Ofsted Outstanding

The Avonwood House System

Upon entering Key Stage 2, all children are assigned to one of the four houses (Amazon, Congo, Kinabalu or Tongass) and along with everyone else in their house, they get to compete against other pupils, from the opposing houses, for the House Cup. This house system clearly matches our behaviour and reward system where children move up and down the ‘Rainforest Layer and they receive an APE point if they go up to the ‘Emergent Layer’. 

APE points are also awarded to our children via the Avonwood house points system. Ape points are awarded for the following areas of excellence...

A – Attitude 

For this, children need to go above and beyond in their attitude to others. This could mean displaying a significant kind or gentle attitude to another pupil.  It could be in word or deed, for example praising the work of others or taking a new pupil under their wing.  
 
This could also relate to written work along with class discussions, where a child has appeared to do or give more to their work. They may write more or focus more for a sustained period of time. They may attempt to give more concentration or contributions to class discussions or try even harder to make the right choices.

P – Presentation 

The pupil has gone above and beyond their usual standard of presentation. For example, where writing maybe inconsistent in size, the pupil has worked hard to maintain a steady correctly sized legible and joined script. A further example might be around the use of tables or diagrams, where a pupil has made a concerted effort to produce a well presented, underlined and neatly shaded work. 

E – Effort or Earth Charter 

This is an opportunity to acknowledge when a child goes above and beyond with something in school that relates to our Earth Charter ethos. It is deliberately broad and designed for teachers to creatively look for opportunities to catch the children living up to our Earth Charter values. 

They add a small sticker in house colours to their class reward chart. 25 points = Bronze Award, 50 points = Silver Award and 75 points = Gold Award. Each award means a trip to our Headteacher Award Shop to choose a prize! An APE certificate for their achievement is also rewarded.

Every week, on Friday, the A.P.E (Attitude, Presentation and Effort) point monitors collect the A.P.E points won by the students that week in class, and they present the winning house at the assembly. The house in 1st place will receive twenty tokens in their tube, 2nd place house will be gifted fifteen  tokens, 3rd place house will get ten tokens and the last place house will receive five tokens. Along with this, the winning house is crowned the House Cup until the next week. You can see the picture of the display in its early days.  Adding on to the A.P.E points you can earn in class, there are many other opportunities in which you can gain major points for your house such as our inter-house competitions and challenges. So far, this has included a general knowledge quiz, running competition, Times Table Rockstar competitions and an ‘Avonwood’s Got Talent’ competition. There also many more opportunities planned throughout the year, such as sports day, world book day quizzes and much more!

Below, you will find a summary from our house captains in Year 6, who help organise events, organise the children and their houses and present in assemblies each week.

House Captains

Tongass: Xavi and Chloe

Xavi

Why I like to be a House Captain:  I like that I get to sit at the front of the hall at assembly! I’m happy that I get to represent my house at Sports Day and other competitions. 

Chloe

What I do as House Captain: We help to collect up APE points at the end of the week and help to announce them during assembly. - Chloe

Kinabalu: Elsa and Ethan

Elsa

Why I like to be a House Captain: I really enjoy going round the school to collect APE points and announcing the winner in assembly. 

Ethan

What I do as House Captain: As a House Captain, we collect APE points for our House competitions, represent our Houses at Sports Day and help set up the hall for assemblies.

Congo: Lottie and Zak M

Lottie

Why we wanted to be a House Captain: Our older siblings were House Captains when they were in Year 6, and we really wanted to do the same.

Zak M

What I do as House Captain: You get to have responsibilities and take part in helping with all the interhouse competitions throughout the school year.

Amazon: Mollie and Reuben

Mollie

Why we wanted to be a House Captain: We wanted to be House Captains to support our House, plus we really like adding up the APE points at the end of the week!

Reuben

What I do as House Captain: We help to organise interhouse competitions like Benchball and Cross Country. We act as role models for our House and hopefully will inspire the younger children to want to get involved when they are older.

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