School Policies

Inspiring learners, inquiring together, enhancing our world

Bradbury School:

• Builds strong foundations in a dynamic, innovative and enjoyable learning environment

• Supports the needs of learners through a balanced curriculum

• Empowers learners to be socially and globally responsible

The Bradbury School language policy is underpinned by the school mission and vision statements and the following philosophy:

Philosophy

The Bradbury School community believes that language is the basis for all learning and communication. Language learning is viewed as a lifelong process, best developed through immersion in, and exposure to, rich and diverse models of language and literacy.

The school aims to provide a learning environment that supports all students to actively learn language, learn about language and learn through language. There is a shared commitment to achieving this through the provision of meaningful teaching and learning experiences that inspire students through an inquiry approach supported by explicit, targeted teaching.

Teachers at Bradbury understand the developmental process of language learning. They recognise that students differ in their level of language acquisition and in their learning requirements. The development of students’ abilities in speaking, listening, reading and writing, is supported through the delivery of a differentiated teaching program. This addresses the diverse learning needs of all students. All teachers are viewed as Language teachers with the responsibility for addressing students’ language learning needs and facilitating effective communication across all curriculum content areas.

As an internationally minded school the status of all languages is validated through supporting additional language learning and valuing the multilingual abilities of the students. Recognition is given to the role of Language learning in the development of cognitive skills and the benefits derived from the acquisition of additional languages, such as promoting higher order thinking skills and multiple perspectives. Also acknowledged, is the significance of maintaining and enriching mother tongue languages to support student learning and maintain cultural identity. The school community is seen as a valuable source of expertise for fostering language learning and the sharing of language skills and experiences is encouraged.

An awareness of the host country’s culture and language is continually developed through the teaching of Mandarin Chinese at all acquisition levels across the school. The ability to communicate in more than one language is viewed as critical to the development of cultural empathy and open-mindedness- attitudes which are important in developing students as balanced, global citizens who are socially responsible.

Language Profile

Bradbury School is a member of the English Schools Foundation which is located in Hong Kong. The school has a constant enrolment of 720 students aged 4-11 years. It operates 24 mainstream classes, each with 30 students, with 4 classes at each of the Year Levels 1 to 6. The school also caters for 21 students with moderate Special Educational Needs with a Learning Support Centre. These students are supported within the mainstream classes.

Currently there are over 45 nationalities represented in the student population with the majority of students being multilingual, many with more than 2 languages. English and Cantonese are the two most commonly spoken home languages, followed by Hindi, Dutch, Mandarin, and small cohorts of many other languages. Understanding the language population of the school is an ongoing process. Language background data is initially collected from admissions information and parent interviews, and is further monitored by speaking with parents and students and with home language data collected from International School Assessments.

Information about individual students’ language ability in English is gained through the admissions interview process and is then tracked across the school using a wide range of formative and summative assessments.

Language of Instruction

English and Mandarin Chinese are the two official languages of the school’s host country. English is the main language of instruction at Bradbury School with specialist classes held in Mandarin Chinese across all Year levels.

Admissions Policy

Applicants to Bradbury School must demonstrate, through interview and assessment, that they are capable of engaging with an English medium curriculum. Further information about this process and the Language requirements for each Year level can be found on the English School Foundation website at www.esf.edu.hk following the links to Our Schools/Admissions.

Chinese

All students learn Mandarin Chinese (Putonghua) with lessons timetabled regularly across the week. The Programme is taught by a team of qualified teachers and educational assistants who are native speakers.

A differentiated programme delivery caters for the varying range of student abilities and differing Language learning needs. Students with Mandarin Chinese as a mother tongue or with demonstrated native speaker ability are grouped together from across each Year Level. Students for whom Chinese is an additional language receive a differentiated programme delivery within their class group.

The Chinese Team plans collaboratively, both within the team and with class teachers across the school. This facilitates the meaningful incorporation of the teaching and learning of Chinese language across the Programme of Inquiry at all Year levels.

