Talking heads: Ruth O’Sullivan, Holmewood House School
We caught up with Ruth O’Sullivan, head of Holmewood House, a co-educational, non-selective prep situated in 30 acres of glorious grounds in Tunbridge Wells. She reveals the five key features she’s looking to enhance in her time at the helm…
This is a really exciting time to be a Head, as the educational landscape is changing so much. At Holmewood House School we have embraced a ‘growth mindset’ culture for our whole school community, which encourages intellectual curiosity and builds resilience in an environment where it is safe to get things wrong.
With the onset of artificial intelligence, we are preparing children for jobs that don’t yet exist, so offering a curriculum that enables and expects children to pose lots of questions, to problem solve and to be able to work collaboratively is at the core of what we do.
We are hugely excited to be working on the following areas:
My Heart My Mind My World
If you were to sum up Holmewood House and try to understand our ethos, it would be best described through our My Heart My Mind My World curriculum. It is through this that we live our school values of Self Belief, Aspiration and Kindness and it is central to everything else that we do.
Through extensive training for our teachers on early childhood development, we have begun to deliver a curriculum that helps children to understand and deal with their big emotions (My Heart), to understand how they learn as individuals (My Mind) and to understand their privilege in the world and their responsibility to the planet (My World). We see pastoral care as inextricably linked to attainment- happy children learn better, so we are super excited about this development.
Skills Based Learning
Using skills to apply knowledge will really help to prepare our pupils for all aspect of life ahead and this process should start as early as possible. Knowledge anchors us, but what we do with that knowledge can be deepened and accelerated by acquiring skills that help us to challenge our current thinking, to be flexible in our thinking and ultimately to find new ways of doing things.
Both throughout the broad curriculum and in our enrichment afternoons, we offer lots of opportunity for children to learn new skills and to practise others. Collaboration is a key focus, alongside STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art and maths), creative skills and independent project work.
Leadership and Independence
I am a passionate educationalist with an interest in educational research and my main area of study is pupil voice and leadership. Authentic pupil voice, encourages and empowers children to be idea generators, creatives, and resilient human beings.
Facilitating their ideas and helping them to make things happen really improves relationships between teachers and pupils and grows self esteem and confidence. While there are opportunities for some of this, there is so much more we can do, so this is a development I am keen to pursue.
Outdoor Learning
We believe that every child should be given the opportunity to experience lessons beyond the traditional classroom. There are physiological, academic and social benefits to learning outside. Research shows that learning outside can boost attainment (attributed to the hands-on aspect and true-life experience), can improve socialisation skills such as collaboration, forming relationships and empathy and can improve health and wellbeing through connection to nature.
We value the importance of a childhood lived at school, so we encourage our pupils to climb trees, make dens and enjoy the great outdoors. We have just re-vamped our pond and outdoor learning area which is an amazing resource and we are developing forest school.
Digitally Enhanced Learning
A positive that came from lockdown is that we have all become much more adept at using technology. I am interested in exploring further how we use technology to properly enhance learning, as opposed to being used because we think we should. We are looking at the benefits and possibilities of using different platforms, apps and kit to teach new skills.
Computer science is hugely important in today’s world and the practical application of this through programming is very popular in schools. Technology is a game changer for those of us who are neuro-diverse and new things are coming out all of the time. There are many adaptive platforms now, which means that we can differentiate for each child individually within the lesson – the computer ‘adapts’ the content to the child’s level.
While this new technology is wonderful, schools need to think carefully about how much time their pupils are on these programmes. The interaction with the teacher and the focus on soft skills should not be lost – a ‘happy hybrid’ is where I think we should be aiming.
See for yourself: At the Holmewood House School Open Morning on Fri 4 Nov. Contact the registrar, Mrs Caroline Mulley directly for more information or Book your place here.
Holmewood House, Langton Green, Tunbridge Wells TN3 0EB, Tel: 01892 860000, holmewoodhouse.co.uk