Bourofaye Christian School

Academics

Bourofaye Christian School is organized academically into two different branches, English speaking and German speaking. The academics for each of these major branches are significantly different from each other. However, the English speaking branch is far larger than the German speaking branch. Information for this page has been extracted from the Academic Manual.

English Speaking Branch

Age at the Start of
the School Year		 School Year / Grade Level of Education Course
4 - 6
7 - 10		 R - 2
3 - 6		 PRIMARY KEY STAGE 1 - INFANT
KEY STAGE 2 - JUNIOR
11 - 13
14 - 16		 7 - 9
10 - 11		 SECONDARY KEY STAGE 3
KEY STAGE 4 - IGCSE COURSE

It is possible a child will not be placed in their chronological year group if we feel they would benefit from more time being spent on the development of their language, or other special educational need. This is particularly true for those children for whom English is a second language.

The English speaking students from Reception (R) to Year 9 are taught using the English and Welsh National Curriculum (NC) as a foundation. This approach gives us certain advantages:

  • We can refer to the objective definitions of attainment levels within the curriculum documents, allowing us to have an external frame of reference.
  • The school is registered with the Department for Education and Employment in Britain for testing at ages 7, 11 and 14. These are standardised test known as SATS and cover learning during a key stage. This also allows us to refer to an objective external assessment of our children’s achievements.
  • The UK is increasingly multi-cultural, especially in the big cities; therefore the curriculum is already designed to be a flexible framework rather than being rigid or culturally bound. It therefore allows us to create a curriculum suited to our needs.

This curriculum is however only the foundation and, where necessary, we modify and add to it to suit our own particular needs both as a Christian school and as an international school.

  1. The Religious Education curriculum goes well beyond the limited requirements of the foundation model. We can also consider how to present the Gospel to those of other faiths rather than just study comparative religion. Additionally, our goal is not to have Biblical teaching boxed into a neat little corner of the timetable, but that it should permeate the whole curriculum and ethos of the school.
  2. Our geography and history programmes allow ample opportunity to study internationally. The basic curriculum is already very international in outlook, but we are able to study units of work that are of particular relevance to the students in our classes.
  3. English assignments regularly allow opportunity to write about Africa or home country experiences.
  4. The Senior PSHE syllabus has a strong international current affairs emphasis and is also geared to helping children prepare for their re-entry, i.e. the ‘return’ to the parents’ home country. This syllabus also includes a local studies unit, which is integrated with studies in other school classes.
  5. We stock a large range of American as well as British library books, including our main encyclopedia sets. Books are welcome from any suitable source.
  6. Both of the main spelling conventions of the English language, i.e. British and American, are taught in the school. Our goals are consistency and accuracy whichever of the two is applicable to the student.
  7. The International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE) examination is what its name suggests, a GCSE that is accredited by the University of Cambridge as an appropriate examination for students aged 15 or 16, but international in that the examples used, the case studies made, and the literature studied, come from all over the world. The major users of the IGCSE are in sub-Saharan Africa and in Singapore and the sub-continent. In some countries it is the official examination at age 16 and the next stage up (HIGCSE) is a standard South African matriculation qualification. A key feature of all of the Cambridge qualifications is that they are specifically designed for international use, including students whose mother tongue is not English.

Subjects from Reception to Year 9

The National Curriculum is sub-divided into 12 subjects, these are then further grouped into Core Subjects and Non-Core Subjects. The subjects students may study from Reception to Year 9 are

Core Subjects
  • English
  • Mathematics
  • Science
Non-Core Subjects
  • Design and Technology
  • Information Computer Technology (ICT)
  • Geography
  • Religious Education
  • Modern Foreign Languages (French and German)
  • Art
  • History
  • Music
  • Physical Education
  • General Studies

Subjects from Year 10 to Year 11

The IGCSE subjects and syllabuses are listed below. Syllabuses can be downloaded by clicking on the links, and range approximately 200KB to 600KB in size. IGCSE examinations are taken at the end of a two-year programme of teaching commencing in Year 10. In exceptional circumstances, some IGCSEs may be taken early.

Core Subjects Non-Core Subjects

The list above is the IGCSE subjects generally available; other subjects may be offered if staff are available and students need to study those subjects. Examples of these include the students who study Korean or Dutch as first or second language.


German Speaking Branch

Age at the Start of
the School Year		 School Year (Klasse) Level of Education (Swiss System)
6 - 8 1 - 3 UNTERSTUFE
9 - 11 4 - 6 MITTELSTUFE
12 - 15 7 - 9 OBERSTUFE

Special courses can be completed using correspondence courses from Germany, for example Latin.

There is considerable integration between the two branches. Physical Education and Expressive Arts are taught together and equipment is shared in specialist subjects such as Science, Art, Crafts and Information Technology. Many staff teach in both branches and senior level German speaking students may well join other classes with the English speakers.

For more information concerning the academics or the schooling system please contact bcseducation@sentoo.sn For more about the daily lives of students at the school, or more general information about Bourofaye Christian School, please see the Overview section.