Identifying the ‘Gifts and Talents’ of Service Pupils under the Service Pupil Support Programme.

Fordham CofE Primary School applied for funding as part of a cluster of three schools in the Cambridgeshire area under the MOD’s Armed Forces Families Fund (AF3): Service Pupil Support Programme, aiming to identify the gifts and talents of Service pupils. This project will not only focus on recognising these pupils’ unique abilities but will also include activities designed to enhance their potential and support their social and emotional well-being.   

Social and emotional needs across cluster schools  

They were awarded £61,000 for their ‘Enabling the Gifts and Talents’ project, which aims to create opportunities for all three schools in the cluster to address their social and emotional needs, especially during parental deployments. The funding will also be used to expand the use of the Service Pupil Premium to support additional sessions with a pastoral teacher, allowing for work in smaller groups or one-to-one settings, and to extend these services to the other two schools in the cluster.  

Deborah Rankin, Headteacher said:” On arrival, pupils can be working academically behind their peers and with the right support and challenge, can accelerate. This project focused on identifying any gifts or talents that may have otherwise been missed. It provided opportunities for the pupils to work in small groups in which not only were their needs being met but also had a positive impact on their confidence and self-esteem, supporting them to flourish and reach their potential”.

All three schools employed staff to focus on supporting Service children both in an emotional capacity as well as academically. Each Service child participated in weekly sessions in small groups with a trained Emotional Literacy Support Assistant (ELSA) to help them cope with the impact of frequent school moves and parental deployments. The children responded positively to these interventions, particularly valuing the chance to share their feelings with peers who understood their experiences. Parents also noted the significant benefits of these groups. 

Pupils were identified if they required extra intervention for being academically gifted or needing support to reach age-related expectations. An experienced teacher was employed to deliver interventions e.g. creative writing and provided extra sessions in maths for a group of talented mathematicians who needed challenging. The impact for these interventions has been highly documented with individuals making excellent progress across the year. 

To further develop their gifts and talents, the funding allowed Service pupils to participate in a diverse range of clubs throughout the year, based on a questionnaire provided by the schools. These activities included chess, gymnastics, confidence-building through sports, homework club, choir, drama, and more. Available to Service children across all three schools, these clubs were scheduled before and after school or during lunchtime breaks. 

Impact

Speaking on the impact of the project, Deborah said: “The biggest impact the project has achieved has been around creating a community of similar backgrounds both for the pupils and parents alike. The pupils have benefitted hugely with developing friendships with other pupils from Service families both pastorally, in academic small groups and through clubs.” 

The case study below demonstrates the impact of the funding on a pupil’s confidence during a parental deployment and highlights the importance of implementing a variety of activates to address social needs and promote confidence building.  

A pupil in Key Stage 2 was a modest child who was quietly confident and unassuming. They started at the school at the beginning of the Key Stage following their father being deployed in the area and had attended two previous schools. The pupil settled quickly making new friends in their year group. This pupil had obvious gaps in their learning and was working academically just below age-related expectations in English and maths. 
The pupil attended the pastoral sessions specifically for Service pupils, developing more friendships with peers in their year group who also had parents in the services. 
The pupil was quite reluctant and quite shy in class, not always putting themselves forward. In the questionnaire the parents completed in November, the parents highlighted that they had talents in drama and singing. The pupil was invited to attend the drama club in the Spring term in which they flourished and later performed alongside peers and other Service pupils. With this funding, we were able to continue to offer a further club for the summer term of drama in which the pupils performed characters from the ‘The Jungle Book’. 
Following a school talent show that was performed to parents in February, this child’s talent for singing was also recognised and singing lessons in school were organised by an external coach. Their confidence in singing has really improved and the coach has suggested that they start to work towards her first grade. The pupil’s confidence had noticeably grown, which was evident in their confident performance during our school’s rendition of ‘School’s Got Talent’. It has been heartening to see the child blossoming socially too, as they have made a lovely group of friends who support and encourage them.’

Find out more

Discover more of the projects funded through the Armed Forces Families Fund programmes, here.