Learning Outside the Classroom at St. Monica's

Intent

Learning Outside the Classroom is carefully planned, sequenced and implemented from Nursery to Year 6. It is an integral element of long-term curriculum planning, through this we aim to enrich and improve our pupil’s personal, social, emotional and character development. This will help the pupils to: 

• relish challenging and unfamiliar tasks and environments;
• embrace learning from their mistakes and recognise this as the key aspect for improvement;
• develop resilience, independence and self confidence;
• learn about themselves and conquer their fears;
• learn to work effectively as part of a team and independently;
• embrace working with the local community in order to develop and improve the local environment and reduce carbon footprints.  

Implementation

At St. Monica’s opportunities for learning beyond the classroom are interwoven throughout our curriculum. Teachers actively seek opportunities to teach outside of the classroom as we recognise the benefits of learning in a wide range of environments ensuring we present pupils with the best possible opportunities to grow. We present pupils with the opportunity to learn in a more diverse manner and environment in a variety of ways including: 

• Specific Learning Outside the Classroom activities which take place each half term which involves year groups ensuring at least one lesson within their timetable is taught outside of the classroom giving more context to learning; 
• Trips and specialist in-house workshops to enrich classroom learning;
• Residentials which enable pupils to learn and explore in a variety of new environments and put learning into context and develop independence and resilience.

Impact

At St. Monica’s, we assess the impact of our intent and implementation in order to help us refine and adapt our planning and as a result improve the quality of teaching and learning. We measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

• Pupil voice is taken to gauge the enjoyment pupils have when learning beyond the classroom as well as evaluating the impact it has on pupils;
• Teacher voice is obtained annually through staff questionnaires, alongside informal meetings and discussions which take place throughout the year; 
• Work reviews take place on a termly basis in order to evaluate the teaching taking place outside of the classroom environment and ensure there is cohesion;

Annual impact reviews are completed to evaluate the quality of teaching and learning which takes place beyond the classroom across the curriculum in order to help adapt and refine planning which, in turn, improves the quality of teaching and learning.