Why OPAL?
At Radstock, we believe in developing the whole child and that every experience has the opportunity to be a learning experience. This includes at lunchtime, which is why we decided to become an OPAL school. We have developed our lunchtime provision so the children are excited to play, and to learn through this play. It is important to remember that although 'childhood has changed, children have not'. With statistics showing that by the age of seven the average child will have spent a full year of 24-hour days watching recreational screen media, we need to play our part in challenging children to become resilient and emotionally regulated individuals by providing opportunities to overcome challenge and fear.
Playtime makes up 1.4 years of a child's primary education so let's make it worthwhile!
What are the benefits of OPAL?
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Physical activity: 100% of girls and SEN more active
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Resilience, perseverance, decision-making and determination
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Creativity, language skills and storytelling
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Mathematical language, engineering and science
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Social and emotional skills
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Environmental awareness
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Improved positive behaviour
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Less accidents and incidents
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More on task on return to class
Risk vs Benefit
The easiest way to manage risk is to remove the activity. However:
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This also removes all benefit
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It denies children essential learning
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It puts children at greater risk in future
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It denies the right to play.
Risk is going beyond what is already known and easily achievable
“If we never took a risk our children would not learn to walk, climb stairs, ride a bike or swim: business would not develop innovative products...scientists would not experiment and discover, we would not have great art, literature, music and architecture.”
Jones, D, Cotton Wool kids
Before we introduce anything new to our provision we look at the risk vs the benefit. We then have an assembly with the children to discuss this before agreeing on how we will play in this area/with this item in a manner that keeps us safe from unnecessary risk. These are shared with our trained Play Team who support the children in their play throughout the lunch period.
