Critical Thinking

At Prospect House critical thinking and reasoning form an important part of our curriculum. Critical thinking is the ability to think clearly and rationally about what to do or what to believe. It includes the ability to engage in reflective and independent thinking, something we feel develops our children’s communication skills and confidence. The children have the opportunity to think creatively, expand their vocabulary and express their opinions and thoughts with accuracy and enquiry.

We believe that there are numerous benefits from mastering critical thinking skills, such as better control of the children’s own learning and empathy for other points of view. Critical thinking has been named ‘the art of thinking about thinking’ and is thought to improve each child’s own thinking. At Prospect House, we endeavour to create a learning environment that both supports and also promotes reasoning skills and critical thinking within the classroom and beyond.

Building Character

Nurturing self-confidence

Some children have the good fortune to be privately educated at schools with the drive, experience and resources to teach children to think for themselves.

At Prospect House School children learn their personal choices can make a real difference, and their opinion matters. Equally importantly, they learn to respect the opinions of others.

They learn the value of endeavour and of staying power, of developing social skills and of forming respectful relationships.

Our children feel confident and valued, so they are not worried about making mistakes and are willing to ‘have a go’. This eagerness to be involved and make a contribution is one of the most valuable life skills we nurture in our pupils.

Tracking Progress

Tracking individual progress

We monitor progress using teachers’ assessments combined with tests which provide standardised national norms. This allows us to track the individual progress of every child.

Testing is operated unobtrusively to the point that younger children do not even realise they are being tested. Little do they know their results allow us to fine-tune their personalised learning programme.

Whole-school screening is also used at various points to make sure children are reaching their potential.

Learning Support

Helping every child to fly

Alongside the observations of staff, the school’s screening programme is specifically designed to detect, at an early stage, those children who may need additional help.

Children may experience difficulty with some aspects of their learning or they may have a specific diagnosis such as dyslexia.

All our specialist support teachers are qualified to work with children with specific learning difficulties. We also have close ties with a speech and language therapist, physiotherapist and visual perceptual therapist, who can all help to support the children in school.

Learning support is a positive experience to ensure every child makes the best possible progress. Lessons support work in the classroom and teach strategies to support any specific difficulties.

Gifted and Talented

Talent spotting is part of our job. If a child if gifted in a particular discipline we build a personalised programme providing the challenge of advanced problem-solving techniques, answering open-ended questions and learning to apply the processes they have been taught in class to unfamiliar contexts.

Children with particular talent in sport, music and drama are encouraged to nurture their skills through deliberate practice, and opportunities to perform, remembering that, from a growth mindset perspective, ‘hard work beats talent when talent does not work hard’ (Tim Notke).