Beyond the Classroom
New Barn School has a varied, exciting extra-curricular offering to ensure our pupils receive a well-rounded experience to prepare them for later life, not just academically, but socially as well.
We’re so pleased that so many staff have offered their time and expertise to be able to deliver to a comprehensive selection of experiences beyond the classroom, from our Personal Development afternoons on Fridays, where children can experience Survival Skills, Fishing, Master Chef, Games Clubs, dog walking, swimming and many more, through monitoring our students through the Pupil Activity Passports to ensure they’re experiencing these fantastic opportunities, through to offering the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, Careers Advice, and more.
Learning beyond the Classroom also encompasses transitions (both little, such as between lessons, and bigger, such as between tutor groups or key stages), trips, clubs, sporting events, and many other exciting opportunities for our young people.
Personal Development
New Barn School believes that Personal Development is crucial to ensure our pupils are able to progress to the next stage of education, preparation for their adult lives and how to engage with society. Across the whole school we have a wide range of opportunities delivered by school staff, external visitors and use of off-site provisions.
We have designed Personal Development programme to be fully inclusive, allowing our pupils access to a broad and balanced range of subjects, enriched by learning activities that nurture personal development and pupil character. We actively promote pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development by providing experiences that stretch beyond the classroom walls in which pupils’ interests and talents are nurtured. This is essential for our pupils to ensure they are equipped to manage their attitudes and behaviours in new or challenging environments.
Every Friday afternoon pupils have the opportunity to undertake a Personal Development Activity, these are chosen on a half termly basis and give our young people great opportunities to experience new exciting activities, some examples this half term are; Art, Coding, DofE, Dog walking, Golf, Master Chef, Music, Sport and swimming.
Throughout the academic year we do offer a range of other activities such as Clip and climb, Film club, Fishing, Model making, Survival skills.
We are always open to this offer being expanded with regular dialogue and suggestions from pupils and staff alike.
These activities supplement what we already offer across the school and throughout the year we have a full calendar of Personal Development events, ranging from a Careers Week, Emergency Service Visits, Religion Projects, Charity Days, National Saints Days, Roald Dahl Day and many more.
Rights Respecting School Award
Every child has rights, whatever their ethnicity, gender, religion, language, abilities or any other status. The ‘Rights Respecting Schools Award’ (RRSA) supports schools to embed the Convention in their practice to improve wellbeing and help all children and young people to realise their potential.
Last year we were very proudly awarded the ‘Rights Respecting Schools Bronze Award’ which means that as a school we are ‘Rights Committed.’ And so everyone understands what is involved and is committed to the journey.
All tutor groups now have a copy of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child on the wall in the tutor bases and each week the Topic of the Week, power point has the most relevant Article from the UNCRC attached which creates activities and discussion for morning tutor each day as well as being part of that week’s assembly.
This year the steering group for RRSA will come from members of the School Council.
To achieve ‘Silver’ we will have to become ‘Rights aware’ and ensure that these rights are embedded in the policies, procedures and culture of the school. We will provide evidence that the knowledge and understanding of the Convention is present in the whole school community and by asking our stakeholders, we will be able to see what impact this is having and our pupils will see themselves as advocates for children's rights both locally and globally.
School Trips
New Barn School runs a wide variety of educational trips all the way through the school from KS2 to our Post 16 groups of pupils.
The trips we run are across the curriculum and these link into our schemes of work to reinforce classroom learning. Our trips also help aid personal development across a number of key areas and further prepare our pupils for life after New Barn School and towards adulthood.
In addition, we also have visitors who come to New Barn School, these include the local police, artists and more.
The School Council
The School Council was established during the 2021-2022 school year and this year there has seen an increased interest and so each tutor group has elected a representative to sit on the new school council.
We are very pleased that all tutor groups are represented one way or another on the school council; either by attending the meetings or encouraging the tutor groups to voice their feelings and pass on the information to a representative as they are not confident enough to actually attend. We are also very grateful that Vicky is also attending each week.
Meetings are now held every week in the Boardroom (they love the chairs) and follow an agenda and get feedback from previous meetings via the minutes that are taken. At present Donna and Jane facilitate the meetings and chair them but after half term the chair will be one of the representatives.
We have contributed to assemblies to encourage the whole school to have a voice and make sure it is heard and the appropriate channels. Jane gave an assembly on ‘Democracy’ and explained how taking part in this process was their way to ensure that Democracy takes place within the school
We are now the steering group for the Rights Respecting Schools Award (RRSA) and hope to complete the Silver Award (Rights Aware) by the end of this school year, with the whole school making an impact. Currently RRSA is included in the weekly power points and the most relevant article from the United Nations on the Rights of the Child is attached with ideas for activities to join in during tutor time in the morning.
We have only been meeting since October in this new format but already the Council has instigated a small basket of feminine articles in all toilets, offered ideas for equipment for the new buildings, gave ideas for the December trips out and asked for Gluten Free items in the Snack Shack.
With the pupils continuing enthusiasm I am sure whatever they are asked to support will be completed to the highest degree and there will be many more ideas to discuss across the table
What is DofE
The Duke of Edinburgh’s (DofE) Award Scheme is the world’s leading extra-curricular achievement award for young people, and is highly regarded by universities, colleges, and employers alike. Participation in the scheme is a fantastic opportunity to broaden horizons, discover new interests and talents, have fun with friends, develop essential skills for the future and achieve a meaningful outcome that demonstrates a young person is a well-rounded individual, capable of making a valuable contribution to society in the wider-world.
Four strands –physical, skills, volunteering and an expedition – will be used to build a personalised programme of activities through consultation with our young people and parents/carers. The DofE award encourages young people to develop a variety of personal attributes such as independence, commitment, leadership, and teamwork, in a non-competitive manner. The adventures and experiences they have along the journey are invaluable stepping-stones to later life. To find out more about DofE, visit their website at
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