Blackfriars Primary

What makes us unique at Blackfriars Primary?

Blackfriars Primary School is situated in the Greater Gorbals neighbourhood in the South of Glasgow. The area surrounding Blackfriars Primary has gone through a substantial regeneration over the past 10 years. There is a recognised increase in owner occupied homes. However our Equity Profile indicates 63.9% of our school population live in areas 1&2 of the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD). The area has high levels of income and employment deprivation compared with the Glasgow Average. There is a high percentage of single parent households with dependent children. The percentage of the total neighbourhood population from an ethnic minority group has increased in recent years. This includes a rise in professionals living in the Gorbals due to the easy walking commute into Glasgow City Centre. 53% of our children have English as an Additional Language.

Pupil Attainment in Greater Gorbals is lower than in Glasgow overall, while child poverty and P1 obesity levels are higher than the Glasgow average. While fewer children than average live in proximity to green space, primary school children are more likely to walk to school when compared to the Glasgow average. Referrals to children and adolescent mental health services and the proportion of children and young people from minority ethnic groups are higher.

Staff, pupils and parents believe that we:

• are a multi-cultural school with over 30 languages spoken. We celebrate diversity.
• provide a welcoming ethos for our transient population.
• know our children well – academic ability, socially and wider achievements.
• have taken ownership over outdoor learning. Children are given opportunities to learn outdoors and learn about sustainability.
• have consistent learning and teaching experiences across stages through the CEP process.
• actively promote health and wellbeing and have a strong nurturing approach.
• have strong community links and partnerships.
• have developed strong family engagement through Seesaw, the school app and the Youtube channel.
• ensure the use of digital technology permeates the curriculum.
• are implementing play-based approaches across the school to develop skills for life and work.

The cultural context of our school:

Local jobs- 

• City Centre
• “City”
• City of Glasgow College
• High Court
• Co-op
• Health Centre
• Library
• Police
• GHA
• Cafes
• Shops
• Services

Local Context-

• The Clyde                                                       
• The Tall Ship
• The Riverside Museum
• Sport-Rowing, Hockey, Football
• Glasgow Cathedral
• St. Mungo’s Museum
• Glasgow Green
• Victorian Buildings & Statues
• Statues of the Gorbals
• Southern Necropolis (Colin McKie)
• Glasgow Central Mosque
• GOMA
• Police Station
• The Tenement House
• People’s Palace
• Templeton Building
• Gorbal’s Parish Church
• Citizen Theatre
• Scotland St. School
• Glasgow High Court
• Gorbals’ sculptures-3 boys- Liz Peden
• Glasgow High Court
• Gaelic in the Gorbals
• The History of the Gorbals, Regeneration, Then and Now
• Community Orchard
• Friends of the South Necropolis
• Leisure Centre
• GHA
• Alexander Greek Thompson
• St. Francis Centre

Our Curriculum is developed through the 4 contexts of learning (Curricular Areas and Subjects, Ethos and Life of the School, Interdisciplinary Learning and Opportunities for Personal Achievement) to support the pupils of Blackfriars to fulfil their full potential through developing the 4 capacities (responsible citizens, effective contributors, confident individuals and successful learners) within each pupil to prepare them with skills for learning, life and work. This session our priorities on our School Improvement Plan are:

1. Support, enhance, guide and improve attendance, late coming and family engagement to ensure improved Health & Wellbeing of all pupils.

• Outdoor learning will continue to support children’s health and well -being throughout session 2022-23.
• Outdoor Learning will provide opportunities for increased family engagement.
• A temporary PEF funded DHT will focus on improved school/family relationships, engagement and learning, improved attendance and late-coming, poverty related barriers to learning and poverty of opportunity.

2. Improving learners’ experiences and raising attainment and achievement.

• The clear, consistent learning and teaching policy (GIC-CEP) will be maintained in Blackfriars Primary.   

• Maintenance of EAL friendly classrooms, EAL Briefing Note and Procedures with increased liaison and information sharing between EAL team and class teachers.
• Literacy for ALL/Glasgow Counts (GIC) will be maintained throughout school.
• Embedding of play/active learning across all stages.
• Social Studies will provide a platform for skills-based teaching, use of holistic assessment and declarations of attainment will be introduced each term.
• Digital Literacy-development of a more consistent approach to digital technology during Session 2022-23.
• PEF will be used to provide activities to close the gap of Equity of Opportunity (GIC-CREATE, PEPASS)
• PEF will be used to release staff to provide targeted intervention and raise attainment including enhanced provision for EAL support.

3. Develop a clear policy for Equalities and Diversity which permeates from P1-P7 which is underpinned by Children’s Rights Legislation.

• Introduce Relationships and Sexual Health Programme as a pilot. (RSHP)
• Cost of the School Day will be consulted and used to guide best practice.
• Language and Communication Friendly School will be developed.
• Restorative Practices will be used to improve relationships.
• Introduction and implementation of RME and HWB frameworks

Through tracking the attainment of our children we identify gaps in our pupils’ lives, which are influenced by poverty and use our Pupil Equity Funding to target the gaps in a bid to provide Equity for all our children.

