Home Page

Design and technology at YWJS

Design and technology Statement of Intent

Resilient Respectful Inspired Curious

Designers at Yeadon Westfield Junior School

At YWJS, each child will have the chance to design, innovate and become a resilient evaluator. They will inspire their curiosity by identifying needs and opportunities and responding to them by becoming inventors and risk-takers. Our children have opportunities to be involved in projects to make products and systems and be able to use and stretch their creative, practical and analytical skills.

Using practical and hands on experiences, our designers will look at real life situations, contexts and famous designers and inventors to be inspired in order to solve problems and create solutions in a controlled, respectful and safe environment.

They will be taught elements of:

Design
Making
Evaluation
Innovation

Our designers will have had chance to create high quality prototypes, driven by detailed plans that have been reviewed, critiqued and evaluated against a specific criteria. Our designers will be encouraged to constructively criticise each design, which in turn builds their resilience and respect whilst ensuring we inspire them and build on their curiosity by giving them a wealth of skills for future development.

STRETCH AND CHALLENGE IN DT

We want children to achieve mastery of the DT curriculum by being able to plan, design and make an item, to fulfil a given criteria, in different contexts. This would require a good level of technical skill with a broad range of tools and use of innovative ways to enhance the outcome of an item. As our scheme of learning is a spiral curriculum, children revisit previous learning – skills and knowledge - and can improve over time.

Design and Technology Curriculum Policy 2021-2024

YWJS DT policy December 2021.doc

DT Long Term Plan 2023-24

dt-long-term-plan-2023-24.doc

Progression of skills

Pupil comments:

Year 3:

"I enjoyed learning about levers and computers." (Lola)

"I like DT because we made these Earths in Geography and when you cut them open you could see the layers of the Earth in them." (Connie)

Year 4:

"I like DT because we get to make mechanisms and make things out of nothing." (Ameliah)

"I like DT because we get to make things and talk about mountains and things on mountains." (Chloe)

Year 5:

"I like DT because we build new things and we find out about mechanics and machines." (Zak)

"I like DT because you get to make things." (Angelee)

Year 6:

"I like DT because I get to experiment with tools and technology." (Lexie)

"I like DT because we get to be very crafty and in year 5 we got to make a Mars Rover." (Noah)

Spring Term 2024 - Year 6 - Fairgrounds

We designed and built electrically powered roundabouts. Here are some of our creations.

Spring Term 2024 - Year 4 - Tents for Jordan Romero

Continuing our work on structures we built some tents which we may try to sell to Jordan Romero!!

Spring Term 2024 - Year 4 - 3 Dimensional Nets

Y4 have been making 3d shapes from nets as part of their DT topic.This also links to Maths and their English/Geography topic of Mountains and Jordan Romero. The children have been exploring the most effective shaped structures to build a suitable tent for a mountaineer such as Jordan Romero. The children built the nets and even some of their own designs then rested items on top to test their strength.

Spring 2024 Year 3 Survival Bags

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 6 - Making Pizza

We tasted some pizza and then designed our own toppings. We then made our pizzas and enjoyed them at our Christmas Party.

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 5 - Making A Mars Rover

We completed our Mars rovers! Here are some pictures and videos of our completed vehicles.

Year 3 DT: Levers and Linkages

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 5 - Mars Rovers

We used our Science and Design lessons to learn about electric circuits and develop our craft skills. We built a motorised chassis for a Mars Rover.

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 6 - Indoor Shelter Building

We have been doing some shelter building in our Design and Technology lessons indoors. We linked the design of our shelters to our World War II topic.

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 6 - Shelter Building

As part of our Shelters topic, we spent an afternoon exploring our school grounds investigating the various shelters we have, how they have been built, and what we use them for. We also used natural resources we could find around the school grounds to make our own mini shelters. We had fun working in teams to attempt to construct some tents without instructions!!

