Design Department

HEAD OF DEPARTMENT

Mr Stanley Newton
stan.newton@ntlworld.com

Design and Technology prepares boys to participate in tomorrow's rapidly changing world. They learn to think and intervene, to improve the quality of life. The subject calls for boys to become autonomous and creative problem solvers, both as individuals and as members of a team. They must look for needs, wants and opportunities and respond to them by developing a range of ideas and making products and systems. They combine practical skills with an understanding of aesthetics, social and environmental issues, functions and industrial practices. As they do so, they reflect on and evaluate present and past design and technology, its uses and effects. Through Design and Technology, all boys can become discriminating and informed users of products, and become innovators.

Our aims in Technology are:

  • To stimulate the boys' interest, enjoyment, curiosity and concern about, technological aspects of their environment, both local and globally, in Design and Technology;
  • To enable boys to be familiar with a relevant body of knowledge, skills, principles and vocabulary, e.g. boys should become competent and confident in conceiving, designing, and producing a range of technological products 'of good quality';
  • To evaluate and improve upon their own technological products and those designed by others./li>

To enable boys to perceive Design and Technology as:

  • A major cultural feature;
  • Part of a wider body of knowledge and skills, e.g. to be able to work both independently and co-operatively.

The boys will have opportunities to:

  • Understand the nature and range of products embraced by the term 'technology', including artefacts, structures (fabricated, textural or edible), environments, and control systems (electrical, electronic, mechanical or pneumatic);
  • Enhance their abilities to generate ideas for designs in response to a wide range of real or realistic technological problems. Boys should explore, develop, clarify and communicate those ideas by a variety of constructional and graphic means, with and without the aid of computers;
  • Seek out, and draw upon, a range of information sources in order to help them generate, develop or realise their designs;
  • Understand the characteristics and properties of a variety of materials, and to manipulate those materials by the accurate and effective use of appropriate tools, equipment, techniques and processes in order to produce an intended outcome;
  • Appreciate the health and safety issues associated with working with certain materials, tools, equipment and processes, and to take such matters into account when designing their own products and in their capacities as critics or consumers;
  • Understand some of the different criteria by which products of Design and Technology from both western and non-western cultures can be criticised and evaluated with respect to both their design and functionality;
  • Refer to work in other curriculum subjects when appropriate, e.g. link to Science when referring to the physical and chemical properties of materials.

    • The Design Technology Workshop at Northwood Prep is located in the Sir Christopher Harding Science and Technology Building. This purpose built, fully equipped workshop is a truly magnificent resource for the practical application of this subject. The boys from Year 3 upwards are taught here by a specialist teacher with full time support from a workshop technician. Facilities for drawing, Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing (CAD/CAM), pillar drills, belt sander, fret saw and vacuum former as well as a full range of hand tools are available for use by the boys.