Children at Lodge Lane Infant School learn through an approach called ‘Imaginative Inquiry’.  This looks and feels like in most schools where children learn through topics or themes (we call them inquiries) which change every term however there are some important differences as well.

It is important to our school that children learn about our values and aims.  Imaginative Inquiry allows us to design learning which places these at the centre of our inquiries.

We do this by having a whole school inquiry theme every term.  From this teachers plan a specific inquiry question which they will explore with their class at the same time as planning from the National Curriculum.

Our inquiry-led curriculum also allows us to work in partnership with children, which is one of our values and aims.  We do this by exploring two questions with the children when new inquiries start.  These are:

• What do we already know about…
• What do we wonder about…

These questions allow us to plan activities which are challenging and do not cover what the class already knows as well as to incorporate activities which the children may be interested in (through the ‘I wonder’ question).

To make this learning more exciting and engaging, the inquiries are taught through imaginative contexts or stories, which is why we call our approach Imaginative Inquiry.  The imaginative aspect of the curriculum is mainly developed through drama sessions.  However it can also be developed through classes receiving letters from fictional characters, telephone calls, mysterious messages left in the classroom or through educational visits and visitors coming into school.  Whilst this imaginative aspect of our inquiries is very exciting, the children always know and understand that it is not real, however we find they choose to ‘believe’ because it is exciting and fun.

Consequently it is not unusual for children to come home and say that Jack (from Jack and the beanstalk), an alien or a zoo keeper has visited their class today…

Our whole school inquiry themes for this year are:

Click here for some examples of past inquiries or here for more details on how the inquiries are underpinned by our school values and aims.

This is what Ofsted (October 2011) said about our inquiry-led curriculum:

The inquiry-led curriculum has been put in place to ensure that pupils develop a broad range of skills and add to what they know so far

Inquiries develop personal responsibility

The sense of awe and wonder is developed via the inquiry-led approach to learning

In addition, increasing emphasis is placed on the sense of wonder and where the imagination can take you so that pupils become full partners on the learning journey

Careful planning of activities, together with open-ended topics involving the use of imagination, enables more able pupils to extend their learning