As part of our ongoing work about the curriculum at Deerpark, pupils and parents have identified skills development as a priority. As a result of this we have begun ‘Master classes’ on a Friday afternoon.

All learners have an opportunity to ‘sign up’ to a variety of Master classes to provide opportunities for skills development within the school day.

Some P7 learners have provided reports about their master classes:

Mindfulness – ‘In my Master Class we learn how to be calm and relaxed by doing things that make us feel happy. Some of the activities we have done are painting, clay, drawing, slime and yoga. The reason we have Master Classes is to help us gain new skills. We have mainly worked on self management. I am grateful I get to relax and develop my skills on a Friday.’ (Evie)

‘Musical theatre master classes – I really like master classes because people get an opportunity to do stuff they may not get to do outside of school and we can do stuff that you wouldn’t normally do in class. The only thing is I just wish they were a little longer because it’s very fun and helpful for life skills. I think it’s great that we get to do different stuff and that we got a third second and first choice on them because that choice was very fair. Moreover, I enjoy that we get half an hour for this stuff because sometimes school can be quite stressful but getting to do this on Friday afternoon is fun and I always enjoy it because in musical theatre we get to show emotions and work together as a team. Thank you for reading!’ (Lexie)