British Values

How do we promote British Values at Ox Close Primary School?

The Department for Education have recently reinforced the need “to create and enforce a clear and rigorous expectation on all schools to promote fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs.”

Examples of some of the ways we demonstrate British Values at Ox Close are listed below:

Democracy

A Class Charter which is created at the beginning of each school year with the class and signed by all pupils and teachers.
Children’s Leadership Team elections are held at the beginning of each school year to select two representatives from Year 2 – Year 6.
Children’s Leadership Team meetings are held on a regular basis with members of the Senior Leadership Team to allow children the opportunity to share their views and help to make decisions about upcoming events within the school.
Pupil Questionnaires are completed on a yearly basis to give pupils the opportunity to share their views.
Children are selected to support in the interviewing process for new staff.
The school has taken part in the ‘Make a Difference’ Go Giver’s Challenge Award, prior to Covid and we are currently planning our work for this year’s award, building on the success of the LGBT project completed previously by our Year 5 children.
Enterprise activities are undertaken by children throughout the school year.

Rule of Law

A clear behaviour policy is in place across the school, with consistent rewards and sanctions.
The school has implemented a very successful behaviour system with the use of Class Charts and children are awarded for achieving milestones in their points throughout the school year.
Individual Behaviour Plans and Behaviour Logs are in place for children, where the school behaviour system does not meet their needs.
Regular visits from our Police Community Support Officer.
We had annual visits from the Fire Service prior to Covid and hope to reinstate these in the near future.
A clear Anti-bullying policy is shared with pupils and parents at the beginning of each school year.
Anti-bullying week is given significant status in the school calendar, with lessons and assemblies planned to support it.
E-Cadets are trained in school as part of an extra-curricular group.

Mutual Respect

Through the RE and SMSC curriculum, children are introduced to a wide range of faiths and religions.
Group work activities are promoted in lessons to support positive relationships.
Team captains and Children’s Leadership Team Captains are elected at the beginning of each school year.
The school participates in Fairtrade Activities throughout the year to highlight the importance of Fairtrade and to raise money for the cause.
Visitors from other faiths and religions are invited in to school to link to the children’s learning, prior to Covid. We are hoping to get more visitors back into school in the near future.
Children explore a variety of faiths and cultures through themed weeks across the school calendar. The most recent of these has been ‘Christmas around the World’, where each class looked at Christmas traditions in a different country
Year 5 and 6 to study India as part of their curriculum.
Show Racism the Red Card is supported in school and given a high profile through assemblies and activities.
National Awareness days are celebrated in whole school assemblies.
Star of the Week Assemblies celebrate children’s achievements each week.

Individual Liberty

A wide range of extra-curricular activities are offered to children.
E-Safety Week including at E-Safety assembly encourages children to exercise their rights to personal freedom safely.
A Class Charts reward system encourages positive behaviour.
Anti-bullying week encourages children to act safely and think about others.
Educational visits and school outings support children in forming positive relationships and broadening their learning.
Children are encouraged to share their successes outside of school on Seesaw, to share with their peers in the classroom.

Tolerance of Faiths

Through RE, PSHE and RSE, children look at and discuss the importance of respecting individual differences and beliefs.
Educate and Celebrate ensures that pupils are aware of the importance of equality, diversity and inclusion.
Themes events take places across the school to raise awareness of celebrations in other countries, for example, Chinese New Year.

At Ox Close Primary School we ensure that our children are given the opportunity to uphold these values. Please download the document below for further information.

British Values Information

Here are some examples of how we promote British Values at Ox Close.

Police Visit

Children in KS1 and KS2 took part in an assembly delivered by the police to talk about hate crime. Children discussed what this means and how it can be recognised.

Celebrating Chinese New Year

Children thoroughly enjoyed sampling some Chinese food, making dragon masks and lanterns and practising some Chinese writing as part of our Chinese New Year celebrations.

Celebrating Success Outside Ox Close

We continue to hold weekly assemblies to share the successes and achievements of children outside of school.

Visit from a local author

Children thoroughly enjoyed taking part in some topic work with local author Adam Bushnall, who presented a whole school assembly to launch a focus week of writing and inspired children from each year group to write their own stories.

Visits from other workplaces

Year 1 and 2 enjoyed a visit from Northumbrian Water, who talked about what their role was at work and how children could help to look after the environment by getting rid of our waste correctly.

Christingles

Year 1 and 2 children all made Christingles and took them home after making a donation to raise money for the Children’s Society.

Prickly Hay

Year 1 and 2 took part in two wonderful performances of Prickly Hay.

We are very proud of them all.

Harvest Festival

Ox Close celebrated Harvest at St Luke’s Church. Pupils from each Key Stage sang harvest songs and we listened to some of the important messages at this time of year, thanking God for the food that we are have been given.

We collected donations of food and took them to our local food bank.

Celebrating Success Outside Ox Close

Children are encouraged to bring in awards that they have earned at clubs outside of school. We celebrate the children’s achievements in Key Stage assembly each week.

Go-Givers Make a Difference Challenge

Miss Todd’s class took part in the Make a Difference Challenge in July 2017.

Throughout the year, they debated on which topic they were going to work on, wrote statements to support their views and took a class vote to decide on their focus.

The children presented their work in an assembly at school and at the awards ceremony in Durham.

Multicultural Week: Summer 2017

During the summer term, each class chose a different country to study for the week. We looked at the different cultures and beliefs, languages, costume and food.

Year 1/2P enjoyed studying Japan for the week. We tasted some authentic food, looked at the how carp fish were used to celebrate the Children’s Festival in May each year and tried on some traditional dress.