Effective Practice Archives - Page 22 of 66 - Estyn

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Information about the school

Dan y Coed school is an independent special school situated in the West Cross area of Swansea. The school is in a large detached property with easy access to the Mumbles coastline and the city of Swansea. The school shares the site with its residential provision, which provides 52-week accommodation which opened in May 2019.

Currently there are 26 pupils attending the school. The school has five class teachers, six lead learning support assistants and 21 learning support assistants. In addition, care workers from the residential setting support children in lessons and activities as required. A clinical team, including a speech and language therapist and occupational therapist technician, supports the education team. 

The school’s aim is to ‘provide a safe and secure school environment that encourages individuality, confidence and self-esteem’.

Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

Dan y Coed follows a skill-based curriculum, tailored to the individual needs of each pupil. Given the wide variety of needs and abilities of pupils, the school needed to ensure that each small step of progress was captured for each of the pupils whatever their level of ability, communication style and learning preference. The assessment system needed to capture progress within lessons, during social times and when learning outside of the classroom. It needed to be applicable to the pupils with the greatest communication difficulties in addition to those pupils studying qualifications. The system needed to encapsulate the progress and impact throughout each pupil’s journey at Dan y Coed as well as providing whole school data that could influence curriculum design, professional learning and innovative teaching strategies.
 

Description of nature of strategy or activity

The school’s assessment strategy aims to capture valuable information consistently about small steps in progression. The ‘achievement continuum’ relates to any skill and subject area. As a result, small steps of progress are consistently identified across the curriculum and in skill areas important to pupils in line with their additional needs and abilities. The continuum consists of 10 levels of progress which range from encounter, interest, consolidation to application. The graduated continuum allows teachers to provide specific interventions and teaching strategies that enable pupils to move up the continuum until they can successfully master each skill independently.

What impact has this work had on provision and pupils’ standards?

Standards across the school have improved. Most pupils have made effective progress across all areas of the curriculum related to individual areas of need such as independence, social and life skills. Pupils are able to transfer skills from one setting to another and apply these to develop further skills in relation to their additional learning needs. As a result of close tracking and capturing each pupil’s small steps of progress, teaching across the school is effective and creative teaching interventions continuously support development. The strong progress of pupils in some cases has allowed them to return to mainstream school, accessing the full curriculum after years out of mainstream education. Many pupils have achieved qualifications appropriate to their future destinations. Many pupils who have left Dan y Coed have moved on to successful further education placements or alternative education settings. 

How have you shared your good practice?

Capturing such small steps of progress across the curriculum has had a tremendous impact on pupil motivation, progress and planning for next steps of each pupil’s journey. Dan y Coed has been able to share this way of assessment with the other schools within the Orbis group, to support them to assess small steps of progress for each pupil across many different curriculums and learning experiences. In turn, this has enabled other settings to develop and implement effective approaches to assessment, planning and progress tracking at an individual and whole school level.

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

The case study is based upon the setting’s processes and impact of self-evaluation.

Description of nature of strategy or activity

Review and reflect – the impact of self-evaluation

At Caban Kingsland, self-evaluation has always been the backbone of the setting’s work. Practitioners continually review their practice to ensure that the process remains a current reflection of the service. They consider what has taken place, and share ideas to encourage the well-being, engagement and educational outcomes for all the children in their care. This supports each child’s individual needs and enables the whole team to understand the best possible ways to create a provision that responds to the latest developments in early years education and care. 
 

What impact has this work had on provision and children’s standards?

It’s crucial that leaders ensure whole staff ownership of the self-evaluation process. It’s not just a routine that takes up time and effort. It’s a process that allows everyone to reflect on successes and aspects that need to be developed further. At the start, self-evaluation helps practitioners to identify the areas that need improvement and this can be stressful as they try to ensure that the provision is doing well. 

The process of regularly evaluating does have its own reward. Pin-pointing areas for improvement, introducing changes, reflecting and actioning further improvements reminds practitioners how well they are working. It’s an opportunity to recall the fantastic experiences and the challenges they identified and changes they introduced and worked hard to embed. In its own way, self-evaluation is the best continual personal development tool available. 
 