Mother Tongue

The school continues to explore ways in which the development and maintenance of students’ mother tongue languages can be supported. Mother tongue language backgrounds are acknowledged as a resource that students can draw on to make connections with the Language learning needs of English.

A collection of bi-lingual and other language books and resources are maintained in the school Library Resource Centre to support students in maintaining their mother tongue. These resources are regularly updated to reflect the current mother tongue profile of the school population. Members of the school community are regularly invited into school to share their languages through sharing stories with the students. These sessions are advertised to students across the school.

Students are able to access a number of programmes run by ESF Educational Services (owned by the ESF) which assist with the maintenance of mother tongue. These classes operate out of school hours at various ESF schools and at ESF central office. The range of languages being offered in the various schools can be found on the ESF Educational Service website at www.esf.org.hk.

Interpreters are organized on request for any parent who would prefer to conduct conversations or interviews through their mother tongue. Office and reception staff are also available to assist with day to day interactions with parents in a number of languages.

English as an Additional Language

The learning needs of students with English as an Additional Language (EAL) are addressed within the classroom learning environment. All teachers are seen as EAL teachers with responsibility for making explicit the language learning needs of English for all students.

The skills and understandings that EAL students bring from their mother tongue and other languages are viewed as a strength to be acknowledged and used to support their learning in English. Many staff have specialist training in teaching EAL students in mainstream classrooms and actively employ teaching strategies that support these students in developing their language skills and understandings.

The Language learning needs for each Unit of Inquiry are clearly articulated to support all teachers in their role as EAL teachers. Additional support for EAL students is also provided as part of the Individual Needs support program.

Agreed Practices

• Bradbury School follows the International Baccalaureate (IB) Primary Years Program (PYP). The PYP is an international, concept based curriculum delivered using an inquiry methodology for teaching and learning. As an IB school Language learning is seen as central to all areas of learning.

• Language teaching is also informed by the English Schools Foundation’s Language Scope and Sequence documents. These documents incorporate the PYP Language outcomes and provide further detail in the areas of Speaking and Listening, Reading, Writing, and Viewing and Presenting. These can be found on the school website. www.bradbury.edu.hk , following the links-Learning at Bradbury/Scope and Sequences .

• Language learning is integral to each Unit of Inquiry (UOI) within the PYP and takes on an authentic purpose by being taught within the UOI.

• All teachers collaboratively plan to clearly articulate Language learning outcomes for each Unit of Inquiry and for Language learning that occurs outside the UOI.

• The Language Coordinator, PYP Coordinator and Teacher Librarian are involved in Language planning across the school. This ensures that learning outcomes are aligned across the school that resources are targeted to support the teaching and learning.

• Teachers are committed to providing a stimulating and effective range of evidence based teaching and learning opportunities to develop students’ Language abilities.

• Planning for Language learning is based on students’ prior understandings and skill levels. Ongoing assessment is used to inform teaching and learning to meet the range of students’ learning needs.

• Teachers understand the importance of oral language development as the foundation for Language learning in all other areas.

• Differentiated teaching and learning is delivered using a wide range of strategies. These include, but are not limited to: the use of flexible groupings based on student readiness, interests and abilities; open ended questions and tasks; mixed ability groupings ; guided and cooperative reading groups; peer tutoring; opportunities for student choice, based on interests and strengths.

• Students’ development in Language learning is tracked across the school using a range of formative, summative and diagnostic assessments. This information is used to inform teaching, to provide explicit feedback to students and for reporting to parents.

• Language teaching utilises a ‘gradual release of responsibility’ model, with students being supported in their language development through cycles of explicit teaching and supported learning, through to the independent construction of new knowledge.

• Professional development in Language teaching is targeted to meet teachers’ and students’ needs and is informed by the School Strategic Plan and the annual Language Curriculum Development Plan.

Appendices:

1. Bradbury School Handwriting Policy

Handwriting at Bradbury School

At Bradbury School we believe that handwriting is an essential skill that students must develop during their primary school years. Although word-processing programs and assistive technologies are also important communication tools -legible, efficient handwriting is still an important skill for future education and most types of employment. The explicit teaching of handwriting also provides many cognitive benefits to support literacy and numeracy development and enhances fine motor skill development.