Identified Supports:

• Annually revisit our Curriculum Rationale as a school community in line with the Gorbals’ profile and our School Equity Profile.
• Have a common Vision for Blackfriars through which our 5 Values permeate.
• Developing the Pedagogy of Play/Active Learning across Blackfriars to address the Gender gap, support increased EAL pupils in school, addressing social and emotional needs, easing transitions, addressing pace and challenge, and raising attainment in Numeracy and Literacy.
• Audit of first languages spoken at home and in school and targeting EAL support firstly, in upper school, towards those pupils New to English and Early Acquisition of English, providing support with skills for learning life and work.
• Interpreters offered and used when necessary.
• “Survival Language” offered to pupils new to English.
• Identifying who are “nearly” on track with their learning in Numeracy and Literacy and providing targeted high quality teaching and learning in small groups 3 times per week in addition to their class learning.
• Class teachers take ownership of Additional Support Needs (ASN) within their class, revisiting Glasgow’s ASN policy, identifying and matching their pupils to each stage of additional support then writing, assessing, evaluating and identifying next steps on a termly basis for the needs in their classes on Staged Intervention Grids. These Grids are discussed at termly tracking meetings. ASN termly class visits to monitor these Staged Intervention Grids in practice.
• To increase reliability around Blackfriars Primary School Attainment Data; Assessment Framework used to support class teachers’ professional judgement around “Achieving a Level” alongside the use of Benchmarks.“
• Language of the Month” celebrates our range of languages
• French language exposure from P1-7 in line with Shawlands Academy French planners and tracking tool.
• Class assemblies to reflect and celebrate range of cultures/religions in school.
• Improved Communication with Parents through use of Groupcall (translating correspondence to parents with EAL), increased adult learning opportunities (identified through increasing community partnership work and contacting and working with our family learning officer), increased family learning opportunities, the Blackfriars Blether, Wednesday morning drop in clinics with SLT, increased notice of “Dates” for parents, targeted Curricular Workshops, surveys gathering parental views twice a session, Open Afternoons, use of the School App, Seesaw, school website and Twitter, monthly newsletter from Head Teacher. Identification that not all parents can afford Android/Smart Phones, data or internet so alternative, traditional “Bag Drop” of info offered to families, consulting all stakeholders early in session.
• Improved transition from Nursery to Primary with a timetable of opportunities provided by DHT, Open Afternoons for prospective parents into P1 classrooms and assistance provided to all Pre Entrant parents with Online enrolment in ICT suite if requested.
• Soft Start provided for children who have difficulty coming to school and who are often late from PEF funded SFLW
• Increased promotion of Breakfast Club
• Improved Community links and partnership working providing increased wider achievement opportunities for all children and increased adult and family learning.
• Termly tracking meetings to track attainment, identify gaps in attainment and target appropriate support for leaning in response to need and target appropriate use of Pupil Equity Fund in response to lack of attainment due to Poverty related issues.
• IDL opportunities redefined and identified to provide relevance
• Progression Pathways introduced in all curricular areas to improve transition, track progress through Curriculum for Excellence and thus raise attainment for all.

• Health planners introduced highlighting the need for increased awareness around Health & Well Being in response to need identified in community of poor diet, obesity and lack of exercise.
• Whole School Community approach to Leading Behavioural Change and relationship policy in line with school Values.
• Outdoor Learning has been revisited and re-established to facilitate the need for children to appreciate learning outdoors and the green areas in proximity to the Gorbals.
• Promoting Wider Achievement displays, assemblies, wall display in each corridor.

As a staff we have considered what our parents are like and recognised that we have a wide range of differing parents, highlighting the diversity in our school. We discuss any needs around this termly at our tracking meetings and through the continuous communication and relationship building of our staff, in particular our DHTs.

How do we support parents?

• Establishment of Core Values for school community
• Increased involvement in assemblies
• Increased communication
• Family Support Worker
• EAL parent groups
• Breakfast/lunchtime/ after school wider achievement activities
• Self – Evaluation parent/carer consultations
• Increased family learning activities
• Meet the Teacher
• Open Afternoons
• Reporting Procedures
• Wednesday morning drop in
• Blackfriars Blether
• Sharing learning experiences through Seesaw

We believe Literacy, Numeracy and HWB are the key to success and we are continually striving to ensure the curriculum we provide delivers the best outcomes for our pupils.

LOGO:   Our Logo is “Learning Today for a Better Tomorrow” 

Vision:

Blackfriars Primary strives to be a happy school, where everyone is friends and where everyone cares for each other. We want everyone to get the help they need to do well, especially those who need extra support. We especially want to do well in our Literacy and in our Numeracy. We want to be able to use i-pads and laptops because we know that these will help with our learning now and in the future. We want our classrooms to be well organised, calm and with interesting, interactive lessons. We want to learn outdoors, so that we can understand the world and learn how to look after it. We want our families to be able to help us with our learning in school. We want everyone to be the best they can be in everything they do, so that we can help make the world a better place.

