Term 1 - Recovery Curriculum

Ringmer Primary and Nursery School  - Whole School Recovery Curriculum Term 1 2020

FRONTIERS - a line or border separating two countries (noun)

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there” – LP Hartley

“We don’t turn back. We leave no one behind. We pull each other up.” — President Obama

“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind” – CS Lewis

“Change happens at the frontier” – Erik Hersman

“When we come to an edge we come to a frontier that tells us that we are now about to become more than we have been before” – William Irvin Thompson

“The new frontier lies not beyond the planets but in each one of us” – Pierre Trudeau

Key aims:  To provide a curriculum that all learners can relate to, to support and generate the feeling of community and to allow for a smooth transition back into school.  To empower children to take an active role in the recreation of school life at RP&NS – to include cohesive mechanisms that unite children academically as well as socially and emotionally .To mark, recognise and celebrate the Covid-19 home schooling experience and to provide MHEW support for all school community members; children, parents and staff.

Key drivers:

Lever 1: Relationships – we can’t expect our students to return joyfully, and many of the relationships that were thriving, may need to be invested in and restored. We need to plan for this to happen, not assume that it will. Reach out to greet them, use the relationships we build to cushion the discomfort of returning.

Lever 2: Community – we must recognise that curriculum will have been based in the community for a long period of time. We need to listen to what has happened in this time, understand the needs of our community and engage them in the transitioning of learning back into school.

Lever 3: Transparent Curriculum – all of our students will feel like they have lost time in learning and we must show them how we are addressing these gaps, consulting and co-constructing with our students to heal this sense of loss.

Lever 4: Metacognition – in different environments, students will have been learning in different ways. It is vital that we make the skills for learning in a school environment explicit to our students to reskill and rebuild their confidence as learners.

Lever 5: Space – to be, to rediscover self, and to find their voice on learning in this issue. It is only natural that we all work at an incredible pace to make sure this group of learners are not disadvantaged against their peers, providing opportunity and exploration alongside the intensity of our expectations.

Key points:

The whole school is working on the same learning journey topic to support unity, cohesion and promote positive behaviours, values based learning and children having ownership of shaping their on ‘frontiers’.

English and Maths teaching is taking place every morning in line with children’s current return to school assessments and needs 

Maths continues to be a stand-alone lesson

English is linked to the whole school learning journey and the selected rich text 

Children have been assessed upon their return to school, this assessment has taken place in a variety of low stakes and informal ways – this has determined starting points for learning and groups and individuals who require targeted catch up.  We are following a routines, relationships, retrieve, remap, reteach approach.

Our afternoons are working around the ‘Frontiers’ learning journey but all lessons will include the relevant skills from each area of the curriculum for every year group

Children are receiving X2 weekly empowerment/MHEW sessions, one of these sessions is replacing our weekly Thrive time session.  Individual children are receiving 1:1 sessions with our Empowerment TA 

All classes are spending half a day per week in the woodland area engaging in team building activities and games to support the rebuilding and development of positive relationships.

The school day is starting and ending with short mindfulness sessions to support children to pay attention to their thoughts and feelings.

All classes are creating their own ‘class’ Frontier lands – they are working together to determine what happens in their land, ownership of classrooms, lead a whole school class virtual assembly, class charter, government, cabinet, responsibilities etc.  Children are thinking of rule of law, support structures, collective care etc.  Some classes are creating leaflets and adverts for their lands.

Supportive steps:

All staff are open and explicit with the children about what we are doing and why – assessments, small group work, 1:1, catch up work, hand washing, staggered timetables etc

This openness has lead all home-school communication with parents – the recovery curriculum has been shared with all parents.

Staff ensure ALL children are greeted verbally (not physically) every morning with a brief but meaningful interaction.

Class Charters:

Our classes have worked together to write class charters - here are some examples.