Bristol standard anyone?

[Guest]

Hi I have been to a training course today re Bristol standard and am seriously thinking of signing up for it with my reception class. I would be really interested in hearing how other people have got on with it any pitfalls? What are you thoughts?

Deb

[Inge]

I did it a while ago now for preschool, but I know it was due to change and not seen any recent stuff..

 

I really liked it.. a good self assessment tool, easy to get to grips with, and made us focus on the child .. It can be time consuming gathering the information and evidence together... but taken step by step was not too much,, found it less than the last Ofsted SEF which we never did.

 

Not working any more so really cannot help any further... (other than I used to validate and many schools did them... assuming it is still similar .. my tip would be to ensure you focus on the child benefits at all times... this is where many schools failed to pass and had to resubmit... )

[mundia]

Hi deb, Im a mentor and vaildator for the Bristol Standard too, and I agree with Inge, its quite a piece of work. It can be hard to do on your own though, so if you have parallel classes can you get together?. If you have a TA, you need to involve them too. Check out your LA to see if they hold network clusters so that you can connect with others.

You should be allocated a mentor, who will go through one of the dimensions with you.

[Guest]

Hi I am also a mentor and validator for the Bristol Standard and have done it with my own Early Years setting for the last seven years. It is quite a lot of work but such a fantastic team building exercise. The whole team needs to work together and this is vital - so much gets done and changed on the way - people become very motivated and as you get ideas for the action plans so little things changed straightaway. It gets everybody singing from the same hymn sheet. It is also a good file of evidence to pass to Ofsted [not sure whether they look at it but I have always given it to them with pride!] You start from where you are! The idea of it is that it is a reflection tool on what you already do well and where you want to go next, compiling evidence for those strengths and making a plan for the next step.

 

The first year where you are doing a full submission is the hardest, the second and third years are a smaller amount of work as you are follwing up on the main submission. The fourth year is back to the full file but by that time it is easier as you know what you are doing!

 

Good luck - well worth it :1b

[HappyMaz]

Welcome to the Forum, littlemouse. Congratulations on making your first post - it is great to have advice from someone who has been there, done that and got the Bristol Standard!

[Guest]

thanks all for your input, i have signed up for it and have been allocated a mentor who i already know from the early years team, someone who i used to teach with years ago so am pleased. We start after Christmas, i kind of didn't really have a choice in the end as my head was pushing for it. My county are really championing it and are hoping to involve as many schools as possible. I have a good GTP student this year so that should help with freeing me up a little to get things done.

deb