Living Our Values

Oatlands is a Values Based School. We work in partnership with a number of other local schools to provide a values based education for our pupils. Through the Values Programme, children are introduced to 22 universally positive values over a period of 2 years. Using a wide range of activities, lessons and events, the pupils are encouraged to consider what the values mean to them, their families and their friends. It is hoped that by thinking and learning about values the children will acquire a solid foundation on which to base their future actions, decisions and judgements, so they may become happy and fulfilled individuals able to make positive contributions to the community in which they live and work.

Our Values Based Education permeates the whole curriculum, the day to day organisation of the school and the interface between the school and our community.

Values are woven into the curriculum in order to give a variety of opportunities for them to be thought about and for children to understand the practical implications of expressing them in relation to themselves, the life of the school, the community and wider society. We use Values Based Education to inspire individuals to choose their own positive personal, social, moral and spiritual values and be aware of ways of developing and deepening them as citizens of the world.

We believe that Values Based Education will:

• Encourage all of us, to be the best that we can be.

• Provide a moral framework.

• Encourage reflective and ethical thinking.

• Help us to better understand and articulate the impact our behaviour can have on our friends, our school, our community.

• Encourage our community to develop and establish strong positive values on which to build lives.

• Strengthen our sense of belonging.

• Promote the giving and receiving of support and develop within us empathy towards all.
  
  

We put philosophy into practice by:

• Introducing the Value of the Month through assemblies and story times.

• Making the value an implicit feature across the whole curriculum

• Having an explicitly focused lesson each week.

• Having central and classed based displays.

• Recognising and celebrating behaviour that reflects our values.

• Focusing on reflective practices.

• Supporting charities.

• Encouraging children to take on appropriate responsibilities.

• Working towards a more sustainable school.

• All adults acting as role models.

• Asking parents and the community for their support.
  
  

 We expect all adults to act as good role models by:

• Taking care of each other

• Ensuring all smiles are returned

• Finding time for yourself and showing that you are human.

• Remembering to be and not just to do.

• Living your values even when things get tough

As a result of our hard work in this area, Oatlands School is proud to have been accredited the Values Quality Mark

In the 2024/25 academic year, the values the children will be focusing on each month are as follows.

Click on the monthly Value for some ideas of how you can continue to support your children in living their values at home.