At Jo Richardson we offer a rich, broad and balanced curriculum which prepares students for the next phases in their education, training or employment and allows all students to ACHIEVE their full potential.
Our social, moral, spiritual and cultural education (SMSC) alongside our student voice is outstanding and has been held up nationally as a model of good practice. We also offer an extensive program for enterprise education and careers education guidance. For further details please follow the link to the relevant pages.
We have an extensive range of extracurricular clubs and opportunities for students outside the taught curriculum including five days where we collapse our timetable to enable students to participate in exciting enrichment opportunities both in school, trips into London and abroad. Further details of our extracurricular program can be found by following the link to our extra-curricular page.
Literacy and numeracy are embedded within all subject across the curriculum. We also have a number of literacy programs such as “Lexia” and “Right to Write” which support students in developing these essential skills. Further details can be found on our literacy and numeracy pages.
KS3
Our KS3 curriculum helps prepare students for the demands of KS4. Details of the lessons taught and the amount of hours allocated to each subject can be found in the table below. Please the individual subject pages for detailed content on the topics taught in each year.
Support for students who enter below age related expectations is through our whole school literacy program, and through specialist teaching in the English and maths department as part of our Nurture curriculum. Some students receive additional support through our Student development department (SDD). Further details of the programs they run can be found on the SDD department page.
KS3 Curriculum plan (number represent hours per fortnight)
| Subject |
Year 7 |
Year 8 |
Year 9 |
| English |
8 |
8 |
8 |
| Maths |
8 |
8 |
8 |
| Science |
6 |
6 |
6 |
| Art |
2 |
2 |
2 |
| Dance and PE |
4 |
4 |
4 |
| Drama |
2 |
2 |
2 |
| DT and Food |
3 |
3 |
4 |
| French and Spanish |
4 |
4 |
4 |
| Geography |
3 |
2 |
2 |
| History |
2 |
3 |
2 |
| ICT |
2 |
2 |
2 |
| PDE |
2 |
2 |
2 |
| Music |
2 |
2 |
2 |
| RE |
2 |
2 |
2 |
KS4
Our KS4 curriculum offers a wide choice of subjects with many different pathways. At the end of year 9 students receive high quality careers education guidance to support them in making their option choices. All students will study a core curriculum consisting of:
- English language and English literature GCSE
- Maths GCSE (Statistics GCSE for top two sets)
- Dual Science GCSE
- PDE (PSHE and RS)
- PE
Students then choose one subject from the following options:
- Computer Science GCSE
- French GCSE
- Geography GCSE
- History GCSE
- Spanish GCSE
Students are then given three free option choices. This means our students can follow a number of different pathways at KS4. For details of the content and exam boards we use please see the individual subject pages. Available options are listed below:
- Art GCSE
- Business studies GCSE,
- Business studies first award BTEC
- Citizenship GCSE, Computer science GCSE
- Construction first award BTEC
- Dance GCSE, Drama GCSE
- DT product design GCSE
- Economics GCSE
- Engineering first award BTEC
- Geography GCSE
- History GCSE
- ICT OCR award
- Media studies GCSE
- French GCSE
- Spanish GCSE
- Music GCSE
- PE GCSE
- PE first award BTEC
- Religious studies GCSE
- Statistics GCSE (if not in top two sets)
- Triple science (Biology, Chemistry, Physics GCSE)
Option support is offered to a small number of students in our SDD department who may struggle with four options and require study support during the week.
KS4 Curriculum plan (number represent hours per fortnight)
| Subject |
Year 10 |
Year 11 |
| English |
8 |
10 |
| Maths |
10 |
8 |
| Science |
8 |
8 |
| PDE (PSHE/RS) |
2 |
2 |
| PE |
2 |
2 |
| Option 1 |
5 |
5 |
| Option 2 |
5 |
5 |
| Option 3 |
5 |
5 |
| Option 4 |
5 |
5 |
For a small number of students an academic pathway in school is not suitable. We have a number of students who attend college in KS4 and follow an alternative curriculum. We work closely with the local authority and outside providers such as Barking college to provide a variety of vocational pathways for these students.
KS5
At KS5 we work alongside three other schools in the local area to form the southern consortium. This enables us to offer a wide variety of courses for our students. Details of the options available can be found on the Southern Consortium website or on our sixth form pages.
Details of the contents of the courses taught on site at Jo Richardson can be found on individual subject pages.
If you have any queries or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact the school office on 020 8270 6222 or contact Ms L Keane at LKeane@jorichardson.org.uk