Challenges

It’s not easy to work closely with others and then call their practice into question, particularly if they are doing what they have always done. Changes to the curriculum, legislation, additional learning needs legislation and the impact of COVID-19 identify that, as a team, changes need to be continually considered. It’s crucial that leaders include all practitioners in the process, allowing them time to identify their own personal development and professional learning needs. The engagement of all practitioners in the process enables everyone to reflect on areas of best practice. This has a positive effect on the team who feel involved and empowered to shape the provision. 

Practitioners ensure opportunities for parents and carers to provide feedback about all aspects of the provision and their child’s experience at the setting. They provide opportunities to receive feedback from other partners and agencies with which they work. This also feeds into opportunities to develop awareness of successful practice and helps identify areas for improvement. Practitioners don’t forget to evidence the positive feedback they receive, and take pride in this as they move forward. As things develop in the provision, practitioners add those little changes. It could be as simple as how they respond to something a child said or did. As a reflective tool, it’s the little things that set the standards for inclusive practice and build a better future for the children at the provision.

Paperwork can be challenging at the best of times. The self-evaluation processes can be daunting. However, as every day is different and practitioners’ heads can be so full of information, they write down questions; how well are we doing? how do we know? How can we improve? Through analysing their work and moving things to a positive conclusion, they look out for the positive impact on the setting. Self-evaluation will clearly identify the best way forward and remind everyone of the great work they do. They enjoy knowing that everything they do is in the best interests of the children and moving things to a positive conclusion as a team. Then they move on to the next issue.  
 

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

The Curriculum for Wales, responsive planning and ensuring children can lead play.  

Description of nature of strategy or activity

Practitioners at Caban Kingsland have worked as a team to ensure that the children are afforded the best possible opportunities within the expectations of the Curriculum for Wales. The provider has always worked hard to ensure that the interests of the child are central to all that it does. It has therefore embraced the Curriculum for Wales, developing appropriate learning environments that respond to children’s individuality and supporting their interests.

This enables it to move their learning and development forward.
As the child is central to everything it does, the setting has looked at ways to ensure that evidence is a true reflection of learning and development as it occurs. Responsive planning effectively provides opportunities for practitioners to observe and record learning as the children play. When children are the active participants in their own learning, the magic unfolds. 

What impact has this work had on provision and children’s standards?

Practitioners at Caban Kingsland have evidenced children actively working to achieve what they have set out to do. Children develop perseverance when solving problems, thinking and challenging themselves. They develop increased concentration, growing in confidence, and resilience begins to become a regular part of play as the children begin to take pride in their achievements. 

Practitioners at the setting are becoming skillful at responding at appropriate times. This is key to getting a good balance of when to join play and when to observe. As the children begin to play together, practitioners have also evidenced that the existing knowledge of each child supports communication. They share ideas and interests based on their own understanding. Practitioners join in the play with the children to support and guide. However, as the children become more confident in their own ability, practitioners spend time reflecting on what has occurred during sessions, extending learning and development through play and considering next steps to support each child. 

Practitioners reflect on play and how children develop in line with the five pathways of the Curriculum for Wales. When connecting the evidence within the pathways, it becomes clear which areas need to be supported. In most cases, children demonstrate how their different skills are developing through their play and interactions, for example through their physical development, exploration and communication skills. Little things like asking the children to choose when purchasing resources for the setting supports a sense of belonging and confidence when making decisions for themselves. This has been very positive as the children have shown more care and respect for the choices of resources at the setting. Also, children love to reflect on their experiences. Resources such as photo books support fantastic discussions and enable the children to revisit learning and take pride in their achievements.
 

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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A Journey Towards an Anti-Racist Curriculum

Jubilee Park Primary School has pioneered a whole school approach to tackling racism.

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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How does your approach to curriculum design and professional learning and development triangulate with your vision?

