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Personal Development
At The Avenue, we recognise that the primary years are a key time for children to develop their own identity and aspirations for the future. As well as academic development, it is essential that children are given opportunities, through the curriculum and beyond, for personal development. We understand the crucial role we can play in helping children to prepare for their adult lives so they can go on to engage positively in society. The opportunities we can offer them while at The Avenue will impact upon their future, helping them to develop the core values we hold at the school
Personal development is both a subject and a school ethos. It is reflected in our school motto of 'every child, every chance, everyday' and in our school values. We want each child to leave the school feeling confident, unique and proud.
Intent
Our intent is to teach children how to navigate through life safely, happily and healthily. Children are growing up in a world that is constantly changing and it is the duty of all the staff at school, in partnership with the parents, to teach the children transferable life skills. We teach children about the world around them, relationships, emotions, reproduction and health, as well as transferable skills to help with life.
Our School values were chose by our school community, we all voted and these three we feel we really live by:
Kindness Honesty Respect
For our children to be kind:
To develop children’s understanding of morality in themselves and others, develop social skills and understand society, build a firm set of personal beliefs and to engage in the community that they live in, alongside understanding the communities of others our school values and treat others how they want to be treated and they learn that showing kindness, compassion and empathy towards others makes the world a better place.
This includes raising awareness of environmental issues, and teaching our children the importance of showing kindness towards our planet and all creation.
For our children to live with Honesty:
To ensure that children feel confident to express their beliefs and take action, whilst understanding and appreciating how other people’s actions are driven by their beliefs, thoughts, feelings and experiences.
We ensure that all children feel that they belong in our special community, so – combined with our high aspiration and expectations – they feel safe, encouraged and prepared to flourish both during their time at The Avenue and beyond.
For our children to Respect:
This is where we learn to treat others as we want to be treated; how to be part of a community; manage our feelings and behaviour, and form relationships with others. "You push, I pull" - figuring it out together. Naturally, we have an ethos of inclusivity and tolerance in our setting, where views, faiths, cultures, and races are valued and where we encourage children to engage with their wider community.
We ensure that we help children to appreciate and respect their own culture and the culture of others. We can help them explore similarities and differences between themselves and others: amongst families, faiths, communities, cultures, and traditions; and to share and discuss practices, celebrations, and experiences.
Implementation
- The Avenue Values and Assembly
- PSHE and RSE Curriculum
- E-Safety teaching and learning
- The teaching of Emotional Literacy and Mental Health
- Progression in Oracy
- Opportunities for Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural (SMSC) development
- RE Curriculum
- Student Leadership Opportunities
- Extra-Curricular Opportunities
- Community Links and Service
- We teach about Protected Charateriscics
- We teach our children about the British Values
Click here to read more about this here
- Assemblies, on a Tuesday, we all gather together to learn and areas that will enrich our Personal Development. This assembly ensure that we grow a sense of belonging within the whole school.
On a Friday, we gather once more to celebrate! We celebrate successes in school and children are awarded with certificates. One child in every class receives a Special Class Award each week to celebrate something they have shined in. We share in our class attendance awards and the winning class receives a trophy (we have other awards also linking to attendance, please do ask if you would like further information).
Children work hard through the week earning house points and these are built upon. Children then receive prestigious badges depending on the number of house points they get.
We sing happy birthday to the children who have celebrated their birthday that week, or will over the holiday ahead.
Finally, we share our own personal development and children bring in things like swimming badges, evidence of money they have raised for charity, taekwondo and many other wonderful things that happen outside of school. It is a wonderful opportunity to share their own development.
It is a joyous occasion and a real sense of celebration.
In addition we have:
- House Events regularly which include assemblies, PE, art and other activities.
- We offer a range of enrichment opportunities and clubs.
- Our military children are invited to join our 'Little Troopers club'
- We offer a wide variety of trips to support children's understanding of the world.
- In year 6, children go on a residential to Hooke Court developing life skills ready for their next steps in education.
Impact
Pupils develop a strength in character from the wide and rich experiences we offer at The Avenue. Our Avenue values, and the learning and opportunities we provide for all pupils, enables them to develop their own character and identity.
Pupils develop a positive mind-set and have high aspirations of themselves. This enables them to be courageous, showing determination and self-belief to try new things and see mistakes as opportunities to learn. Therefore, our pupils flourish in all areas: academically, emotionally and personally.
Our pupils build strong foundations during their time at The Avenue: they hold positive school memories and their Personal Development sets them up for their future.
The Head Teacher and Personal Development Lead consistently monitors the impact of our Personal Development offer through observations, Floor Book monitoring and the ongoing assessment of pupils through the Thrive Online profiling. We use whole-school pupil surveys to ensure that pupils’ voice is a large part of assessing the impact of Personal Development. We also use Parent View, and responses to both parent and staff surveys, as additional evidence of the impact of our Personal Development curriculum.
For information, particularly around our Implementation, please read our Personal Development Policy:
Please also see our related curriculum pages:
/60/personal-social-health-education-pshe
/271/protected-characteristics
Below are some useful websites for parents:
Pop ‘n’ Olly – LGBT+ education for primary schools
AfC Emotional Health Service – A multi-disciplinary team of clinical specialists and mental health clinicians (clinical and counselling psychologists, systemic psychotherapists and art psychotherapists) who provide mental health support to children and young people in Kingston and Richmond.
Mind – To provide advice and support to empower anyone experiencing a mental health problem. We campaign to improve services, raise awareness and promote understanding.
Bullying – Advice and support for children and young people experiencing bullying
CAHMS Resources – Resources to support mental health and wellbeing.
Childline – A counselling service for children and young people.
BBC Bitesize – PSHE and citizenship videos to help children’s understanding.
NCPCC’s Pantosaurus – A video to help children stay safe and keeping their private parts private.
NSPCC – Information and support for child abuse
Mind – Mental Wellbeing resources for young people.
Growth Mindset – Should you tell your kids they are smart or talented? Professor Carol Dweck answers this question and more, as she talks about her groundbreaking work on developing mindsets. She emphasizes the power of “yet” in helping students succeed in and out of the classroom.
