Going the extra mile

Since the beginning of term, we have been working on raising expectations through increasing the positive challenge in lessons. The children are enjoying this. It may be that we are asking them to edit and improve their work, like the portraits in Year 2, or the writing in Year 5 and 6; or encouraging our children to be inquisitive, by thinking of their own questions to ask about a subject and then researching the answers. As a school we are developing our approach to a ‘Stanmore lesson’ where we can help the children to ‘go the extra mile’ with their work.

As I am sure we all know, sometimes it can be difficult to ‘go the extra mile’ when we already feel that our work is the best that it can be. We are encouraging our children to take on this challenge through our Stanmore Keys for Success: confidence, resilience, organisation, persistence and co-operation. These learning behaviours will be strengthened in the coming months and we would really appreciate your support at home by re-enforcing the words so that children realise that they can get more confident and resilient by practising and developing some strategies. 

As leaders and teachers we are also striving to improve, open to learning, and we are continuing to work in partnership with the local authority and Kings School amongst others to take and act on the best advice. Another really important example of this is the partnership with our parents. I have been able to meet with a number of parents this week and some parents have also met with Mrs Fenton our new SENCO. By working in partnership, we can focus together to achieve the best that we can for our children.