When considering and responding to national policy it is important that we don’t lose sight of the moral purpose and our ‘why?’. The expectation upon the teaching profession is high, never more so than in the current climate of mass educational reform in Wales. During such a period of change it is vital that, as school leaders, we remain focused on our vision principles and develop strong collaborative relationships. A positive climate for learning requires clear, open and honest communication and a commitment to our profession. The outcome of which is trust, an essential component of collaboration.

We started by working with all staff to explore our professional capacity and questioning ‘what does it mean to be a member of staff at Jubilee Park Primary School?’. This reflection resulted in a co-constructed professional charter for all staff and a collective commitment to learn, enquire and take responsibility for our professional learning.

What does it mean to be a member of staff at your school?

For staff to take responsibility for their own professional learning requires a climate and culture of trust. School leaders create such a culture through carefully considering systems and structures which focus on learning. Our structure ensures all leaders have a responsibility for professional learning, in my experience and opinion, it is not the job for just one leader. Such collaborative leadership ensures clarity, cohesion and a commitment to professional learning from the outset which is further supported by specific pathways. Our professional learning and development pathways value the choices that individual staff make within our school; whether that is a leadership role, being a teacher or teaching assistant or specialising in a specific area. Each pathway consists of opportunities that are available for all staff within the school and provide an entitlement for each individual learning pathway.

What systems and structures are in place in your school? Are they focused on learning and do they promote collaboration? Do they provide an entitlement for individual learning pathways?

Individual learning pathways do not mean that staff all work in silos and their actions are disparate across the school. On the contrary, all professional learning is focused upon our vision principles and school improvement. It is well-designed so that it includes a blend of approaches and is focused upon our common language of learning.

Our language of learning supports a collective understanding of Curriculum for Wales, a focus on reflective practice and professional growth. We make choices about our use of language, for example we do not have ‘staff meetings’ instead we have ‘professional learning and development sessions’. Such a small tweak can have a big impact across a school. Our weekly sessions are attended by both teachers and teaching assistants and are planned in advance of each term. Sessions are led by staff within our school, valuing their expertise and ensuring that the content of sessions are bespoke for our school. We maximise the time available through ensuring sessions are focused and provide time for staff to talk, reflect and collaborate.

What is your language of learning?

From experience, providing time for staff to talk and collaborate is essential. We provide time for our teachers and teaching assistants to engage in research which is directly linked to our school improvement. Each fortnight, teachers are provided with dedicated reading and research time which has been crucial for our curriculum development and reflective practice. In addition all staff engage in an individual professional inquiry throughout the year, again, time is provided for staff to fully immerse themselves in this work.

All staff are supported to become reflective practitioners. They maintain a professional learning diary which focuses on their progress and impact. They also map out a five year professional plan. We have found that moving away from thinking about progress in academic years and encouraging longer term growth has enabled staff to consider the impact they are having within the areas of the professional standards and what they need to continue to thrive as a professional.

How are you supporting your staff to become reflective practitioners?

Creating the conditions for our practitioners to thrive is enabled through high quality professional learning. Within our school, teacher agency is encouraged, collaborative agency expected and dedicated time is provided for all staff to research, collaborate and trial new ideas. There is a collective purpose and this, joined with trust, ultimately benefits staff and children. We know that children learn from everything around them – people, environment, atmosphere, routine and experiences. As a headteacher I believe that schools should be relentlessly focused on learning. For this to be a reality requires a culture of learning, effective relationships and trust, so that all practitioners and children are afforded the opportunity to thrive.

How are you building the capacity of your learning community so that all staff can thrive? 

Catherine Place

Headteacher
Jubilee Park Primary School, Newport, South Wales

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Information about the school

Bryn Celyn Primary School is situated in the North East of the city and mainly serves the Bryn Celyn estate and surrounding areas. The school has 199 pupils and is one form entry. The school has a Flying Start Setting on site that supports early education and transition into the school nursery. The school currently has 74% of pupils eligible for free school meals.

Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

Develping effective partnerships with parents is vitally important in order to support pupils’ learning.  Research has shown that the single most important influencing factor in a child’s education is parental support.(Soroya Rene Fyne-Sinclair, 2016) ‘Children whose parents are involved in their education have a tendency to progress and flourish in all aspects of their life (Vaden-Kieman & McManus 2005).

Fostering positive relationships with the local community has been crucial in order to raise standards throughout the school. The school takes every opportunity to involve parents in its life. It often has to reach out to parents in order to seek their views by using a wide range of approaches to engage as many parents as possible. One method of achieving this is by asking parents to contribute to the School Improvement Plan by completing an annual questionnaire. The school provides parents with the support they need to access the questionnaires. Staff make themselves available in the playground at the end of the school day with ipads to complete questionnaires and offer drop in sessions to support parents in school. Feedback from questionnaires highlighted the parents’ desire for more opportunities to work with the school on ways they could develop their own literacy and numeracy skills in order to support their children’s progress in learning.  
 

Description of nature of strategy or activity

The school used many strategies and agencies to help engage with the parents. It recognises that getting to know parents and developing trust and mutual respect is key to parental engagement. Meeting and greeting each morning along with more formal activities all help to form working relationships with parents that benefit the pupils.

The school works with a number of groups to support parental engagement including, Cardiff and Vale College Families Learning Together Courses. Here, parents develop their own literacy and numeracy skills to enable them to work with their children at home. Parents can earn points that enable them to achieve an National vocational qualification (NVQ) and attend other courses offered by the college. Parents enjoyed learning how to decorate cakes with an acredited course. One of the parents used these new skills to start their own cake decorating business. Curriculum evenings have helped parents understand how and what their children are learning in school. Reading clubs have shown parents a range of strategies to further improve their children’s reading. Drop in sessions after school, where staff support parents to complete job applications and school applications, are offered. This has resulted in many parents gaining secondary school places for pupils in a timely manner and a few parents accessing courses and gaining employment. ‘Family Phonic’ sessions run by staff enable parents to learn how to teach their children phonics and help them on their journey to become successful readers. Stay and play sessions encourage parents into the school environment and help them understand how children’s skills develop through play, especially in the early years. The school’s bring a parent to school week was a successful event and was especially useful in building links with families. During a week in the autumn term parents applied to come to school with their children. They took part in literacy and numeracy sessions with their children. This built relationships with parents, and helped them to see how learning is structured and how the school organises its classes. Parents gained a real understanding of how their children learn, along with some strategies they could use at home. Parents reported that they were able to find out about their child’s day by asking them more informed questions about their learning. Class assemblies were an excellent way to showcase pupils’ learning and develop opportunities to speak with families about their child’s learning. Coffee mornings help to build relationships and parents helped make resources for the children’s learning. Enterprise weeks, where pupils generate ideas and make products to sell, are a good way of linking with families and building entrepreneurs of the future!  

The most successful event that the school held was a careers fayre. Raising aspirations for pupils is a priority for the school. The area has high unemployment and the aspirations of pupils are often low. The school utilised its contacts and found representatives from heath, finance, education and industry to support the event. To ensure that pupils visited a range of stalls they were given a card to get stamped by at least five stall holders and Key Stage 2 pupils worked on generating questions to ask the representatives before the event. Stamped cards were put into a prize draw at the end of the event. The careers event was held after school and an unintended positive consequence of the event was that parents who were with their children accessed the information themselves, finding out about different careers they were interested in. The school hopes that this has raised the aspirations of parents to find employment or enter training. The evaluation of the event was very positive. Many pupils and parents found the event valuable; it had made them think about what they wanted to do when they left school, and how they were going to achieve their chosen career. The school now works closely with the Cardiff Commitment, ‘open your eyes week’. This builds knowledge from the initial career fayres and gives pupils an insight into a variety of careers from people working in them.   
 

What impact has this work had on provision and learners’ standards?