Our aim at Bradbury School is to teach each child to write legibly, fluently and at a reasonable speed. To support this aim a structured, whole school approach to handwriting has been adopted.

• The model used at Bradbury is the Nelson Handwriting font. This is a modern cursive font style widely used in schools overseas (UK, Australia, NZ) and here in Hong Kong. Modern cursive handwriting fonts allow students to move from script to cursive using a natural linking` style. They also allow for personal styles to develop easily once the basic style is mastered.

• The font is taught explicitly across the school using whole class and small group teaching.

• Students progress from a focus on clearly shaped correctly oriented letter formation in the early years, to joining letters and finally a clear fluent style that can be adapted to a range of writing tasks.

• Attention is paid to correct posture and pencil/pen grip to assist with ease of writing.

• Students are involved in regular handwriting practice for a variety of purposes and by Year 6 the focus is on producing legible, efficiently produced handwriting as students develop more individualised styles.

• We respect that our students come to Bradbury from many different countries and have already learnt to write using many different handwriting styles and fonts. Provided the handwriting style is established, legible and efficient the student will be supported to continue using that handwriting style.

• Year level Nelson handwriting resources are provided for each Year Level as a style guide and with an outline of the appropriate order for teaching letter joins,

• Appropriately sized formative pencils are used in Years 1 and 2. Students use pens in their workbooks from Years 4 and 5 onwards, as they gain control and efficiency with their handwriting.

• The use of lined paper facilitates more legible handwriting than unlined paper- the use of developmentally appropriate line spacing, including the use of dotted thirds is reviewed annually.

In developing Bradbury’s academic honesty policy teachers and parents should encourage students to be:

• Inquirers who acquire the skills necessary to conduct inquiry and research.

• Principled; acting with integrity and honesty and taking responsibility for their own actions.

• Open‐minded and accustomed to seeking and evaluating a range of points of view.

• Risk takers who are brave and articulate in defending their beliefs.

• Knowledgeable; exploring concepts, ideas, and issues.

An academically honest student will:

• Appropriately use the help of parents, older siblings, or friends.

• Acknowledge the source of direct quotations when being used for research purposes.

• Reference resources using bibliographies, references and appendices.

• Cite all sources (books, internet, CD ROMs, maps, audio-visual, illustrations and graphs) in suitable format when being used for research purposes.

• Know what constitutes cheating and abides by these agreements.

• Follow test conditions.

An academically honest student will not:

• Copy from another student during assessments.

• Copy another student’s homework or written task and hand it in as their own.

• Directly copy information from primary or secondary sources without referencing its source.

• Complete tasks for another student and/or give another student his/her own work to copy.

• Communicate to anyone during an assessment/test.

Furthermore teachers and parents will:

• Work with students to develop shared understandings about cheating, plagiarism, and other instances of academic dishonesty.

• Teach students to reference sources correctly.

• Actively supervise tests, assessments and research tasks.

• Emphasise, teach and assess note-taking and summarising skills.

• Clearly outline test/assessment expectations to students which value the process, not only the end result

• Encourage students to reflect on the learning process.

Developing life-long readers, thinkers, and learners!

Aims The objective of this policy is to see that our library provides a variety and abundance of materials from all media to support and enrich our school curriculum, to stimulate cultural development, to motivate students to read, and to provide the teaching staff with relevant professional materials.

We aim to achieve this by:

• recognising that everyone is a learner and that learning is continuous

• working collaboratively and supporting each other

• communicating effectively in a variety of ways and in more than one language

• respecting and valuing our own and other people’s cultures

• appreciating that we are all different and that we learn in different ways

• having a balanced approach to life and learning

• striving for excellence in learning

• being active learners who are curious about the world around us

• reflecting on our experiences and learning from them

• sharing responsibility for ourselves and others and believing that our actions can make a difference

• recognising the importance of mother tongue in the development of literacy

We aim to develop learners who are:
Inquirers – Thinkers – Communicators – Risk-Takers – Knowledgeable – Principled – Caring – Open-Minded – Balanced – Reflective
and who demonstrate the following attitudes:

Appreciation – Commitment – Confidence – Cooperation – Creativity – Curiosity – Empathy – Enthusiasm – Independence – Integrity – Respect – Tolerance
 

The Teacher Librarian will: 

• ensure that the Library programme, in its content, design, implementation, assessment and review, shall reflect the Bradbury School philosophy, objectives and policies with library maintenance, purchasing and instruction.

