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Newark Hill Academy is a 2-form entry school, with 30 pupils in each class. We are located very close to Peterborough City Centre and have a high proportion of children who are disadvantaged. At Newark Hill Academy, everything that we do is centred on the whole child. We ensure our children are delivered a broad and balanced curriculum, and we recognise the importance of providing our pupils with all of the skills they need to lead successful lives now and in the future.
We began our Skills Builder Journey in 2020. We were keen to get involved with the programme because we wanted to equip our children with the skills and knowledge they need to achieve their goals in life, throughout their school journeys as well as when they enter their working lives. The Skills Builder Programme has integrated well into our curriculum and the essential skills are now embedded into all aspects of pupils’ learning, across the whole school. Because of this, this year we decided to move from the Accelerator Programme to the Digital Membership. We are extremely proud to have achieved our flagship award for the past 2 years, and this year we have continued to promote the essential skills into the wider school community.
Overall impact
The Skills Builder Programme has had a highly positive impact on both pupils and staff. The programme is simple and easy to implement and resources provided on the hub have been a great support in delivering effective and engaging lessons. Children across the school are able to articulate what each skill means and they demonstrate awareness of how they can make progress within each of the skills. Pupils have particularly enjoyed participating in the challenge day projects. Speaking from the perspective of Skills Builder Lead, the planning sessions and strategy reviews have really helped me to focus us on what we want to achieve as a school, and provided me with a clear plan of action. Overall, Skills Builder has enabled us to equip our pupils with skills that will benefit them in their everyday lives and working careers. This year we have also continued to embed the essential skills across the wider school community. During staff meetings, teachers have been given the opportunity to reflect on their own skills and begin to develop their own ‘baseline’ assessment.
Keep it simple
The 8 essential skills are embedded within our teaching and learning policies, and our curriculum plans across the school. Our long-term and medium-term planning indicates which skills are being focussed on for each half term. All classrooms, from Reception through to Year 6, have the essential skills on display so that they can always be referred to. The language of the essential skills is used by all staff members, across all areas of learning. Assemblies, staff meetings, parent meetings, learning events and weekly newsletters regularly reference these skills. This year, we have held our Skills Builder assemblies more frequently. During each of these we focus explicitly on one essential skill. Pupils are also awarded certificates for consistently demonstrating the skills focus from the previous assembly. In the classroom, our learning objectives provide the children with a visual reminder of the skills they are practising during each lesson. Our dojo points reward system is linked to the 8 essential skills, so that children are rewarded points when they are demonstrating good use of a particular skill. We have a Skills Builder display in one of our main corridors, which shows work from across the school, linking to the essential skills.
Start early, keep going
Our essential skill teaching includes all of our pupils, from Early Years right through to Year 6. During the Summer term, when we hold our transition meetings for parents new to Early Years, we introduce our parents to the Skills Builder Framework and the essential skills so that they are aware of these from the very beginning of their children’s school journey. All staff have access to the resources on the ‘Skills Builder Hub’ and use these frequently to support their teaching. All year groups and classes have regular and planned opportunities for the learning and practising of essential skills. These are explicitly shown on long term and medium term planning. All staff have received ‘refresher’ training of our key practices at the beginning of the academic year, and during other staff meetings and briefings. Staff new to the school this year have received more extensive training, delivered by the schools Skills Builder Lead. This ensures a consistent approach is maintained throughout all year groups across the school. Monitoring of essential skills across the school includes book looks, pupil voice and environment checks, carried out by the Skills Builder Lead.
Measure it
During the Autumn term, all staff complete their baseline data using the assessment tool on the Skills Builder Hub. Following this, teachers review their hub assessments on a termly basis, to allow for progression and to also plan for next steps. These assessments are tracked by the Skills Builder Lead, in order to ensure that they are completed across the whole school. In order to achieve a more personalised assessment overview for those pupils not working within the same step levels as the majority of their class, class teachers use the ‘Expanded Universal Framework’ to assess these pupils. Our provision maps across the school also make reference to the essential skills, identifying children’s strength and next steps for specific steps within particular skills. These are reviewed on a termly basis. We believe that this approach creates a strong inclusive approach, ensuring that all of our children have the opportunity to achieve and progress in developing their skills. This is something we have been proud to share with other professionals throughout the year, whilst being assessed as a school for our ‘Inclusion Quality Mark Award’.