Parent questionnaires show that more parents feel better equipped to help their children at home with learning. Parents feel confident to approach members of staff and ask for help when needed. Parents and school staff work together to benefit the pupils. Parents feel that school is a safe place and that they can ask for support in many aspects of their life, such as help to apply for jobs and to ask advice. All these activities have helped integrate the school into the community and take away barriers to furthering pupils learning.

How have you shared your good practice?

The school has shared some ideas with the High School Cluster.  

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Information about the setting

Camrose and Roch Playgroup is an English-medium playgroup in the village of Pelcomb. It welcomes children aged from two to four years of age, five mornings a week, term time only. The setting currently has children with additional languages and this has enhanced language learning opportunities for all. 

Context & background to the effective or innovative practice.

At Camrose and Roch Playgroup, the aim is to provide a caring, warm and safe environment where children can grow, learn and develop through play. The setting values the children’s ideas and fascinations and listens to what they say. Staff work well together to ensure that activities and resources are planned using the children’s interests and schemas as a starting point. The setting provides highly valuable experiences for the children both indoors and in the outdoor areas. The children are fortunate to have their own woodland, which is used a great deal. Children have plenty of opportunities to revisit skills in the learning environment. Staff make good progress in supporting the children with their Welsh language development. 

Description of nature of strategy or activity

The setting is constantly aiming to improve the children’s language and communication skills through daily songs, rhymes and story time. The setting used ‘World Nursery Rhyme’ week as a focus, and flexible plans were put in place to share a variety of traditional nursery rhymes. Both staff and children focused on their favourite nursery rhymes, both in the Welsh language and also some new rhymes for the children to learn. ‘Provocations’ were set up in the environment for children to explore and they were able to return to these experiences freely. Curiosity, awe and wonder were added and the language opportunities flowed when the children had to search for the little mouse from ‘Adeiladu Ty Bach’ who had disappeared from his house. Rich mathematical conversations developed naturally as the children chatted with staff about how many cakes of different sizes they had made. They used weighing scales with the purpose of seeing who had more dough linking to the rhyme ‘Pat-a-cake Pat-a-cake’. ‘Hickory Dickory Dock’ encouraged counting and number recognition skills as children made their own clock using natural resources such as pebbles and driftwood. ‘Incy Wincy Spider’ provided opportunities for prediction and problem solving as the children explored how to move the spiders along the waterspout. The block area enabled the children to create their own house for a little mouse. Children had opportunities to role play with props from ‘Sing a song of sixpence’ imitating the King counting his money or the maid pegging out the clothes. The enabling adults challenged the varying needs of the children and added to their experiences.

What impact has this work had on provision and children’s standards?

In the setting children choose activities independently, at their own pace. By providing learning opportunities linked to familiar nursery rhymes, children are highly motivated and engaged because the learning is meaningful to them, building their confidence and self -esteem. The focus rhymes are reinforced during daily song time. As a result, children develop a love for nursery rhymes and singing.  

Staff observe how children use resources and activities and follow their lead when deciding when to move on to something new or notice how learning could be further developed. Staff know the children well and as a result can provide appropriate challenges for their next steps in learning. Children re-visit activities independently, leading to deeper levels of engagement and allowing time to develop their play and learning.
 

How have you shared your good practice?

Practitioners plan to share their good practice with the setting’s network of Foundation learning settings at their next meeting. They will also share their plans and have the opportunity to discuss their case study with other leaders. The setting shares the children’s daily experiences with parents and carers through an online app. 

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Information about the setting

Cylch Meithrin Pontrhydfendigaid is a Welsh-medium setting that is situated in a community hall. Full day care is provided for children between two and four years old, five days a week during term time.

The setting is registered to admit 16 children and 10 children were receiving funded early years education at the time of the inspection. A majority of children come from non-Welsh-speaking homes.

The setting is a focal point of this close-knit and unique community. The main room is small but the setting has worked with the community to develop the outdoor area further. The outdoor area is available to the children throughout the session. The leader has been in post since October 2020.

Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

One of the setting’s strengths is its interactive relationship with the community. By working with the hall’s committee, the football team committee and the children’s parents, the community extended the setting’s outdoor environment. Through the conscientious work of the whole team, the outdoor area was developed to create an environment of a high standard that promotes particular skills and ignites children’s curiosity. The team have high expectations of themselves and work together effectively to ensure improvements to the environment. The budget and grants have been used efficiently and stimulating resources have been created to promote exciting, ambitious and relevant experiences for children. The role of the community has been key in creating an outdoor area of a high standard, which has a positive effect on children’s learning experiences.

Description of nature of strategy or activity

While planning the outdoor area, practitioners have succeeded in combining the children’s interests and extended their skills and independence. As a result, children develop the confidence to make mature decisions about their play and learning. They explore the wide range of areas that are available confidently and adapt resources according to their interests, for example by adapting the large car to be a work van for builders. Children make decisions to add technological resources or equipment to the provision completely independently. They enjoy using apps to track aeroplanes that fly over the setting while sitting in a wooden aeroplane in the outdoor area. Then, they examine the globe and pretend to fly to other countries. Some resources have been developed in co-operation with local businesses and these resources promote children’s independence and skills successfully. 

The setting has ensured that the resources in the outdoor area provide a good level of challenge to extend children’s skills. As a result, children make independent decisions about how they would like to use the equipment and what level of challenge is most appropriate for them. For example, children choose how they would like to use the climbing equipment.

The leader ensures that she takes advantage of the expertise of staff and people in the community to improve children’s skills. Practitioners are creative when using recycled resources to create imaginative resources that are of interest to the children. For example, they create Welsh cobs from leftover pieces of wood and make a fuel or electrical pump for role-play cars.

What impact has this work had on provision and learners’ standards?

Developments in the outdoor area have had a positive effect on the children’s behaviour and well-being. They feel at ease, eager and completely confident when using the wide range of resources in the environment. The open-ended resources provide various opportunities as they play and these opportunities change in line with the children’s interests and creativity. When making choices for themselves, children are more eager to communicate and there is a spontaneous excitement to talk to others. Resources have also provided opportunities to stretch confident speakers by creating situations to enrich and deepen their understanding of language. For example, they discuss the condition of the silage or identify the area’s birds of prey.
 
Opportunities to make a range of decisions about their learning in the outdoor area has had an effect on the children’s perseverance skills as they concentrate for extended periods. Practitioners are able to interact skilfully with the children by encouraging them to extend their ideas and promote the children’s independence to make decisions. For example, the children understanding that cement is needed to build a wall, so they get shaving foam to imitate the cement when building a wall independently. Children have taken ownership of the areas and are completely confident when considering that all of the resources are available to them throughout the session. If something is not available to them, they know that they can make it.
 

How have you shared your good practice?

Good practice is shared with the non-maintained sector and schools within the local authority in county-wide training on foundation learning modules. The setting’s experiences are used to exemplify the practical principles of pursuing children’s interests and the way in which this has a direct effect on children’s lives, confidence, skills and well-being.

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Context and background to practice

Anglesey authority’s Learning Service has made great strides during the last three years. Purposeful restructuring to add a number of senior managers has allowed the Learning Services to employ a senior manager with specific responsibility for co-ordinating and safeguarding learners’ well-being. The Learning Service’s senior leaders place great emphasis on promoting the well-being of the island’s children and young people and work closely and successfully with different departments within the authority smoothly and without barriers.

There is a strong culture of planning services that are aligned closely with the Well-being of Future Generations Act. The Learning Service has developed a ‘Tîm Môn’ ethos and mindset, where everyone works together and everyone’s contribution is valued, nurtured and used for the benefit of the island’s children and young people.
Within the Learning Service, a Senior Officer was appointed to pay particular attention to promoting well-being and cooperating across services and partnerships. The Well-being of Future Generations Act is at the heart of all of the work plans. Schools are aware of how their contributions to providing inclusive provision in their schools contribute within a wider context to regional and national priorities.  

