School values and aims

“Our vision is to create a school community in which everyone can participate, excel and be proud of their achievements to enable them to become successful citizens in tomorrow’s world”

The school will:

Participate

Provide a stimulating learning curriculum, opening up new experiences and motivating all to be active engaged participants in their learning. We aim to encourage pupils to discover knowledge actively with purpose rather than passively receive it. We aim for everyone in our community to engender and value a love of learning.

Excel (as a learner)

Encourage all pupils to see themselves as being capable of learning and capable of achieving through a firm foundation of positive attitudes and an understanding of themselves as learners. We encourage all children to develop the necessary traits, attributes and behaviours to continue to learn and become prepared for the ever-changing world ahead of them.

Be proud

Provide a secure learning environment where effort is acknowledged and celebrated. We seek for all to feel a sense of self-worth and pride in what they have achieved. According to Ron Berger, Pupils will feel a sense of pride when they produce work they can value. This means we emphasise how pupils can improve their work.

We have a desire that all stakeholders take with them happy memories of their time in school, feeling that they have been valued. We aim for all members of the community to show mutual respect and courtesy, in an environment that is a safe and happy place to learn where all pupils achieve their potential.

For the children we sum this up as :

You participate in your own learning to ‘Build your best’
You excel at being a learner by striving to ‘Be your best learner’
You are proud of who you are and what you have achieved to ‘Try your best’

The three ‘Golden Threads’ of our vision are weaved into our practice

Our school vision drives our curriculum: We use the golden threads of participation, excelling and being proud to steer our decision making and curriculum planning. These threads are continually revisited as pupils travel through their KS2 journey.

To ensure children participate in their own learning we will:

Have a motivating curriculum that fosters curiosity and inspires our children to want to learn more.
Encourage pupils to strive for improvement, building upon their own starting points. We encourage cooperation between pupils to enhance learning as a whole.
Work to ensure that all children are able to learn new knowledge. We routinely recap and revisit learning to ensure that it sticks in the long term memory.
Provide equality of access for all and the opportunity for all pupils to make progress, ensuring high expectations and appropriate levels of challenge and support.
Encourage pupils to read, as we see this as the most important key to learning. Pupils are taught reading skills and are able to access texts relating to other subject areas to boost learning.
Give children home learning to involve them in their own practice

To ensure that children excel as learners we will:

Have an awareness of how humans, think and learn and provide learning sequences which do not overload the working memory.
Give pupils a variety of strategies to enable them to make meaning from new information; these may include linking new information to that which is already known, summarising the main points or organising information in different ways e.g. drawing from a written description
Work to ‘Build Learning Power’, by giving pupils learning to learn strategies to make learning visible and allow them to see the progress they are making.
Give pupils concrete examples to understand abstract ideas and build in the opportunity for retrieval practice thorough revisiting the key learning
Work to ensure that all children are able to read which will enable them to access the wider curriculum
Work to ensure that children are able to be fluent with number through our maths curriculum including how to problem solve and reason
Work to ensure children are able to communicate with adults and their peers to help learning stick. This is sometimes through formal discussion in Lets Think in English and through discussion in class.
Use success criteria for children to assess their own learning.
Give children home learning to give them the opportunity to independently apply what they have learnt

To ensure that children are proud we will:

Give them good models of practice, including the process of how to achieve good quality work, giving pupils feedback on how they can improve their work, giving them time to edit and prepare a final piece that they would be proud to share.
Give encouragement and show appreciation of children’s achievements and work, whether great or small. Research suggests that pupils are more motivated of they believe that knowledge can be improved through hard work.
Encourage children to explore their interests and things that they enjoy doing. We aim to spark interest through the curriculum. Additionally, pupils take part in societies, extracurricular activities and complete homework projects.
Endeavour to build children’s sense of self worth and moral sensibility through our identified values
Give opportunities for pupils to think about our school values as they nominate a person in their class each week for their achievements.
Give all children a bank of strategies which help support them in making positive life choices and help prepare them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences that they may encounter later in life
Promote spiritual, moral, social and cultural development through many different aspects of the curriculum

Our values

The seven school values, which are made up of three golden threads which permeate school life and a further four values, which we belief are important to everyone to live by, underpin the learning and social behaviours that we expect all members of our school community to demonstrate.

We support pupils understanding of the school values as well as their emotional literacy and wellbeing in a number of ways including:

School assemblies
PHSE work
Encourage the pupils to use methods of managing their own wellbeing through ‘Trick box’
ELSA and school counsellor work
Inclusion Manager work

Our values have been chosen to develop pupils both morally and educationally. Through our values we aim to:

Enable children to focus upon the positive aspects of themselves, reminding them of their individual worth, their worth in the school and wider community.
Maintain high standards of behaviour, conduct and self-confidence.
Raise standards by promoting our inclusive ethos which supports the development of the whole child as a reflective learner within a calm, caring, happy and purposeful atmosphere.
Encourage children to ‘live the values’ in all aspects of their lives both in school and out.

Fundamental British Values

The British Values are defined as democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs. We promote these values through our own school values, curriculum and wider curriculum activities and whole school events and opportunities.

