Rightly Proud!

What a wonderful, memorable experience for our young people - Arwen, Thomas, Alma, Luis, Eilidh, Isaac, Eamon and Rachel - to have an opportunity to present their Together Alliance UNCRC mural of Children's Rights at the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday 13th December, hosted by Deputy Presiding Officer Linda Fabiani MSP and with a presentation from Maree Todd MSP, Minister for Childcare and Early Years.

P7 Sciennes pupils with MYSPs Joel, Suki and Thomas and Maree Todd MSP

Juliet Harris and Liz Millership (Together), Maree Todd MSP and Linda Fabiani MSP

2017 State of Children's Rights in Scotland published today

We were all rightly proud of our pupils' fantastic artwork and their confidence in presenting to such an esteemed group of adults, gathered Together to launch the 2017 Report into the State of Children's Rights in Scotland. It was a delight to see their artwork feature in the newly released publication and a joy to see Arwen find a picture of herself when she opened the booklet.

Thank you very much to Juliet Harris and Liz Millership from Together for looking after us so well and making everyone feel welcome and at ease. Particular thanks to all the parents who accompanied and supported the children's participation in this very special event.

Rightly proud pupils and parents

P7 explain the journey along the seven panels of their child rights mural, from 'The Policy Factory'  panel where children's voices are excluded to 'The Meadow of Rights' panel where "everyone can be who they are" and have their voices heard.

Cathy McCulloch (Director) and Chelsea Stinson, Children's Voices Project Manager from the Children's Parliament (based at Summerhall) approached us last year with this very exciting opportunity to work with Together - the Scottish Alliance for Children's Rights.

http://www.togetherscotland.org.uk/resources-and-networks/the-uncrc-in-scotland-seminar-series-2017 

As part of a seminar series on children's rights in law, practice and policy, Together and the Scottish Universities Insight Institute worked with international delegates to ensure that children and young people play a key role and that key messages from the seminars are accessible to everyone. Together commissioned artists Joanna Boyce, Yonnie and Lyver to work with our then P6 pupils to present key messages in a creative and engaging way. Three young people who had attended the seminars (Joel, Thomas and Suki) interpreted the key messages and themes then our P6 pupils (now P7) worked closely with the artists to visualise the imagery suggested, for example 'rights in the clouds', 'a policy factory', 'a meadow of rights' and 'connected Together in a daisy chain.'

Having adopted the name 'The Clan of Children's Rights', this group of pupils will continue supporting and developing our rights based learning at Sciennes (particularly in the Year of Young People 2018) and we sincerely thank all involved in this project for helping them gain the confidence, understanding and enthusiasm to take a lead role within our school.

 

Article 42

All adults and children should know about this convention.

Article 12

You have the right to an opinion and for it to be listened to and taken seriously.

Sciennes Values Respect

Sciennes P4-7 Aim High Assembly 18.8.17 from Sciennes Primary School

On Friday 18th August we welcomed Primary Four pupils and all new pupils to their first upper school assembly. We also welcomed Miss Jennifer Ferguson and Miss Sophie Mitchell to the Primary Five team.

This year, we are revisiting our school vision and values so pupils were invited to think about what is most important to us in the Sciennes Family.  We are extremely grateful to parent Emma Kirk (CEO User Vision and Convenor of the Parent Council Communications Group) who recently led an excellent session to help the whole staff revisit and reflect on our vision and values. Pupil Council leaders will soon be elected, one from each class P2-P7, who will then be able to join in on discussions and support the process.

We explored ways to respect everyone's right to be safe and right to learn at Sciennes. Primary Seven pupils helped explain what 'The Golden Rule' means.



Showing respect universally unites us all: in the classroom, in the school and beyond, as global citizens.  Brad Montague's moving film ' Smuggling Hope' was shown to help us all continue to believe that we can all make a difference by upholding our values.

'WE Free the Children' Returning to Sciennes!

We are tremendously excited about an upcoming return visit to Sciennes on Wednesday 7^th December from WE Free the Children, again arranged for us by Schools Co-ordinator Harriet Morgan.

Jacob, from WE Free the Children, visited in June to work with half of our (then P6) pupils and it was a superb and inspirational day, providing a wealth of opportunities for our children to embrace pupil leadership. Wednesday 7th December will mark a return visit from the charity, where a Speaker and Facilitator will work with the remaining half of our P7 pupils.

We are honoured to welcome Nicola Brentnall, the Director of The Queen’s Trust and Kate Likely, UK Director of Free the Children, who will join us on the day.

P6 and P7 pupils have been invited to a special assembly at 9am and then half the P7 year group will take part in Free the Children workshops throughout the day, while Ms Sellar will lead the remaining pupils in a repeat of her excellent Global Goals workshop, focusing on Gender Equality.

