Professional Focus Paper
Course: Design and Manufacture
1.
Level: National 4
Who is this paper for and what is its purpose?
This paper is for teachers and other staff who provide learning, teaching and support as learners work towards
Design and Manufacture National 4. The paper is intended to stimulate professional reflection and dialogue about
learning. It highlights important features of learning that are enhanced or different from previous arrangements at
this SCQF level.
Curriculum for Excellence is a unique opportunity to raise achievement and to ensure that all learners are better
prepared than they have been in the past for learning, life and work. This is because the new curriculum gives real
scope to build learning 3–18 in a joined-up, seamless way, and as a result, progression in learning can be much
stronger. There is a clear focus on attributes and capabilities, skills (including higher-order thinking skills), and
knowledge and understanding. These are delivered through the experiences and outcomes of the Broad General
Education (BGE) 3–15 and, through programmes that build directly on the BGE, leading to qualifications. Because
of a strengthened focus on the nature and quality of learning experiences, self-motivation is likely to be increased
and learners consequently more engaged and enthused. To ensure continuity and progression, qualifications at the
senior phase have been designed to embrace this unambiguous focus on high-quality learning.
Curriculum for Excellence has the flexibility to meet the needs of all learners in their local circumstances, enabling
each to achieve their very best. For example, some centres may take the opportunity to offer qualifications over two
years which might involve learners bypassing qualifications at a given level. Others may enable learners to work
towards qualifications within one year. In both cases, the advice in this paper is relevant to the learning and
teaching approaches that learners will encounter.
How will you plan for progression in learning and teaching, building on the Broad General Education?
2.
What’s new and what are the implications for learning and teaching?
Design and Manufacture National 4 consists of two Units and an Added Value Unit, providing learners with the
opportunity to develop and apply skills, alongside increasing their depth of knowledge and understanding.
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Materials and Manufacturing
Design
Added Value Unit
To achieve Design and Manufacture National 4, learners must pass all of the required Units, including the Added
Value Unit.
DESIGN AND MANUFACTURE
What are the key aspects of Design and Manufacture National 4?
Progression from the BGE
This qualification has been designed to articulate with the BGE. Staff will find it useful also to refer to the
Technologies Progression Framework, as they plan learning that builds from BGE into National 4.
Integrated approach to skills development
Learning experiences should promote developing skills and techniques as well as an understanding and
appreciation of the influences and practices of industrial designers. Learners should develop knowledge of
commercial production and the evaluation of products.
The Units can be taught and completed as free-standing components or as part of the full National 4 course. In
order to qualify for a course award, the Added Value Unit must be completed.
All design and practical work should, from the outset, be closely related to the work of practising industrial
designers. Learners should be encouraged to learn the methods and contexts in which professional practitioners
work. Consequently, learners will be better able to describe, respond and analyse not only the work of others but
also be able to evaluate their own work and develop their own practice.
This course has been designed to articulate with Design and Manufacture National 5. This allows staff to choose
areas of study to support progression and allow themes to be continued in greater depth or other areas of study.
Wider range of evidence of learning
The concept of assessment as an integral part of teaching and learning is encouraged. Assessment should be
ongoing and in dialogue with the learners. Staff can collate evidence from a range of activities, of various forms and
in a number of ways, including sketch books, notes from group discussions, presentations, reviews and product
evaluations. For example, learners could be split into small groups each researching a particular designer working
in a specific manner or style. Each group could then present their findings to their peers, which would offer an
excellent forum for discussion and the sharing of information and research.
Added Value Unit
Learners will be required to complete an Added Value Unit, which offers scope for personalisation and choice. It
draws together the application of skills of design, and related knowledge and understanding of materials and
manufacturing. It will allow scope for further development and application of the literacy and numeracy skills
developed within the BGE.
This activity will assess learners’ skills in designing, developing, presenting, manufacturing and evaluating a design
solution. The response to the assignment will include a portfolio, a model, a prototype or a completed product. The
brief for the project will be sufficiently open and flexible to allow for personalisation and choice.
What are the key features of learning in Design and Manufacture National 4?
