At Tollgate we share a set of beliefs and approaches to support our response to the ECM 5 outcomes – being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution, economic wellbeing: 

* that teachers in each year group, planning and working together, will enable pupils in each parallel class to gain an ‘equal entitlement’ of teaching and experiences
* that by adhering to school policies we enable pupils to experience a continuity of approach, which helps them to feel settled and ready to learn
* that behaviour management is best achieved through the principle of ‘choices’, which we sometimes need to help children to make. All choices have consequences. We do not believe that extrinsic rewards or punishments are the best way to help children with these choices.
* that when pupils make bad choices, we criticise the choice, not the pupil.
* that an explicit set of lifeskills helps children understand the choices they make, and the strategies they employ
* that it is better to express instructions to pupils in positive, not negative, language.
* that we should foster, by example, a whole school ethos of caring about all school members, whether or not they are in our group, class or Key Stage
* that mind maps are a useful tool for pupils - helping them to think about their learning, to classify and see links 
* that we should foster healthy lifestyles by encouraging physical activity, food awareness, water drinking, fruit eating and milk drinking, plus advice for parents about healthy lunchboxes 
* that engaging pupils through creative approaches is a more effective teaching strategy than a diet of worksheets 
* that we should support pupils developing social skills by making a ‘shell’ available in every class for pupils to withdraw to when necessary 
* that early intervention, when indicated by Boxall profiling, will be through access to a Nurture Group. This access will take precedence over other curricular activities. 
* that P4C (Community of Enquiry) methods develop pupils’ thinking and comprehension 
* that pupils should be enabled to make a positive contribution to the running of the school