Derbyshire Virtual School
If you always do the same things you will get the same results!
By Kim Brooks
Tell us about your Virtual School?
Derbyshire’s Virtual School
champion innovative work in creative practice and mindful pedagogy.
As a Virtual School, we are
wholly focussed on improving the educational achievements and life chances for
children in local authority care. We know too well the appalling national
statistics that characterise the poor outcomes for children who have had traumatic
family lives and are subsequently brought into state care: homelessness, mental
ill health, unemployment, high numbers ending up in the criminal justice system
etc.
Our overarching strategic
direction as a Virtual School stems from three main guiding principles:
•
Addressing the barriers and challenges in our education systems to
improve policy, practice and pedagogy within our local schools and settings
•
Improving the education pathways and planning processes used by all
professionals involved in the child’s journey through the care system
•
Embolden children and young people to have a greater sense of their own
agency and support them to better influence their learning journey
What did you do to create such notable success with
the pupil premium?
Two of our most powerful
current innovations are learning and development programmes we undertake with
the support of Pupil premium Plus funding – Derbyshire’s Attachment Aware
Schools Programme and Creative Mentoring.
The Attachment Aware Schools
Programme develops school ethos, pedagogy and practice through a yearlong
action research professional development programme. Enabling staff in schools
and settings to deeply explore and understand human behaviour and the
ramifications of what it reveals about the experiences and needs of the child.
This programme allows us to work in partnership with schools to:
•
Improve the conditions for Children in Care in schools and settings
•
Produce a portfolio of good practice examples and other resources to
share across the whole of Derbyshire’s school community (and beyond!)
•
Raise awareness of the issues and needs around attachment and trauma
•
Consolidate working relations between the Virtual School and all
schools
•
Help to reduce fixed term exclusions
•
Catalyse a new community of practice amongst schools
•
Encourage mindful pedagogy.
We have been oversubscribed
by schools applying to join this programme and the research from those who have
participated to date has been truly transformational of the school environment
and pedagogical practice in the classroom. The schools who complete the year’s
programme with us go on to mentor and support other schools- creating a
Derbyshire network of excellent attachment and trauma informed practice around
our county. The programme is now in its third year and has involved almost 50
schools in all age and stages of education, creating safer and more nurturing
learning environments for the whole learning community.
Our Creative Mentoring
programme is a unique personalised approach to working with young people in
care who are struggling to engage in education or at risk of exclusion or
disaffection. When a young person is identified as needing specialised support,
a Creative Mentor is commissioned; facilitating their mentee to reach a more
positive emotional frame of mind and nurturing them to grow their skills and
competences. The means of working with the young person are always practical,
using a range of different creative mediums e.g. film, drama, music, poetry
etc. or engaging with different environments which helps them safely explore the world around
them and address learning, personal and emotional issues from an
‘artistic distance'. Activity takes place at home, in school or in the
community over varying lengths of time, dependent on the specific learning
targets that are set.
In order to capture impact
we ask Creative Mentors to chart student progress and improvement in: engagement;
achievement; confidence; communication; motivation; ambition; all requiring a
holistic view of the young person’s journey and re-framing their attitudes to
learning in its broadest sense.
Impact
Both of these programmes of
work are fully embedded in the overall strategic direction of our Virtual
School.
Attachment Aware Schools and
Creative Mentoring are together helping schools and settings to have a greater
understanding of and better strategies for supporting our most vulnerable
children. We know AAS participating schools are undertaking whole school ethos
change and experiencing newly found success in working with children in care
and all their vulnerable learners.
Creative Mentoring provides
a model of personalised support for individual pupils, requiring the 'team
around the child' to work more collaboratively, placing the child, their
feelings, interests and motivations at the centre of the planning process.
Winning the award and sharing good practice
Being runners up in this
year’s awards has given our work a national profile and brought two of our
Virtual School programmes to the attention of other local authorities and
Virtual Schools. We have been asked to share these in more depth and have been
invited to speak at meetings and conferences - helping us to share our work
with interested colleagues around the country.
In order to achieve our
Virtual School vision we recognise that we must work innovatively across all
the sectors and agencies that contribute to the lives of our young people in
care, to improve communication and planning and to help connect all the
different aspects of the child's life across home, school and leisure.
How can other organisations get in touch with you?
By emailing the Virtual
School Headteacher - Kim.brooks@derbyshire.gov.uk