Physical Education Core

Head of Department: Mr M Wilce

What is Core PE?

Physical Education is a core subject which will be taken by all pupils. Our Key Stage 4 curriculum aims to suit pupils’ individual needs and allows them a choice in which physical activities they would like to take part in.  Our purpose is to ensure students understand how to maintain a healthy active lifestyle when they leave school and develop life skills such as resilience, collaboration and empathy ready for the ‘workplace’. Core PE also gives KS4 students much needed stress relief from their exam subjects.

What skills will I develop?

Students will physically exercise, work hard and increase their heart rate to maintain their healthy active lifestyle and provide time out from their exam subjects.  They will have an opportunity to improve and develop existing practical skills in addition to leading, coaching and officiating.  Perhaps most importantly students will develop life skills such as resilience, responsibility, integrity, communication, influencing others, evaluation, empathy and innovation.

What syllabus will I follow?

There is no exam syllabus.  Curriculum lessons are delivered based on the activity pathway chosen.

What will the course look like?

Students can opt from several different pathways:

Competitive Games

This pathway is designed for those students who enjoy playing team sports and are motivated to compete and attempt to outwit opponents through a mix of teamwork and leadership skills. They have an opportunity to develop tactics and strategies and improve their technique and performance. These sports also linked to extracurricular clubs and sports links in the community. Pupils will take part in sports such as football, Rugby, basketball, table tennis and softball.

Alternative Games

This pathway is designed to allow students to try sports and activities that they may not have come across during their KS3 Physical education lessons. This pathway gives students a broader knowledge of the types of games and activities available to them and allows them to develop new skills or transfer existing skills into new sports. Students choosing Alternative games will be able to try such sports as Tchoukball, Korfball, Handball, Spikeball Danish Longball and volleyball

Active lifestyles and games

Having two separate strands; one that includes games and one that focuses on fitness-based activities, allows a variety to students’ lessons. Pupils on this pathway will engage in a range of physical activities to promote and manage their physical activity and health into adulthood. The aim is to establish an activity framework that ensures pupils are knowledgeable and equipped to participate in lifelong physical activity. Pupils on this pathway will take part in games such as badminton and netball, as well as other fitness-based activities such as Boxercise.

Adventure

This pathway combines a variety of activities that fall in to the OAA category, they aim to present pupils with an intellectual and physical challenge whilst promoting teamwork, building trust, and developing problem solving skills. These activities include Mountain biking, Rock climbing and Orienteering. This pathway also allows students to develop tactics and strategies in gameplay through Nerf Combat and Dodgeball, develop life skills of communication as well as evaluate and assess both self and peer performance through problem solving.

Leadership academy (Y10)

Pupils use lesson time to develop their knowledge of leadership through a variety of activities which allow them to build on skills such as communication, organisation, teamwork, and confidence. These skills are then used to deliver a variety of sports festivals to their peers and primary school pupils. This pathway is directly associated to the department ethos of developing employability skills through sport and physical activity. These activities include tag rugby, hockey, basketball, dodgeball, netball, table tennis, football, tennis, badminton, and rounders

Sports Acro and games (Y11)

This pathway is designed for those pupils who enjoy specific gymnastic type activities. Within this pathway pupils learn how to control their body through floor and flight skills. Pupils learn how to control their body to allow for movements and static skills to be completed. As well as this, pupils are still able to have time to engage and improve in team sports. Pupils who choose this pathway will take part in Gymnastics, Trampolining, Parkour, and ultimate Tag as well as Rounders and Tchoukball.

Students stay on the same pathway for the whole year – they will opt for their pathway at the end of year 9.  Students will have an opportunity to opt for a different pathway in year 11.  This process will be done at the end of year 10.

 

What homework will I get?

Students following the performance plus pathway may have session plans to write up or evaluate at home.

We expect students to be exercising and participating in physical activity outside of school to maintain their healthy active lifestyle.

How will I be assessed?

Students will be assessed using our Comberton KS4 Core PE assessment levels.  Students are assessed in three strands: Enjoyment, Lifelong Activity and Employability Skills.  The levels use the same language as the KS3 assessment lower down the school and the criteria is centred around the vision and purpose of Core PE at Comberton. These levels do not correlate to GCSE at all.

What jobs or further courses of study might this lead to?

Core PE ensures that students are successful in whatever they chose to do next by:

• Helping to ensure they are healthy and free from illness
• Maintaining fitness levels to cope with everyday demands
• Providing stress relief and good mental health to cope with pressure and difficult circumstances
• Developing life skills and employability
• Developing confidence and self-esteem to ensure they are ambitious and achieve their potential

Are there any entry requirements for this course?

All students participate in Core PE.  Students need to ensure they are well organised for lessons with their PE kit and are actively involved in all activities.

If I need additional support, what can I access?

After-school PE clubs run as usual for KS4 students.  If students want to participate in more activities and increase their physical activity levels, then we would like to see them attend these clubs.  This will also help students to develop the positive habit of exercising outside of Core PE lessons.

Back to table of subjects