Applied Transdisciplinary Learning
Applied Trandisciplinary Learning (ATL) is a key feature of the No Limits Curriculum at Park Academy West London. ATL involves learning between, across and beyond different disciplines that is relevant to the real world and applied to real practical situations. The goal is to access, analyse and synthesise information and knowledge over several disciplines in order to understand the operation and issues facing the world today and in the future. Very rarely in the real world do people operate in only one discipline, the aim of the curriculum is to replicate real world experience to ensure learning is authentic.
Students in Years 7 and 8 complete six assignments over the course of the academic year, each with a focus on different curriculum areas:
Year 7:
- Tomorrow’s World
- Love, Life and Loss
- Demos Kratos
- Computer Science
- Shakespeare Redesigned
- Healthy Living
Year 8:
- Café Culture
- Out of this World
- Global Culture
- Crime Scene Investigation
- Health and Disease
- The Civil Rights Movement
Each assignment, which have been developed and adapted to reflect our students and the local community, is based around a driving question which provides the purpose of learning. The assignments require students to draw on knowledge from single discipline learning and be creative in how they apply the knowledge to real world scenarios. Developing cultural capital is a central part of the ATL curriculum and students are provided with opportunities to enrich their experiences throughout the assignments. Following each assignment students participate in an exhibition in which they present their work, enabling them to further develop many of the Future Skills.