Merton Abbey Primary School

We are a successful local school and we simply want the best for the children we teach.We want children to love learning: when they are with us and after they have moved on. We want them to enjoy learning in and out of the classroom - so we provide a curriculum that interests, excites and engages children.

Standards are crucially important. We want children to make the best possible progress – to achieve the highest standards in learning – so that they see themselves as successful learners. We want them to be fully equipped for later stages of education and for the rest of their adult life.

High quality relationships and good behaviour are at the centre of everything we do. Children and adults in our school have relationships built on trust and respect. Children are taught to get along very well together. This is why the school has the ‘great community’ atmosphere that visitors speak so highly of.

Our school is expanding. This is an exciting time for us as we look to the future. We are delighted to serve a community that is growing. We look forward to increasing our teaching team and the facilities we offer over the next three years - but we are determined to keep hold of our close relationships between children, staff and parents.

The school motto is Working hard and caring for each other. We place great emphasis on teaching children the value of sustained effort and encourage them to approach their learning with resilience and persistence. As well as academic learning, we teach children the importance of social learning: getting along well with others and taking care of one another. This helps us to create a community where everyone feels safe and happy.

Merton Abbey offers to all children a high standard of academic and social education, enabling and challenging all pupils to reach their full potential.We provide a safe, secure, stimulating environment in which we encourage all children to value themselves and others; make the right choices and develop into responsible and caring members of society.

At Merton Abbey Primary School one of our key aims are to prepare the children for life in modern Britain. We want our children to leave us as confident, respectful individuals who can participate fully in our society. We ensure that the fundamental British Values are introduced, discussed and experienced through the ethos and work of the school. All curriculum areas provide a vehicle for furthering understanding of these concepts and, in particular, our RE and PSHE lessons provide excellent opportunities to deepen and develop children’s understanding.

We have classes from nursery to Y6. Teachers in these classes work together to plan the Curriculum so that there is continuity and progression across the age ranges.

Work is planned in Topics, lasting half a term, which include activities and learning in all curriculum areas; the highest proportion of your child’s time will be spent on English and Mathematics. In each class children are divided into groups, according to their learning needs and styles for some work and activities, and at other times the class teacher will gather them together as a whole class. We use discussion and paired work to enable the children to clarify issues and talk about their learning. All classes also have a teaching assistant so that there is a good adult/child ratio.

Classrooms are organised so that children have all the apparatus and materials they need readily to hand, and learn to make choices independently of the teacher. At times a group of children will work under the direction of the teacher and at other times they will be given a task to complete with only the minimum of help.

From time to time, educational visits are planned in connection with class work. You may be asked to make a voluntary contribution towards the cost of these visits. Please speak to the Headteacher if this causes any difficulty. Teachers may also ask for parents to volunteer to help supervise the children on outings, and this can be a good way to get a better understanding of what your child is learning.

Merton Abbey has a governing body, as do all other state schools in Merton. Our purpose is to help the school achieve the best for all our children. We do this by working with the head teacher and staff to make sure that teaching is excellent, good resources are available to help children learn and money is well spent. We also read and act upon the many documents sent to school, so that we are confident that Merton Abbey operates legally and gets the support and grants, to which it is entitled. Another of our roles is to appoint the head teacher and assist in other senior appointments.

The full governing body meets once a term and we also have regular committees which focus particularly on school standards, staffing and the budget. Governors are volunteers and are appointed to represent all parts of the school community: parents, teaching and support staff, Merton and community interests. We are expected to attend meetings regularly and are welcomed in to visit school in working hours, so that we have opportunities to talk to staff and children. This helps us to understand how Merton Abbey works and what we can do to make it even better.