SIR JONATHAN NORTH COMMUNITY COLLEGE
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FACULTY OF HUMANITIES
The Humanities Curriculum Team at Sir Jonathan North Community College incorporates Geography,
History, Citizenship, Religious Studies, Sociology and Travel and Tourism. For the academic year of
2010/11 there are eight full and a number of part-time members of staff.
All subjects within the Curriculum Team share the same general aims and a common approach to learning.
The aim of the whole Curriculum Team is to promote the development of the students’ interest in and
understanding of the world in which they live, through the study of human behaviour, beliefs and
experience. We seek to encourage the development in our students of independence as learners,
imagination, a spirit of enquiry, tolerance and respect for others.
Accommodation consists of six classrooms and an office/ resource centre in the main building and two
mobile classrooms. In addition, the Curriculum Team has exclusive use of 15 computers in one of the
classrooms, as well as shared access to other computers and the ICT areas. Netbooks can also be booked
for use in classrooms. There is a staff computer in each classroom. Each Humanities classroom has a
projector / interactive whiteboard.
In Key Stage 3 students will have 4 Humanities lessons per week. All subjects are taught separately and by
subject specialists wherever possible. In Key Stage 4, students have 2 Humanities lessons per week in
Year 10 and 3 in Year 11. Geography, History Religious Studies and Travel and Tourism are taught as
GCSE courses. All students take a short course GCSE in Religious Studies as part of the General Studies
course in Citizenship. We also run Sociology GCSE in co-operation with the neighbouring school, The
Lancaster School.
In Key Stage 3 students are taught in 2 populations and the classes in each population are ability grouped
throughout KS3. There is additional Learning Support for some lower ability groups. Key Stage 4 students
are able to opt for at least one Humanities subjects to study. They can choose between Geography,
History, RS, Travel and Tourism and Sociology. For this academic year some students have been offered
the opportunity to take an extra Humanities GCSE. The number of groups in each subject varies from year
to year. Students are grouped according to option choice and where there is more than one group they are
ability set. Students all follow full GCSE courses initially but a decision may be made to enter some
students for short course certification.
Currently there are 3 History, 2 Geography, 2 Sociology, 1 RS and 1 Travel and Tourism group. All KS4
students also follow a GCSE short course in RS or Citizenship. We are also running joint GCSE courses
with The Lancaster School in History and Sociology.
Current priorities for the Curriculum Team include further development of GCSE and vocational courses,
planning and revising schemes of work to incorporate AfL. Creative and independent Learning are
important elements of our teaching. We are developing our monitoring of student achievement through
more effective use of data. We are continuing to develop and refine the Humanities Record of
Achievement, investigating ways to make students more aware of their own strengths and weaknesses and
encouraging them to set their own learning targets. Fieldwork in all subjects is a high priority.
The Curriculum Team makes a contribution to the College literacy programme, working closely with
Learning Development to develop strategies for improving student literacy, especially in Year 7. In addition
we have begun to focus more closely on developing strategies to extend the more able in KS3.
The Humanities Curriculum Team seeks to provide a variety of educational experiences and is eager to
develop a wide range of teaching and learning styles, developing more active methodologies and making
full use of a wide range of resources. By sharing good practice informally, through work sampling and
classroom observations, we are continuing to improve the quality of teaching and learning within the team.
February 2011
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