At South Pennine Academies, we want every student to have the best possible chance to achieve in school. Stronger partnerships with families, local businesses, community agencies and universities are essential as we focus on improving student outcomes.
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At Willowpark, we aim to give pupils the knowledge, skills and understanding they need to lead confident, healthy independent lives and become informed, active, responsible citizens through our delivery of SMSC and Character Education.
We strongly believe that we teach our children about how we and others can be spiritual, moral, social and cultural throughout each day of our lives and how we all have our own beliefs and how we can respect ourselves and others.
Health, Social, Character Education and Citizenship permeates the whole of the taught and wider Curriculum we provide.
We explore SMSC through our curriculum, through values in school, assemblies both whole school and class and through our links within our diverse community.
The DfE reinforce the need:
To create and enforce a clear and rigorous expectation on all schools to promote the fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs.
Each year the children in all classes decide upon their class rules, a mission statement and class target. All children have an annual questionnaire where they are able to put forward their views about the school.
We have a pupil council which meets regularly with the Head of School or Assistant Head to discuss issues raised in class. Children on the pupil council are voted in by their classmates following an election process. The council carries out its own surveys and knows that its opinion counts as it is involved in decision making and able to effect change within the school. Councillors will visit the local council chambers and meet local officials and decision makers such as the Mayor.
Recently, members of our Junior Leadership team met with our local MP Debbie Abrahams for a Q&A session. The children came up with a range of fantastic questions covering topics such as resilience after setbacks, climate change and crime prevention, amongst many others. Debbie commented the quality of the questions asked by the children was right up there with some of the best she's been asked and noted that the conduct and attitude of our students was impeccable throughout the meeting. We are very proud of the fantastic job our student did representing our school. Well done everyone!
The importance of laws, such as those that govern the class, the school, or the country, are consistently reinforced at Willowpark Primary Academy. Pupils are taught from an early age to distinguish right from wrong and learn the rules of the school. These are our Willowpark Ways and pupils are taught the value and reasons behind these rules. They learn that they govern and protect us, the responsibilities that this involves and the consequences when the rules or laws are broken. Visits from authorities such as the Police help to reinforce this message.
At Willowpark Primary Academy, pupils are actively encouraged to make choices, knowing that they are in a safe and supportive environment. As a school, we educate and provide boundaries for pupils to make informed choices, within a safe environment and through an empowering education. Pupils are encouraged to know, understand and exercise their rights and personal freedoms and advised how to exercise these safely, for example through our eSafety and PSHE lessons.
Mutual respect is at the heart of our values and rules. Children learn that their behaviours have an effect on their own rights and those of others and these are regularly reinforced through our behaviour policy. All members of the school community treat each other with respect. Our Willowpark Ways include: We always share and work together. We are always polite and have good manners.
Although predominantly white British, Willowpark Primary Academy is becoming a more culturally diverse school community. We actively promote diversity through our celebrations of different faiths and cultures. Religious Education lessons, PSHCE lessons and annual events reinforce messages of tolerance and respect for others. We link with another local primary school with a very different ethnic and religious mix to ours and take part in a variety of visits based on curriculum subjects, social and cultural activities. Members of different faith groups and religions visit school and are encouraged to share their knowledge to enhance learning within classes and the school. The children visit places of worship that are important to different faiths.