Autumn Term 2023 - Year 5 - Muddy Puddle Day - Greek Food (and other activities)

Our day started with the preparation of a typical chicken Souvlaki (skewer) and a Greek Salad as part of our DT work. We used the bridge cutting technique to cut up the meat and vegetable elements of the skewer before threading them on ready to be cooked on the open fire pit. Souvlaki (known to the Ancient Greeks as 'Obelisk') were cooked authentically as they would have been in ancient times. We considered a balanced diet and the children ate their creations.

Later on, the children completed our first Cross Curricular orienteering session around the school grounds. Using a bespoke map with complex key the children had to navigate their way between control points answering questions about ancient Greek pottery as they went. All teams did brilliantly with some teams completing the course quickly and others answering the questions accurately. They covered large areas of ground on foot as the ancient Greeks would have done.

Alongside the orienteering session we also used water colours to create our own Greek temple pictures.

After lunch, we created our own Greek pots using clay and various tools. We added detail linked from our history work last week about what was pictured on Greek pottery. This included drawings of events in the Olympics and what the Greeks did for entertainment and their jobs.

Finally, we learned about the 12 labours of Hercules including the story of the Nemean lion's fight against Hercules to finish our outdoor adventure.

DT - Year 4 - Making lamps from repurposed items - links to our Eco Schools project

Summer Term 2023 - Year 3 - Design & Technology

"Designing a healthy Sandwich.'
We evaluated pre-made supermarket sandwiches, looking at their appearance, texture, smell & taste. We then practised our cutting and grating skills, preparing the ingredients. We designed our own healthy sandwich before making it. Next, the exciting part, where we ate half of our own wrap and half of someone else's. Finally, we evaluated our own sandwiches.

Summer Term 2023 - Year 5 - Carnival Masks

During last half term we were studying South America. As part of this we designed and made our own carnival masks.This video shows the design process and our final masks. Please remember to use the pause button if you want to look more closely at any image.

Year 4 - Spring 2 March 2023 - Making structures (for camping) linked to our English topic about Jordan Romero

Year 4 - Spring 2 March 2023 - Making 3D shapes from nets

Spring Term 2023 - Year 4 - D & T on our Muddy Puddle Day

We used this Muddy Puddle Day to combine our maths with art to create geometrical artwork. We went indoors to make some Mayan style wraps and enhance our food preparation skills. Back outside we cooked and ate the wraps round the fire pit, learning more Health and Safety skills.
We warmed up playing Pok-a-Tok. This is a ball game where you can't use your hands or feet to move the ball. Challenging but fun.
We also acted out some of our Mayan stories.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 5A - Mars Rover

We designed, built, and tested (but not actually on Mars) a Mars Rover. Here are some pictures of us at work.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 5H - Mars Rover

We designed, built, and tested (but not actually on Mars) a Mars Rover. Here are some pictures of us at work.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 6 - Testing Shelters

Having built shelters outside we moved into the classroom. Here we built model shelters and tested them for strength and water resistance.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 3 Levers

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 5 - Making (and eating) Souvlaki

As part of our Ancient Greek and our Design and Technology studies we made Greek salad and souvlaki. We then donned our muddy boots and cooked souvlaki in the fire pit - before eating and enjoying.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 6 - Building Shelters

Year 6 have been building shelters as part of their Design & Technology studies.

Autumn Term 2022 - Year 6 - Skills

We practiced some basic skills - hammering and sawing - and then we built a framework using straws and masking tape.

Summer Term 2022 - Year 3 - Sandwich Making

The children looked at what constitutes a balanced healthy diet, then evaluated pre packaged sandwiches, for their taste, smell, texture and appearance. They then went on to designing their own healthy sandwich. The children practised their cutting techniques using the bridge and claw method and grated some of the ingredients. Later they made their designed sandwich and evaluated it : )

Summer Term 2022 - Year 4 - Making Electric Lamps

A triple whammy here! 4I have been making a simple circuit for a lamp. The lamp was designed and built in their DT lessons (topic Electricity) out of recycled materials which links with their Eco Schools topic of waste. Their science topic is also electricity and their electricity objective was to make a simple circuit, a circuit with a brighter bulb and a circuit with more than one bulb.

