Our whole-school long-term plan for Design and Technology is carefully structured to support pupils in building a secure understanding of the design process, materials, and technical knowledge. Each unit is designed to build logically on prior learning, allowing pupils to develop and apply a growing bank of creative and technical skills with increasing confidence and independence. Projects are purposeful and contextualised, encouraging children to design with the user in mind and to consider their wider responsibilities in the world.

Throughout DT lessons, we encourage pupils to:

• Develop pupils’ creativity and technical knowledge.
• Encourage pupils to design with purpose, considering user needs and global responsibility.
• Enable pupils to reflect critically and improve their designs.
• Promote teamwork, resilience and empathy in problem-solving tasks.
• Foster spiritual awareness by recognising the gifts of God in their abilities and materials.

Our DT curriculum is coherent and carefully sequenced. Each stage of the design process -investigating, planning, making, and evaluating - is explicitly taught and revisited to ensure deep understanding and skill development over time. Teachers adapt lessons to meet the needs of all learners, ensuring every child is supported and challenged appropriately.

We also aim to foster design thinking behaviours in our pupils: being observant, making connections, learning from mistakes, listening to others' ideas and having the courage to try again. These habits are nurtured through hands-on experiences and reflective learning.

Finally, Design and Technology provides meaningful opportunities for spiritual reflection, as pupils recognise their God-given gifts in creativity, craftsmanship and resourcefulness. 

To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in Design and Technology, we provide structured and purposeful learning opportunities that allow pupils to engage in a creative, iterative process of designing, making, and evaluating. Our curriculum builds progressively across year groups, enabling all children to develop the technical knowledge, skills, and reflective thinking required to become confident and capable designers.

As we strengthen our DT provision, we are aligning our planning and pedagogy more closely with national guidance and best practice, placing emphasis on design thinking, purposeful making, and critical evaluation. Each unit follows a clear design cycle and incorporates opportunities for innovation, collaboration, and independent problem-solving.

Our DT teaching is underpinned by the following key principles:

• Coherence and Progression – New learning builds explicitly on prior knowledge, with clear sequences in skill development, design processes, and practical techniques. Units are carefully planned to increase in complexity and challenge over time.

• Purposeful Contexts – Pupils engage in design tasks set in a variety of meaningful and relevant contexts such as the home, school, playgrounds, the local community, industry and the wider environment.

• Iterative Design Process – Pupils are encouraged to explore and improve ideas through repeated cycles of planning, making, testing, and evaluating. Each stage of the design process is explicitly taught: research, design criteria, prototyping, product development, and evaluation.

• Tools and Materials – Children learn to select and use a wide range of materials, components, and tools safely and appropriately. They are given hands-on opportunities to apply technical skills such as cutting, joining, shaping, programming, and finishing using construction materials, textiles and ingredients.

• Communication and Representation – Pupils communicate their design ideas through annotated sketches, cross-sectional and exploded diagrams, mock-ups, pattern pieces, and computer-aided design. Younger children may use talking, drawing, templates, and simple modelling as stepping stones into more formal methods.

• Computing and Technology Integration – Where appropriate, children apply their understanding of computing to program, monitor and control products, using technologies such as iPads and laptops to enhance their designs and digital literacy.

• Critical Evaluation – All children are supported to explore existing products, reflect on their own work, and consider the views of others to improve their designs. Evaluation is an integral and ongoing part of the process, supporting both self-assessment and peer feedback.

• Structures and Mechanisms – Pupils investigate and apply mechanical systems (e.g. wheels, axles, sliders, levers) and structural principles (e.g. strength, stiffness, stability) to make functional, innovative and appealing products.

To support retention and ensure that children "know more and remember more" in DT:

• Knowledge organisers, mind maps and key vocabulary are used throughout each unit to consolidate learning.

• Peer critique and feedback are embedded into the classroom culture to promote resilience, reflection and a growth mindset in response to challenge.

DT also forms part of our broader cross-curricular offer. Where appropriate, links are made with subjects such as science, art, computing, and history to deepen pupils’ understanding and reinforce the relevance of design in everyday life.

Children’s learning is celebrated through displays, class showcases, and opportunities to share their outcomes with real audiences. In line with our school values, pupils are encouraged to recognise the gifts and creativity they have been given, and to use them responsibly in service to others and the wider world.

The Design and Technology Curriculum at All Saints Catholic Primary will help pupils to develop a strong understanding of how ideas are turned into purposeful, real-world solutions - reflecting our God-given creativity and the call to serve others. Through planning, making, testing, and evaluating, children will build practical skills and problem-solving abilities that prepare them to shape the world with care and intention.

Children will explore design and innovation across different cultures and time periods, learning how human creativity has responded to needs and challenges throughout history. This approach makes Design and Technology engaging, relevant and memorable, helping children to become thoughtful, resourceful, and compassionate individuals who use their talents to improve the world around them in line with Gospel values.

Design and Technology will be exciting and purposeful, with a visible presence in the life of the school through displays, models, cross-curricular projects and themed days. Parents and grandparents will be encouraged to support the teaching and learning of D&T by sharing their skills and experiences, helping to build a community rooted in creativity, faith and service.