Happy Wednesday!

Embedding Formative Assessment (EFA) Open Morning

Tuesday 18th March 09:30 - 11:30

We are delighted that one of our WELL schools has been recognised as a national ambassador for SSAT Embedding Formative Assessment (EFA). To find out more about Kirkbampton CofE School's ambassadorship view the press article HERE.

There is an invitation for WELL schools to attend an EFA open morning at Kirkbampton CofE Primary School (CA5 6HX) in conjunction with SSAT, to hear from the school's leadership team how they have adapted the programme to suit a small, mixed aged primary setting and the opportunity to observe lessons in action.

Full details can be found on the event's flyer HERE.

To book a place please email Head@kirkbampton.cumbria.sch.uk or phone 01229 576377, places are free of charge but limited.

'Expert Reading Instruction' Primary Reading Pedagogy Project 

Stella Jones, Town End Research School 

The deadline to express an interest in 'Expert Reading Instruction' programme has been extended to Wednesday 12th February.

A significant number of our Primary, Infant and Junior schools have identified reading as a priority for improvement. 

We encourage all WELL Primary schools that have reading within their school improvement plan to view the PROGRAMME OUTLINE outline for this high quality PD opportunity, delivered by Stella Jones, Town End Research School.

The training can include two members of staff attending three face-to-face sessions and engaging with additional support/webinars/resources to be provided etc. Please find dates below, Venue TBC:

• DAY 1 - Reading Fluency (Friday 14^th March)
• DAY 2 - Reading Comprehension (Friday 2^nd May)
• DAY 3 - The Reading Lesson: Essential Ingredients (Thursday 5^th June)

This PD programme will be limited to a maximum of 25 schools. To express an interest, please contact WELL@cumberland.gov.uk by Wednesday 12th February 2025.

Supporting our Schools Further

One of the recommendations of WELL Independent Evaluation Y3 Report from the University of Nottingham, is how we continue to explore the best ways to support schools with more limited capacity. This is going to be one of our areas of focus for the second part of this academic year.

We would welcome ideas and thoughts around this, if you have any please email these to WELL@cumberland.gov.uk.

Spotlight on Sophistication

Over the past few weeks, we have been hugely encouraged by schools that have arranged to meet with Dale with both their implementation leads and priority expert teacher, to talk through and further develop the sophistication of their implementation plans.

The engagement and quality of the conversation has been really impressive. If any other schools would value the opportunity for both their implementation lead and subject leads to talk through their plan with Dale at the ERA building (CA14 4ES), please email WELL@cumberland.gov.uk and we can arrange this with you.

'Effective Implementation for Maths Leaders' Training 

We recently completed Day 3 of a four-day course for Maths leaders in Cumberland, to support their use of evidence-informed approaches and effective implementation.

During the course, we have looked at the EEF Guidance Report on Effective Implementation for Schools and considered this alongside the EEF recommendations for Maths from Early Years to KS3.

Maths Leaders have spent time exploring their own school priorities, looking at the evidence base around different approaches for Maths and then thinking about how they engage and unite the staff in their schools to carry out these approaches with fidelity and increased reach. We have looked at what research and evidence is available for Maths and have explored both the NNW Maths Hub resources and research papers through the Chartered College of Teaching.

Together, we have written a modelled Implementation Plan based on the introduction of 'Think Aloud tools' to develop vocabulary and reasoning in Maths and leaders have used this worked example to help them formulate their own plans to put into action back in school.

Day 4 of this training will take place on Thursday 20^th March 1pm - 4pm at the Greenhill Hotel (CA7 8LS), in this session colleagues will share their experiences of the Implementation process and reflect on their next steps both in school and as a support network.

Disadvantaged Provision Project 

We are now beginning to work with our 2^nd cohort of schools, as well as continuing to work with the initial schools taking part. This now means that over 40 WELL schools are now linking with us and Marc Rowland to consider their provision, review their Pupil Premium Strategies and identify ways forward to improve outcomes for pupils.

All schools taking part have 2 school visits, one at the start and one towards the end of their participation with a range of network meetings and workshops on offer in between.

Network Meetings Schedule 

The upcoming project network meetings will be held from 4pm - 5pm at the ERA Building, please find all cohort dates detailed below:  

'Assessing the Impact of Pupil Premium Funding on Primary School Segregation and Attainment'

Please find a link to a paper, recommended to WELL Schools by Marc Rowland, from the University of Durham, reviewing the impact of Pupil Premium funding in Primary education. 

Strand Booklet Developments

The newly developed and designed Cumbrian Award Enterprise Strand Booklet will be available for Cumbrian Award schools to use after half term.

The Adventure and Culture booklets are in the process of being developed. Printed copies of last year's booklets are available in the meantime and can be delivered to schools to support pupil participation in the award. Schools are welcome to create or use their own comparable booklets for each strand of Cumbrian Award if preferred.

An online order form will be sent to all Cumbrian Award schools this week.

If you would like copies of the new Enterprise booklet or last year's Adventure or Culture booklets to be delivered to your school, please complete this form by Wednesday 12th February and we will arrange this.

Poverty Proofing© Survey 

Deadline Wednesday 26th February

As part of Cumbrian Award's work with the Children North East Poverty Proofing© UK Team, to unpick the barriers of pupils participation in the Award, we kindly ask our Cumbrian Award schools to complete THIS QUICK SURVEY.

Annual Events Planner and Programmes Padlet 2024/25

The WELL Programmes Padlet outlines all of our high quality professional development programmes available for 2024/25.

All WELL Events and upcoming training sessions are detailed in the WELL Annual Events Planner.

Events on the Annual Events Planner with a 'green dot' are bookable via SLA Online/ School Development Team. For all other events, please email WELL@Cumberland.gov.uk directly to express an interest.

The Annual Events Planner is a live link and will be updated throughout the year.