Summer Term 2022 - Year 5 - Brazilian Masks and the Samba

Year 5 have been making Brazilian masks. They have also been learning the samba ready for a big event later this term - so watch this space!

Spring Term 2022 - Year 4 - Making Tacos

We designed, made and evaluated a wrap as part of our cooking topic. We are learning about the Maya and so our design had to include foods that would have been accessible to the Maya. We chopped carrot, onion and tomatoes then grated carrot and rolled it all up into a wrap with some chilli for seasoning. We enjoyed eating the wraps afterwards too!

Spring Term 2022 - Class 6G - Tinkercad

Tinkercad is a brilliant piece of software. We used it to design a desk pencil stand. We could see the design in three dimensions. We could print one out with a 3-D printer (if we had one!). Here are some short videos of our designs.

Spring 2022 - Class 4I - Structures

Class 4I took their work about Jorden Romero and their study of mountains into a design project – designing a tent to take on an arduous mountain ascent.

Spring Term 2022 - Year 3 - Muddy Puddle Day

We spent Muddy Puddle Day studying and building 2- and 3- dimensional shapes.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 6 - Pizza!

The pupils learned some basic preparation techniques, designed their own pizza boxes and flyers and then made pizza.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 5 - Mars Rover Part 2

Here it is - the long awaited part 2. Watch our Mars Rovers in action.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 5 - Mars Rover Part 1

We made mechanical Mar Rovers linked to our space work. We used our woodwork skills to create the chassis and really enjoyed using the saws. We also used the electricity work about circuits we learnt in science last year in Year 4 to create our own working electrical mechanism. It was quite a challenge to get the whole Mars Rover to move. There are two videos to this project - watch out for part 2 soon!

Y4 Structures

In Design Technology (DT) the children have been learning about structures. This is linked to our topic about Mighty Mountains and how Jordan Romero survived on the Mountains during his Mountain climbs. The children looked at different shaped structures and made these structures out of nets.

Autumn 2021 Year 3

Year 3 children investigated levers for their Design Technology project. Using cardboard and split pins we made a lever with a fixed and loose pivot. We then designed a background picture and added a Temple Cat with a moving tail. Here are some of the things children said about the project:

"I enjoyed making the lever, it was fun." Phoebe

"Making a cat with a moving tail was lots of fun." Bobby

"I thought colouring the background made my moving picture stand out." Brooke

"I thought designing the Temple cat was very enjoyable." Emily

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 6 - Shelters

Our topic has been Shelters. We looked at different types of shelter. Then we designed, built, and tested our own shelters.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 5 - Making Souvlaki

We designed some Greek inspired pottery, then we prepared some Greek food and finally we went out to the fire pit where we cooked and ate the food.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 6 - Basic Skills and Frameworks

We have refreshed our basic sawing and hammering skills and then gone on to build frameworks out of straws.

Autumn Term 2021 - Year 6 - Den Building

As part of their World War II topic Year 6 have been studying air-raid shelters. As part of this topic they have been evaluating different shelters and then building their own.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Summer Term 2021 - Year 4 Eco-Schools Energy Topic

We researched the ideas behind reusing materials. We learned about electric circuits.Then we designed and made our own electric table lamps using recycled materials.

Summer Term 2021 - Class 5A - Brazilian Masks

As part of our Bustling Brazil topic we designed and made carnival masks.

Summer Term 2021 - Class 5H - Brazilian Masks

As part of our Bustling Brazil topic we designed and made carnival masks;

Summer Term 2021 - Year 6 - Fairground Rides 1

Year 6 have been developing their Design and Technology skills through the building of working models of fairground rides. These 4 videos show the different aspects of this topic.