Curious Minds

Thumbs up from CCE

Helen Burns from Creativity, Culture and Education paid a visit to Curious Minds recently and was extremely impressed by the quality of creative teaching and learning she saw in schools who have been part of the Creative Partnerships programme.

Visiting Castercliff Primary School in Nelson she learnt how the school was working with drama practitioner Jenny Harris across classes in KS1 and 2. Jenny has been on a longterm residency working alongside teachers to create amazing literacy lessons – for example, children made recipes based on their favourite genre of writing, or created an Ancient Egyptian marketplace  and used persuasive speeches to sell each other real grapes. Hard haggling honed those all important communication skills and created a model for teachers to use when the programme finishes.

Moving to Whitefield Infants School, also in Nelson, Helen saw how the creative curriculum underpins everything the school does. Staff have networked with cutting edge practice in Barcelona, Italy and the Netherlands to support their creative journey and the school still works with creative practitioners and uses a creative approach to all its teaching.

Many thanks are extended from CCE and Curious Minds to the schools for these inspiring visits.