Action Teams for Partnership work on academic, behavioural and climate of partnership goals each year.
Below are a selection of some of the goals schools across Ireland have achieved during the 2019-2020 school year.
One ATP set the goal of improving the reading skills of the children in their school, by increasing their awareness of literacy in their everyday environment. They named their goal ‘Reading Goggles’! The children made their very own bespoke “reading goggles” and when they wore them, their new eyewear would help them notice all the words and signs in their everyday environment. Their fabulous new goggles may even help them to read and sound out all the words – magical!! Parents noted a massive improvement in their children’s awareness of words in their environment and in their enthusiasm to read these words. Parents also liked how this project helped them engage in their children’s learning experience in a fun and interactive way.
In another school the ATP chose to focus on improving the level of Oral Irish of their pupils. This was a continuation of a goal from the previous year, when the ATP worked on increasing general literacy by involving parents as “Literacy Lift Off” volunteers. These parents got involved as volunteers to read with the pupils in the classroom, help with local nature walks and school hall events. Parent Literacy Lift Off volunteers took on the work of increasing oral Irish with the pupils through the use of ‘Gaeilge’ Irish language story sacks. The ATP developed 4 new Irish story sacks for use with pupils and Literacy Lift Off volunteers.
The ATP of another school chose to work on a project aimed at helping their pupils to be good citizens. They involved a local Foroige group to run their “How to be a Good Citizen” programme with some students over 4 weeks and explained the programme to the whole school at a school assembly. Children were nominated to receive a “Good Citizen” badge and certificate if they showed some of the 7 good citizen qualities- courage, patience, respect, caring, loyalty, trustworthiness and fairness. A student was also chosen at random to act as “Cúntóir Cairdiúil” (‘Friendly Leader’) in the yard. This person wore a special “Cúntóir Cairdiúil” jacket and helped to make sure all students were welcomed and included at break and lunch time.
The behavioural goal of one ATP was to introduce restorative practices across the school. The principal was keen that the whole school community was involved and that everyone from teachers, secretaries, caretaker was fully involved and understood the principles of creating a restorative environment. The first thing was to contact a suitably qualified trainer and an organisation. This included training 60 parents as it was felt that parents must be fully aware of and involved with the culture that the school desired to introduce. Restorative scripts were created and used by the children in the play yard. Children loved the crocodiles and eye language taught and quickly began to use it.
An outdoor classroom with desks and benches where children can have some classes was created in one school. Family members of students have made raised flower beds etc. The space can also be used at breaktime with some parts for tabletop games and some areas to act as a quiet space, at the request of the children. This has enabled the school to fulfil the goal areas of Partnership Schools Ireland. The outdoor classroom is a space for children to learn, therefore feeding into academic goals; somewhere for them to take some quite time and be calm and peaceful, which supports a behavioural goal and is a warm, welcoming, and inviting space at the entrance to the school that has helped to build new partnerships with families and the wider community, which captures the spirit of the welcoming goal perfectly.
Students on one ATP felt it would be a great idea to have a “welcome board” in the entrance of their school. They thought it would be a nice idea to have a way of welcoming their fellow students back to school, and keeping in touch with each other, especially if they weren’t all going to be there at the same time. The work for researching, sourcing, and installing the welcome board was all done by the students on the ATP while their school was closed. The ATP were also able to meet remotely during this time. The board has been installed and is updated by students regularly. It has been a very positive, and welcoming, addition to the entrance of the school.
