SCHOOL OF THE WEEK: Ystruth Primary School

Perhaps it begins with the school’s stunning location in Blaina, nestled deep in the valley complete with a playground which looks out towards mountains on both sides.

Or maybe it is the strong emphasis on using the expressive arts – including opera, art and cookery – to teach the school’s varied curriculum.

Most likely, head teacher Elizabeth Harris says, it is the children and staff who make the school such a happy place to be.

“They are the most important people here,” says Mrs Harris, who has led the school as head teacher since it first opened in 2003.

“People comment on how lovely the children are. You can feel it when you walk into the school, what a lovely community school we have.

“It’s a warm, welcoming place which you can’t have without staff commitment. You can train teachers to be teachers but to have that emotional wealth to invest, that’s a special thing.”

Mrs Harris said a lot of her teachers have trained at the school and wanted to stay on. “Every member of staff brings different things to the school, skills which need to be passed down through generations.”

It is the “community spirit” at the school which makes it such a success story, she added.

And a success story it is, after the school was named just one of two “green” primary schools in Blaenau Gwent under the new rating system for schools which was unveiled in January this year.

Ystruth Primary and Abertillery Primary School – who Mrs Harris collectively calls the “green team” – were the only two of Blaenau Gwent’s 24 primary schools who were rated in the highest banding, which is based on performance. The bands are green, yellow, amber and red.

The school, which counts 321 pupils, is equally proud of its other accolades. It was the first school in Blaenau Gwent to receive both the national quality award of the Welsh Network of Healthy School Schemes and the eco-platinum award. The school was also named a Rights Respecting School with Unicef.

For head teacher Mrs Harris, who started her career as a secondary teacher of home economics and cookery, she is pleased to see the emphasis placed on the “expressive arts” following a major review of curriculum in Wales.

The Welsh Government-commissioned review, carried out by academic Graham Donaldson in March 2014, gathered evidence from more than 700 people. It has recommended a bigger focus on digital competences, life skills including health and well-being, and the expressive arts.

Mrs Harris said: “I have been very concerned that the expressive arts are being forgotten but under the new Donaldson review the curriculum is now embracing the expressive arts.

“Now, we use all the subject areas as a vehicle to explore the creative arts.”

It is clear the creative arts are both encouraged, closely entwined and enjoyed in the school’s curriculum.

One recent example of how more practical, life-skill related subjects are being intertwined with academic studies is the Greek picnic activity.

To chime in with both “the revival of cooking in the Great British Bake Off and the pupils’ studies of ancient and modern Greece”, activities were organised to create and eat a Greek picnic.

Pupils studied the history and then made Greek salad and pitta breads to bring their studies alive.

“Literacy and numeracy is used throughout the whole curriculum, we want to link it together and use the arts to bring the curriculum alive.

“Everybody has an opportunity to cook throughout the school, from nursery, the children are making gingerbread because of the tale The Gingerbread Man tale.”

It is a team approach which Mrs Harris said makes the school so successful. She said: “Our school motto is TEAM – Together Everybody Achieves More.

“And what’s been really nice is the community links, we have links with community first too. Every Friday morning, parents come in and work alongside children in the school making healthy meals. We’ve had excellent parental engagement for that.”

Positivity and consideration for others is also something which is greatly promoted among the school. “Mood-hoovers” and “lemon-suckers” are not encouraged, Mrs Harris said: “They are a bit like Eeyore, ever so gloomy”.

The pupils across all years also do a programme called SEAL – Social and Emotional Aspects and Learning. The programme, which is incorporated into the curriculum, is all about friendship, relationships and supporting each other and there is a new theme each term.

Every morning pupils volunteer at breakfast club, which distributes breakfast to about 50 pupils before school. The volunteers also distribute 192 milk bottles to children in nursery, reception, Year 1 and Year 2 as well as the special autism classes.

Ystruth Primary is the only school with autism provision in Blaenau Gwent and counts 12 children in their two classes.

The classes for the children with autism – the younger “robins” and older “owls” – also contains a relaxation light room for therapy in case the children get anxious.

Mrs Harris said the four robins and the eight owls have a 50 per cent inclusion policy with the rest of the school.

“They do need to learn skills of being in a social environment. They go shopping and do swimming once a week. It gets them out in structured ways. They all come in to assembly every morning. Inclusion is something which is very high up on the agenda.”

The pupils are also signed up to a buddy system where they make friends with another pupil in the school.

It seems a nice place to be, which is only built upon with the range of extra-curricular activities the school offers.

Seven-year-old Rhys Selwood, 7, and Year 6 pupils Ellie Bath and Ellie Selwood, describe the range of activities at the school – which include beat-boxing, library club, cricket and knitting,

Each Friday afternoon the children get to choose an activity to do during Beetime – time set aside to “broaden, enrich and empower”.

Mrs Harris said it is important to also “break down barriers” in the kind of activities they do and recently a team from the Welsh National Opera visited to do a day-long workshop on the art form which can often seem exclusive.

The school has not been without its challenges, including coming to terms with the shock of losing 35-year-old teaching assistant Emma Thompson in 2012.

But Mrs Harris said despite tragedy, the school stays positive. “Other challenges we have include the need to continue to maintain certain standards and also continuing to strive for the best.

“We need to go over and above ourselves and maintaining and building on what we are doing well.

“Also adapting to use the new technologies which were introduced is a big one. Computing is now part of the new curriculum and we need to keep children up-skilled for the future.

“But I don’t see these as challenges I see them as opportunities.”

And that seems to be the atmosphere which resonates throughout the school. Whether it be from widening the curriculum or the school’s unique autism provision, offering opportunity seems to be high on the agenda.