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The Opening Minds curriculum features five categories of competences: learning, citizenship, relating
to people, managing situations and managing information. Focusing on competences means that
Opening Minds teaching emphasises the ability to understand an d to do, rather than just the
transmission of knowledge.
These competences are broad areas of capability, developed in classrooms through a mixture of
instruction and practical experience: children plan their work, organise their own time and explore
their own ways of learning.
Subject boundaries are less defined than in traditional curriculum teaching, with schools often
integrating the teaching of several subjects together into modules or topics, where competences can
be developed through the exploration of common themes. Crucially, the input of teachers and the
individual needs of schools are central to the planning of each Opening Minds project.
Each competence category contains a number of individual competences, which are exp ressed in
terms of what a school student could achieve having progressed through the curriculum:
Learning
understood how to learn, taking into account their preferred learning styles, and understood
the need to, and how to, manage their own learning throughout life
learned, systematically, to think
explored and reached an understanding of their own creative talents, and how best to make
use of them
learned to enjoy and love learning for its own sake and as part of understanding themselves
achieved high standards in literacy, numeracy, and spatial understanding
achieved high standards of competence in handling information and communications
technology and understood the underlying processes.
Citizenship
an understanding of ethics and values, how personal behaviour should be informed by these,
and how to contribute to society
understood how society, government and business work, and the importance of active
citizenship
understood cultural and social diversity, in both national and global contexts, and why these
should be respected and valued
understood the social implications of technology
understood how to manage aspects of their own lives, and the techniques they might use to
do so including managing their own financial affairs
Relating to People
Managing Situations
understood the importance of managing their own time, and developing techniques for doing
so
understood what is meant by managing change, and have developed a range of techniques
for use in varying situations
understood the importance both of celebrating success and managing disappointment, and
ways of handling these
understood what is meant by being entrepreneurial and initiative -taking, and how to develop
capacities for these
understood how to manage risk and uncertainty, the wide range of contexts in which these
will be encountered, and techniques for managing them.
Managing Information
developed a range of techniques for accessing, evaluating and differentiating information and
have learned how to analyse, synthesise and apply them
understood the importance of reflecting and applying critical judgement, and have learned
how to do so