Kirkliston Primary School

Kirkliston Primary is a high achieving school with a long and proud history of serving the village and the surrounding area. It is a school where each child is valued as an individual and an important member of our school community.

Through our learning  and teaching we aim to enable children to S.H.I.N.E. and be:

• Successful and Safe: by showing respect to each other and other cultures and being supported as creative and critical thinkers
• Healthy: by encouraging high achievers through a holistic and active approach with high expectations
• Included: by being involved and independent in a motivating and inspiring curriculum developing interest in the global community, where all needs are identified and addressed
• Nurtured: building self-esteem and resilience where new ideas are encouraged and everybody has a voice
• Engaged: where excellence is expected through the highest quality of learners’ experiences and an ethos of achievement, enabling leadership across the school community

We celebrate our successes in a fortnightly Star Award celebration assembly where children are identified by a member of staff for making progress in one of the 4 capacities. It is important that all members of staff are involved in this to ensure that children recognise that their contribution to their community and progress is valued. All children have an opportunity to be identified on an annual basis.

Children also have an opportunity to share their out-of-school successes at their fortnightly House Meetings. They can bring along good news, certificates and medals to share with their house members.

Our school values are Compassion, Justice, Integrity and Wisdom. These key human aspects of learning are supported through the following arrangements by:

• Creating a school ethos which, in every way possible, gives value to these aspects of development, especially by providing an overall atmosphere that is both caring and challenging and which provides opportunities for the development of personal responsibility.
• Promoting social and moral learning through the way in which disciplinary issues are handled.
• Ensuring that staff and adults within the school provide positive models for pupils.
• Arranging regular gatherings of the school as a community and using such occasions to encourage and reinforce the values on which the school is based.
• Enriching the curriculum in all appropriate areas with an emphasis on spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.
• Providing opportunities within the curriculum to advance personal and social development.
• Providing a programme of religious education in which consideration will be given to responses to basic questions relating to the meaning, value and purpose of human life.
• Providing a programme of moral education.
• Taking every appropriate opportunity to acknowledge, value and appreciate the various cultures and heritage of the pupils and to encourage them to appreciate and value the cultures and heritage of others.

At Kirkliston, pupils from N to P7 will be taught across the different curricular areas using a variety of different approaches, and involving pupil interests and ideas. We recognise the varied learning styles of our pupils and appreciate the need to provide a balanced and interesting curriculum. As we develop what and how we teach, careful consideration is given to the main principles behind A Curriculum for Excellence.

Throughout the school year, class teachers sit with individual children to reflect/ discuss their learning and identify next steps. This personal learning planning is shared with parents as a learning profile. Issued twice yearly, the profile takes account of learning within the four contexts – discrete, interdisciplinary, wider achievements and ethos and wider life of the school.

From as early as Primary One, pupils are given the opportunity to participate in a range of out of school visits. These are designed to complement the Learning and Teaching taking place in class and play a valuable role in developing skills and knowledge. P4 and P7 pupils enjoy a residential outdoor education visit to Broomlee and Benmore respectively.

Kirkliston Nursery School

Queensferry Road, Kirkliston, EH29 9AQ

Tel: +44 131 3332336