We are delighted to take a practitioner-led approach to research and development. 

Through action research and collaboration, we look for continual improvements to the learning experiences of the pupils in our schools. Professionals from across our partner schools work collaboratively to establish new and refined ways of delivering first class education to the pupils.

Currently, our development priorities are:

* Developing Vocabulary - enhancing the level of language children use in their oral and written work. This  feeds into the general reading confidence of the pupils and improves their comprehension skills.

* Ensuring breadth and depth across all curriculum subjects. This is well timed and parallels the messages from the DfE about children's fluency across all curriculum subjects and will lead us to embed an even more knowledge-rich approach to learning.

* Development of Geography curriculum Our partner schools recognise that children require access to a curriculum which regularly revisits and embeds previously learned geographical information.  A full review of all curriculum areas is underway beginning with Geography.    We are confident that when our children transition to secondary school their grasp of key geographical knowledge and skills will be strong and set them up well for KS3 learning.

* Responding to national changes in assessment in RE  On a national level, new expectations for religious education have led all Catholic schools to review their curriculum and the assessment of learning.  We have embraced the changes wholeheartedly and can confidently say that the curriculum and assessment we have in place for RE is of the highest quality and is already embedded in practice across our partner primary schools

If you are keen to get involved in any of the above research projects, please contact paradigm@stjosephs-epsom.surrey.sch.uk