School visit to Thorington School
Today we visited Thorington school in Cashmere.   It was a valuable experience to visit another school.  We were met by Carmel who is the syndicate leader of the junior school.  She was lovely and very happy to answer any questions we had.  She talked a lot about the set up and how they arrived at their current position.  It would seem that the teachers did a lot of pre planning and talking things through before becoming "collaborative."  They used the Christmas holidays and worked through a list of questions.  Carmel gave us the list  of questions they used and these included everything down to pet peeves and where they would store the children's records.
We did a tour of the school and some of the things that stood out included the way they manged their space.  It was helpful to see a building that had been renovated as opposed to built from scratch.  The walls had been knocked out to create more open spaces.  The children were very calm and for the most part- on task.
The big stand out for me was the1:15 teacher which was funded by the board of Trustees( I believe).  This is an extra trained teacher when the numbers get above 1:15.  The trained teacher comes into the school for the literacy hour and teachers small groups of reading etc.  This would be a very valuable and could only be beneficial to the results.  I keep thinking about the children in my class and how much this would of benefit.
I also really liked the "holding pen" idea whereby children who were waiting to read to the trained teacher could sit quietly and read a book in a space that meant no time was wasted.  The space where the instructional  teaching was happening was quiet and focused.
A couple of other incidental things I liked were the blackboards outside each classroom that provided an opportunity to communicate to parents on a daily basis.
We were asked to ponder some questions on our visits.
What are good practices/systems that you saw on your visit?
1:15
Good use of Space
Calm Environment
What are strategies that were being used to promote the children's self management?
Holding pen
Must do/can do
1;15
What types of acivities were the children completing?
Worksheets-phonics type activities
Writing
Reading
Independent reading
Ipad activities
Were there any resources that you thought be useful for your team?
Blackboards
Teachers in the 1:15 programme.
Headphones and Ipad covers that were very strong.

How did the teachers manage transitions?
Not sure

What are some questions you have in regard to to what you saw?
What does the planning look like on paper?
How do they work reporting to parents?