• promote digital citizenship and keep to the guidelines stated in ‘Internet Guidelines for Staff’ and the ‘Responsible Use Agreement’.

• provide materials which will enrich and support the curriculum, taking into consideration the varied interests, abilities, and maturity levels of our students.

• provide materials which will stimulate growth in conceptual understanding, knowledge, literary appreciation, aesthetic values and ethical standards.

• provide background information which will enable our students to make intelligent judgments in their daily life.

• provide materials on both sides of controversial matters so that our students may develop, under guidance, the practice of critical reading and thinking with classroom instructional units.

• place principle above personal opinion in the selection of materials of the highest quality in order to assure a comprehensive collection appropriate to the users of our Library.

• Implement a systematic programme of library and research skills for students and where appropriate teachers.

Criteria for Selection of Library Resources

• Library resources will be chosen to support the mission statement, and the beliefs and values of Bradbury School.

• Library resources will be chosen to support the existing curriculum, as well as the personal needs and interests of library users.

• Library resources will meet high standards of quality in factual content and presentation.

• Library resources will support the transdisciplinary nature of our curriculum.

• Our Library resources will be appropriate for the age, emotional development, ability level, learning style, and social development of the students for whom the materials are selected.

• Library resources will be selected to help students gain an awareness of our global society and reflect the international nature of our curriculum, school and world.

• The selection of Library resources on controversial issues will be directed toward maintaining a diverse collection representing various views.

• Library resources will be selected for their strengths rather than rejected for their weaknesses.

• Library resources will also support the development and provision of the mother-tongue language collection both text and online materials.

• Support the resourcing of units of inquiry.

APPENDIX ON LIBRARY PROCEDURES:

Procedures for Selection of Library Resources

• In selecting Library resources, the librarian will measure available materials against the above criteria and the emerging needs of the curriculum.

• All members of the community will be regularly encouraged to make recommendations for purchase.

• When feasible, the resource itself will be examined.

• Gift materials will be measured against the above criteria, and will be accepted or rejected accordingly. The physical condition of gift material needs to be considered and contributors should have an understanding that the librarian has the discretion to handle the materials how he/she see fit thereafter.

• Resource selection will include the routine removal of outdated and inaccurate materials, as well as the replacement of lost and worn items still of educational value.

Procedures for Library Borrowing and Recess

• Morning Break: students are welcome in the library from 8:10-8:20. They are welcome only for quiet reading, studying, or working on a project. Access to computers will only be allowed for research. (There will be a limit of around 40 students.) Lunch from 12:10-12:40 – Monday-Thursday Y4-6; Lunch from 12:40-1:10 – Monday-Thursday Y1-3

• Students (individually), who are independent users, may come to the library throughout the school day, including recess (Non-fiction section/Early Years Fiction section depending on the class) and are quietly engaged in an activity. They may simply come for checkout as well. If planning to send in a group, please call first. * When there is no adult, the library is off limits.

• Borrowing:

  • Year 1: one book per week (until January, then 2 books per week.)

  • Year 2-4: two books per week

  • Year 5-6: two to four books per week

  • Students may renew a book as long as no holds exist.

  • Reference books are not to leave the library

• Overdues:

  • Students may not borrow if they have an overdue.

  • Overdue notices will go out at the beginning of the month to teachers.

  • Students will be asked to take care of any problem within the month, so that they never go long without checking out a book. Arrangements can be made for students who may not be able to pay for a lost or damaged book.

• Expectations:

  • Same as whole school expectations.

  • Treat the books responsibly.

• Consequences:

  • A look, a talk, back to class, removal of privileges for a specified time.