Our values are underpinned by fundamental British values of:

Democracy: We all have a say.
Rule of Law: We respect the rules of school and laws in society.
Tolerance of different cultures: We are one community who care, respect and understand one another.
Mutual respect: We respect others and expect them to show us respect.
Individual liberty: We know human rights and exercise these in school life and beyond.

Value	How We Promote
Democracy Links to children’s values: Participate Teamwork Respect Integrity	Elections are held for School Council and House Captains. All positions are elected by children. Class Charters Children vote on their class reward treat Curriculum work including debates and discussions, e.g Ancient Greek democracy, Relationships Assembly themes
The rule of law Links to children’s values: Integrity Respect	The School golden rules Class Charters School policies on Behaviour, Anti-bullying, Health and Safety, e-Safety, The PSHE curriculum, particularly units on Drugs and Alcohol and Sex Education. Safety rules for the playground and during lessons particularly PE and Science. Safety expectations on school trips Expectations about uniform, conduct around school etc. Support from outside agencies, e.g. NSPCC, Police Cycling training in Year 6 Assembly themes
Individual liberty Links to children’s values: Integrity Respect Participation	The School rules Step system in class provides children with reminders and opportunities for them to take responsibility for their actions/behaviours Class Charters Assembly themes Ensuring there are time where children have free choices, e.g. at playtimes, in their work, in groupings. PSHE lessons, including those on keeping safe on line. The school’s RE curriculum Positions of responsibility, taking ownership and encouraging independence. Optional activities which children can elect to participate in
Mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs Links to children’s values: Integrity Respect Participation	School expectations and values. The school has a very positive ethos and strong community where all children are included and valued. Assembly themes The RE curriculum – the cycle of learning (contextualise, evaluate, apply, communicate) The School rules and Class Charters House Teams encourage mutual respect and positive team work Links with local church and other community groups Play Leaders – supporting and including other pupils French taught through the school The PSHE curriculum Sports events Sports Day, Pancake Race etc. to promote team building and mutual support

Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural development

The children at Grange Junior School thrive in a supportive and interconnected school community. They learn about their responsibility to be part of a wider community and they are well-prepared for this role when they move to secondary school.

Spiritual development Pupils are reflective about beliefs and human values

One of the ways in which we help pupils to reflect on what they are learning and think deeply about important issues is through collective worship. There is a planned programme for collective worship and the children enjoy these occasions.

Christian and other faith festivals are celebrated to develop appreciation and respect for other beliefs and values. The vast majority of the children demonstrate interest in these beliefs and reach an understanding of our common values including spirituality.

Spiritual development is not limited to religious concepts and beliefs but is nurtured throughout the whole curriculum, where children are given opportunities to develop curiosity, imagination and creativity.

Moral development A clear sense of the principles of right and wrong

At all times pupils are taught the importance of integrity, fairness, justice, respect, truth and honesty. Pupils understand these principles and their understanding is demonstrated in the ways in which they are prepared to stand up and speak out when they believe that something is wrong.

The school’s behaviour policy and rules are based upon a clear moral code and the principle of responsibility for self and others.

The children enjoy exploring ethical issues in subjects across the curriculum, particularly PSHE and in initiatives affecting our immediate and wider communities such as school council projects.

Social development Very good skills for cooperating and working together

Pupils are successfully encouraged to take responsibility within the school community, and they are willing to do so. In lessons and other initiatives the children have many opportunities to work together and adopt a number of roles including Sports Leaders and monitors and through Societies, where they collaborate well and get on well together.

They have many opportunities to work with adults from outside the school such as members of the Church of the Good Shepherd. They also cooperate in a range of extra-curricular activities such as sport and Junior Duke.

Initiatives and activities such as Trick box have taught the children how to manage their own emotions and resolve individual conflicts.

Cultural development Pupils greatly enjoy cultural activities

The curriculum provides a wide range of opportunities for artistic, musical, dramatic, literary, sporting and other cultural activities.

The children are also taught about the structure of our own society and the values of respect and integrity. Understanding of democracy is given a practical forum in the school council. This gives pupils the opportunity to discuss, listen to others, form opinions and accept the majority decision. The school council has been very successful in developing skills and understanding of how to cooperate and develop our school community.

Our Ethos

Our ethos at Grange Community Junior School is based on inclusivity. Everyone in our school community is cared for and valued equally as a unique person. We believe that the ethos creates an environment where all members of our community can learn. We know that by working in partnership in a positive, caring and supportive environment, people develop a sense of belonging and feel valued. We understand the impact of self-esteem on motivation and the ability to learn.

Our Aims

At Grange Community Junior School, we strive to break down any barriers to learning and provide high quality teaching which will inspire and motivate children to engage in their learning and be prepared for the ever-changing world ahead of them. We commit ourselves to our own development, always seeking to improve our practice. We aim to provide pupils with the tools for learning and first-hand experiences, we aim for our teaching to lead to learning that is real, relevant and will support our children to leave primary school equipped for life: able to make their own informed choices, with the skills and mind set to thrive, live happy, healthy lives and take on the world.