School Improvement Plan 2017/2018

Our priorities this year are to:

  • To create a school community which works together to achieve positive outcomes for our learners (T.E.A.M.)
  • To develop a coherent, progressive and relevant curriculum to support positive outcomes for our leaners.
  • To develop approaches to assessment so that staff, pupils and parents have a clear understanding of learning and milestones.

We aim to: / Outcomes for children
Children will:
/ Have a clear, coherent and progressive curriculum which supports all learners to achieve their potential, enjoy learning and have the necessary skills to be 21st Century learners and citizens. / Be empowered to achieve their potential through the development of skills
Engage in learning which is relevant for them and supports them making informed choices.
Develop key skills which support them to be life-long learners.
/ We aim to work together to create a positive team who works together to make our school the best it can be. / Feel happy, safe, confident and know that we are all working together to create a school community.

/ All staff will have a clear and shared understanding of assessment and benchmarks.
All parents will have the opportunity to understand and explore pupils’ learning to support their child. / Make clear progress in their learning.
All parents will understand what their child is learning and how they can support this.
Staff will confidently be able to plan and assess learning which supports raising attainment and achievements for our pupils.
This will be achieved through staff professional development, new resources and self-evaluation activities. Parents, Staff, Pupil and Community voice matters and we will regularly ask you questions to support improving our school together.

Additional Interventions to Raise Attainment and Ensure Equity for all learners

We are a Scottish Attainment Challenge School, which means we are working with Education Scotland to support our school to improvement and raise attainment through targeted interventions. We also receive money from the Scottish Government’s Pupil Equity Fund, which supports us trying to reduce the poverty related attainment gap and ensure the best outcomes for all our learners.

The year the theme of our Scottish Attainment Plan is ‘Raising Attainment and Early Intervention’. The theme of our Pupil Equity Fund Plan is ‘Readiness to Learn’ and this is supporting all pupils to engage in learning, which meets their needs and supports the school to settle following a significant period of change.

Interventions have been implemented following consultations with Parents, staff, pupils and community members. We will continue to consult with these groups as we plan for next session’s interventions and the following years.

Scottish Attainment Challenge Interventions – Raising Attainment and Early Interventions
Interventions / What we said/What Data said / Action – What we did. / Outcomes for Learners

Reading Wise Intervention / Some pupils showed significant gaps in their reading which was impacting on their learning and engagement. / We have implemented Reading Wise across the board with 54 pupils undertaking the programme to support their reading skills (decoding and word attack) / Pupils will be able to use skills within their learning.
Pupils will be able to engage in other areas of the curriculum due to increased reading ages.
Writers for Writing and Speak Out Radio Broadcasting / Data showed that the minority of our pupils were achieving the National expectation in relation to writing.
Pupils showed low levels of engagement in writing. / We have worked with partners at SHMU and the Scottish Book Trust to create dynamic writing projects to develop pupils’ writing skills and enjoyment. / Pupils will engage in writing and develop essential skills for writing and be able to apply these across the curriculum .

Talk Boost / High levels of our children have low levels of vocabulary and this is impacting on their learning and their literacy.
High levels of our children require Speech and Language input in Nursery and the early stages of primary. / All our Nursery pupils are targeted for Early Talk Boost interventions to support the development of their vocabulary and literacy skills. Targeted pupils in P1 are supported to engage with the Talk Boost project to support their oral literacy. / Pupils will develop their confidence and oral literacy skills which will support engagement in learning and emerging literacy skills.

Therapeutic Councillor / Some of our pupils have emotional and social difficulties, which are impacting on their resilience and ability to engage in learning. / We are working with ACIS Youth to support pupils accessing a therapeutic councillor to develop skills for coping with their emotions and engage in learning. / Pupils who are working with the councillor will engage in learning and develop strategies to self-regulate.
Pupil Equity Funding Interventions – Readiness to Learn and Building a Community for all learners
Interventions / What we said/What Data said / Action – What we did. / Outcomes for Learners

P1 Play Based Curriculum – to support transition between Nursery and School. / Data showed that only 50% of our pupils were going into Primary 2 as expected or above.
Developmentally pupils were starting P1 at pre-school levels and there were significant emotional and social barriers which would impact on their success. / We have implemented a play based curriculum which builds on the learning from Nursery. The focus of play is developing Literacy and Numeracy through play whilst using Health and Wellbeing as the foundation for learning. / Pupils will be secure in their learning and will be able to engage in leading their own learning.

Building confidence and resilience through sport / All stakeholders felt that poor behaviour was being rewarded and that pupils were disengaging with learning as a result.
Pupils showed low levels of resilience which was impacting on their learning. / We have set up partnerships with Transition Extreme and Adventure Aberdeen, which supports pupils to experience challenges through sport. This is building their confidence and ability to cope with new challenges and experiences. / Pupils will develop resilience, self-regulation and confidence to cope with new challenges.

Mindfulness for Self-Regulation
Nurture EYP – to support engagement and Family Learning to support Inclusion not Exclusion. / Some of our pupils have high levels of emotional and social difficulties which are impacting on their ability to engage with learning.
Pupils, at times, are struggling to develop strategies for self-regulation of emotions. / All pupils from P4-7 are engaging with a Mindfulness programme
Staff are being upskilled in developing the use of Mindfulness in the classroom.
An EYP has been employed to support these pupils through nurturing approaches.
A Family Worker is working with families to support inclusion. / Pupils will be able to engage with learning in a meaningful way.
Pupils will be able to self-regulate their emotions.

JASS Leadership Award to support transition to Secondary. / Transition between Primary and Secondary needed to be developed to ensure coherence and progression. All staff felt there was a need to develop pupils skills for learning, work and life. / The JASS Leadership Award is being implemented by all Primary Schools and Northfield Academy. / Pupils will be able to develop key skills in learning, work and life to support being active citizens in our local community and building on their learning in Primary ensuring progression.

Great Teaching, Great Learning

Staff are working on a professional development approach called Great Teaching, Great Learning to develop our collegiate approaches to teaching and learning with the aim of ensuring that we are develop as a professional team.

Visible Learning:

The Northfield ASG is about to embark on a 2 year programme called Visible Learning which will support staff to develop professionally and ensure that children are engaged in their own learning and empowered to develop themselves.