1. - Presented ideas from initial seminar to Headteacher and Curriculum Leader - Made changes to planning within individual year groups to reflect developments in investigation, focus and telling more than the ‘single story’ - Observed lessons as part of Peer coaching - Identified and met with other year groups in school to develop their planning teaching in a similar manner.

2. Challenges: - ‘Outstanding’ school, does it need change? - Curriculum already innovative and doing lots of the things discussed at first seminar – Where can it be improved? - Convincing people to adapt planning they have already worked very hard to put together – what are the benefits? - Not an expected part of the curriculum in England, as it is in Wales, so low on Head’s list of priorities. How challenges were addressed:  Aimed to be professional and organised before initial meeting with head.  Willingness to adopt policies within own classrooms first and phase in changes, with us taking on workload  SEAL element an important aspect in getting leadership on side, as this is being pushed heavily within our mixed demographic school

3. Global Citizenship Course – Emma Williams and Phil Richardson

4. How planning was changed:  Took original plans and adapted.  Focused more on specific subjects (cultural/ethnic awareness), and on more ‘multiple stories’ and interactive sources  SEAL element meant plans became dually focused on geographical/factual knowledge and emotional literacy

5.  Planning/theme for Autumn 2.  In Reception we used to focus on ‘Fairytales’, dipping in and out of significant events/celebrations as they happened – e.g. Eid, Christmas, Diwali etc.  Found that these diverse celebrations were merely ‘touched upon’, rather than being treated as significant learning experiences in their own right.  I looked at the planning, and found that in changing the theme to ‘Celebrations’, we could spend the whole term learning about events and celebrations from varying cultures and traditions, with learning experiences anchored in ‘real time’. We would also be achieving excellent coverage of EYFS scale points which not only relate to Global Citizenship, but we have found historically difficult to achieve.  EYFS Scale points – SD 7, SD 8, (ED 9), SD 6, (SD 9), KUW 6

6.  Lesson linked with Comenius project.  Initial lesson to ‘grip’ children – looking at traditional national dress from England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales.  Questioned children to gather/assess their knowledge and understanding.  Touched upon a little about each country – showed pictures from online search of national dress of each country.  This lesson was peer assessed.

8.  Builds upon plans for Autumn 2 theme of ‘Celebrations’ – gives a deeper understanding of our own heritage and culture.  In preparation for future topics – Where in the World is Barnaby Bear? – which explore places around the world.  Will be beneficial later in the year when celebrating the Queen’s Jubilee, allowing the children a better understanding of the geography involved.  Gives the children a greater understanding of where they live, their citizenship, and their place within Great Britain and the wider world. Getting to know Great Britain…

9.  Identified other Year groups with topics which could be adapted/focused easily and agreed to work with these year groups with headmaster.  Arranged meetings where we can explain and hopefully pass on knowledge we have picked up, and help to adapt and develop their planning and topics.  The future aim is for this experiment to be spread to the whole school, with an Inset day in the summer term, ready for planning for the academic year 2012/2013. Extending the knowledge...