School Vision & Development Plan

"Loved, Inspired, Shining"

“There is no fear in love, perfect love drives out all fear.” 1 John 4:18 

 

School Development Plan 2024-25

This academic year the key areas of our School Plan will fall into the acronym ORBITS. We hope that this will help our whole community to understand what it is that we are working on so that we can all work together to achieve even greater things for our amazing children. We have explained in more detail what each of the letters stands for below:

 

                                                                                     

                                                      Outstanding Writing

Retrieval of Learning

Building Connections

Inspirational Curriculum

Talents and Creativity

Simcha (Hebrew for shared joy)

                                               

Outstanding Writing: This year, we will be continuing to build on our work around reading and phonics to focus on strengthening our children’s love of writing. Whether this be children taking their first steps into mark making, or producing beautiful written gems for others to discover! Our English Leader will be running parent information sessions to explain how we teach writing and ways that you can support your child at home.

Retrieval of Learning: This was the only identified area for development from our recent Ofsted inspection in June. This year, we will be further focusing on research around learning and memory in order to help our children with retrieving previous learning and making connections to new learning. Systems such as “Flashback Friday” will be used to help the children revisit and recall their learning and make sure learning is cemented in their long-term memory.

Building Connections: This area will have a broad focus. It will celebrate children making connections in all aspects of their learning, as detailed in the point above, as well as maintaining and building human connections within the school and within our wider community. We pride ourselves on our outward facing approach and the community feel within the school. We want to ensure that this continues to be a priority for us and that opportunities to access the community are welcomed to enhance learning in all subjects. We want to embrace all opportunities for our children to access our local area, expertise within the community and experiences that will enhance their learning. We have gained a great deal from our long-standing partnerships, especially within the Arts and want to further explore other community links over the academic year.

Inspirational Curriculum: We are so proud of our outstanding curriculum offer which ensures that our children have access to a broad and balanced curriculum which inspires them and harnesses their interests, providing aspiration in all subjects. We will be further focusing on the sequencing of our learning to ensure knowledge and concepts can be revisited and built upon in all subjects and across all year groups. Teachers will be making explicit connections to previous learning to help the children recall knowledge that they have previously learned.

Talents and Creativity: As you are all fully aware, we are passionate about the power of creativity and the impact that this can have on our children’s learning. This year, we will be re-applying for our Artsmark status and hope to demonstrate how we have continued to enhance our already outstanding practice since we were last awarded with Platinum Artsmark status. When we were visited by Ofsted in June, the inspectors were amazed at how we consider and actively promote different career pathways, by allowing our children to work alongside people from a range of industries and professions, despite the fact that our children are still very young. Whether this be Science, Technology, Maths, English, PE, Performing or Creative Arts or any other subject, we know the purpose of showing our children that anything is possible and allowing them to nurture and celebrate their talents and passions.

Simcha (this is pronounced SIM-HA and is Hebrew for Shared Joy): Simcha means more than just joy, it is the joy we gain from being together. This was introduced to our children last year and has had such a wonderful impact that we wanted to keep it as one of our main priorities. Wellbeing has always been a priority in school and the strengths in this area were recognised as part of our Nurture UK accreditation. We know that community connectedness has a huge bearing on our health and wellbeing and we want to ensure we prioritise time for coming together, both in school and within our wider community, to create moments of joy and celebration.