Computing & ICT

The Computing department at St. Mary’s College provides a varied, rich and challenging curriculum throughout a pupil’s time at our school. Our clear intention is to equip pupils with the knowledge and skills to be confident in their use of technology, provide pupils with experience in a wide range of technologies, help pupils to understand the way in which a wide range of technologies work, and encourage pupils to recognise that technology is a tool that can be used to aid them in solving problems.

To facilitate this, our curriculum is designed to provide pupils with a wealth of opportunities during lessons to experience a wide range of practical and theory-based topics. We recognise that within lesson time pupils may not have the opportunity to fully explore areas they find of particular interest and offer a range of extra-curricular activities to allow them to do so.

We are proud to be able to offer both GCSE ICT and Computer Science providing a solid base to those young people with aspirations to work within the computing sector, and pupils who will need to make effective use of a range of ICT based applications within other sectors of employment. The computing teachers at St. Mary’s have computing based degree qualifications coupled with relevant industry experience which help to make our curriculum content relevant and engaging for pupils.

Lower School

Pupils in years 7 to 9 study a wide ranging curriculum which incorporates topics related to both ICT and Computer Science.

ICT topics are designed to enable pupils to make informed, effective and intelligent use of the ICT facilities, both those available in and outside of school. Pupils will be introduced to the software contained in the Microsoft Office suite of programs building a bank of skills and an appreciation as to how the software is used by businesses outside the school setting.

In addition to the software provided in the Microsoft Office suite, pupils will be introduced to more creative applications allowing them to build skills in topics such as graphic and photo editing, audio and video creation and creating their own multimedia rich websites.

Computer Science topics introduce the computer system, giving an idea as to how computers work, and provide opportunities for pupils to design and create software solutions to problems, making use of computational thinking skills and introducing programming in a variety of languages, both graphical and textual.

The aim being to allow them to make an informed choice in year 9 as to whether a study of ICT or Computer Science will best suit their future study and career aspirations.

GCSE

We offer the choice of either ICT or Computer Science to pupils when they take their GCSE options in year 9.

CIE iGCSE ICT (course code 0983)

The Cambridge International GCSE provides pupils with practical experience of applications that are commonly used within industry for productivity and data analysis. In addition, the included theory topics provide the means for pupils to gain an understanding of how computer systems are implemented within the workplace, the ways in which technology is used within a variety of industries and the knowledge to critically analyse their use of technology to deliver solutions to common business problems.

OCR Computer Science (course code J277)

The GCSE in Computer Science is engaging and practical allowing pupils to develop creativity and problem-solving skills. It contains opportunities to build on programming skills taught at key stage 3. To support this pupils will analyse problems, developing computational thinking skills to help devise algorithms to allow them to provide creative solutions to problems by analysing, designing, building and testing programs. In addition the GCSE course covers more theoretical topics including how a computer works and ethical, legal, cultural and environmental concerns associated with computer science.

A Level

OCR Computer Science A level (course code H446)

From September 2025 students will have the option to study A Level Computer Science, following the OCR Computer Science course and building on the study of Computer Science in Middle School. The course has been designed to develop student’s technical understanding and their ability to analyse and solve problems using computational thinking. The course is structured into 3 components.

Component one focuses on computer systems, their internal workings, the way in which data is exchanged between computer systems, software development and includes legal and ethical issues associated with computer useage. Component two provides practical experience of using computational thinking techniques to solve problems and create software solutions through programming. Component three allows students the flexibility to create their own software solution based on a real world problem, providing them the opportunity to analyse the problem, design and develop a solution, and evaluate their solution including relevant documentation.

Students who have studied either GCSE Computer Science or GCSE ICT can study Computer Science at A Level.