Curriculum Leader

Mr M Wilde

Intent

In food technology at Hexham Middle School, students will learn how to make healthy choices and equip themselves with the life skills necessary to support their health and well-being. Pupils will acquire the skills and confidence to experiment with food preparation as a creative craft and be given the opportunity to develop a lifelong appreciation of and interest in foods from different cultures.

They will learn how to prepare and cook a variety of dishes, using a range of cookery techniques and equipment. Students will also learn about the importance of nutrition and the way in which food works to maintain a healthy body.

As well as this, they will be taught the importance of food hygiene and safety. Pupils will also practise important life skills, such as time management and the ability to multi-task, working with others, decision-making, attention to detail and economical budgeting.

In addition, they will be encouraged to analyse, discuss, describe and evaluate their dishes using a variety of verbal and written formats.

In food technology, pupils will also be encouraged to learn subject specific terminology and develop their literary and verbal skills. They will also develop their practical numeracy by weighing, measuring, timing and portioning food during lessons.

There are key areas of study which will be revisited each year which will increase in complexity and provide new challenges. They include:

  • Nutrients
  • Ingredients, including their chemical, functional and physical properties
  • Culinary skills
  • Food Presentation
  • Safe and hygienic working practice
  • Diet and good health
  • Factors affecting food choice
  • Where food comes from
  • Food spoilage
  • Cultures and cuisines

Wider Curriculum

There are many extra-curricular and cross curricular opportunities in food technology. Some of the clubs and activities which have taken place over recent years include; Children in Need Bake Off, The Baked Bean Challenge, Lockdown Rainbow Bake Off, Sugarcraft Club, Life Skills sessions, Young Pea Chef of the Year cookery competition, the Tunnock’s Teacake challenge and HMS Masterchef. The department also has strong cross curricular links with other subjects across the school, including Humanities, English and French. We have had Chinese cooking sessions with Mandarin Club, made some traditional WW2 war recipes to link with year 6 English lessons and year 6 have also practised making Chapatis, to link in with their RE lessons when they were learning about Diwali. 

Sequence of Learning

In year 5 food technology, pupils will learn how to prepare and cook a variety of dishes, using a range of cookery techniques. This will include making pitta pizza, pasta salad, biscuits, cheese straws, baked omelettes and buns.

They will also learn about the principles of a healthy and varied diet and study how a range of ingredients are grown, caught, reared and processed. Pupils will also learn about food hygiene and safety in the kitchen, the Eatwell Plate, how to carry out a simple sensory analysis, basic knife and cooking skills and in addition, learn how to use a range of kitchen equipment. They will evaluate their work and carry out peer assessments regularly throughout the term. Students will be assessed at the end of the rotation on their skills in preparation, planning, making and evaluating their work.

In year 6 food technology, pupils will learn how to prepare and cook a variety of dishes, using a range of cookery techniques. This will include making cheese scones, soda bread, rock buns, couscous salad, savoury muffins and biscuits.

They will also learn about the principles of a healthy and varied diet and study how a range of ingredients are grown, caught, reared and processed. Pupils will also learn about food hygiene and safety in the kitchen, the Eatwell Plate, how to carry out a simple sensory analysis, basic knife and cooking skills and also learn how to use a range of kitchen equipment. They will evaluate their work and carry out peer assessments regularly throughout the term. Pupils will be assessed at the end of the rotation on their skills in preparation, planning, making and evaluating their work.

In year 7 food technology, pupils will learn to prepare and cook a variety of dishes, using a range of cookery techniques. This will include making pizza, mini ginger cakes, shortcrust pastry triangles, sausage rolls, toad in the hole, savoury rice, vegetable curry, chocolate biscuits and minestrone soup.

Additionally, they will learn about the principles of a healthy and varied diet and study how a range of ingredients are grown, caught, reared and processed. Pupils will also learn about food hygiene and safety in the kitchen, for example; how to store foods safely, the ‘4 C’s’, risk awareness, recognition and avoidance of food poisoning. They will also know about the principal nutrients and how they help the body, a range of knife and cookery skills and in addition, learn how to use a variety of kitchen equipment. They will also look at a variety of seasonal foods and seasonality. They will evaluate their work and carry out peer assessments regularly throughout the term. Pupils will be assessed at the end of the rotation on their skills in preparation, planning, making and evaluating.

