OfSTED Curriculum Planning Tools Update

We have been busy developing the curriculum planning module in Stedfast. With the release of the new OfSTED Inspection Framework due in September 2019, we know how keen education and training providers are to prepare this element of their delivery.

Amanda Spielman – AOC Conference 2019

Amanda Spielman addressed the AOC Conference this week and reiterated that OfSTED inspections of further education and skills would be heavily centred on curriculum planning. OfSTED will focus on the substance of apprenticeship programmes.

For apprenticeships, as with the new provider monitoring visits, we are going to be paying more attention to whether these foundations for a good curriculum, training, and apprenticeship offer are in place. The new framework will ask providers to be clear about why their curriculum is as it is. In apprenticeships, this means looking at whether the apprenticeship offered meets the needs of local and regional employers.

We have been working hard at Capella Systems to help providers meet the needs of the new OfSTED Inspection Framework by further developing our curriculum planning tools for education and training providers.

Curriculum Planning Module

In our latest update (28 Mar 2019), we introduced additional reporting tools with a new curriculum mapping tool. This is a great visual checker to see which curriculum activities map to curriculum outcomes.

The curriculum planning module was designed to allow providers to create and manage curriculum plans easily. Users are able to set up a curriculum plan for each of their apprenticeship or learning programmes, add activities and attach resources. Importantly, we have also added a 20% Off the Job planning tool for apprenticeship providers.

Why is using the Stedfast curriculum planning tool so important?

This is going to be a critical area that OfSTED are going to inspect. Providers cannot rely on just producing a Word document or Excel spreadsheet listing when programme elements will be delivered – that really doesn’t work. Providers need to ensure that they can easily demonstrate their curriculum intent by listing the programme elements or activities, what learning will take place and its purpose, the needed practice, and what assessment activities are planned. Providers also need to be able to demonstrate the learning material and assessment activities that learners will complete.

Critically, providers must also schedule their curriculum and demonstrate how this has been done. The example used by Amanda Spielman at the AOC Conference was:

At Ace Training, for example, tutors and employers determined that apprentices’ training should be re-ordered because the apprentices needed to gain skills earlier than planned to fix intricate architraves, and hang doors accurately. Effective sequencing like this is so important. It means that apprentices build, consolidate and build again upon what they know.

We have developed Stedfast so that providers can schedule curriculum activities. Also, we factored in 20% off-the-job training. Providers can record this for all of their curriculum activities