The Circle of Life


How will what I do today impact the world tomorrow?

The Circle of Life:

How will what I do today impact the world tomorrow



‘At XP we build our community through:

Activism, Leadership, and Equity - sharing our stories as we go.’


As such, we design our curriculum to realise these principles. Our relentless focus is to ensure that our students grow their character, create beautiful work and achieve academic success. Therefore, we develop our curriculum so that learning is relevant, purposeful and authentic. This manifests into a number of key seams that we use as a focus for realising our design principles through our curriculum.

Our three rich seams at XP are:


  • Climate Emergency - this is an existential threat so this is an imperative part of our curriculum. If we want our students to change the world, they need to save it first and they need the skills to lead this action. Our students make the knowledge they acquire around this seam powerful by actively making a difference to our world.


  • Social Justice - the world is filled with inequity and this is sustained by systems, structures and governance that protects the interests of the few and neglects the many. We uncover, confront and challenge inequities of race, gender, identity and class through our work and use the knowledge we acquire to affect social and cultural change. We want our students to be leaders of this change.


  • Diversity and Belonging - at XP we understand the power of crew and we know our community is stronger because of our differences. This is, therefore, a key seam that runs through many of our expeditions and case studies allowing our students to deepen their empathy and understanding of the value of difference and non-conformity. We strive for equality at XP by promoting equity so this is reflected in our curriculum design.



The Learning targets were:

Case Study 1: Science

  • Explore and compare the differences between things that are living, that are dead and that have never been alive.

  • Identify that most living things live in habitats to which they are suited and describe how different habitats provide for the basic needs of different kinds of animals and plants and how they depend on each other.

  • Identify and name a variety of plants and animals in their habitats, including micro-habitats.

  • Describe how animals obtain their food from plants and other animals, using the idea of a simple food chain, and identify and name different sources of food.

  • Identify and name a variety of common animals that are birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals and invertebrates.

  • Identify and name a variety of common animals that are carnivores, herbivores and omnivores.

  • Describe and compare the structure of a variety of common animals (birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals and invertebrates, including pets).

  • Notice that animals, including humans, have offspring which grow into adults.

  • Investigate and describe the basic needs of animals, including humans, for survival (water, food and air).


Case Study 2: Geography

  • Name and locate the world’s continents and oceans.

  • Identify seasonal and daily weather patterns in the United Kingdom and the location of hot and cold areas of the world in relation to the Equator and the North and South Poles.

  • Understand geographical similarities and differences through studying the human and physical geography of a small area of the United Kingdom and of a contrasting non-European country.


Case Study 3: Art

  • To use a range of materials creatively to design and make products

  • To use drawing, painting and sculpture to develop and share their ideas, experiences and imagination

  • To develop a wide range of art and design techniques in using colour, pattern, texture, line, shape, form and space

  • About the work of a range of artists, craft makers and designers, describing the differences and similarities between different practices and disciplines, and making links to their own work.

Our Learning:

In science, we studied animals including humans; we looked at characteristcs, classification, lifecyles, survival, habitats and food chains. We looked at a range of animals, such as fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals including pets. We even incubated, hatched and cared for our own chicks as part of our lifecycle learning.


In case study two, we became geographers and investigated the weather and how our actions are having a negative impact on the environment, habitats and weather of the UK and the wider world. To help us undertand this, we also looked at identifying the different continents and oceans around the world.


Case study three, saw us developing our ideas for the finished products. We were inspired by the work of Val Hunt. Val Hunt is an artist who creates beautiful work by collecting things people have thrown away and recycling them into art. We decided to create our own jelly fish out of recyled PET bottles. However, we then decided to go bigger and work as a crew to create a life sized sea turtle made out of waste materials. Our own real life expert Mr Hull, worked with us to create the frame and base. As part of the art unit, we also had to evaluate different material we could find. We also developed new techniques, such as bending, twisting, weaving and platting to help create our sculptures.


Hooks / Learning Visits and Environments

The children were hooked into their learning by creating our own ocean dioramas, craft sea creatures and by participating in a virtual author workshop to learn how to create some of the beautiful illustrations that we found in our core text 'The Blue Giant'. We then visited The Deep in Hull. Here we took a trip with Kal the Killer Whale on a journey around the five oceans of the world in search of food and a family. During Kal’s travels, the whale encountered different animals who needed help. The children explored the effect of plastics on the ocean, the animals that live there and began to think about what action they could take to help the planet.


We also invited an expert from Greenpeace, Cristina Manolache, to come and talk to the us about climate change and the use of plastics.


Quality texts

Mermaid School:Save Our Seas - Lucy Courtenay

The Blue Giant

Dear Greenpeace

What a waste

The big book of the blue

Old enough to save the planet

Someone swallowed Stanley


Assessment

Our significant assessment pieces for this expedition were science, art and literacy based; writing non-chronological reports and letters. We produced sculptures highlighting the impact of pollution on sea animals. We used rubrics and protocols throughout to assess our learning. Lesson targets, success criteria and anchor charts (good models) enabled us to produce beautiful work through critique and multiple drafts.


Final Product

The Learning Exploration culminated in an life sized sculpture of a sea turtle made out of recycled materials and rubbish. We made this as a crew with each child contributing to the design. We also made our own jelly fish sculpture using the same techniques as our larger crew sculpture.