The research base, benefits and reasons around using mixed ability are on the website on the Curriculum overview page.

With regards to setting of SPARX work. Staff are to adjust the homework curriculum as they see to benefit the class. This could be by getting students to do pre learning or by consolidating knowledge at a later date. Meaning that homework will have both of these features. SPARX is a system that adjusts to the student, meaning that if the student is getting all of the questions correct, the questions will increase in difficulty. If a student is finding it difficult, the questions ease in difficulty. Videos are also provided to support students.

Our English home learning at Key Stage 3 centres around building and maintaining regular reading habits, whilst also promoting reading for pleasure. It is designed to be personalised, offering students the chance to read what they are interested in. The platform we currently use for students to record this, Sparx Reader, includes regular, low stakes quizzing to help regularly reward students.

Sparx Reader offers books for students within their zone of proximal development, meaning students should be able to access all the books offered and thus develop their reading skills and confidence in accessing increasingly more challenging texts, which they will encounter across the curriculum at KS3, 4 and beyond. Students can select books they want to read from the personalised options generated for them, but we also allow students to read their own books and record what they are reading on the system. Students can unlock Gold Reader for regular reading at any level, but we have unlocked this feature for students when asked to help promote a personalised approach: please contact your child’s English teacher if you want this option for your child.

Using the Sparx Reader platform, students are able to earn regular rewards, which we use to help praise students and offer rewards outside the system, including reward points, physical copies of books and VIP lunch passes. The accuracy level provided by Sparx Reader allows students to receive support in their library lessons or further intervention during mentor time.

Students also read a physical copy of a ‘class reader’ in their English lessons in each year of Key Stage 3, alongside two in their personal development periods. Students have further access to physical books in their fortnightly library lessons in Key Stage 3 (as well as the opportunity of using this excellent provision outside of lessons) and there are several reading stations around the school where students can take a physical book to read: Mr Amos and the PE department are also running their World Book Day book swap for Year 7 again.

How SEND students are supported across the school

SEND training is delivered to all staff by the SENDCO on the first day of term and a follow-up twilight session is delivered by the SENDCO to teacher trainees, Early Career Teachers and teachers who are new to the school in the first half-term of the academic year.

All teaching and support staff have access to a range of training in SEND and Inclusion through SENDCO-led CPD sessions and WAGOLLS, EP, SEMHL and CCT Teacher-led training sessions and Local Authority and external SEND organisation training offers.  In addition, all Finham staff can attend the Lion Alliance suite of training sessions led by national leaders in their field, which in the last two years have had a focus on SEND and Inclusion and Behaviour Management

A summary of all home communication has been collated and has been made available to parents/carers so they are aware of what they can expect a certain points of the academic year.

The letter home (08/01/2025) explains all forms of communication and how parents can engage with the school and who they should contact regarding specific matters relating to their child. This includes how Bromcom is used in order to regular update parents and carers with day-to-day information about their child.

Parents are always encouraged to use the contact tab on the home page of the website if they do not know who to make contact with directly. Contact that comes in to the school in this way is then disseminated to the most relevant staff member by the school admin team.

Parents and carers are still encouraged to use the studybugs app to report a child’s absence.

For information, all staff email addresses follow:

initial.surname@finhampark.co.uk

For ease of reference, these have always been hyperlinked on our website on the relevant curriculum subject page.

We would expect all staff to follow the school's behaviour policy with regard to the issuing of a C1-C5 within lessons for any behaviour that impacts their own or others learning. C3 and above involve a formal consequence and potential removal from the learning space. Patterns of behaviour are monitored on a weekly (pastoral team) and half termly (senior leadership team) basis so that any patterns of behaviour can be identified with a particular focus on students who are repeating and not amending poor behaviours.

Any higher-level behaviours would also involve communication home and further support from or pastoral/senior leadership team. Any student who is struggling to amend their behaviours of a period of time will receive ongoing support through various interventions in school, but also escalated consequences, which could include; being withdrawn from lessons, suspensions from school, and as a last resort, a period of time spent at another school which could become permanent. 

The first point of contact would be the individual subject teacher or the head of department if issues are linked to a specific subject area. This information can be found on the school website.

If there are more general concerns, your child's mentor or college leader is the best point of contact. If you do not know which mentor group of child, your college is in this information can be found via the 'MyChildAtSchool' app within their timetable. You can also raise a general query via the contact tab on the school website.

Information around the use of mobile phones in school can be found on the school website, on page 11 of the Behaviour Policy.

The school’s current position is that phones should not be seen at all during the school day, unless a member of staff allows students to use them for learning purposes e.g. calculator, online quiz, and will be confiscated on all other occasions if seen.

This was reviewed in the 2023/24 academic year and is one aspect of school life that is continually reviewed and amended to address current trends that we see relating to their use by students in school.

Mock papers are discussed in class, but they are not discussed question by question. The results are analysed and then topics that the class got wrong are discussed and delivered by the teacher. The curriculum is adjusted to suit the class to close gaps in misunderstandings. Teachers are instructed not to go through questions that the majority of the class got correct.

Students go through papers each week as part of their weekly paper. Questions in the classroom are also exam-style questions, meaning we are practising exam-style questions very frequently. 

Finham Park is committed to providing high quality teaching and support for all students with SEND.  If parents have concerns, they can raise them with classroom teachers directly, with the College Leader/Deputy College Leader or directly to the SEND Leadership team through the PA to the Director of SEND, Jacqui Bevan:  j.bevan@finhampark.co.uk

Please see full SEND Information and SEND Leadership details on the school website.