Latest News and Updates from Brill School
09.11.2020
Parent Update Evening
Our 3-5 Year Aims and Priorities for 2020-2021
Below is a presentation from our Chair of Governors, Liz Cotgreave. Liz shares our aims for the next 3 to 5 years and the outcomes of our 2020 Parent Survey, then highlights a few of this year's priorities. We've picked some of these to tell you more about in the videos that follow.
The following set of slides are a more detailed version of those in Liz's presentation, and you can see the 2020 Parent Survey results here.
Priorities for 2020-2021
Below Mrs White and the Team share videos explaining how we plan to address some of these priorities and why we feel these are important areas to focus on this year. We will share more videos updating you on our progress in each area of our priorities throughout the duration of the year.
Aim #1: Brill children move on with ‘the wind in their sails’: with the resilience, thirst for learning and values to sustain them beyond their Brill School years.
Priorities for 2020-2021:
- Ensure all stakeholders have a clear understanding of what a ‘BRILL child’ means and have clarity on our school vision.
The video below will explain to you our curriculum's vision for all pupils at Brill School and explains to you what we mean by 'The Brill Child'.
Watch the short video below where Mrs White focusses on, in more detail, three areas of the 'Brill Child'.
Our Curriculum's Vision
See below the curriculum vision document that Mrs White has discussed above.
The Whole Child
Watch the short video where Mrs Keeping talks about how we put emphasis on developing the 'Whole Child'.
Watch the short video below to hear Madame Tate sharing her passion towards Modern Foreign Languages.
Watch the short video below to hear from Mrs Oliver, our new SENCo.
Please visit the subject pages on our website, under the Curriculum tab to hear from other members of the team talking about how we approach specific areas of the curriculum in engaging and innovative ways.
Watch the short video below to hear from Mrs Green who explains how the new outdoor area for Year 1 enhances and enriches Year 1's curriculum.
Watch the short video below to hear Mrs Keeping sharing her passion for Forest School and its benefit on the children's curriculum.
Parent feedback and Q&A session
Please watch the video below to hear about our follow up Q&A session, which will be held on Teams.
3.11.20New routine for drop off and collectionThank you for your cooperation this morning while we trialled a slightly amended version of our staggered morning start. Tomorrow we will once again ask all parents and children to wait on the field and we will bring in a year group at a time.
- The teachers will hold up their year group signs when it is time for your children to come through to the playground.
- We ask that all parents go directly to wait on the field in the morning and do not enter the staff car park or walk along the pavement to the side of the staff car park to get to the school - please take this into account if you need to leave a little longer to walk around to access the field in the morning.
- Please wait on the field until you see your class teacher hold up your year group number. Parents and children can then come forward to the field gate.
- We ask parents to clear the area promptly.
- We will then use the same system to release the children in the afternoon, where we again ask parents to wait on the field until your year group sign is held up.
We hope this will alleviate some of the potential for cross over of parents and children. If any parents are running late and miss your child's year group entry, please do not come up the pavement as others will be exiting that way, but wait on the field until all year groups have come through and parents cleared the area, then you may come forward.Thank you for your ongoing support.Mrs White
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Parent Update Evening 2019
Posted: Sep 27, 2019 by: brillslt on: Brill Highlights
To listen to podcasts from the evening, click here.
2019 Priorities
As you will all know, we had a short visit from OFSTED inspection in the spring. The inspector gave us very positive feedback, even describing our school as “a jewel of a school in beautiful surroundings”. One reason they came to see us is the excellent progress pupils have made over the last three years. In the inspector’s words:
“In the 2018 national tests and assessments, pupils’ achievement was exceptionally strong. Pupils’ results were particularly impressive in key stage 2. You and your staff have not been complacent following these top-notch results. There is a strong ethos of self-improvement.” (You can read the inspector’s short letter here and by then clicking on the OFSTED 2019 image)
She encouraged us ‘be brave’ and develop our ethos and curriculum even further. So that is what we are setting out to do this year. Our three top priorities are:
Develop our curriculum
OFSTED are changing the way they inspect schools. They are now looking for depth of learning across all parts of the curriculum rather than focusing narrowly on maths and literacy. Here’s what they had to say about our school:
“They (the children) are exceptionally well stimulated by the challenging topics they study. Pupils are also enthused by the raft of additional opportunities provided by the school, which are a feature of the curriculum.”
We know our curriculum can be even better. We want children to understand what it takes to be a ‘Brill Geographer’ or a ‘Brill Historian’ and challenge themselves to learn more about their topics. This term the teachers are focusing on Art and History. They started the year with an abstract art workshop with a practising artist to learn more about teaching the subject. We’ll be updating our website to explain more about our approach and give you the information you need to support your children. Please see link to our Curriculum Intent document for more detail.
Challenge our children even more to help them grow as individuals
The inspector said the children were “a credit to us” (and you!) and praised their resilience, knowledge and the way they look after each other.
We believe that children’s ability to respond to challenge, learn independently and find their interests and talents is every bit as important as curriculum learning. Our Christian values and the activities we build in through their school years (from the buddy system to forest school, residential trips to pupil-led fundraising activities) are a key part of their personal development. We want you to understand the intention behind this approach and our expectations for the children because it shapes homework, behaviour systems and more. We’ll be explaining more during this year (starting with homework). We are also doing lots in class to encourage children to stretch themselves further with all their learning. Look out for blog posts with more about this.
Please see this link 'How to help every child for fill their potential'
Develop our facilities
With your support (and our wonderful PTA of course!) we have been lucky enough to develop our facilities a great deal over the last few years, from the library and IT suite, to this year’s interactive whiteboards and lockers. We are now looking ahead to the next 3-5 years with ambitions to develop our sporting facilities further, in collaboration with the village community. The children will be involved in our plans and we’ll tell you more as we progress.
Parent Survey 2019
We are delighted so many of you filled in our parent survey again this year (72 people) and that your feedback was so positive! You can see the results here.
We had positive comments on things that got better last year including:
- how we support our pupils with additional needs and work with their parents
- The breadth of extra-curricular clubs on offer
- how we communicate with you
- the sports opportunities on offer for all children
We’ve also taken account of all your suggestions for further improvement.
Homework
Parents have different views on homework so we’re trying something new! We hope that giving children a choice of tasks for the half term will help them learn independence and enable them to choose the kind of homework that suits them. We are just starting out with this and will adapt it as children, teachers and parents try it out. Let us know what you think and tell us if you need more information.
Communicating about children’s progress
A few parents told us they would like to understand their child’s progress more clearly. We will use the first parent council of the year to find out more about what parents want. Please look out for a request for input from your class reps and tell us what you think.
Communicating with parents
Most of you told us we are doing a great job and that you have enjoyed parent information evenings, online club booking and the website. We know there is always more we can do so we will be updating the website through the next couple of terms, in particular to share more information about our exciting curriculum developments - more on that coming soon!
