Extra-curricular activities

At Saint Thomas More, we offer many additional, enriching opportunities both during the day and after school.

During the day, we offer, for example: chess club, forest school, sewing, homework club, reading sessions and leadership opportunities.

After school, we offer clubs in: dance, art, cooking, STEM, Latin, writing, Geography, History, cricket, football, dodgeball, multi-skills, Y6 Booster sessions, gardening and choir.

Cultural Capital

We take our curriculum very seriously and continuously strive for both excellence and fun! We know that every family who joins our STM family will have their own knowledge and experiences that will link to their culture and wider family. This might include: languages, beliefs, traditions, cultural and family heritage, interest, travel and work. Although Lumen Christi has designed its own curriculum, each school has made it their own, and at STM we are constantly redesigning and tweaking to cater for the children we have in front of us. This is what helps create our wonderful vibrancy and buzz around school!

Cultural capital is the accumulation of knowledge, behaviours and skills that a child can draw upon and which demonstrates their cultural awareness, knowledge and competence; it is one of the key ingredients a pupil will draw upon to be successful in society, their career and the world of work.

Cultural capital gives power! It helps children achieve goals, become successful, and rise up to be the best they can be, Cultural capital is having assets that give children the desire to aspire and achieve social mobility whatever their starting point.

At STM, children benefit from a curriculum that builds on what they understand and know already. It revolves around the coherent cycle of learning from the past, living in the present and looking to the future. This means our children have a deep and connected knowledge and understanding of where they came from, who they are and what they might become. We believe that exposure, not only to culture but also to situations in which the children might not have previous experiences of, is of paramount importance to their ongoing successes.

The children, wherever possible, learn from experts. Why do we enrich the learning in this way? because we believe that learning from experts inspires the children and exposes them to the rich and diverse world around them. It is a way to prepare our children for life beyond STM. So what do we mean by 'experts'? Here are a few examples of what our children experience at our school:

STEM lessons delivered by The Royal Air Force

Writing lessons delivered by Pie Corbett

Cricket lessons delivered by professional cricket players

Dance lessons delivered by a male ex-West End dancer

Politics sessions with Jess Phillips

Science lessons delivered by scientists currently working in the field

Engineering sessions delivered by women engineers and lessons looking at product design by Dyson

Sustainability sessions delivered by Enzen

During vocations week, the children hear from a variety of professionals and get to 'take over' the school, shadowing adults in their role.

Gradually widening children's experiences as they progress through school is an important step in providing rich, engaging, hands on learning. We plan carefully for our children to have progressively rich experiences from their first day to their last. It must feel like a little bit of magic.

Curriculum Statement and Rationale

"Outcomes in each school enable our children to reach their full potential as a child of God."

Websites to support learning

Here are some websites that we think will help you work with your children at home, reinforcing much of the work we do here in school. Why not have a try and let us know how you get on. We are always keen to find out about new websites, so if you have any favourites, please let us know.

Links that are not underlined may be opened by holding crtl + Enter

Maths

White Rose are releasing daily lessons throughout the end of the Spring Term and Summer Term. Just follow this link to look at resources and their learning videos. https://whiterosemaths.com/homelearning/ 

Websites to support times tables

http://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/7-11-years/times-tables

http://www.teachingtables.co.uk/

Websites to support maths fluency

http://www.arcademics.com/

Websites to support phonics and reading

http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/

www.starfall.com

http://www.topmarks.co.uk/english-games/5-7-years/letters-and-sounds

http://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/

FREE AUDIO BOOKS using Audible from Amazon 

Websites to join for free Science

https://explorify.wellcome.ac.uk/

Other Curriculum Subjects

BBC Bitesize-  http://www.bbc.co.uk/education

This covers both key stage 1 (KS1) and KS2 (KS2) for a wide range of subjects

Woodlands Primary School  -  http://www.primaryhomeworkhelp.co.uk/

This has fantastic interactive resources across a range of subjects.

Crickweb - http://www.crickweb.co.uk  

Another good website for a wide range of subjects and general info about education