The format of the workshops fits ideally with our aims to develop pupil-led social action as part of the Junior Award Scheme for Schools:

Team Building/Issues Module – exploring prevalent issues in society, and globally to build confidence, identify leadership skills and also get pupils thinking about issues they care about.
Reflective Module - enabling pupils to think how they can use their skills for issues that are important to them.  
Action Planning - putting pen to paper to create a tangible action plan for children to develop and put into practice.

www.we.org/gb 

Free the Children

Free The Children is an international charity and educational partner that believes in a world where all young people are free to achieve their fullest potential as change-makers. Over the last 20 years, Free The Children has grown into an international movement supporting youth empowerment through educational service-learning initiatives in North America and the United Kingdom, and a holistic and sustainable international development model. It is supported by the Queen's Trust, the UN, Virgin Atlantic and has many international supporters -  Malala, Desmond Tutu, Prince Harry, Oprah will give a flavour. Their model is 'children helping children' and they promote pupil leadership and taking action, here and abroad. The scheme began in Canada, initiated  by one of the CEOs when he was 12, and is a social enterprise endeavour. 

For more information about Free the Children, visit their website.

The 'Free the Children' programme fits extremely well with our well established Junior Awards Scheme Scotland (JASS) programme in P6 and P7 where pupils are asked to take their own action to achieve a 'Me and My World' element. JASS is a children's version of The Duke of Edinburgh Award, and the idea for it actually came from Sciennes! It is now adopted throughout Edinburgh and beyond so has been retitled Junior Award Scheme for Schools.

The Junior Award Scheme Schools (JASS) is an accredited learning programme, celebrating wider achievement, for young people (P6-S2). Sciennes and Tollcross Primary Schools have been implementing this scheme since we piloted it in 2009.
The concept emerged from a discussion during a Sciennes P7 visit to Lagganlia between Alice Brown, Gael Logan and Barry Hewitt who came up with the idea to set up a 'Duke of Edinburgh' style award scheme for upper primary pupils. The scheme has since been developed into a city wide programme.

There are three levels (bronze, silver and gold), each requiring a higher degree of commitment. Each level also includes four sections to be completed:

• My interest - a hobby or interest
• Get Active, Stay Active - involvement in a sport or physical activity
• Me and My World - a community or environmental project
• Adventure - a teamwork challenge through involvement in an outdoor activity (e.g Benmore and Lagganlia)

http://jassawardsciennes.blogspot.co.uk/

Sciennes helped develop an online version - eJASS.


Free the Children also fits well with our Unicef Rights Respecting Schools programme. We have recently achieved Level One and our next steps are to continue to extend knowledge of UNCRC and to expand global citizenship. The Free the Children programme will assist us with that. We have highlighted the relevance of the Global Goals for Sustainable Development since their launch in September 2015 and the programme also supports this extremely well.

Global Goals One Year On

Sciennes Global Goals House Assembly 16.9.16 from Sciennes Primary School

On Friday 16th September 2016 we held our first House Assemblies of the new session for P2-P7 and welcomed P2 pupils to their first ever House Assembly.

In May 2016, Sciennes became a Level One "Rights Respecting School" and we have already begun our journey towards Level Two accreditation. Our journey so far has been recorded on our Rights Respecting Sciennes blog. We reminded pupils what it means to be a Rights Respecting School and that it includes being a Global Citizen. We first introduced our pupils to the United Nations' Global Goals for Sustainable Development when they were launched last year in September 2015. By 2030 these aim to:

End extreme poverty
Fight inequality & injustice
Fix climate change




On September 25th 2015, 193 world leaders committed to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs.) One year on, we watched a rap to help us understand all the goals better.


We thought about what we have already done in school to be Global Citizens. For example, last year the whole school took part in a City of Edinburgh pilot project to raise awareness of 1 in 5 Child Poverty (SDG1), P3 led a whole school project to raise money for 9 playgrounds for Syrian refugees (SDG10), P6 took part in Gender Equality workshops (SDG5) and our ECO Group campaigns took action on Climate Change (SDG15) and promoted Sustainable Consumption (SDG12).

We watched an animation written by Sir Ken Robinson, 'The World's Largest Lesson Part Two' which gave us ideas of what we might do next to help make a better world.


The World's Largest Lesson 2016 - with thanks to Sir Ken Robinson and Emma Watson from World's Largest Lesson on Vimeo.

Congratulations to our newly elected Pupil Council members who will be the voice of their classmates throughout the year and will also be our Rights Respecting Schools Ambassadors.

Article 29

The right to education which develops your personality, respect for others’ rights and the environment.

Sciennes Values Respect

At the P4-7 Assembly on Friday 5th February P7 House Captains helped us think about the Golden Rule and how it can help us to RESPECT each other's RIGHTS.

