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CURRICULUM

Steelstown Primary School and Nursery Unit were inspected by the Department of
Education's Inspectorate Branch in January 2007. The report was extremely positive and
highlighted the many strengths of the school's educational and pastoral provision. It
recognised the strong support of parents, governors and wider community for the work of
the school and concluded that parents and the local community can have confidence in the
school's capacity for sustained self-improvement. A copy of the Report is available on the
DE website www.deni.gov.uk .
Children in Steelstown Primary School are educated within the school's ethos of a Catholic
Maintained School, in line with the requirements of the Northern Ireland Curriculum.

As well as the statutory curriculum, the school offers a variety of enriching curriculum and
personal experiences for the children. Art & Design, Music, P.E. and Drama are highly
valued as important areas of the child's personal and social development.

The Enriched Curriculum, or Foundation Stage, where the focus is on the development of
the child's personal, social, physical, literacy and numeracy skills, was successfully
introduced to the school in September 2003 and is currently being implemented.
The newly developed and highly successful Linguistic Phonics programme was introduced
to Years 1, 2 and 3 pupils in September 2005 and to Year 4-7 pupils in September 2006, to
assist children with their reading and spelling.

Primary Movement, an innovative approach to developing children's skills of co-ordination
and concentration, is taught in Nursery, Year 1, 2 and 3 on a daily basis.

Throughout the school teachers focus on activity-based learning, where children are
involved in practical activities, which help them to develop their thinking skills, imagination
and creativity and enable them to become more independent in their learning.

The Extended Schools Funding introduced in 2006 has helped the school to introduce a
wider range of extra-curricular activities for our pupils. New clubs include Reading, Guitar,
Maths and Art. There is also an extensive programme of Summer activities during July and
August.
Staff are committed to the development of pupils' ICT skills. All Year 7 pupils achieve CCEA,
ICT Accreditation at Levels 3, 4 and 5 and the software programmes Autoskills 'Academy of
Reading and Maths' are used by the Learning Support Team to improve pupils' literacy and
numeracy skills.

In October 2007, Y6 pupils from the school were the N.I. winners of a U.K. wide I.T.
competition run by PITcom (Parliamentary IT Committee).

Steelstown Primary is a health promoting school and has a healthy breaks policy. Staff work
closely with parents, local health professionals and the wider community in helping pupils
to develop a healthy lifestyle. A Breakfast Club is available for pupils between 8.45 and 9.00
a.m. The Compulsory Nutritional Standards for school meals is currently in operation in the
school's canteen and pupils are encouraged to eat a sandwich, yoghurt or a piece of fruit at
breaktime.

A 'Healthy Lifestyles' week is organised for pupils, parents and community in January each
year.