In the English primary education, core subjects often take precedence over foundation subjects, making it challenging to deliver a broad and balanced curriculum. Primary schools follow the English National Curriculum (NC), which offers an outline of core knowledge around which teachers can develop exciting and stimulating lessons to promote the development of pupils’ knowledge, understanding and skills as part of the wider school curriculum (DfE, 2013, p.6). This paper explores the implementation of a cross-curricular approach in a Year 2 classroom in London. It interprets the NC guidance to demonstrate how this framework can create meaningful connections between core subjects and the often-overlooked foundation subjects, thus elevating the profile of marginalised disciplines. Creating a robust Long-Term Plan (LTP), Medium-Term Plan (MTP) and weekly plans are identified as key tools for addressing this curriculum imbalance, ensuring that cross-curricular connections are planned for carefully throughout the academic year. By doing so, the article argues that schools can deliver a purposefully broad and balanced curriculum through the connections of different disciplines that share a common theme.