The principle of preventative working is at the heart of all of the authority’s work. For example, an integrated method of co-operation has ensured that families in need have quick access to food banks.

The strong co-operation between different departments and agencies provides an integrated experience of support for all learners in the county, including those who are at risk of becoming disengaged and their families. The Learning Service works productively with partners, including social services, welfare officers, the Gwynedd and Anglesey inclusion services and youth services. They work proactively to prevent problems at an early stage to respond to the needs of vulnerable learners who are showing symptoms of anxiety to encourage attendance. 

An ‘Early Intervention Hub’, which includes around twenty different agencies, is a good way of working together and planning efficient support for vulnerable learners and their families jointly, without duplicating the support unnecessarily. This, in turn, ensures that the children and young people of Anglesey are able to continue with their education at school, and exclusions due to anti-social behaviours are decreasing.

There is a strong focus on developing all practitioners’ awareness of trauma and the effect of trauma on children and young people. Training is co-ordinated at several levels, including teachers and assistants in schools and non-maintained settings, in addition to other stakeholders within the council who support children and young people. This practice has equipped the workforce to be able to communicate clearly when discussing the effect of adverse experiences on the development, self-image and confidence of individuals. 

The preventative strategy ensures that there is a youth officer in every secondary school on the island. They facilitate the ‘drop-in’ service for learners and support provision of personal and social education. They also prepare employment courses for learners who are at risk of becoming disengaged so that they can gain alternative qualifications and experiences. Units from Agored Cymru, the John Muir Certificate and First Aid have been provided. Youth workers ensure that all secondary schools have established a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer + (LGBTQ+) group and evening youth clubs strengthen the link for young people to activities in the community and the link with school. As a result, projects such as ‘Prison Me No Way’ and ‘Gangs Getaway’ have had an influence within communities.  

The ‘Y Daith i Saith’ (The Journey to Seven) scheme by the Family Support Team promotes the development and well-being of the youngest pupils and is being developed jointly with a range of stakeholders, including a health service and a group of primary schools. As a result, this work strengthens the ethos of community focused schools and the preventative strategy at an early stage and provides the best opportunity for children on their learning journey.

The Learning Service ensures a strong link between national, regional and corporate priorities in terms of well-being and the practical and preventative work that takes place in non-maintained settings and schools across the authority. The close co-operation with different departments within the authority facilitates the work of schools in ensuring that inclusive provision in the classroom is manageable. The corporate strategy of providing training to improve practitioners’ understanding of the effect of trauma and adverse childhood experiences on pupils’ achievement and well-being is having a positive effect on the quality of provision in schools and now across services.

One of the strengths of the co-ordinated work is the way in which the Learning Service succeeds in involving headteachers in different forums to seek their views, influence, shape and plan new provision. For example, Safeguarding Champions has succeeded in raising the status of preventative work within safeguarding across their clusters and, as a result:

  • all schools submit safeguarding referrals of a high standard when concerns arise
  • investment in a common electronic platform has provided consistency in recording causes for concern across the county
  • all schools have adopted robust trauma-informed styles that align with a good safeguarding ethos

In addition to this, schools take confident action to make referrals to the Children’s Services Early Intervention Hub in conjunction with parents, where appropriate. All of this strengthens preventative work in schools and there is an ongoing commitment to safeguard and improve the well-being of learners. As a result, the most vulnerable pupils are given the best opportunities to engage with their education.

Improvement Resource Type: Effective Practice

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Information about the school

Sandycroft Primary School is in Mancot, in Flintshire local authority. There are 354 pupils on roll. The school has 14 single aged classes, including three nursery classes. Around 24% of pupils are eligible for free school meals. The school identifies around 32% of pupils as having additional learning needs. Around 14% of pupils speak English as an additional language and a very few pupils speak Welsh at home. Currently, around 5% of pupils are members of the gypsy traveller community.

Context and background to the effective or innovative practice

Sandycroft Primary School has large grounds, made up of a traditional playing field and an area of what was wasteland, which had not been used by the school for many years. 

