Our personal development curriculum ensures that all
children embody the school values of achieve, belong and participate.
Belong – We ensure that our children feel part of a
community:
Participate – We ensure that children engage in all areas of the
curriculum:
Achieve – We support the children’s development at their appropriate age and stage to enable them to be successful and happy:
We provide our children with a high-quality PSHE
curriculum through Jigsaw PSHE. Every child has specific PSHE lessons each week
as well as circle time and other opportunities to discuss personal, social and
health matters. In Nursery and Reception, PSHE is part of the PSED prime area
of learning as children are provided with the necessary skills they need to
build relationships, discuss and understand their emotions and learn personal
hygiene skills.
Emotional and mental health is a real priority at our
school, especially following the impact of COVID-19 on our children and
families. Through our PSHE curriculum we ensure that children understand the
range of emotions and equip them with skills to deal with these in their daily
lives. All classrooms have daily well-being check in stations where children have
the opportunity to reflect on their emotions and indicate to their adults how
they are feeling. This then enables staff to have conversations with children
about how they are feeling as soon as they arrive and after key transition
times which means children do not have to dwell on their emotions throughout
the day. We complete Thrive assessments and run Thrive interventions to support
children who may have issues with areas like their self-esteem. We also work
closely with our families to support mental health outside of school too.
We have a member of staff who is a trained ELSA and
members of staff who have completed youth mental health training.
Our positive behaviour policy works alongside our
belief in the importance of good mental health. We believe in the importance of
having a culture of praise and addressing the unacceptable behaviours presented
by the child rather than the child themselves. We hold restorative justice
conversations with children to provide them with the skills to deal with triggering
situations more calmly and effectively which are deep rooted in emotion
coaching practices.
Assemblies are an important aspect of our Personal
Development curriculum. They give us an opportunity to discuss our school
values and attributes as a collective so that children are able to see the
importance that these have on our daily lives. We are also able to address
areas of the PSHE curriculum that are pertinent to all children such as NSPCC
PANTS, online safety and anti-bullying. Through our assemblies we are also able
to highlight and teach children about British Values. We are also able to
celebrate our achievements.
British Values enable children to feel part of a
community and understand the country that we live in more. The values allow the
children to develop their character and become effective citizens. We cover the
British Values in our assemblies and ensure that there is clear understanding
of the vocabulary. We also learn about them through our Picture News lessons
where children learn more about the world we live in and are able to see the
British Values in a context.
British Values are an important part of learning about
equality and diversity. We want to ensure that our children understand how
diverse our country is and why the British Values are important.
Another aspect of our Personal Development curriculum
is the opportunities that we provide the children. We want to make sure that
the children are presented with as diverse a range of experiences as possible
to ensure that they have the cultural capital to make informed choices and to
be successful and happy in the future. We ensure that there are trips planned
into our curriculum, for example, visits to the theatre to see a pantomime and
a history trip to Hooke Court. We invite visitors into our school to enrich our
curriculum, for example, Jungle Nick with his insects and spiders to complement
our learning on jungle animals. We also provide children with a range of
activities within school to ensure that children are studying an engaging
curriculum, for example, making samosas as part of an RE unit of learning.
Alongside enrichment within school, we also provide extracurricular opportunities for our children. There is a wide range of clubs available to children from Reception onwards. For example, we provide golf, football, performing arts, science, reading, language and eco clubs. Our aim is to provide a variety of clubs to interest all children and to also encourage children to step out of their comfort zone and try something new. As well as chosen extracurricular clubs, we also provide targeted clubs to those children who are either disadvantaged or require extra support with areas of the curriculum. This may take the form of specific clubs such as phonics club before school or financial support for those children who are unable to access clubs otherwise. We also aim to involve the local community in our clubs which further supports our value of belonging.
Community is vital as it links so closely to our
values of belonging and participating. We want our children to feel part of a
community within school, whether that is through being part of their class or
through membership of clubs or councils. At Orchard Grove we have a school
council who are an invaluable link to the pupil voice and have an impact on
developments and decisions within the school. We also have an Eco School
Council who ensure that the school is doing everything that it can for the
environment – recycling, litter picking in the local area, reducing our energy
consumption and building habitats for insects. They will be working towards the
Eco Schools bronze award.
At Orchard Grove, we also have a PTA group who
fundraise for the school and provide brilliant opportunities for the school and
community such as seasonal fairs, family discos and pre-loved book fairs. Events
involve staff, families and community members which links to our values of
belonging and participating.
In addition to this, we also have strong links with
the community through events with the local library, the local churches and the
town council. This helps us with our curriculum but also ensures that our
school and families feel like an important part of Taunton itself.
At Orchard Grove we have four houses headed by
important contemporary and historical figures – David Attenborough, Mary
Jackson, Michael Faraday and Caroline Herschel. These figures support the
character development element of our personal development curriculum. We want
to provide children with a range of aspirational and diverse role models which
link closely with our curriculum and our school values. These houses enable
children to feel part of a group outside of their class. They work hard to gain
house points for showing our school attributes (resilience, positivity,
engagement, respectfulness, responsibility and rising to challenges) and
celebrate as a team at the end of each half term. We also have whole school events
where children work across year groups, for example, Sports Day, Tri-Science
week, art projects with our feeder secondary school, etc.
Equality and Diversity is integral to our Personal
Development curriculum. Across the subject areas, knowledge is chosen to
highlight equality and diversity at every opportunity. For example, learning
about women’s roles in the 1940s; learning about Mary Seacole as well as
Florence Nightingale; and learning about a broad range of artists from around
the world. Our resources are chosen carefully to reflect the diverse nature of
this country, especially as this may not be evident in every classroom. We
celebrate diversity, whether this is through the different languages spoken by
children and staff or studying and celebrating world celebrations and festivals
to ensure acceptance and tolerance is present. In particular, our RE curriculum
focuses on a different religion each half term and also a different aspect, for
example, celebrations, icons or beliefs, so that at the end of KS2, children
will have a broad understanding of the beliefs of lots of different people
around the world. With this education we hope to develop tolerant citizens of
the future, locally, regionally, nationally and globally. Citizens who not only
exist within their communities, but who give back and add value to their
communities too.
