Hi-tech Pathway for Elstree pupils

ELSTREE School in Upper Woolhampton is utilising state-of-theart software to profile the development of early years pupils.

Arc Pathway is a digital platform which collates information on pupils’ individual curricular and extracurricular progress.

Parents are able to engage directly with this information via an online portal.

The Arc project was started six years ago and Elstree pre-prep head Alice Holifield was alerted to it in 2020.

The software has now been rolled out for the pre-prep school, with secure profiles set up for each child.

It is hoped that this technological intervention will open up exciting new opportunities for parent-teacher engagement.

Mrs Holifield said: “I had been looking into how staff could spend less time collecting evidence, how our provisions could be tailored more to the needs of each individual and how our data could be used more accurately for planning.

“A child’s profile shows us their areas of strengths and confidence in relation to their age, and also highlights areas of learning that each

The new Arc Pathway technology in use at Elstree School

child has not yet developed.

“It helps us with our child-centred planning, as the software automatically generates priority next steps for each child.

“Parents can see their children’s progress and we love seeing observations that parents have made at home.

“This is particularly rewarding when parents are doing activities

with their children to support them to achieve one of their next steps.”

Arc Pathway managing director Jackie Harland said: “Alice told me the teachers love using Arc Pathway, which for us is so vital.

“Genuine enthusiasm for profiling, observing and next steps is one of the keys to a healthy early years’ practice. We are delighted this is the case with Elstree.”