Educational Visits and Residentials

School trips and visits are an integral part of the education of children at Dickens Heath Community Primary School.  We value the opportunities such visits offer our pupils and the commitment of staff and adults undertaking them.  Trips include class visits aimed at bringing learning alive and providing first-hand experience; extra-curricular outings such as activities with the school choir or sporting events; and attending or taking part in performances or competitions. 

Children in Years 5 and 6 take part in residential visits. These are planned to provide new and exciting experiences in music and creative arts, as well as in outdoor adventure and sport.

Opportunities to Volunteer

Volunteering is an activity that everyone can get involved in and benefit from.  At Dickens Heath Community Primary School we promote and encourage pupils’ active citizenship and positive contribution to the school and wider community. We offer lots of opportunities for pupils to take on new responsibilities and be involved in successfully supporting the life and work of the school. These include elected representatives on our School Council, Digital Leaders, Playground Leaders and Librarians, and within classes children can volunteer to take on various responsibilities ranging from lunch duties, to collecting and distributing registers, to helping with the organisation of equipment in assemblies.

Pupils tell us that they enjoy the opportunity to volunteer to help make their school an even better place to be and rising to the challenge that additional responsibility brings. 

Music, Art & Drama

Dickens Heath Community Primary School provides opportunities for children to take part in a wide range of musical activities and performances where they are encouraged to sing, compose and work creatively with sound. Through active listening, pupils’ awareness, understanding and appreciation of a wide variety of music are developed. A range of opportunities are provided within and beyond the curriculum for children to showcase their musical skills and talents, for example every year our older pupils take part in Young Voices where school choirs across the Midlands region come together to performance at the Indoor Arena in Birmingham.  We also have a Boys Choir who have performed at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

As a school we appreciate and understand the importance of drama within our curriculum. Research reveals that drama had a positive impact on children’s physical, emotional, social and cognitive development. Drama is developed across the whole school in a variety of ways including story-telling, and annually across school from Christmas performances in foundation stage and KS1 to spring and summer productions and class assemblies in KS2. Links with local secondary schools with onsite theatres ensure that the children gain first-hand experience of performing to an audience and staging a production.

PE & Sport

At Dickens Heath Community Primary School we offer a plethora of sporting opportunities to all children to nurture and develop talents and interests.  We also use a proportion of our PE & Sport Premium to part-fund a qualified sports coach to support curriculum delivery as well as extended intra-competitions and lunchtime activities.  

In addition, we ensure that our swimming programme extends to both year 3 and 4 pupils with ‘catch-up’ swimming for any child who has not yet acquired the skills by year 5.

Wednesday enrichment afternoon

Our whole school timetable has been adjusted to facilitate a dedicated weekly enrichment opportunity from 2:00pm for all children. Parents can choose whether to use this enrichment time off-site with their child, or to enrol their child in a school based enrichment opportunity such as chess, cookery, art, music, sport or science.

Visitors into School

Visitors have a valuable role to play and can contribute to many aspects of the life and work of the school.  They deliver talks, workshops and full day activities across a wide range of subjects, giving pupils access to outside experiences and expertise. Visitors provide a link with the wider community – children have the opportunity to work alongside artists, musicians, authors, health professions and others.