At William Barnes, we positively encourage the involvement of parents in school life. We recognise that parents and other carers make a real difference to pupils’ engagement in their learning and their progress. National data shows that pupils who are well supported by their parents make much better progress and are more successful in their learning. During regular Family Learning Weeks parents and other carers are invited to join their child in their learning. There is always a theme for these weeks, but we also invite parents to join their child for routine lessons such as reading, writing and mathematics. Parents have really enjoyed taking part and feel more confident about helping their child with their learning at home.
We have also introduced a monthly “HomeTalk-SchoolWrite” event where children are encouraged to discuss what they are going to write about at home, before they write independently at school. This has also been very successful in helping to raise the standard of writing throughout the school, and helping children feel more confident about their writing.