Focus tightly
Regular opportunities to develop essential skills are given to all pupils, by skills being embedded across all areas of learning and through everyday classroom language. The essential skills are mapped to the themes and topics of each lesson. Across the school, planning demonstrates that all teachers dedicate time to the teaching of skills, pitching teaching at an appropriate level. Teachers use a range of resources on the Hub, lessons, videos and other resources. The essential skills are also enhanced within extra-curricular provision, with different after school clubs focussing on a different skill area. We run a specific ‘Skills Builder’ extra-curricular club, led by the Skills Builder Lead, in which pupils engage in a range of engaging activities with specific skills focuses. The children who attend this club form part of our ‘Skills Builder Committee’, and enjoy sharing their learning experiences with the rest of the school during our assemblies. A number of our intervention groups are also tailored to focus on particular essential skills that our children need support developing. For example, In Early Years, one of our interventions focuses on developing early speaking and listening skills (step 0) with a small group of focus children, identified from previous assessment. This enables us to really embed these skills with the children and provide them with further opportunities to practise.
Keep practising
We have embedded the essential skills into all aspects of our curriculum. Staff give children the opportunity to use and practise their essential skills by incorporating the skills and language across all lessons. This is done in a range of ways, for example; using the skills displays in each classroom and displaying the skills symbols on learning objectives. Children are encouraged to show the skills in all that they do – classroom-based lessons, PE and sports activities, play times and extra-curricular activities. We have incorporated essential skills into our extra-curricular clubs, which provides even more opportunities for our pupils to practise their essential skills. Just a few examples of these include; debate club with a focus on speaking and listening, sign language club with a focus on listening and aiming high, and football club with a focus on teamwork and staying positive. Homework set across the school aligns with one skills at a time and children and parents are encouraged to engage with the home learning hub. Homezone challenges are set via our school newsletter. We have provided parents with information around the essential skills and ways in which they can promote these skills with their children at home. Top tips are also shared with parents during our celebration of learning events.
Bring it to life
We provide the opportunity for all our pupils to experience the application of essential skills. We host several careers days and events throughout the year. During these events, we always ensure that discussions and activities have explicit links to how the essential skills contribute to daily life. This year, a number of our year groups have engaged with online careers Q&A sessions run through Skills Builder. Before these events, children have been given the opportunity to plan their questions, which have been based around each of the essential skills. This year we have also hosted a Careers Fair, welcoming a number of parent volunteers to come into school and share their job roles with the children. Our volunteers talked to pupils about which skills they specifically use daily within their roles, and pupils asked essential skills specific questions to our visitors. Our annual whole school Skills Builder Challenge Day has once again been a huge success in providing pupils with the opportunities to put all their skills into practise. At the end of the event, pupils are awarded certificates for thriving in specific skills. Our Key Stage 2 pupils have enjoyed Careers related trips to the Big Bang project and our local college this year. Discussions and activities before and after these trips have been focussed explicitly around the essential skills.
What's next
The essential skills are well established and embedded into our daily practice, and we will continue to use the essential skills across our everyday learning, maintaining that consistency throughout everyday school life and beyond. One thing we would like to achieve next year is to become more consistent across year groups with the use of the expanded universal framework to assess those pupils not working in line with the majority of their class. To achieve this, it will become a focus for our Skills Builder staff meeting during the Autumn term. We are also keen to increase our pupils’ awareness of their own progress by implementing more self-assessment opportunities and using the Skills Builder Passports more consistently. We are very much looking forward to continuing our Skills Builder journey and teaching our children the essential skills needed for their everyday lives, both now and in the future.
