Ongoing School Partnership

Pinewood recently developed an ongoing partnership with local primary school, Bishopstone. Bishopstone have and will continue to be invited to events and talks throughout the year which may be of benefit to the teachers and / or children and will enrich the childrens lives.  The teachers are invited to attended relevant talks with external speakers on Pinewood INSET days and the children have been invited to attend events such as Junk Orchestra Day, Drumming Wrokshop, Mayan Workshop, ChildNet Talk and school performances.

Aims

The aim of the project is to build a good working relationsip with a local primary school and help them enrich the learning experience of their pupils. 

Pinewood arranges all transport for the children and staff from Bishopstone to and from the school.

Success of this partnership will be measured by reviewing feedback from Bishopstone throughout the year. 

Background

Pinewood recently created a new role, Head of Outreach, with the aim of strengthening its outreach programme with the local community.  The Head of Outreach then approached a local Head teacher to see if forming a partnership was a viable and welcome option.  

Bishopstone was chosen based on the fact it is Pinewood's closest local Primary school and we have had positive feedback on previously attended events

Resources

All events take place at Pinewood and Bishopstone students are transported to and from the school.  The events which Bishopstone are invited to are ones which would go ahead for Pinewood children irrespective of whether another school was involved, so no additional financial contribution is necessary, however there may be additional staff on duty. 

Impact

This partnership allows both Pinewood and Bishopstone children the opportunity to build relationships with peer groups from outside their own school.   It also offers enrichment to the curriculum of those children at Bishopstone with workshops and events that their school may not be able to afford. 

Bishopstone Headteacher has said that over the last year Pinewood has offered Bishopstone a range of experiences that they cannot afford to book, at £350 a workshop they say they would be lucky to have one of these a year.  Their children adore coming to Pinewood, meeting other children, working alongside them and this has also been a highly beneficial outcome for their staff.  Being able to see how others ‘teach’ and when Pinewood teachers visited it allowed Bishopstone staff to realise that what they do is good, but in the daily grind this can be forgotten.  They say that Pinewood priving a minibus service to the events has been the icing on the cake.  

"The children have gained in learning, for example the science workshop, R.E, learnt what a sand pit is and how far a 100m run would be (not having a field we use the local farm for sports afternoon), every time we have joined you academically they have been enriched.  Most importantly it is about the children . . which when it comes down to it is why we do everything, everyday, to give them that little bit more!"

Pupil Involvement

The partnership is not limited to one particular year group, so activities will run across the whole school. 

Frequency

This is an on-going partnership which will be evaluated periodically throughout the year.