Developing Skills for Study, Work and Life
Our curriculum, developed with colleges, universities and employers, focuses on developing learners who will thrive in the C21st world of life and work. Personal, Learning and Thinking Skills (PLTS) are an important part of this focus, and schools are delivering these through various contexts. At Thomas Estley, we emphasise these particularly in Modules and through the Year Nine Specialisms afternoon. Our GCSE courses build on these skills and provide a variety of pathways for further study.
Specialisms: A personalised pathway
Tuesday afternoons for Year Nine include a range of specialist contexts, allowing learners to develop knowledge and skills specific to a chosen area in addition to the learning and thinking skills themselves. This is obviously in addition to the normal Year Nine subjects, timetabled across the rest of the week as usual. We know that this Tuesday ‘Specialisms afternoon’, in place now for several years, adds motivation and enjoyment for our learners, in addition to helping them pursue an interest which they may then choose to develop further through their GCSEs and beyond, in or out of school.
Find out more
If you have any questions about a specific specialism, please speak with the relevant lead teacher; or if it is a more general question about Specialisms, you can speak with Mr Fegan during tutor time.
Which specialism?
Leadership and Character skill-building is built into every course - particularly with a focus on developing independent and confident lifelong learners who can apply learning and thinking skills across the curriculum and begin to prepare themselves for the world of work. Your choice will not affect or limit your GCSE option choices.
You likely have some particular areas of interest and so we operate an option system where you will choose areas of interest and we try, dependent on demand and staffing, to allocate you to one of your preferred areas. If we feel that you would benefit from studying one course in particular, we will discuss this with you.
See below for information about the different context being offered this year.