Sunday 1 June 2008

Pupil attendance 2


Throughout the past session a working group, chaired by Iain Stewart (PT Guidance), has been looking at what we can do at Liberton High to improve pupil attendance. In addition to reflecting on our current practices, members of the group have also visited other schools. Based on one such visit we are considering changing the structure of tutor groups. In the past, we have had groups of 25-30 pupils all the same age. What we are proposing to change to is groups of between 20 and 25 of pupils ranging from S1 through to S6 within house groups. There are pros and cons to doing this but some of the advantages include:

  • Breaking up peer groups who have developed bad timekeeping habits and have security in their groups
  • Giving senior pupils the responsibility of looking after and supporting younger pupils
  • Further developing buddying opportunities

In the past few weeks staff and pupils have had the opportunity to comment on the proposals; on Tuesday night those who are at the Parent Council meeting will have the opportunity to air their views.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi

I am unable to read all the text as the graphic is sitting on top of it.

Dj Macdonald said...

Thanks for alerting me to this Sally. I have reconfigured the position of the graphic - I hope that does the trick!

Anonymous said...

Donald

We tried something at Dunbar where we awarded an attendance teddy bear to the class in the year grouip with the best weekly attendance. The teddy was presented at the year group assembly and the winning class kept the teddy for the week. We started it off with S1s but within a few weeks every year group - S6 included - demanded the same opportunity. It proved to be good fun and improved attendance quite dramatically.

Dj Macdonald said...

Thanks Don, based on past experiences in changing negative behaviours among pupils, I found that offering rewards was far more effective than a sanctions based approach.