Health & Wellbeing

Giving our children the best possible start in life.

In the Health and Well-being Area of Learning and Experience, progression involves the development of five statements of what matters:

1. Developing physical health and well-being has lifelong benefits

2. How we process and respond to our experiences affects our mental health and emotional well-being

3. Our decision-making impacts on the quality of our lives and the lives of others

4. How we engage with social influences shapes who we are and affects our health and well-being

5. Healthy relationships are fundamental to our well-being.

At Twynyrodyn Community School, we recognise the significance this AoLE has to our over-arching vision for our pupils.  It maintains a significant presence in our School Development Plan and receives the investment this presence warrants.  From whole school Trauma Informed training and practice, with well-being interventions, to the addition of resources to improve the physical health of our children, this area sits at the heart of the decisions and developments we make.

According to the Scale of Multiple Deprivation, our community has particularly poor results related to health, so it is vital we instil positive health-related behaviours in the children and ensure they have the knowledge to make informed lifestyle choices as they grow.

The four purposes are at the heart of our health and well-being curriculum. They are the starting point for all decisions on the content and experiences developed as part of our provision to support our children to be:

• ambitious capable learners ready to learn throughout their lives.

• enterprising, creative contributors, ready to play a full part in life and work

• ethical, informed citizens of Wales and the world

• healthy, confident individuals, ready to lead fulfilling lives as valued members of society.

The new Curriculum for Wales and the Health and Wellbeing curriculum at Twynyrodyn Community School reflect the significance of this AOLE on the four purposes (namely  healthy, confident individuals, ready to lead fulfilling lives as valued members of society, ambitious capable learners ready to learn throughout their lives as well as enterprising, creative contributors, ready to play a full part in life and work). This requires a multifaceted approach including effective approaches that run consistently through the school alongside interventions and support for pupils who require it in order to ensure all pupils feel a sense of belonging to their class, school and community. 

At Twynyrodyn, Health and Well-being is central to our practise and forms our Autumn term project driver with the over-arching theme ‘You, me, us’.  These projects will focus on the concepts of belonging, community, happiness, identity and empathy, amongst others.  These aim to connect our pupils to their community, providing an understanding of how to develop and maintain healthy relationships, linked to the Relationships and Sexuality Education mandatory content from Welsh Government.  The projects also aim to develop our children’s understanding of healthy bodies and minds.  

At the heart of our HWB philosophy we develop our classroom structures and routines to meet the needs of all our learners and build positive relationships with pupils and parents alike so that pupils feel connected, secure and safe. We provide a welcoming environment where pupils and parents feel that staff are approachable and understanding through visible morning greetings and a supportive ethos. We also have systems set up to allow regular and prompt communication with parents such as Seesaw, twitter, text service, google classroom and social media, allowing parents to be a part of their children’s learning journey. All staff have high expectations of themselves with regards to building positive relationship with their class and the understanding of the impact of children's positive well being on their happiness and attainment in school. We create welcoming and safe environments that celebrate pupils’ work and achievement as well as providing a sense of belonging whilst organising resources to promote independence and support learning. Pupils are involved in setting rules and expectation for their behaviour in their classroom and around the school and contribute to a class charter. Each class follows a positive reward system (dojo) to praise positive behaviour amongst pupils. We celebrate both pupils behaviour and work by awarding Seren yr Wythnos.

We develop physical health through our REAL PE scheme which provides a consistent approach from N-Y6, alongside the physical development aspect of REAL PE each topic/lesson has an PHSE focus based on one of 6 areas (cognitive, social, personal, physical, health and fitness and creative) so pupils develop social and emotional skills to improve their emotional well being whilst concurrently developing their physical literacy. Alongside our REAL PE we promote physical well-being through our daily Physical 15 sessions (yoga, walk a mile, dance etc.), as well as our recent purchases in outdoor gym equipment, activeboards and playground equipment. We also offer opportunities for pupils to take part in extracurricular activities including dance and sports clubs as well as the chance to represent our school as part of the football, rugby, netball or athletics team.

We develop mental health and emotional wellbeing through our use of the recently developed outdoor areas in our school grounds, creating opportunities for skills and knowledge progression within different strands of the AoLE, providing pupils with opportunities to work alongside their peers and discuss their feelings, how to develop healthy and positive relationships, how our actions affect others as well as improving their understanding of how our decision-making impacts on the quality of our lives and the lives of others, how we engage with social influences shapes who we are and affects our health and wellbeing and how healthy relationships are fundamental to our wellbeing.

To ensure all children have a good level of socioemotional well being we regularly assess pupils using the Motional tool and run intervention such as ELSA, lego therapy and 1-1/group sessions for pupils who require it. As a trauma informed school, all staff have been trauma informed trained and three members or staff have taken this training further in order to support our most vulnerable pupils, completing their Diploma.

Participation in healthy activity has dramatically increased over the last year through the introduction of Physical 15, where the pupils complete daily exercise, including yoga, dancing, use of the outdoor gym and active play equipment.  Pupil voice activities and parental survey results both showed extremely positive feedback regarding these developments.

Motional screen results showed that individual well-being interventions had a positive impact on almost all of the pupils who experienced these.  Screen results were also used to create programs for whole class delivery to form part of our Health & Well-being provision to support the development of all children.