The school systematically developed the grounds over many years using a variety of different strategies and approaches. The bulk of this work was driven by staff, parents and governors in their own time after school and in holidays. This kept costs to a minimum. The school was also able to gain funding from local businesses and grants with various organisations. Using the grant funding, it was able to purchase large play equipment such as a castle, pirate ship, play pods and a climbing wall. Local businesses were also involved practically, and they provided their staff to work on projects, such as planting an arboretum and installing sports equipment such as a basketball area. 
 
However, the main drive behind the work was the school using parents’, staff’s and governors’ own DIY skills to develop a range of outdoor classrooms, an outdoor scrapyard and outdoor provision areas to support learning and well-being across all age ranges. The school has also invested in ample storage to ensure that resources are rotated on a regular basis to maintain pupil interest. 

In addition to this, the playground has been organised into a range of play, sport, craft and practical areas to accommodate the broad interests of the pupils. Pupil voice is a key aspect of this planning. This enables them to be actively engaged at break times with a range of activities and sports. 
 

Description of nature of strategy or activity

The school aims to provide high quality outdoor learning and experiences that encompass one or more of the following elements:

  • generally takes place outdoors
  • often has an adventurous component
  • involves physical activity
  • respects the natural environment at all times
  • develops curiosity and innovation 
  • promotes cooperation and teamwork
  • encourages resilience and determination 
  • develops gross and fine motor skills 

There is a whole-school focus on outdoor learning. Equal weighting is given to outdoor learning that occurs in lessons and during play times. All staff are involved and understand that the outdoors can be used to develop understanding in each area of learning and experience. There is a large breadth and range of activities and resources that the pupils can access. As a result, the outdoors is very flexible to meet the needs of the curriculum. The school provides a range of outdoor clothing for staff and pupils including waterproofs, wellies and PPE where appropriate to ensure that the weather does not restrict opportunities for outdoor learning. 
 

What impact has this work had on provision and learners’ standards?

  • A whole school focus on outdoor learning encourages and enthuses pupils to attend regularly and is used exceptionally well to enhance pupils’ physical and mental health.
  • The pupils thrive in the extensive and well-developed outdoor areas, no matter what the weather. 
  • The stimulating outdoors ensure that the levels of engagement are good. 
  • The range of activities ensures that outdoor learning is used across the curriculum. For example, the youngest pupils develop their knowledge of number in the outdoor environment. They collect and count natural objects in the school grounds and use the objects to make repeating patterns. By Year 2, pupils confidently measure planks of wood in standard units and problem-solve how to fill a gap with a suitable length of wood, when building a bridge. 
  • Older pupils show resilience when problem-solving, both in the classroom and at break times, often through interesting and authentic experiences in the workshop. They persevere with tasks and attempt alternative ways of working.
  • Nearly all pupils investigate their surroundings and develop their imaginations. For instance, the youngest pupils plant seeds to develop their school garden areas, use diggers to build sandcastles when creating imaginary towns and sing and dance on the outdoor stage. 
  • Older pupils develop many useful life skills, for example when caring for the school’s free-range chickens, and when working as teams to problem-solve in the forest school.
  • Pupils enjoy using their creative and artistic skills. For example, they create three dimensional observational pictures using natural materials and fruit that they collect from the school’s orchard. 
  • The development of pupils’ physical skills is excellent.
  • Most pupils develop balance, co-ordination and strength very well when using the extensive outdoor provision, such as the climbing wall, castle structure and forest school. 
  • Pupils develop their gross and fine motor skills in the outdoor ‘scrapyard’, which is particularly impressive. They use a wide range of tools, such as socket sets, spanners and screwdrivers, safely to dismantle household objects and machinery. This also helps them to begin to explore the mechanics of how these items work.

The outdoors is an essential part of every pupil’s daily life in school. The impact on them is not isolated to any one area; it develops them holisticially.  
 

How have you shared your good practice?

The school gets regular visits from other schools and has hosted a working group for the consortium focused on health and well-being.