What is Design and Technology?

“Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it’s really how it works.”
Steve Jobs

Design and Technology is fundamental to the ‘made’ world around us. It challenges us to explore and evaluate the build, purpose and suitability of objects and then use these skills within our own learning. The development of technical knowledge underpins the design, make and evaluation of our own products, building skills in the areas of food, mechanisms, structures, textiles, electrical systems and the digital world as we progress throughout the school.

High-quality design and technology education makes an essential contribution to the creativity, culture, wealth and well-being of a nation. It channels the innate curiosity of children and fosters the ‘How?’, ‘Why?’ and ‘What if…?’.

Intent

At Alphington, we are creating our future designers!

Design and Technology is an inspiring, rigorous, and practical subject. Design and Technology encourage children to think and work creatively to solve problems both as individuals and as members of a team.

At Alphington, we encourage children to use their creativity and imagination, to design and make products that solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts, considering their own and others’ needs, wants and values.

During DT lessons, we make links to other subjects such as Maths and Science so that children can apply knowledge and skills learned in different subjects in a variety of ways.

The children are also given opportunities to reflect upon and evaluate past and present design technology, its uses and its effectiveness and are encouraged to become innovators and risk-takers.

We want our children to:

• Develop the confidence to take risks through drafting design concepts, modelling and testing
• Be reflective learners who try things out and identify any issues with their designs
• Create a design to meet a set of agreed success criteria
• Evaluate their own and others’ work and identify improvements that can be made
• See how skills acquired in DT lessons can be applied in their lives as part of an ever-changing technical world

Implementation

This image is sourced from the Kapow Primary DT Long Term Plan document.

The teaching of Design and Technology at Alphington is based around the Kapow scheme of work.

Through a variety of creative and practical activities, we teach the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making.

The children design and create products that consider function and purpose, and which are relevant to a range of sectors (for example, the home, school, leisure, culture, enterprise, industry and the wider environment).

When designing and making, the children are taught to:

Design

• use research and develop design criteria to inform the design of innovative, functional, appealing
• products that are fit for purpose, aimed at particular individuals or groups.
• generate, develop, model and communicate their ideas through discussion, annotated sketches, cross-sectional diagrams,
• prototypes, pattern pieces and computer-aided design.

Make

• select from and use a wider range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks (for example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing, as well as chopping and slicing) accurately.
• select from and use a wider range of materials, ingredients and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their functional properties, aesthetic qualities and, where appropriate, taste.

Evaluate

• investigate and analyse a range of existing products.
• evaluate their ideas and products against their own design criteria and consider the views of others to improve their work.
• understand how key events and individuals in design and technology have helped shape the world.

Develop, Use and Apply Technical Knowledge

• apply their understanding of how to strengthen, stiffen and reinforce more complex structures.
• understand and use mechanical systems in their products.
• understand and use electrical systems in their products.
• apply their understanding of computing to program, monitor and control their products
• Understand some of the ways that food can be processed and the effect of different cooking practices (including baking and grilling).

Key skills and key knowledge for D and T have been mapped across the school to ensure progression between year groups. The context for the children’s work in Design and Technology is also well considered and children learn about real life structures and the purpose of specific examples, as well as developing their skills throughout the programme of study. Design and technology lessons are also taught as a block so that children’s learning is focused throughout each unit of work.

The Design and Technology curriculum is a spiral curriculum with key areas revisited with increasing complexity. Each new unit of work begins with a recap of the previous related knowledge from previous years. This helps children to retrieve what they have learnt in the earlier sequence of the programme of study and ensures that new knowledge is taught in the context of previous learning to promote a shift in long term memory.

Impact

Evaluation and assessment are the bedrock of Design and Technology. From the very beginnings of a project where we ask, ‘What do we understand by…?’ or ‘How does this function?’ via ‘Knowledge catchers’ and disassembly, through progressive teacher questioning which promotes the higher order thinking of all learners, to the evaluation of an end-product by child assessment, teachers will challenge and monitor children’s understanding and development of skills.

Children will produce an end-product for their project, although it should be noted that the skills developed (both practical and those such as enquiry or evaluation) are fundamental to the process and as such, it is expected that products may vary in outcome and suitability to the brief. At the end of every unit, there is a Kapow assessment quiz and alongside this, all children will assess their products, making judgements about the ‘suitability to purpose’, revisiting the original design brief in order to do so.

By the end of Year 6, children will have gained knowledge and understanding of different skills and techniques required to problem-solve by designing and creating a variety of products using a safe approach. They will understand the cross curricular elements within the subject and the importance of skills learnt in other areas of the curriculum and how they aid the design and make process, as well as how these techniques and skills will aid them in future life and learning.