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We are a mainstream Catholic High School in Doncaster for students aged 11-18. Our focus is on creating a supportive and inclusive community, fostering intellectual curiosity, moral integrity, and a deep sense of faith. Through our commitment to Catholic values and traditions, we seek to empower our students to become compassionate, responsible, and respectful global citizens. As a school, we specialise in performing arts. Skills Builder is a natural fit for our school as we emphasise the importance of equipping students with well-rounded skills and values to succeed in today's rapidly evolving world. We have been working with Skills Builder for three years now, and the programme is having a positive impact on students' self-esteem and aspirations.
Overall impact
By building students' essential skills, and supporting students to articulate their skills strengths, we have seen a real increase in students' confidence and aspirations. Students are now able to confidently talk about the essential skills, why these are useful, and what their strengths and areas for development are. Staff are increasingly aware of the importance of the essential skills in their subject areas.
Keep it simple
We have built awareness of the essential skills by putting up displays in most classrooms, as well as in corridors. As a school, we have a half-termly focus skill which feeds into assemblies and rewards. All students have received assemblies about the essential skills, and students are also rewarded for displaying different skills. We have also raised awareness of essential skills amongst parents and carers by circulating skills challenges in our parent newsletter and on plasma screens around school. The language of essential skills is also woven through our planning and policies, for example our Careers Development Plan, Behaviour Policy and medium-term planning for each curriculum area.
Start early, keep going
All students have had regular opportunities to build their essential skills. All of KS3 have had 7 Skills Builder focus lessons built into the IT curriculum over the course of the year. Meanwhile, KS4 and have had opportunities to build their essential skills through the wider curriculum, and have been present in assemblies. Next year, we hope to give all students a weekly registration slot to build their essential skills. Our Nurture Groups will follow their own Skills Builder scheme of work during registration slots.
Measure it
Teachers regularly award achievement points to students who demonstrate the essential skills. By reporting on these achievement points, we are able to monitor students' progress in the essential skills. Some curriculum areas, for example English Maths and IT, have also been referencing the essential skills when giving students 'What Went Well' or 'Even Better If' targets. Next year, we are hoping to integrate the skills assessments onto SIMS as a part of our Raising Achievement strategy. When giving students targets, teachers will be able to select a step of a particular skill.
Focus tightly
Years 7-9 receive explicit teaching through the Computer Science curriculum. Each year group had 7 dedicated Skills Builder lessons throughout the year, with teachers using Hub resources to teach specific skill steps. In addition to this, we have been sending out resources for form tutors to use in regular explicit teaching slots, and for curriculum teachers to use in their subject lessons. Next year every year group will have a weekly form time slot to focus on Skills Builder.
Keep practising
Essential skills are explicitly referenced on schemes of work for all subjects and all year groups. Most teachers reference skills displays during curriculum lessons, and more and more are incorporating the skills icons into their learning slides. Vocational subject teachers have also been using Teamwork passports to help students reflect on how they have used specific steps of this skill in their projects. Certain subjects such as Maths have started incorporating the skills icons into their learning slides. Students also have the opportunity to practise and reflect on their essential skills through extracurricular activities: the booklets have been adapted to include space for students to log the skills they have used.
Bring it to life
The essential skills reflective log has been incorporated into work experience booklets, to help Year 12 students think about the skills they have used during their placements. Students also use similar reflective resources during school trips. Essential skills were also a key focus during Green Careers Week, with speakers talking to KS3 students about the skills they use in their job. Year 6 transition students also learned about the essential skills. Next year we're really excited too run some skills-based mock interviews with our Year 12 students in September.
What's next
Next year we are excited to have a weekly form time slot for each year group to work on building their essential skills. Students in Nurture groups will also have the opportunity to build essential skills in form time, by following a bespoke skills curriculum. We're really looking forward to using the Skills Builder resources in our Year 12 mock interviews in September.