Active learning
Learners are expected to demonstrate the creative techniques they have developed and consolidated throughout
the course in the production of an item to meet the final course design assignment brief. Throughout the course, it
is essential that learners have opportunities to think have their thinking challenged. The course is dynamic. It
should be delivered through the fullest range of teaching and learning strategies in order that all learners can
engage with what will be interesting, exploratory and experiential learning activities for them, and to develop the
higher-order thinking skills required in order to do so. Effective learning and teaching in design and manufacture
DESIGN AND MANUFACTURE
enables learners to be informed, skilled, thoughtful, adaptable and enterprising citizens. For example, opportunities
for the learner to explain and justify their decisions to their peer group will build confidence. These opportunities will
also help learners to use feedback and peer-assessment to review, reflect and plan their next steps. Practical tasks
will require the learner to problem solve and demonstrate tenacity in finding solutions to design briefs, as well as
working with manufacturing machinery.
How will you ensure there are opportunities for young people to explain their thinking, to show their understanding
of processes and concepts?
Learning independently
Outcomes are less prescriptive, focus more on skills and applying learning, and offer greater scope for
personalisation and choice. Learners, therefore, have the opportunity to experience a wider range of learning and
teaching approaches in different contexts that can better meet their needs and build on their experience and
achievements in the BGE. Throughout their experiences in the units, learners should have opportunities to tap into
their natural inventiveness and their desire to create and work in practical ways.
Staff should ensure that learners have opportunities to make decisions and choices in areas of the course that
particularly interest them. For example, they may do this when studying the work of individual designers.
In order to develop independent thinking skills and learning, teachers should place greater emphasis on choices
and decisions made by the learner, based on their expertise and skill level.
To further promote personalisation and choice, design and manufacture provides frequent opportunities for active
learning in creative and work-related contexts. The Units provide opportunities to develop, use and extend skills
that are essential components for life, work and learning, now and in the future, including planning and
organisational skills.
Responsibility for learning
Practical tasks should encourage learners to take personal control of their own learning. Opportunities for learners
to reflect on and discuss their own progress should be built routinely into all planned learning experiences. To
ensure that learners are able to take full responsibility for their own learning, learning intentions and success
criteria should be explicit and fully shared with the learners. Learning and teaching approaches should promote the
development of learners’ skills in self- and peer-group evaluation, for example, encouraging group work and peer
learning.
How will you ensure that learners are making informed decisions about where they are in their learning and what
they need to do to progress?
Collaborative learning
Partnerships have a particularly important role to play in delivering programmes in design and manufacture. For
example, there will be relevant expertise among staff in other areas of the curriculum, such as art and design.
Tasks within the school and community, for example, to improve aspects of the physical or local environment, can
also lead to productive partnerships within and beyond the school. In addition discussing, debating and the sharing
ideas and techniques should be encouraged. This will result in reflection and deeper, more meaningful learning.
How will you work with other partners in school and the local and wider community to support young people’s skills
development?
DESIGN AND MANUFACTURE
Applying learning
The course enables learners to develop, consolidate and demonstrate creative techniques in the production of the
assignment and prototype. Throughout the course there are opportunities for learners to develop higher-order
thinking skills. Within the wider community, links with design studios, architects, construction and manufacturing
businesses can bring significant benefits, realism and additional sense of purpose to learning. The final course
assessment through the Added Value Unit, requires the demonstration of breadth, challenge and application. It
provides a key opportunity for learners to demonstrate and apply the range of skills they have developed
throughout the course.
How will you ensure that pupils can reflect on their learning and make relevant connections with other subject
areas and the world of work?
How will you ensure that the added value aspect of the course assessment will reflect learners’ progress
throughout the course?
DESIGN AND MANUFACTURE
3.
Qualification information
The SQA website provides you with the following documents:
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Assessment Overview
Course Specification
Unit Specification
Support Notes
Course Assessment Specification
Unit Assessment Support Package
Full information on arrangements for this qualification is available at the SQA website:
Design and Manufacture National 4:
http://www.sqa.org.uk/files_ccc/CfE_AssessmentOverview_N4_DesignandManufacture.pdf
4.
What other materials are available on the Education Scotland website which staff
could use?
Support materials have been produced over the last year to support Curriculum for Excellence and further support
materials and events are planned. This downloadable list is updated quarterly with the most up-to-date details
available from the pages below.
http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/learningteachingandassessment/assessment/progressandachievement/what
weassess/curriculum/principlesandpractice/hwb/asp
Published and planned support for Curriculum for Excellence:
http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/publishedandplannedsupport
T +44 (0)141 282 5000 E enquiries@educationscotland.gov.uk W www.educationscotland.gov.uk
Education Scotland, Denholm House, Almondvale Business Park, Almondvale Way, Livingston EH54 6GA
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