Welcome

Welcome to Quilters Junior School.

Our vision for the pupils of Quilters Junior School was best expressed by Martin Luther King JR:  'Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education'. 

At Quilters Junior School, we want our children to be confident, self-assured citizens, ones who actively seek to help others, while being adept at self-care.  

We want children to feel special as individuals, but to feel even more special about being a Quiltonian, part of our school family.  Everyone at Quilters is known and celebrated as an individual, but the sum of the parts is greater than any one of us.  We a proud to be part of something truly special and we all have our part to play in making that so.  

In order, to build self-assurance, confidence and character, children need to enjoy, participate in and succeed in a wide range of varied experiences.  With each experience and success, a layer of confidence is added to the way the child feels about themselves.  Every time a child feels good about one thing, it spurs them on to attempt something else and confidence continues to grow.     Of course, not every experience results in instant success - that is unrealistic and unachievable. We encourage children to show  resilience and persistence when things don't go to plan straight away.

We actively teach them strategies for dealing with disappointment and remind them that everybody has to put effort in to achieve genuine success.  We teach our pupils, our Quiltonians, the 5 Ways to Well-Being so they know how to self-care and how to nurture their own self-belief.  They learn how to use the 'language of resilience'.  Our pupils communicate well, are assured and are ready to make a difference as life long citizens.  

Work-experience

As well as this, pupils at Quilters Junior School are able to experience six activities that enable them to gain ‘work-experience’ and develop skills and passion for future employment.  The vocabulary and communication skills each requires ensure they develop their cultural capital further. 

Our curriculum offer is outstanding and worthy of dissemination.  

1. Pupils in Year 6 all attend a 5 week Construction School.  Pupils interact with a virtual client and work through all stages of the construction process: enquiry, tender, procurement, contract award, first-fix, second fix, testing and commissioning to produce a one way-lighting circuit that could light ten stairwells in a flat complex. 
2. Pupils in Years 3 to 5, run their own Pop Up Café, every year, on Saturday afternoons.  Pupils brand it, plan and cost the menu, decorate the café, cook (in the school kitchen with the cooks) and serve the food, offer waiter service and record their café’s accountants and work out the profit.  In Year 6, the children run a restaurant for two nights – 5.30pm to 10pm, offering a three-course meal.  Reservations for the restaurant can only be made over the phone!  All pupils also enjoy cooking lessons in the school kitchen with our catering team.  This ensures they not only gain enterprise skills, but also understand healthy eating and food hygiene.  
3. Every pupil in the school are trained as a Dementia Friend.  During Year 5 and 6, every child attends a care home where they interact with residents with and without dementia.  Every pupil also has an elderly penpal who they correspond with regularly and meet during penpal events in school.  
4. Each year, the school’s allotment allows every child in the school to spend time growing and caring for the plants/vegetables in ‘Sarah’s Garden’.  All produce will then be used by the pupils in their yearly school cooking lessons. 
5. All Junior pupils have the opportunity to ‘work’ in the Play Zone and have the chance to ‘give’ to younger pupils.  They revel in the chance to be positive role-models to the Quilteenees of the Infant School.
6. All Junior pupils are taught Emergency Life Saving Skills. Pupils get to experience what it might be like to work in the emergency services.   

All of the above exposes the children to new experiences, opens up aspirations and enables them to celebrate their strengths, using what they have already learnt.

Quilters Quest

In KS2, the Infant Adventure begins afresh, this time with the ‘Quilters Quest’.

Children are encouraged to push themselves in an even larger, more diverse range of experiences during their time at the Junior school, gaining a sticker for each involvement in an experience, completing the Quest once they have a total of at least 20 experiences.

Time in class is given for children to reflect upon and write about these experiences in their Quest Booklet. As part of this, pupils constantly assess their ‘soft skills’ (the school's values: resilience, team work, self-belief, pride and empathy) thinking of tangible ways to improve them, before assessing any improvement in future sessions.

Everyone has their moments, their time to shine, their chance to know they are special, unique and valued.  

Self-care

We want our children to be excellent communicators.  We want them to be able to recognise when their mental well-being is good and not so good.  We want them to feel comfortable talking about how they feel and asking for support whenever they need it.  

Pupils at Quilters Junior School are taught explicitly how to self-care.  They are taught how to use the '5 Ways to Well-Being':

• Connect with others
• Take notice of the world around you
• Give to others
• Actively learn
• Be active

 Ultimately, leading on from the quote of Martin Luther King Junior, we know that happy children learn.  Our children feel appreciated, respected, recognised, fulfilled and loved.  They are self-aware and emotionally intelligent.  They are ready to make a difference to those around them now and in the future.