Progression in learning is a process of developing and improving in skills and knowledge over time. This focuses on understanding what it means to make progress in a given area or discipline and how learners should deepen and broaden their knowledge and understanding, skills and capacities, and attributes and dispositions. This is key to them embodying the four purposes and to progressing into different pathways beyond school.

How do we want our pupils to progress?

Increasing effectiveness

We want our pupils to become increasingly effective at learning in a social and work-related context. As they become increasingly effective they are able to seek appropriate support and independently identify sources of that support. We want our pupils to ask increasingly sophisticated questions and find and evaluate answers from an increasing range of sources. This includes increasingly successful approaches to self-evaluation, identification of their next steps in learning and more effective means of self-regulation.

Increasing breadth and depth of knowledge

We want our pupils to acquire both breadth and depth of knowledge. As learners progress, we want them to develop an increasingly sophisticated understanding of the concepts that underpin different statements of what matters across all the Areas of Learning Experience. We want them to develop a growing understanding of the relationships between these and use them to make sense of and apply knowledge.

Deepening understanding of the ideas and disciplines within the Areas

We want our pupils to become increasingly aware of the ways in which ideas and approaches can be grouped and organised. As they progress, they need to develop deeper understanding of the different types of learning that are involved in each Area of Learning Experience, and see these in the context of the four purposes and the statements of what matters.

Refinement and growing sophistication in the use and application of skills

We want our pupils to develop a range of skills including: physical, communication, cognitive and Area specific skills. In the early stages of learning, this range of skills includes focus on developing gross and fine motor; communicative and social skills. They will also develop the skills of evaluating and organising information in applying what they have learned. As learners progress, we want them to be able to demonstrate more refined application of existing skills, and to experience opportunities to develop new, more specific and more sophisticated skills.

Over time, we want our learners to be able to effectively organise a growing number of increasingly sophisticated ideas, to apply understanding in various contexts and to communicate their thoughts effectively, using a range of methods, resources or equipment appropriate to their purpose and audience.

Making connections and transferring learning into new contexts

We want our pupils to become more confident in making connections across their learning within an Area, between Areas, and with their experiences outside of school. Over time these connections will be increasingly sophisticated, explained and justified by our learners. We want pupils to be able to apply and use previously acquired knowledge and skills in different, unfamiliar and challenging contexts.