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Sandhill View Academy is an 11-16 Academy located in the city of Sunderland. It is part of the Southmoor Multi Academy Trust and has a partner school in the Trust, Southmoor Academy, which has also taken part in the Accelerator programme this year. Sandhill View wanted to get involved in the Accelerator programme in order to be supported to implement essential skills into all areas of the curriculum and school life. The Accelerator programme gave the school the opportunity to benefit from additional staff training, support to develop a strategy and to be able to network and receive further advice and ideas in order to develop our skills strategy further. As a school, we strongly feel that skills are just as important, if not more important, then academic qualifications in preparing our students for when they leave school. We believe that if a student has a good knowledge and understanding of a wide range of skills, then they are ready for future careers and pathways. We have been working towards achieving the Silver Award this year and we will be continuing to embed the essential skills next year.
Overall impact
We feel that the Accelerator programme is just the start of the road in order to develop our students' essential skills. The programme has really highlighted for us that, despite an extensive careers education programme involving many employers, education providers and more, essential skills are at the centre of preparing our students for their futures. We made a decision earlier in the year to really focus on skills as the key basis for our careers programme and being part of the Accelerator programme has just confirmed to us that this was the correct decision to make and we are on the correct path moving forward. A particular highlight has been able to 'celebrate' skills throughout all areas of school. It is fantastic to be able to walk into a classroom when conducting learning walks around school, and be able to hear the skills being used and that students and staff are becoming more confident in the use of skills. Our Careers Weeks have also been a highlight in our careers calendar. Our Maths department focused on 'Problem Solving' and they organised an activity where students had to take on the role of a travel agent and had to solve problems to create a journey. It was great to see students so excited in engaging with the skills.
Keep it simple
At Sandhill View Academy, the teaching of essential skills has been embedded into all aspects of teaching and learning. Our starting point this year has been to spend some time ensuring that students, parents and teachers fully understand the meaning of each skill. We wanted to ensure that it was clear at all levels what each skill was about so that the messages became consistent throughout school and between subjects. Students were introduced to the essential skills through their tutor time, where we had a weekly focus on each skill area. This was then supported with further work in SMSC (PSHE) lessons where students were able to record how they have achieved each skill. We encouraged teachers to use the skills icons in their resources used in lessons, we added skills posters to the front of each classroom, and we created a page on our website so that parents and employers could see our emphasis on these skills.
Start early, keep going
We started by encouraging teachers to use the videos and the materials from the Skills Builder Hub in their lessons and then we asked form tutors to practise some of the skills using these materials in form time. This then had a ripple effect with other teachers starting to use the resources in their own lessons. The training sessions encouraged staff to work together in their subject teams and then share ideas across subject areas so that everyone can see where the skills are being used. We decided to 'brand' as many aspects of school life as possible with the Skills Builder skills icons - so our calendared Careers Weeks in each subject area included a focus on one particular skill and this skill icon was then used when sending information home to parents.
Measure it
At the start of the year, the Skills Builder ladders were included in student planners. Therefore students have their own copy of the Skills Builder Framework with them at all times. Staff used their teacher praise stamp to indicate in the planner when students were demonstrating that they have achieved a particular step. We are looking to develop the assessment of skills in the next academic year, and have asked all subject areas to start to focus on 3 particular skills to build into their lesson objectives. Subjects have started to gather information on the base-line for where each year group is currently in each skill area for their particular subject.
Focus tightly
We have provided all teaching staff with the skills icons and step descriptors that they can use in their own lesson materials. Teaching staff regularly use these materials in lessons and can easily include them into their lesson materials. As mentioned above, the student planners have all the steps from the Skills Builder Framework already included, so staff can refer to these easily throughout the lessons. We decided to make the steps very visible within each classroom, therefore, posters have been created which display the skill icons. These are used by teaching staff to simply refer to the skills at opportune moments throughout the lesson.
Keep practising
As well as using every opportunity to practise skills in the curriculum, we are also very committed to building skills into every area of school life. Careers Weeks, Home Learning Challenges and much more provide opportunities for practising the skills outside of the classroom. We are also looking to build the skills into the extra-curricular programme from next year, so that students can understand the skills how the skills can be practised in different contexts. We are also looking to ensure that all other opportunities in school, such as visits out, also link to the key skills.
Bring it to life
We work with a wide variety of different employers from different sectors in order to support developing key skills. Many of our Year 10 students participated in a recent Virtual Trip where they were able to use the skills throughout the day to find a solution to a business challenge and then present to the employer. We have also used the Challenge Day resources with our Year 8 students to learn about setting up a business.
What's next
Moving forward, now that the language of the skills has been embedded into school life, our next challenge is to really focus on the 'measure it' principle. We want to ensure that students are very clear in terms of which step that they are on and that staff are also confident to say which step students are on. We are going to ask subject areas to focus on 3 particular skills each so that they are not overwhelmed, and more than likely in the first half term, to focus on one of these 3 skills. We are going to look to build the age-appropriate steps into the lesson objectives at the start of the lesson.
