Proud to launch our first ever Primary Dragons Den 

Year 5 primary pupils wholeheartedly embraced the opportunity to take part in our first ever Primary Dragons Den programme last week. 

Pupils in Year 5 from all our primary schools came together at Haberdashers’ Hatcham Primary on Wednesday 22 March for the launch of our new Primary Dragons Den programme. Run in partnership with Envision UK, the programme aims to empower young people to tackle social problems affecting their community and support them to make changes whilst building their skills beyond the classroom.

 

 

The programme will run until the end of June and will support the pupils involved to design, develop and deliver a social action project that will make a positive change in their school. Culminating in a final Dragons’ Den style pitch presentation to a group of judges, the pupils will share how their project has gone and the impact it has had with a view to come in top place.

Whilst some healthy competition is a way to engage and encourage pupils, most importantly this will be an opportunity for them to develop confidence and essential skills in communication, creativity, determination and teamwork – a core element of the Envision programmes.

Our Director for School Improvement (Primary), Sarah Mitchell said:

Our secondary schools have been working with Envision for some time and it’s great to see a programme like this being offered to our primary pupils. It has been partly inspired by the Livery Academy Awards that our sixth formers participate in each year.

Research shows that children as young as 8 are thinking about future careers so for us, this is an important part of the Haberdashers’ Advantage character education curriculum and an exciting way to cultivate children’s interest, exposing them to different opportunities that help prepare them for later life. We are excited to see the wonderful ideas that come from this.

By the end of the programme, pupils will have:

• Developed essential skills through designing, developing and delivering a social action project
• Built confidence through working collaboratively and overcoming obstacles
• Deepened understanding of effective social action and how to be a responsible citizen

During the session, pupils were asked to think about issues that affect them and their peers. Our Year 5s took to the discussions with enthusiasm and energy, and settled on an idea per school team that they can plan SMART objectives around and deliver. Each school decided on their team name and their initial project proposal:

School	Team name	Proposal
Hatcham Primary	Twelve Stars	Creating a meditation space / sensory room to promote wellbeing in school.
Hatcham Free School	Food Fighters	Food fair – food donations and fund raising for local food bank.
Knights Primary	Tactic Twelve	Developing friendships between different year groups.
Slade Green Primary	Uniform United	Tackling uniform poverty – second-hand uniform sales.
Crayford Primary	Ambitious Athletes	Encouraging people to be active – activities for break and lunchtimes.

 They will take these ideas back to their school to get feedback and make a final decision on what their social action project will focus on. We can’t wait to see how they get on and how their projects progress. Good luck to all teams!

Director of Enrichment, Emma Fearnley said about the programme:

It’s incredibly exciting to see our primary pupils embracing this opportunity. There was a great sense of energy and focus in the room with plenty of ideas flowing. Providing chances like this for our younger pupils means they can build the important skills and foundations they’ll need later in life and will leave school more confident and determined.