For SEND schools with children of mixed abilities and complex needs, finding a curriculum that provides structure while allowing flexibility can be challenging. The Fountains Primary School in Stretton faced this challenge head-on. By adopting and adapting the Cornerstones Curriculum, they’ve created a rich, inclusive, and tailored learning experience that ensures every child makes progress – no matter how small the steps.
Assistant Headteacher Abigail Wilburn shared how their staff use and adapt Cornerstones to deliver meaningful learning opportunities for all children.
How do you build confidence and consistency in your curriculum?
All staff have received training on how to use Maestro and we ensure staff complete a refresher every year. New teaching staff also receive training about how to use it during their induction. Teachers use the timetable planner function to help plan their lessons and this has proved invaluable if they job share. Teachers can see what has been previously taught to avoid any overlap.
How do you adapt the curriculum for the individual needs of your children?
One pupil was imitating a fire fighter in their Me and My Community topic by squirting water from a handheld sprayer onto a painted fire. The learning outcome for this particular pupil could have been to develop their fine motor skills, however the target for another pupil may have been to listen to and follow simple instructions. It just depends on what stage the pupil is working at within their assessment.
How do you put creativity in your curriculum and enhance collaboration?
We encourage teachers to be creative and work alongside their colleagues, sharing ideas and participating in departmental planning sessions. When visiting lessons, sometimes I think ‘wow this lesson is amazing’ and this is evident from the pupils’ high levels of engagement and interaction with the resources and equipment.
How do you ensure progression and coverage in your curriculum?
Every year I will review the long-term plans and look at the topics across the whole school. Children might stay in the same class for 2 to 3 years. So I have to be mindful that they’re not repeating content. That’s when I’ve started to extract some of the more complex topics and adapt them to meet the abilities of the children in each particular class.
How do you link learning outside the classroom?
All classes have a memorable moment linked to their termly topic and this has been instrumental in helping our pupils to develop a strong cultural capital. The school also organises a summer school for our children and their families. The trips are carefully planned to ensure that they link to the Cornerstones topics that the pupils have been studying during that year. For example, we took a group of pupils to Blackpool and this related to our Coastline topic. Some children visited the Harry Potter Studios after studying the topic ‘Heroes and Villains’.
What’s it like having Cornerstones in your school?
I really like it, the staff find it extremely beneficial as it has reduced workload and provides a basis for teachers to plan and deliver a broad range of exciting lessons across the curriculum.
What advice would you give to a similar school if they were considering adopting the Cornerstones Curriculum?
Go for it, we haven’t looked back. It provides us with a range of projects and ideas to support our planning across our four curriculum pathways. We use it with our most complex pupils who follow a more bespoke life-skills based programme of study and with our functional pupils who engage in formal subject specific learning.
Do you have any advice about adaptation?
Simply consider the needs of your pupils from a holistic viewpoint. How can you adapt the curriculum content and what resources can you use to ensure that the learning, social, behavioural, sensory and communication needs of all your pupils are being met? Finally, it is important to ask yourself these questions when using the platform to plan your lessons. Are your activities purposeful? Do they have clear learning outcomes? And how do you intend to assess these outcomes.
Conclusion
At The Fountains Primary School, the Cornerstones Curriculum is more than an adopted curriculum – it is a flexible framework that allows staff to personalise learning, nurture creativity, and celebrate progress in every child.
For schools considering Cornerstones, The Fountains offers a shining example of how it can be adapted and embedded to meet the unique needs of children, while inspiring staff and enriching the whole school community.
Interested in finding out more about how our curriculum can be adapted to meet the needs of your children? Please fill out this short form, and one of our curriculum advisers will be in touch.