Willenhall Community Primary School is within Coventry City Council situated 2½ miles south east of the city centre. We are a 2 form entry school teaching children aged 3 to 11 years (Nursery to year 6).
Federation
Willenhall Community Primary School is part of The Affinity Federation with Whitmore Park Primary School.
Ethos
At our school we feel it is important that children feel happy and secure so that they can work to the best of their ability and make good progress. The school offers a broad and balanced curriculum which covers all aspects of school life and not just the subjects viewed as part of the National Curriculum. School life aims to provide all children with the skills they will need for life in the 21st century. We encourage the children to set themselves realistic but ambitious goals which provides them with a sense of achievement and raises their self-esteem.
School Values
Our school community embraces five key values, we teach our children these values to support their moral development and to prepare them for life in Modern Britain.
We manage behaviour positively and always seek to listen to our pupil’s views and understand their perspectives. To manage behaviour which breaks our rules, we use a system of stages. To reward positive behaviour, we use a variety of methods such as praise and communication with parents/carers.
We work closely with our pupils’ parents and carers to ensure they are kept fully informed about their child’s behaviour.
British Values
As well as supporting our children’s social and moral development through the teaching of our school values, we also actively promote British Values and help our children develop their own understanding of what it means to be British.
In accordance with the Department for Education, we define British Values as being:
Democracy
As well as lessons in our PSHE scheme around Me and My Community, all children are taught about democracy as part of our annual School Council cycle. Each class are taught about what it means to live in a democracy, the process of elections and the roles of elected representatives. They then participate in a school-wide election week, where children can put themselves forwards for School Council and campaign for votes, standing for one of our School Value political parties. Every child then votes, and the winners are announced – sometimes by our local MP, Zara Sultana. Our School Council then lead the school in representing each class’s views and contributing to other local events, such as the Pupil Parliament event at the University of Warwick.
The Rule of Law
The place of laws in society is also covered through our PSHE Me and My Community topics, for example in year 5 where children will investigate the links between laws, local and national government and democracy. We also refer to laws when promoting our school values in assemblies and ensure children understand the link between our behaviour expectations and laws in the wider society. Community visits, such as from local police officers, also help the children understand how laws inform people’s jobs and responsibilities in our local community. Year 6 also develop links to local magistrates and visit the National Justice Museum in Nottingham as part of their Crime and Punishment topic.
Individual Liberty
Children are taught in school about the importance of their own choices and the impact they have on people around them. Throughout our PSHE scheme, children are taught about the importance of personal responsibility and how they can contribute to their local community. Our bespoke PSHE curriculum also emphasises the role of personal safety, whether it be in the home, when outside, online or in their future relationships. We also teach and empower the children to ask and answer their own questions about life, morality and beliefs, such as in our specially developed philosophy for children schemes, Delphi Philosophy, in Years 3 and 5.
Mutual Respect and Tolerance of those of Different Faiths and Beliefs
Respect is one of our key school values and underpins everything we do and every part of our curriculum. We always reinforce ideas of respect and equality in the way we promote positive behaviour in school and is often a feature of our weekly celebration assemblies. We also actively promote and celebrate the wide diversity of languages, cultures, religions and backgrounds of our local community, such as acknowledging religious festivals such as Christmas, Eid and Diwali, and celebrating events such as Black History Month. Our R.E. curriculum is also structured in such a way that children are able to compare and find common links between different religions and cultures and recognise that this diversity is something to be celebrated in our community.
Assemblies
Our assemblies are broadly Christian in theme. We have weekly whole school assemblies with our values as the focus. During these assemblies, a moral value is explored – often through a story and there is a moment of quite reflection where pupils are asked to bow their heads.
Our other daily assemblies are class based and focus on celebrating pupils’ achievements and giving pupils opportunities to reflect on our values; supporting them in developing an understanding of spiritual and moral issues.
Each term, we also hold performance assemblies where our pupils’ achievements are celebrated alongside musical and dance performances. Parents and Carers are invited in to join in these celebrations.
Assemblies are generally led by members of staff but occasionally visitors and members of the local community, who share our values, are invited to present an assembly.
School prospectus
Click here for the school prospectus.
History
Willenhall Primary School opened in 2005 and has occupied a brand new building since April 2007, following the closure of two previous primary schools Chace Primary School and Willenhall Wood Primary School.
Community
Willenhall is a suburb of Coventry in the West Midlands of England.
Willenhall is in the south-east of the city adjacent to the suburbs of Binley, Ernesford Grange and Whitley. It covers the area bounded by the Rugby to Coventry railway line, the River Sowe and the city’s boundary with Warwickshire.
For general election purposes it is part of the Coventry South Constituency and for local elections it forms part of the Binley and Willenhall ward on Coventry City Council.
Willenhall was originally a small village that was absorbed into the city as it expanded. During the Second world war the Chace National Service Hostel was built in the area to accommodate the influx of munitions workers to the City. After the war the estate became established with the building of a large number of council houses. The area today remains mainly residential though to the south-east there is 9 hectares of woodland called Willenhall Wood which has been designated a nature reserve. This was famously the site of a plane crash in 1994 when a Boeing 737 came down as it headed to Coventry Airport. The wood is frequently visited by the children from the school to enhance their curriculum learning and Year 6 annually take part in bulb planting in the wood. Willenhall is a close community and the school fosters links with the local community: the school enjoys regular talks/visits from the Willenhall History Society; at Christmas the school choir entertains residents in the local residential home; local businesses/companies have come into school to talk to our Year 6 pupils about apprenticeships, higher education and jobs they might aspire to; the school has very strong links with our local police station, who come into school and talk to different year groups about a range of differing issues.
Willenhall is the location of the Chace Avenue police station that forms part of the Coventry Local Policing Team of the West Midlands Police and houses the Binley and Willenhall neighbourhood team.