Pupil voice in school means a whole-school commitment to listening to the views, wishes and experiences of all children. At Byker Primary School we value what children and young people tell us about their lives, acknowledging we all have different experiences, knowledge, skills and support and this can impact how we manage challenges throughout the day. We encourage our children to have a voice and talk about their experiences, strengths in their lives, as well as the challenges. We encourage them to look at how they can overcome challenges and reflect that sometimes we need to let others in to support us over these challenges. One tool we use to help us gather children’s voices is Three Houses.

The Three Houses tool is a resources used to help children identify things in their life they feel positive about, things they are worried about, and what their hopes and goals are.

At Byker Primary School we want children to feel confident about feeling safe in school, to have skills and knowledge to support them to minimise risks and protect themselves and others and most importantly to raise concerns if they do not feel safe. We give children opportunities to talk to adults in class and within the wider school about their worries and as a school we act upon this. We have shared a child friendly version of our safeguarding policy which goes into more detail about what we do to support children. Lessons and the behaviour scheme in school support children rights to feel safe and that they have a responsibility to help keep everyone safe.