                                                Blackfriars Primary Pupil Leadership Team March 2021

VALUES: Caring, Honest, Achieving, Included and Respect   

Aims:

• Raising attainment in literacy and numeracy, embedded within our nurturing city;
• Supporting families to be better able to support their child’s learning and development;
• Improving children’s health and wellbeing through nurturing approaches, increased participation in physical activity and sport and engagement with Outdoor Learning.
• Instilling a sense of citizenship and responsibility in pupils and encourage independent learning, creative use of digital technology and enterprise thus preparing them with skills for learning, life and work in an ever changing world.
• Fostering an awareness and understanding of differing cultural, social and environmental issues, exploring and appreciating the world around us, promoting sustainability and celebrating diversity.
• Involvement of the whole school community in decision making.
• Understanding our linguistic diversity in order to promote success for our EAL learners by supporting and developing the children’s proficiency in English to promote a policy of inclusion for all.
•  Using the UNCRC to ensure that a rights based approach supports our ethos and permeates all areas of our curriculum in school.

How are we embedding the 7 principles to help ensure that every single child at Blackfriars meets their full potential? We consider each of the 7 principles fully. The 7 principles are also key to the self= evaluation process within Blackfriars Primary.

Our Core Curriculum Structure

When designing our curriculum, we considered what we wanted our learners to look like in Blackfriars Primary.  As part of this process we considered the following:

• The cultural context of our school
• Attainment results (both professional judgement and standardised assessments).
• How best to encourage our parents
• What can we do to ensure teaching and learning prepared children to become successful 21^st century citizens.
• Supporting EAL learners and families.

We aim for our pupils by the end of P7 to have developed the following:

• Honesty
• Kindness
• Confidence
• Positivity
• Respect
• To be smart
• Obedience
• Helpfulness
• To be clever
• Dedicated
• Able to travel safely on public transport
• Hardworking
• Patience
• To be a good listener
• An awareness of different ways to get qualifications e.g. apprenticeships, college etc.
• A good knowledge of Maths and Science
• To know the importance of education
• To not be afraid of who they are
• Confident and willing to question things
• Growth mind-set
• To be able to present to an audience
• A good human being
• Ambitious
• Dreams
• To know nothing is impossible
• To be happy
• To have everyday life skills

(May 2021)

We made the following key decisions:

1. When planning for teaching and learning the 4 contexts for learning will be considered.

• Curriculum areas/subjects
• Interdisciplinary learning
• Ethos and life of the school
• Opportunities for personal achievement

2. We prioritise Literacy, Numeracy and Health& Well Being as core areas.

3. Interdisciplinary learning will be planned for links made between curricular subjects, will be purposeful, meaningful and relevant to children rather than being contrived whilst providing more opportunity for personalisation and choice.

4. We want to ensure that we have a focus on skills, our learners are developing.  We are developing our planning and assessment in all Curricular Areas.

5. We focus more on progression pathways to ensure that our learners are developing at both age and stage appropriate level.  This will also help to ensure that there is no unnecessary repetition of learning.

6. We will continue to develop our knowledge around providing reliable declarations of “Achieving a Level” which will lead to more reliable, robust data for Blackfriars Primary.

7. We have addressed our Teaching and Learning to provide a more standardised approach easing transition for learners.

8. Our Health & Well Being will emphasise the importance of a Healthy Diet and exercise.

9. We are improving our classroom environments to be more inclusive of children with English as an Additional Language.

10. We have implemented the Pedagogy of Play/Active Learning throughout our school to meet the need of all learning styles and support learners with EAL.

We will provide opportunities for our children to:

• Exercise their responsibilities as members of a community
• Participate responsibly in decision making
• Contribute as leaders and role models
• Offer support and service to others and play an active part in putting the values of the School Community into practice.

• These examples are designed to give an idea of what we do in Blackfriars.  They are always evolving and being added to.

How have we designed our curriculum?

We strive to ensure that children are at the heart of everything we do at Blackfriars.

As a school we consulted with all stakeholders in ensuring that our Values and Vision is a true representation of who we are at Blackfriars and what we want for our learners.  This involved us revisiting our Visions, Values and Aims.

At Blackfriars Primary our learners, staff parents and partners believe that we are proudly unlocking potential in Blackfriars .

Our core values define and shape our school & form the base layer of our curriculum.  At Blackfriars Primary we want our learners, staff, parents and partners to feel

• Cared for
• Honest
• Achieving
• Included
• Respected

We are continually striving as a staff team to provide an inclusive ethos for our pupils.  We are a caring and nurturing staff who have highlighted raising attainment as our priority.  We are committed to planning active and engaged lessons with technology incorporated into our teaching and learning.  Our approach to training is reactive and purposeful designed to meet the needs of our children and we seek regular opportunities for meaningful moderation to ensure our pupils are on track.  Generations of families have attended Blackfriars Primary School and we are mindful of our responsibility and place in the community.