Garnetbank Primary School

Creating a new School Charter

At Garnetbank Primary we already have Class and Playground Charters to help us learn about Children’s Rights. These charters help us to make sure everyone knows their Rights and can enjoy these Rights together.

When we create Charters for our school we explore the UNCRC and all of the Rights within it. We then think about what we can do (children and adults) to help everyone enjoy these Rights – our ‘Rights Respecting actions’.

Charters are a powerful way of learning about the importance of Children’s Rights, what these are and why they are so important.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Throughout June children explored the UNCRC with their teachers and families and chose their favourite Rights for our new School Charter. Our new Rights Respecting Club are currently working with Mrs Simpson to make sure our new School Charter includes everyone’s ideas on which Rights are most special to our school.

 

Look out for news of our new School Charter soon……

 

 

 

_{In February pupils from our school were excited to have the chance to work with 'Rights Info', a human rights charity that works to empower people to understand, respect and celebrate their rights.}

_{Sarah and Jack came along to film children talking about Children's Rights and what they mean to them. This was for a joint project with the Equality and Human Rights Commission to show the importance of opening up discussion around human rights.}

_{Watch 'FairPlay' - RightsInfo's film on Human Rights here...}

 

‘Fairplay’  has had a lot of attention on Twitter – have you watched it yet? You might just recognise some children from Garnetbank if you do!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

UPDATE/ UPDATE/ UPDATE!!

_{Sarah and Jack from 'RightsInfo' have very kindly created a special follow-up video just for us with Garnetbank children talking about Human Rights.  Click on the link below to find out why we think rights are so important.....}

 

 

Our new Playground Charter

 

 

 

Every class has been working with their class teachers and Mrs Simpson to create a new Playground Charter for our school.

 

Just like our Class Charters, the Playground Charter will help us to ‘zoom in’ on important children’s rights which will help us all to make the most of our playtimes together.

Classes worked togather to choose 4 important children’s rights to include in our Playground Charter.

 

              

 

This term the Rights Respecting Schools Steering Group are thinking about the different ways we can make sure everyone enjoys these rights in the playground.

 

 

Promoting Children's Rights

This year our school has been taking part in lots of projects to help other people learn more about Children's Rights and to help children all around the world enjoy their rights.

Our RRS club and Pupil Council were excited to work with Leah from 'WE Schools' in February.  WE Schools is a charitable organisation which works in schools to empower children and encourage them to take an interest in local and global issues.

During our day with Leah she led a whole school assembly and shared a key mesage that - 'no matter your age or where you live, we can all make a positive impact – whether that’s volunteering, fundraising or raising awareness for causes that matter.'

Later, smaller groups of children took part in workshops focussing on the UN's Global Goals and how we can help others enjoy these in our local community.

 

 

 

International Women's Day 2018

 

In March P7 pupils had an inspiring day at the EIS / Glasgow City Council International Women’s Day celebrations at the City Chambers.

Pupils had the chance to listen to inspirational women speakers while teachers explored the dangers of gender stereotyping.

 

 

We love learning about Children’s Rights at Garnetbank Primary School!

 

 2016 Day for Change

 

Day for Change is Unicef UK’s annual fundraising campaign for Unicef’s work to keep children around the world safe. 

A big thank you to everyone who brought along their pennies

for UNICEF's Day for Change fundraising event.

 

We doubled our original target of £200 and in fact raised

£400 for UNICEF.

 

Many thanks to all of our school community for their

generosity!

 

 

This year it's for everyone and we've got a challenge for you.

The challenge is to collect as much loose change as you can from January to May - from around the house, down the sofa, your pockets - and anywhere else you can think of!

All the change you collect will go directly to Unicef’s Children's Emergency Fund to save and protect children caught up in emergencies around the world.

Children are the hardest hit in emergencies. When conflict or disaster strikes, they are put in terrible danger. Many lose their homes, their schools, even their lives. By donating your change today you can help to keep more children safe around the world.

·         £8 can supply high-energy food for a malnourished child for one week

 

·         £26 can pay for a winter kit for a child, including a hat, scarf, gloves, thermal wear, winter boots, underwear and a baby quilt. 

