Hi All,
The IPC have been in touch with us here at
the
I agree with Barry that the revised KS2
curriculum is unlikely to conflict with the IPC, as it is designed to encourage
teachers to make creative choices rather than be slaves to QCA units - and
likewise the IPC topics should not be followed slavishly.
However the issue of finding (for
teachers) providing (for museums and other providers) resources to support an increasing
diversity of subject matter covered at different ages is likely to become a
growing issue for all teachers who break away from the QCA/ and museums who
provide resources. At the moment we can invest time and expense developing
resources linked to a QCA unit because we can pretty much guarantee the
resources will be used by thousands of schools.
Nina
From:
List for discussion of issues in museum education in the UK. [mailto:
Sent: 08 July 2009 11:21
To:
Subject: Re: International Primary
Curriculum
Hi Kim,
I’m a governor of a primary school
that uses IPC. The school is very happy with it, but acknowledges that there
are some ‘gaps’ – particularly in terms of maths/literacy, so
they use some of the QCA schemes of work (adapted) to plug these.
The topic list, as you say, is long
– and I think that this is deliberately so, in that it affords schools a
whole raft of different options that can suit their budget, their own
likes/dislikes, and the pupils in the school. My school, for example, has been
using topics over the past year on: The Circus; Chocolate; Volcanoes; The
Holiday Show. The topics have certainly involved a number of trips to museums
and other places of interest/education/entertainment, including The Natural
History Museum, The Science Museum, London Zoo, and local parks.
I suppose, in a sense, the school is
lucky, in that it is situated in
If you like, I can find out in more detail
how the topics were linked to the resources/visits. I think it would certainly
be useful, though, for the heritage sector to look at the IPC and do some
linking; the revised KS2 curriculum is unlikely to conflict with IPC, as it’s
going to be all about more freedom/choice, and I suspect many schools may opt
for a topic-based approach, even if it’s not fully IPC, so any work done
on IPC would not be wasted.
Best
Barry
Barry Creasy
research, consultation,
evaluation, cultural analysis
A: 43b
T: 020 7625 4952
M: 07791 869670
From:
List for discussion of issues in museum education in the UK. [mailto:
Sent: 07 July 2009 21:10
To:
Subject: Fw: International Primary
Curriculum
Hi all,
I wondered whether anyone else has had contact with the
International Primary Curriculum? I recently met representatives of the IPC and
they said there were actually about 520 schools doing it now across the
It is all about old-fashioned topic based teaching and
includes "treasure", "building a village" and "myths
and legends" in a list of about 80 topics.
The teacher who came along to tell us how they were using it
did say that the one thing that is hard about teaching it are the lack of
resources available to support it. I wondered whether some cultural and
heritage resources could be linked to the topics.
The costs are quite high for schools to start using the
curriculum, £7500 one-off fee which includes curriculum planning help and
access to all the full topics, and then £1000 a year membership to continue
receiving support and access to resources as they get created. On talking to
the representatives they seemed quite happy to do a deal for the cultural
sector as curriculum support would not be needed. I think it might be worth
talking to them about membership for museums/heritage/ cultural organisations.
Alternatively, the new KS2 curriculum is going to look very
like this, anyway, so we could wait until that is out, and it'll be free. What
are people's thoughts?
The representative I met was Martin Skelton, the Founding
Director, though I don't have his direct contact details, I'm afraid.
Kim Biddulph
Heritage Educator and Interpreter
www.kimbiddulph.co.uk
07888 674376