Developing Thinking Skills Policy

Sacred Heart Catholic Primary School, Leigh

Developing Thinking Skills Policy

Live and Learn with Jesus.

We follow Jesus through fairness, kindness, love, friendship and happiness.

At Sacred Heart Catholic Primary School our mission statement is Live and learn with Jesus and our aims asserts that we try to:

Help our children to develop their personalities, skills and abilities intellectually and socially.
Provide teaching which makes learning challenging and relevant, and enables pupils to achieve their full potential.
Ensure that all children are given equal access to the curriculum regardless of race, gender, age or disability or ability.

Aim

We believe that our children need to be prepared for an ever-changing world where they will be expected to think and reason for themselves. Children who are encouraged to be independent learners are more likely to achieve their full potential.

Our aim is to provide good quality learning experiences that promote higher order thinking skills and promotes independent learning and self-evaluation. This will be achieved through discrete development of skills and understanding as well as being part of our delivery of the National Curriculum and RE. The following approaches will be adopted:

Provision

Whole school approach

We aim to achieve the following

A climate within the whole school that ensures all children feel valued and celebrates effort and achievement, while maintaining the highest possible expectations.
A climate that promotes co-operation, where individual differences are explored and valued
The promotion of children working independently and using their initiative by developing their skills to organise their own work, access the resources they need and work in collaboration.
The teaching of active listening and speaking skills and the verbalisation of strategies used for problem solving, hypothesising and inference.
The identification of opportunities within the school to utilise approaches to teaching and learning and influence our schemes of work, planning and policy documents.
The development of staff expertise through relevant professional development, mentoring and access to current research information.

Teaching Approach/Curriculum Approach/Pupil Approach

Our aim is to:

Establish what children can already do and understand through a range of questioning styles and problem solving experiences.
Ensure relevant informative feedback is given by the teacher both verbally and written.
Stimulate opportunities for pupil self evaluation and peer evaluation with feedback opportunities.
Establish a climate of questioning by children as well as by the teacher
Promote courteous discussions between peers.
Ensuring that objectives or outcomes are made explicit.
Promote the discussion by children of strategies that were successful and those that were less successful by giving and discussing their reasons.
Provide appropriate challenge through a range of tasks and questioning.
Vary the range of pupils’ recording methods without an over reliance on individual written accounts (e.g. group brainstorms, mind maps, tape recordings, posters and photographs, sticky notes.)
Plan work that uses a range of experiences and includes learning styles VAK.
Plan work that provides for a range of experiences and includes ongoing formative assessment opportunities.
Mark work regularly and promptly with written formative comments that relate overtly to the objectives set and provide clear guidance for future progress. (for younger children read the comments to them and discuss – set as a simple target and stick in front of book – don’t mark everything in detail!)
Set individual tasks following discussion with individuals - these may form group targets.
At regular intervals, record formative assessment statements for each child across the curriculum subjects in order to inform summative statements.
Use a range of pupil grouping relevant to the objective of the activity.
Celebrate effort and achievement relevant to individual needs while maintaining the highest possible expectations.
Differentiate appropriately through context, resources, activity, support and outcome.

Environment Approaches

Our aim is to provide a wide range of enrichment activities for our pupils to ensure they achieve their full potential through engaging challenges and a range of opportunities within the taught curriculum and extra opportunities. These will include school clubs and activities such as science club, maths club, chess club, games club, ICT club, leaning a musical instrument, residential and day visits and the use of visitors in school.

Playtimes and lunch times will promote opportunities to develop co-operation skills and respect for others, and their immediate environment, through use of games markings on the tarmac, designated quiet areas and outdoor play equipment that will promote discussion and creativity and co-operation.

Monitoring

The Co-ordinator for Thinking Skills will be responsible for regularly updating the subject leaders and assessment co-ordinators of current initiatives.

Reviewed Summer Term 2022