RIGHTS   RESPECTING   SCHOOLS

At St. Mary’s we are proud to be a UNICEF UK Silver: Rights Aware school.  The Right Respecting Schools Award recognises achievement in putting the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) at the heart of a school’s practice and ethos.

Over the past few weeks we have been  learning more about Rights Respecting Schools.  In P3 we know that all of The UNCRC consists of 54 articles that set out children’s rights.  All of them are important and we  have been focusing on 6 individual rights and in class we created our own class charter. The charter helps everyone to understand the role they play in upholding their rights and those of others.  Also, children have been asked to consider the ways in which adults could support them to make effective choices.

By making our children aware of their rights and how they can respect these, we hope that they can make informed decisions about their learning, health and well-being and become rights-respecting global citizens.

The six articles we are focusing on in P3 are as follows:

Article 1 – All children under the age of 18 has rights.

Article 2 – All children have these rights, no matter who they are.

Article 3 – All adults should make decisions based on what is best for you.

Article 12 – You have the right… to be heard.

Article 19 – You have the right… to be safe.

Article 28 – You have the right to… learn at school.

Primary 3 were asked what they thought about Rights in our school.  Some feedback from P3…

“You need them (rights) to be safe and there’s a lot of them”.

“It’s good to get a chance to have your say and tell everyone what you think”.

“We all have the same rights”.

“You have to be responsible with them.  Like, if you have the right to go to school, you need to listen so you learn”.

“Everyone in the class, even the whole school has got the same rights”.

“Our charter has all the rights on it that we are learning”.

“No one has the right to take away yours (rights)”.

“I like all the rights”.

“I like article 2 because it means we all have rights no matter what”.

“We should have respect“.