Skip to content ↓
Summerhill School

Summerhill School

Tutor Time

At Summerhill School each year group, and each House follows a bespoke Tutor Programme every morning.  Students arrive at school through their designated House doors, where their first point of contact for the day is their respective House Officers and Heads of House.        

We believe it is imperative for the first twenty minutes of the day, that every student begins their time at school with their pastoral points of contact and so as soon as they are admitted through their House doors, the students make their way to their House tutor.

House assemblies run every week, in which students from each of the Houses make their way to the Main Hall which is flooded in their house colour lights in order to be able to be given key messages; House news; competition results and Heads of House focus on the assembly theme for the week. 

Years 7 – 10 are engaged on a weekly basis with the Votes for Schools programme.  In this session students engage with key aspects of the curriculum for SMSC, British Values & Prevent, as well as meeting many other areas.  It is a platform in which learners have a voice on topical events in the world, and the programme engages in hundreds of organisations to ensure that their voices are heard.

Every Tuesday, each House is engaged with our “Tracker Tuesday” programme in which students throughout the school engage in conversations with their form tutor about the importance of attendance. This time gives the students the chance to talk to their form tutor regarding any concerns they have, and enables the opportunity for particular support to be put in place.

Each week during Tutor Time, every student and member of staff drops everything and reads for 15mins. An oasis of calm and focus, students are encouraged to reflect upon what they have read by taking part in a focused discussion. We also offer students a recommended reading list to inspire students' book choices and guide them into a world of reading for pleasure.

This year we have built into our tutor programme a mindfulness and well-being session to help support our learners regarding their mental health.  There are a range of activities which are gone through with the students in order to be able to teach them methods to deal with how they are feeling and help to build emotional and mental resilience to the challenges they may face in life