In year 8 food technology, pupils will learn to prepare and cook a variety of dishes, using a range of techniques. This will include making mini carrot cakes, Swiss roll, upside down cake, spaghetti Bolognese, stir frying, as well as homemade burgers, fajitas, bread rolls, pizza wheels and chocolate mousse. They will also learn about the principles of a healthy and varied diet and about micro and macro nutrients.

Pupils will continue to develop their knowledge in the following areas: nutrients; ingredients including their chemical, functional and physical properties, culinary skills, food presentation, safe and hygienic working practise, the use of kitchen equipment, the importance of diet and how it relates to good health, where food comes from, food spoilage and different cultures and cuisines. They will evaluate their work and carry out peer assessments regularly throughout the term. Students will be assessed at the end of the rotation on their skills in preparation, planning, making and evaluating. In year 8, pupils will also have the opportunity to take part in the Tunnock’s Tea Cake challenge in lessons.

Curriculum Sequence

You can download a PDF copy of the Curriculum Sequence here.

SEND

All learners with additional needs access a broad and rich classroom experience with a well-planned curriculum both within and beyond the classroom. Pupils with additional needs are enabled to achieve well by:

    • High quality planning, teaching and learning across the curriculum.
    • Adaptations made in teaching and learning to ensure all pupils succeed and learn well. 
    • Staff responding to learners’ needs and adapting teaching as a result. 
    • Teaching staff planning and delivering a wide range of high-quality interventions and support sessions. 
    • High-quality ‘Pupil Profiles’ which ensure staff know each child as an individual, including how to support their learning. 
    • Where appropriate, an ‘Individual Education Plan’ with bespoke and individualised targets is implemented, and regularly reviewed. 
    • For learners with an ‘Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP)’, a wide range of individualised targets and support strategies are implemented in a multi-agency approach. 
    • Coordinating our ambitious support in school alongside a multi-agency approach to ensure that all pupils achieve their full potential. 

As part of our implementation model – the ’10 Elements of Great Teaching’ – our teaching and support staff will enable pupils with additional needs to thrive by: 

    • Planning well-sequenced lessons which build progressively in small steps. 
    • Implementing the school’s lesson design principles so that teachers gradually handover the learning through guided and independent practice. 
    • Maintaining a calm, focused, inclusive and positive environment for learning in all classrooms. 
    • Implementing a wide range of strategies to empower pupils to remember more over time and to check that this is the case. 
    • Using metacognitive strategies to encourage self-regulation and to plan, monitor and evaluate learning. 
    • Delivering expectations and instructions clearly in small steps. 
    • Teaching subject-specific vocabulary (tier 3), alongside tier 2 vocabulary, and ensuring that it is used and retained. 
    • Using a wide range of teaching resources and materials to support all learners including visual and audio resources. 
    • Using high-quality modelling in lessons through the ‘I do, we do, you do’ approach. 
    • Using a wide range of scaffolds to support learning including writing frames, planning structures, word processing. 
    • Providing high-quality worked examples which narrate the learning, steps and processes so that pupils develop their independence of learning. 
    • Using organisers such as ‘Knowledge Organisers’, diagrams, planning structures and writing frames to support pupils’ learning. 
    • Allowing pupils to record their ideas in a range of ways including, where necessary, by using online resources and visual/audio support. 
    • Providing word lists/vocabulary banks to support pupils’ access to learning. 
    • Using sentence stems to promote positive talk and discussion. 
    • Using flexible groupings in the classroom so that pupils can learn alongside and from each other. 
    • Implementing dyslexia-friendly approach to reading and writing tasks. 
    • Modelling thinking out loud strategies across the curriculum. 
    • Using a wide range of technologies including online resources, voice recording and visualisers to model worked examples.