At Amwell View School, we believe that Design Technology is a subject that offers the opportunity for pupils to be creative, imaginative and productive, whilst developing a range of skills for them to use in school and at home. Within Design Technology and Cooking and Nutrition (also referred to as Food Technology), the aim is to practice life skills in the appropriate setting so they are easy to transfer to the home and additional educational settings.
The curriculum is delivered in a variety of ways matching the learning styles and abilities of each individual including pupils with a diagnosis of Autism, PMLD and SLD. Amwell View School has a specialist room for delivering Cooking and Nutrition, which enables pupils to access the appropriate equipment in a home like setting. We also have brilliant outdoor and indoor learning environments and resources where creativity and innovation can be taught in Design Technology lessons.
The subject overview enables pupils to focus on topics and skills, which are progressive and meaningful as well as being transferable to the home. The nature of Design and Technology offers opportunities for children to develop and be part of the process of designing and making, whilst developing their knowledge and understanding of how tools work and how to evaluate their work. Pupils also explore different attitudes to the world and how they live and work within it, whilst developing an understanding of technological processes, products, and their contribution to society.
Within Design Technology, we teach Cooking and Nutrition, which is a subject that has a major impact on pupil’s daily lives during their time at school and beyond. The curriculum enables pupils to follow a healthy, balanced diet and to prepare food in a safe and hygienic way. The foundation behind Cooking and Nutrition as a subject begins by promoting exploration of nutrient-rich foods through taste, touch and smell, to familiarise all pupils with the wonderful world of food. As pupils develop through the school, they are given the opportunity to prepare their own food by learning a range of skills to use in a kitchen, which pupils can take home and practice. Designing and creating food products by building on pupil’s preferences, knowledge and skills, is an exciting vehicle for learning which can instil a love in creating healthy food options for pupils to access. As pupils become Post 16 students, the emphasis of the subject curriculum is around real life experiences and skills that develop our students’ independence and support them in their contributions to their home environment and society. The Post 16 curriculum provides pupils with opportunities to design a recipe, create and serve food to staff members, to give the students a sense of pride that they are providing a healthy, enjoyable meal for important people in their lives.
The fundamentals behind Design Technology as a subject begins
with pupils showing preferences and making choices to design things that they can enjoy, interact with, and can take ownership of, whilst beginning to develop new skills and use new tools and resources. Design Technology allows such creative freedom and this is promoted throughout the subject. As pupils become more independent, they are encouraged to become more imaginative and inventive with products they create. Within a motivating and challenging learning environment, pupils can develop their use of skills, knowledge and creativity and this enables them to work in unison to produce a product they have made themselves.
In Design Technology, pupil’s’ needs are met on an individual basis, focusing on what skills they learn and develop as they transition through the school and beyond. The lessons are set out to support them to focus on communication and self-help skills which are transferable into the community. The impact of the skills learnt, means that pupils build up a bank of knowledge around safety in the kitchen, making healthy food choices and making simple recipes which they can transfer into their daily lives. Their progress is assessed and recorded using each pupil’s individual priority objectives, which are set and reviewed each half term by the class teacher. Pupils use a range of resources within both ‘Design Technology’ and ‘Cooking and Nutrition’ lessons such as, a toaster, kettle and a range of DIY tools, to experience and access the curriculum and develop pupil’s own independence. They are shown the safety aspects when using all types of equipment and how to appropriately use them in the correct context. In addition, cross-curricular skills are practised, such as reading recipes, requesting equipment using pupils preferred method of communication and sharing resources with peers. All of these skills are vital for the pupils to learn to transfer within their wider communities and into the home environment, which is supported from school to home by sharing photographs and videos viaof Tapestry.
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