Fergus from the Pupil Council explained the 1 in 5 Make a Difference Award. Pupil Council leaders will collect class ideas next week. (P6 pupils can contribute their ideas when they get back from camp.)

P6 pupils will achieve one quarter of their Bronze JASS Award - the Adventure Certificate - when they attend Benmore Outdoor Education Centre next week.

Tanatallon are still in the lead with House Points!

Sciennes Golden Rule P4-7 Assembly 5.2.16 from SciennesPS



 

Article 29 You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for others’ rights and the environment.

Don't Stand By

Article 22 The right to have help if you are a refugee

Holocaust Memorial Day

Our three Primary Seven classes are attending a special showcase of 'Inside Hana's Suitcase' at the Filmhouse Cinema on Wednesday 27th January, to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day. Our Class Teachers are experienced in handling this topic sensitively each year to help us learn lessons in how we treat one another. Mr Howie, who is a trained Holocaust Educator, has also been working with our P7 pupils.


Article 29 You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

1:5 Hungry for Books - Gift a Child a Preloved Book during Scottish Book Week

Sciennes' Pupil Council is leading a 'Hungry for Books' campaign, launched at House Assemblies on Universal Children's Day 20th November and taking place ONLY throughout Book Week Scotland from Monday 23rd November to Friday 27th November. We have been asking our pupils how they can make simple acts to bring about change and highlighting the Global Goals at our Assemblies.

Sciennes Primary School is proud to be one of six schools in Edinburgh working with Pattie Santelices (City of Edinburgh Principal Officer Mental Health and Well Being) and committed to raising awareness of children in poverty.

The aims of the project are:
* To highlight the scale and impact of 1:5 child poverty.
* To explore cultural and structural explanations of child poverty.
* To consider the costs associated with the school day at Sciennes
* To reflect on how we can make education fairer and equitable for all 



Last year, P3 pupils successfully organised a whole school Harvest appeal leading our school community to donate food items generously to Foodbank. This year, we are asking everyone to feed minds by donating at least one 'preloved', much loved, quality children's book which will then be redistributed by Foodbank and other organisations.

Sciennes is one of six school hubs for the city - Central Hub - and our Pupil Council members will work with volunteer Librarians to help collect and deliver donated books.

Hungry for Books 23^rd – 27^th November ‘Gift a child a pre-loved book’

Did you know that 1:5 children live in poverty or have at some time in their lives? This is shocking to us in Sciennes’ Pupil Council. And we want to help. So we have decided to do a book collection. Please give a child in poverty a book to pass the time and make them feel like an ordinary child. And try to think how many hours are really in a day when you don’t have the money to buy expensive video games and other things. So please bring a book for the book bank.

Hamish Croft, P7 member of Sciennes Pupil Council 


1:5 children living in poverty leave school unable to read well. These children are also less likely to have books in the home and read for pleasure. During Book Week we are seeking donations of high quality children’s books which our Pupil Council will then redistribute to children in need through Foodbank.
I would also like families in school, who would welcome an opportunity to select some books, to please contact me directly. I can assure you of my utmost discretion and confidentiality.

Alison Noble, Headteacher

Sciennes House Assembly 20.11.15 from SciennesPS

Article 28  The right to learn

Call to Action

On Friday 30th October at the P4-7 Assembly, Mr Howie first introduced to pupils the idea that they can become or can support change makers. He explained that on the previous weekend (24th October) many of the UNESCO landmark sites around the world, including Edinburgh Castle, were lit up by blue lights to mark the 70th anniversary of the United Nations. (Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is also 70 this year.) Mr Howie explained the background to the United Nations and Unicef and why they were set up. 193 countries have signed the United Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) but Mr Howie asked our pupils if they believed that all children actually have these rights around the world. He then asked our pupils how they felt about not all children having their rights respected and to think about what they could do (see slideshow below).

Happy Birthday UN at 70 Sciennes P4-7 Assembly 30.11.15 from SciennesPS

Simple Acts

On Friday 13th November, Mr Forrest Howie led a powerful and thought provoking P4-7 Assembly to help the children think about how they could take simple acts to bring about change. He explored inspirational examples, telling stories about Malala Yousafzai and Samantha Smith as well as George Clooney's recent visit to Rose Street's Social Bite Social Enterprise cafe. He also gave us historical examples of Martin Luther King's campaign for civil rights and Emmeline Pankhurst's campaign for Votes for Women and made us think how we can encourage and support change makers, as well as be change makers ourselves by taking simple acts, such as writing letters, like Samantha Smith did in the 1980s.

Food for thought, and Mr Howie's Assemblies continue to take us all forward in recognising and realising rights. House Assemblies on 20th November will feature Unicef's OutRight campaign and continue our focus on the Global Goals

Taking Action from SciennesPS