At High Wycombe Church of England School, we have planned for a diverse PE curriculum which meets the National Curriculum.  Each child receives two hours of high quality PE teaching using various spaces within our school environment.  All classes have one Games lesson and another PE lesson.  Throughout the year, we are also fortunate to have sports coaches who provide enriching sports sessions where the children are encouraged to be further motivated to improve their skills and think critically about their performance. 

Our curriculum has been carefully planned to provide a progression of skills and knowledge that allows each child to steadily develop abilities before the end of their primary education, therefore allowing them to take on their experiences and a level of confidence to their next stage in education.  The children in our school have additional opportunities where they can take part in class competitions, out-of-school competitions and extracurricular activities, allowing them to develop these skills further and apply what they have learnt to other sporting events. 

As a whole school, we apply for and participate in various inter and intra-sporting competitions, which contribute to us participating in the School Games Award scheme.  As a community, we value participation in these competitive school events, but also understand that some individuals do not thrive in competitive circumstances and may not wish to contribute in the same way and at the same level.  Therefore, we support children to use a positive growth mindset where they can have a go, try their best and if they don’t succeed at first, then to try again later. We acknowledge that each individual child should have a personal target befitting of their comparative capabilities. As a whole school, we wish to support the children having positive experiences of being physically active, and we have an inclusive approach where we all value the importance of physical and mental well-being. 

The children take part in a wide range of invasion, striking and fielding, throwing and catching, net and wall games, dance, gymnastics and alternative sports.  By taking part in this breadth of activity, we believe it allows all children to explore their own creativity and imagination.  We are proud of the extended events we promote in the school, such as ‘Healthy Heroes Week’ where all children participate in athletics events using indoor and outdoor spaces with multiple adventurous activities.  All pupils are invited to take part in after-school clubs, and we invite multiple children to participate in competitions outside of school.  In year 6, the children are invited on a residential trip whereby they will participate in a wide range of physically challenging activities where they use a multitude of skills and build self-confidence and teamwork.  Consequently, these experiences have been proven to have a positive effect on children’s self-esteem and confidence levels, thereby improving their emotional health and wellbeing. 

Breaktimes are a fundamental part of the school day routine.  Because of this, we aim to optimise this opportunity by offering lunchtime supervisors and several upper key stage two children training to deliver and supervise a variety of games for the children.  This has allowed the children to adopt a happy, healthy and ready-to-learn-like approach.  We have a multitude of outdoor playing environments for the children and a selection of play-based equipment which the children and adults can utilise to start games, or otherwise promote various skills such as team building, cooperation and a philosophy to keep trying.  EYFS also has use of their own outdoor play area and an area of space used for smaller scale forest school activities.  Both of these provide children with the opportunity to develop and improve fundamental gross and fine motor skills as well as developing communication and teamwork. 

To develop leadership skills, eight children from Year 6 can nominate themselves as sports leaders/house captains from each of the school's house teams; 'Riders', 'Bikers', 'Surfers' and 'Skaters'.  This gives older children an opportunity to develop their leadership and communication skills.  Sports Leaders/House Captains contribute widely to the school ethos in areas such as the sports achievement assemblies, monitoring and evaluating PE in the school, encouraging all children to participate in extracurricular activities and promoting positive physical and mental wellbeing.  These children are carefully selected to be positive role models for the younger members of the school, helping to organise playtime games and assisting in our ‘Healthy Heroes’ week. 

As well as within our PE curriculum, we are strong believers in promoting an active learning attitude in the classrooms to reduce any sedentary routines.  Staff carefully monitor active learning minutes as well as use a variety of online and physical resources to increase physical movements.  We also encourage all children to participate in our ‘Run a Mile’ on a regular basis in accordance with the government's requirement for all children to be physically active for 60 minutes per day.