Computer Science will encourage students to; think creatively, innovatively, analytically, logically and critically, understand the components that make up digital systems, and how they communicate with one another and with other systems, understand the impacts of digital technology to the individual and to wider society, apply mathematical skills relevant to Computer Science, understand and apply the fundamental principles and concepts of Computer Science, including abstraction, decomposition, logic, algorithms, and data representation, analyse problems in computational terms through practical experience of solving such problems, including designing, writing and debugging programs.

Year 10 – Students will be taught one unit on Computer systems: they will prepare for the exam for their external assessment unit, which will assess the following:

• Systems architecture
• Memory and storage
• Computer networks, connections and protocols
• Network security
• Systems software
• Ethical, legal, cultural and environmental impacts of digital technology.

Year 11 – Students will be taught the final unit on Computational thinking, algorithms and programming: they will prepare for the exam for their external assessment unit which will assess the following:

• Algorithms
• Programming fundamentals
• Producing robust programs
• Boolean logic
• Programming languages and Integrated Development Environments.

All students will be given the opportunity to undertake a programming task(s), either to a specification or to solve a problem (or problems), during their course of study. Students may draw on some of the content in both components when engaged in Practical Programming.