 

·         £100 can provide support for three children who have suffered the distress of war.

At Garnetbank Primary School our Rights Respecting Schools Steering Group encourages all pupils to learn, investigate and consider the importance of children’s rights.  14 pupils from throughout the school were elected by their classmates to join the RRS group.

During our monthly meetings the steering group will take part in practical activities relating to a wide mix of articles contained within the UNCRC.

 

You can read our meeting minutes from January 2016 here.

You can read our meeting minutes from October & November 2015 here.

 You can read our meeting minutes from 2014-2015 here.

 

 

Please click on the link below to access our new whole school Rights Respecting School Policy.

 

Class Charters

This session, to deepen our understanding of Children’s Rights, every class has created their very own Class Charter.

 

The Rights Respecting Schools group are raffling off a tempting Fairtrade food hamper (worth £50) to raise money for The Fairtrade Foundation during this year’s ‘Fairtrade Fortnight’. The group have discovered it costs £150 for a farmer and their family to join up to the Fairtrade initiative. The children decided raising money for this would be a good way to help children around the world enjoy more of their rights as described within the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).

The children wrote letters to nearby supermarkets and were delighted to receive replies from our local Tesco and Co-Operative stores on Sauchiehall Street. The stores both donated £25 worth of good to create our food hamper. Members of our RRS group had a great time choosing the items to go in the hamper.

Please buy a raffle ticket to be in with a chance of winning the hamper whilst also helping overseas farmers and their families join this life-changing initiative. Tickets cost £1 and will be on sale throughout this week (2^nd – 6^th March). The lucky winner and three runners up will be announced on Friday 6^th March. Runners up will each win a delicious Easter Egg donated by our local Sainsbury’s store.

 

 

 

Outright Campaign

As part of UNICEF's 'Outright' campaign to raise awarness levels of children's rights, Primary 7 have been writing letters to Aileen Campbell, the Scottish Minister for Children and Young People.

In their letters the children shared the UNCRC Articles which are the most relevant to them and asked the Minister some rights related questions.

Members of the RRS Steering Group carefully posting off all of our letters!

 

Click on the links below to listen to some of our letters.

 

                             

 

During the month of November Mrs Simpson also visited each class to deliver focus lessons on children's rights and the UNCRC.

 

The new RRS group are looking forward to taking part in activities linked to UNICEF's new  ‘Outright’ campaign which marks the 25^th anniversary of the signing of the UNCRC. This campaign encourages pupils to speak out about children's rights.

 

The steering group, along with P7, will be using 'Craftivism' to spread the word about children's rights - creating colourful bunting which celebrates and shares important articles from the UNCRC.

 

 

 

Primary 7 have also created a new Twitter account to allow them to take part in a unique UNICEF Q&A session on children's rights on Thursday 20th November.

 

 

Find out more about the 'Outright' campaign by clicking here.

 

To access a 'child friendly' version of the Articles conatined within the UNCRC click here.

 

Key principles and provisions of the Convention

The CRC consists of 54 articles. A ‘child’ is defined as every human being below the age of 18. The key provisions are:

• The right to a childhood (including protection from harm)
• The right to be educated (including all girls and boys completing primary school)
• The right to be healthy (including having clean water, nutritious food and medical care)
• The right to be treated fairly (which includes changing laws and practices that discriminate against children)
• The right to be heard (which includes considering children's views)

 

 

Why teach about the Convention?

Teaching children and young people about the CRC means that they can find out about the legal and human rights and responsibilities that underpin society. By learning about the Convention, children and young people in the UK can discover that:

• They have rights
• They should be informed about their rights
• They should be helped to exercise their rights
• They should be able to enforce their rights
• There should be a community of interest to advocate young people’s rights

 

 

We have received a reply to our letters!

We have exciting news. Fiona McLeod, Acting Scottish Minister for Children and Young People, has responded to our letters with a letter of her own and a video message. In her letter and video she answers some of our questions and tells us why upholding children’s rights is so important to her.

Click to read her letter and watch her video message.

Our favourite part of the video is "If you keep speaking, we'll keep listening".