.
How parents can help
• Provide your child with resources at home such as books, Internet access and revision material.
• Having a constant dialogue with your child about their learning will help them consolidate their understanding.
• Check and help with homework where possible.
• Encourage your child to attend computer club and enrichment sessions.
Languages
We offer creative and stimulating lessons which cater for the various learning styles of our students through the use of games, worksheets, posters, languages websites, and authentic resources (e.g. magazines, films, CDs). Students are assessed in the four skills: Speaking, Listening, Reading and Writing at the end of each module and whenever teachers feel it suitable to assess learning or to do a recap of learning.
Assessment:
Our students are in control of their learning and use their Learning Ladders which they complete in lessons to enable them to see the progress they are making day by day.
Y8 FrenchAutumn term / Module 1 / Famille et domicile / Family / jobs / weather / where I live.
Module 2 / Temps libre / What I did last weekend and yesterday evening / TV programs / talking about past events.
Spring term / Module 3 / Les sorties / Invitations and excuses / clothes / shops and shopping.
Module 4 / Manger et boire / Food / French meals / shopping for food / at the restaurant.
Summer term / Module 5 / Voyages et vacances / Countries / holidays.
Module 6 / Les copains / Friends / pocket money / hopes and wishes / present, past and future tenses.
Y8 Spanish
Autumn term / Module 1 / La gente / Presentations / describing my friends / Celebrities and the use of comparatives/ my daily life and the use of reflexive verbs / my nationality.
Module 2 / ¿Vamos a salir? / Places in town and the use of near future and present tense / Inviting someone to go out and making excuses / I have a problem and the use of verbs expressing opinion.
Spring term / Module 3 / Mis vacaciones / Places where you went on holidays and the use of past tense /talking about activities you did in the past while on holidays / expressing opinion in past tense / using present and past tense together to talk about holidays.
Module 4 / La comida / Talking about meal times / shopping for food / eating in a restaurant / talking about a past meal / talking about likes and dislikes using past, present and future.
Summer term / Module 5 / De moda / Talking about clothes and colours / talking about the school uniform/ talking about a trip to Argentina and the traditional clothes in Argentina / talking about a fancy dress party.
Module 6 / Barcelona / Saying what there is to see and do in Barcelona / shopping in Barcelona / asking and giving directions / describing a holiday in Barcelona / reading a short story set in Barcelona combining different tenses.
We strongly recommend that students choose a language as one of their GCSE options, therefore some of the lesson activities will be GCSE type activities so that students are challenged and prepared for the exam requirements expected in the languages GCSE exams.
Homework:
We believe that homework is a very important part of our students’ learning. We have a wide range of homework activities e.g. research on a topic/ area of the country of the language your child is learning, presentation to be performed in the class, completion of tasks on languages websites as well as a variety of tasks on Sam Learning.
Community Languages:
We offer the possibility for students to take GCSEs in a range of community languages including: Panjabi, Gujarati, Italian, Urdu, Polish, Turkish, Chinese, German, Arabic, Dutch, and Portuguese.
Trips:
We offer cultural/linguistic trips to France and Spain to support our students’ learning: recently we have taken some of the students to Paris, Boulogne and Costa Brava to enhance their cultural knowledge of the countries as well as developing their language skills.
Geography
At The City of Leicester College we strive to make our students aware about the world they live in, the challenges facing it and the part that they can play in improving this space we call home.
We aim to develop the skills that will enable our students to understand the processes and patterns they see around them and to use the technology they have at their disposal to explore and explain these phenomena. At KS3 we encourage them to be inquisitive, to ask questions about what is going on around them and to interact with each other in our diverse community.
Year 8 starts with the interesting world of SETTLEMENTS: students will study a variety of places from the megacity of Manila, the fantastic sustainable city of Curitiba in Brazil and the regeneration of our own city, Leicester. They will question their parents on what life was like many, many years ago in the settlement where they grew up. They will decide whether the regeneration of Leicester has been successful and what a future Leicester may look like. This is followed by the study of one of the most interesting countries in the world: CHINA. They will learn about the physical aspects of the country, about the people and how they (and the environment) are affected by the rapid development of the country.
Year 8 then move on to study of one of the favourite topics of conversation in the UK: WEATHER! Why is it always raining in the UK? Why does it snow in winter? Why is Leicester’s weather so different from settlements in Wales? They will then study one of the favourite topics at KS3: TOURISM. What impacts (negative or positive) do they have when going on holiday, what is sustainable tourism and why is tourism of such importance for many countries?
Students will study COASTS at the beginning of the summer term and will end with a study of BRAZIL and its favelas, the interesting flexcar, the biofuel that is making Brazil one of the fastest growing economies in the world, the rainforest and, of course, the impact of the Olympics.
Independent learning opportunities:
All these topics offer the perfect opportunity for students to do independent research, for example: the fascinating wildlife and the history of the China; Curitiba, the most sustainable city in Brazil; the wettest/ hottest/driest/coldest settlements in the world; the most sustainable tourist destinations in the world; the history of the Olympics.
Assessment:
Students will complete their assessment on both topics at the end the study period. Parents can definitely assist in helping their children to prepare by making sure that they know the key words and their meanings and key information about the different topics.
Homework projects: How Safe is My Street? and Life in the Favelas.
Personal and Social Enterprise (PSEnt)
Vision
To inspire and motivate your child to become an enterprising young adult who is a successful, healthy, happy, critical consumer with a desire to make a positive contribution to local, national and global communities.
The work we do also supports your child’s behaviour in school and relationships with peers and adults.
Autumn term / Spring term / Summer termTopics covered / Relationships
Gangs / Conflicts
Prejudice and discrimination
Taking informed and responsible action
Joint Enterprise / Making and maintaining positive relationships
Sexual health.
Respecting and accepting differences. / Investigating chosen social issue
Responsibility as a global citizen
Communicating opinions to an audience
Skills developed / Expressing opinions
Leadership
Team work
Communication
Creativity / Adapting to change
Team work
Personal reflection / Team work
Creativity
Innovation
Communication
History