Carpenters Primary School Achieves Flagship Status

Context

Carpenters Primary School continues to be an inclusive and welcoming environment for children, staff, and families. It is clear that staff and members of the community share the ethos, commitment, and drive to secure the best possible outcomes for their children. The attendance of children with SEND is higher than that of others and the school prioritise their support by buying into borough support at the highest level.

 The School is Diverse

The school community is diverse and includes an increasing number of children joining the school with additional needs. Staff are committed to ensuring that children’s needs are met through a more personalised curriculum. Early identification allows staff, from Nursery upwards, to offer appropriate support at the optimum time. An example given today by staff was 'bucket time'.

 ‘This supports lots of children with low communication skills. We are fortunate to work closely with the Speech and Language Therapist.’

Attention Autism training really supports children coming into Nursery and the transition from Reception to Year 1 has been particularly successful through these difficult months with the children making exceptional progress. Senior Leaders praise the staff who have responded magnificently with constant problem solving and flexibility.

Training is Important

Other aspects of training cited by staff as having a positive impact on their thinking and practice included the Hearing Impairment Training, ‘this was amazing and really made me think about the environment for the children,’ and the Team Teach Training was further identified as having offered additional teaching tools to ‘the arsenal.’ Induction of new and newly qualified staff is thorough. On speaking to two new members of staff it was clear they valued the opportunities for training and the induction systems which they said, ‘were really supportive of them; both by their year group support and also Leadership which offered great teamwork’. This was externally verified by the reaccreditation at Gold Level by Investors in People, who recognised the high level of staff support and wellbeing at Carpenters primary School.

There has been Challenging Times

The pandemic has been a challenging time for staff, children, and parents. The borough has experienced very high numbers of Covid from the very beginning. Throughout this time staff prioritised the safety and mental wellbeing of their children. The staff have been incredibly supportive of their community and offered both practical and emotional support throughout. Before the full reopening of school to all pupils, the staff made weekly calls home to speak about coming back and gauge how children, staff and parents were feeling. Support was developed in response to this. Four days of INSET was allocated at the start of term to allow for additional phone calls and follow up 1-1 discussions. These were well received, with children having the opportunity to discuss/write down how they felt about returning. Staff devised sessions to build up the children’s confidence and to reassure parents.

Children Are Resilient

The pupils at the school are confident and thoughtful and organised themselves to ensure they all had a chance to speak. They demonstrated how resilient children can be and how positively they view life despite all that they had gone through over the last 18 months of the pandemic. The school was clearly a fun place for them to be.

 They said they particularly liked:

·        The Worry Box - ‘We can talk to someone if worried.’

·        The Leadership Room - known as the ‘cool room’ which pupils can use at lunchtime. ‘We can solve problems in a good way. They help you resolve your problems.

·        Art Therapy - ‘When upset it takes your mind off things. Sometimes we can do bubble art, it can be anything you can think of!

·        Learning - ‘Teachers make lessons fun and enjoyable and help us address key points.’

·        English - ‘Variety like creative writing and poetry.’

·        Working in smaller groups - ‘This means anyone is not left out.’

There are Smooth Transitions

The School has an effective established procedure to support children who are newly arrived in the country or to the school. Staff work closely with the Inclusion Team, coming together regularly to plan support smooth transitions. An HLTA also leads with supporting mid-phase admissions. At the moment there are approximately 39 different languages spoken by the children and induction includes an initial meeting to gather information, carry out baseline assessments, including Phonics and vocabulary assessments to support access to the curriculum. Good practice includes offering an enriched curriculum and language groups daily where children learn through role-playing spoken language in context alongside visuals. All classes display visual timetables and children are buddied up with children who speak their language. Staff find that this supports their emotional needs, promotes friendships, and provides reassurance to them. Colourful semantics is used in groups and interventions to reinforce Quality First Teaching, which in turn supports children to access the curriculum.

There is a Clear Robust Structure

Safeguarding is a shared responsibility at Carpenters Primary School. The Safeguarding and the Wellbeing Team work closely together. Their weekly meetings are described by staff as following a clear and robust structure that has evolved and changed in response to challenges in the outside world. Staff training has been very helpful. A peer-on-peer abuse working party, alongside four other schools, was initiated in June with members meeting every half term to evaluate their provision and see what more they can do to support pupils and prevent peer-on-peer abuse.

Wellbeing is a Priority

A Parent/Governor who although an established governor, had recently taken on the mantle of Inclusion Governor has been involved in activities and attended meetings with key staff/other governors. It was recognised that wellbeing was a priority for staff and pupils and appreciated the training provided. This was initially face to face pre-pandemic, however had subsequently been moved online. Governors are supportive of staff and want to do everything they can to support the work of the Headteacher and staff. Although this has been a difficult year for the community at Carpenters Primary School, they are to be commended for everything they did to support each other, the children, and parents throughout.

Find out more about the IQM Inclusive School Award

If your school is interested in obtaining the IQM Inclusive School Award or you wish to talk to a member of the IQM team, please feel free to telephone: 028 7127 7857 (9.00 am to 5.00 pm) or email: [email protected] for further details.