Opening Worlds
In September 2021 Kensington Primary School adopted a new curriculum which starts in Year 3 and then will be rolled out in the subsequent years until it is implemented from Year 3 through to Year 6.
Opening Worlds is a knowledge-rich humanities programme for teaching history, geography and religion in Years 3 to 6. As a school we are provided with curriculum resources together with training, support and ongoing programme-related professional development for our school teachers. Because of its rapidly discernible effects on literacy and its highly inclusive approach, Opening Worlds has quickly gained appeal in schools tackling under-achievement in areas of considerable social disadvantage.
The Opening Worlds programme was first launched in 2019 by Christine Counsell and Steve Mastin, in association with Haringey Education Partnership (HEP) where over 60 primary schools took it up. More recently, a further 60 primary schools have now adopted the programme in Cambridgeshire, Peterborough and Liverpool. In partnership with HEP, Opening Worlds now works with formal networks of ten or more primary schools (e.g. LA partnerships, MATs and other school groups with established community leadership).
The programme meets and substantially exceeds the demand of the National Curriculum for history and geography. It is compatible with most SACRE locally agreed syllabi in RE. The programme is characterised by strong vertical sequencing within subjects (so that pupils gain security in a rich, broad vocabulary through systematic introduction, sustained practice and deliberate revisiting) and intricate horizontal and diagonal connections, thus creating a curriculum whose effects are far greater than the sum of its parts.
