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Topcliffe CofE Academy is a small rural school where children enter with a range of understanding about learning. We have a higher than average proportion of children with SEND and Pupil Premium, from a huge range of socio-economic backgrounds. Our school vision is dedicated to preparing children for life in our ever-changing, diverse, modern world, and when we heard about the Skills Builder programme, it was obvious that this is the way that we can support our children in the best way to achieve this. As we have implemented the programme, and embedded it into how we deliver learning at Topcliffe Academy, we started introducing the skills in Nursery, at the age of 2 years old and continue to use, develop and assess these skills right up to Year 6, as we strive to develop children's resilience, confidence and approach to life.
Overall impact
Progress has been interesting to monitor over our time on the project as the first year we started it we went into the various lockdowns and had to find ways of developing it, despite most of the children being at home. The skills we taught really supported the children and parents with remote learning and gave a clear focus to what we were trying to teach. For example, when delivering a maths lesson we were able to explore what the features of a good 'problem solver' were and how these would help solve the maths problem that was given. Since returning to school, the children have also needed the focus on these skills in order to help them self-regulate as learners and refresh what we would have said were the 'basics' before the pandemic. The skills focused approach has supported teachers with how to teach the basics again and helped them to not just assume that all children know what a 'good listener' looks like, for example. The framework has given them the tools to break the skill down and teach it individually before expecting to see it in a contextual situation. As a school community, we are now a 'Skills Builder community' and these skills drive everything we do as the children learning and as the adults working with them.
Keep it simple
Skills Builder has become the driver of all of our learning in school. Throughout the course of each school year, each skill is brought into focus for a half term, with the others in reference also. Each half term begins with a launch day, where the focus skill(s) is/are introduced with the video activity, and this skill and level are then displayed on each classroom door, so that they can be referred to easily, to remind of the language used and where learning is focused. We have the skills displayed in each classroom, as well as a permanent display in the hall. The focus skill(s) also form our weekly celebration assemblies where children are given a Skills Builder certificate in accordance with the skill and level they are working towards, to celebrate and highlight the value of the different skills.
Start early, keep going
We focus on particular skills each half term, building them at the relevant levels through our launch day activities, as well as a reminder half way through each term with a reignition day. Children are given the opportunity to practise and develop the full range of skills through the different activities in our timetable, such as Forest schools, where children must work on all of the skills at different times, in order to achieve the desired outcomes. We also subscribe to the challenge/project days, which are dedicated to the skills. We have involved parents by highlighting the focus skills each half term, which are sent home on a topic overview that identifies the skills and allows parents to understand the way in which this is being done. Introducing the language of Skills Builder at home has helped to create a continuity in our approach. We also comment on the progress of Skills Builder on our termly reports that are sent home.
Measure it
Our teachers end each half term assessing the focus skills that have been built, and begin each half term with an up-to-date assessment of where the children are at for the new skills, using the online dashboard assessment tool. Progress is therefore formally assessed half termly with regards to focus skills, aswell as when children have completed a project day, or challenge day with regards to the full range of skills. At the end of each half term, the children are also given the opportunity to assess for themselves which skills they have used, and how they have done. Teachers use the language of Skills Builder in the classrooms, so on an individual basis, where children display elements of the different skills, this is celebrated and reinforced - as well as where reminders are needed at times for some children. This is done using the language the children know, which is helpful to support them to build the skills in the right way.
Focus tightly
Each half term, on our launch day, the skills are brought into focus with direct teaching using the videos and activities on the dashboard, aligned to the step each class is working on. This is then reinforced, through direct teaching, at our midway point - or another skill brought into focus in the same way. We also have regular forest schools sessions each week, where these skills are relied upon. Skills are chosen depending on the focus activities and direct instruction, alongside reminders of the steps the children are working on, helps ensure that this learning is achieved and reinforced.
Keep practising
We also complete the challenge/project days in each class, which allows the children to put into practise the range of skills, through the exciting activities that they can complete. As well as this, we are also committed to something called 'courageous advocacy' as part of our school ethos. This is an opportunity for our children to embrace issues that are important to their lives, and be agents of change, by undertaking projects to highlight issues and do something to help - for example, to petition the local council about the speed of traffic outside our school, raise awareness of bees, or do something to help climate change: these projects are driven by the key skills of Skills Builder, and provide another opportunity for children to build them.
Bring it to life
We use the Skills Builder project ideas and often combine these with current issues that are happening in our community - local and global. For example, Year 1 and 2 focused on raising money for the World Wild Life fund and researched how they could help and then decided how they wanted to do it. As a class they decided to run a cake sale to raise money. This project involved teamwork to plan and produce the cakes, aiming high to raise as much money as possible, creativity to devise what would raise the most money and all the other skills to ensure the project was a success. Another example is when the Year 5 and 6 class campaigned to get the speed limit changed outside school and worked collaboratively to research traffic flow, speed and volume of traffic. They then contacted the local MP and local community parish members to campaign about the cause.
What's next
We plan to continue being ambitious for our children through planning more real life projects that will motivate and engage with real life contexts. We plan to make our curriculum even more skills based this year so that our children leave our school with a really solid foundation of skills that will help them be 'good learners' for life. After the success of our Big Business Challenge week, where the children designed and delivered their own products and services for our Summer Fair, we are now looking to form a long term partnership with a local business so that we can bring further meaning to the children's learning and give skill practice opportunities. We also want to further develop how we use Skills Builder to assess our children with Special Educational Needs who may appear not to make progress in the conventional (academic attainment) sense of the word and yet we know we can evidence their progress through this framework and share this with their parents.
