Youngsters in Quest to pick up new skills
DURING the pandemic children from all years at St Christopher’s in Accrington took part in the brand new QUEST Award. This encouraged them to continue learning, but more independently.
The report, ‘An Unequal Playing Field’, shows huge disparities in children’s participation rates across a wide range of extracurricular activities depending on their social background.
St Christopher’s tried to redress the balance by helping pupils to develop their independence through making choices about participation in both after school and lunchtime clubs, but encouraging them to join local teams and uniformed organisations. Then the pandemic hit. The QUEST Award had been developed to bring to the classroom the skills that children have already developed independently of school through personal or family interests. It encouraged all round development of the pupils by asking them to undertake five mini projects.
However, since lockdown group activities have not been allowed, so the QUEST Award was reinvented and the children as always were an innovative as ever.
“The QUEST Award has helped students learn how to motivate themselves when time becomes unstructured,” said headteacher Richard Jones.
More than 50 pupils have obtained their bronze award with innovative ideas, from learning sign language like Year 7 pupils Chloe and Imogen, to aspiring vet Sianna (Year 9) creating an in-depth study of the chicken, and even hatching a batch of chicks.