Travel , News & Accreditation
ACADEMIC YEAR 2023-24
Accreditation 2023
In 2023 the school was awarded the Bronze accreditation from TfL Stars. Well done and thank you to the pupils and parents on helping us gain this through our initiatives.
World Car Free Day - September 2023
On Friday 22nd September, children and parents at Our Lady of Grace took part in the World Car Free Day. By taking part we are trying to help improve our school’s air quality, with less cars idling, reduce congestion around our gates, creating a safer environment for pupils and help keep everyone healthy by travelling to school actively.
Parents were asked to leave their car at home and with their children either walk, cycle or scoot or park and stride.
ACADEMIC YEAR 2022-23
Considerate Parking
Thank you to those who entered the ‘Considerate Parking’ Competition run by the School Council.
There were 35 entries and many were of a very good standard.
Well done to everyone that entered.
Junior Citizens
Year 6 classes St Teresa & Oscar Romero, had a brilliant day at Sutcliffe Park where they had the chance to learn all about being Junior Citizens of London. During the visit, they took part in interactive workshops with the police, London Fire Brigade and ambulance service. They also learned how to safely approach dogs as well as how to cross roads safety. A fantastic day of learning and fun.
Transport For London Workshops 13th & 14th June 2023
On Wednesday Reception classes were fortunate to have Ann from TLR to come and talk to us about how to be safe when we are on the road. We learned we had to stop, look, listen, think and hold hands when crossing the road. We were told how to be safe in the winter by wearing reflective material or objects. It was really interesting, it has made us aware of the dangers we could encounter on the road.
In Year 1, we really enjoyed our visit from TfL. We listened carefully to the steps which we can remember to make sure we cross the road safely. We were reminded of what the different colours of a traffic lights means and we loved acting out walking across the road safely.
Year 3 took part in a workshop all about the Green Cross Code and car safety. They discussed the importance of wearing a seatbelt correctly and looked at current UK law. They observed a model car with a passenger in, going down a ramp. It showed the pupils what might happen when a driver stops suddenly and a passenger isn't wearing a seatbelt.
Year 4 have been learning about road safety. John and Sarah from the Royal Borough of Greenwich were here to speak to us about the Green Cross Code and how to keep safe on roads. We took on roles as drivers, pedestrians and an old lady to help us understand why it is important to make sensible choices when walking on the road. They also showed us different road signs and what they mean. Finally, we looked at different road user scenarios and how their choices affected the other road users.
School Travel Policy
The Staff, Governors and School Council worked together to draw up the School Travel Policy which you can find below:
In our bid to reduce congestion at the school gates, we are working with parents and the Greenwich School Travel Plan Co-ordinator. We are planning various initiatives to help us do this. Please see the letter below for more information:
Walk to School Week - May 2023
Park and Stride Letter to Parents
Accreditation 2022
In 2022 the school was awarded the Bronze accreditation from TfL Stars. Well done and thank you to the pupils and parents on helping us gain this through our initiatives.
Park and Stride
As you may be aware, we are working very hard to try to reduce congestion at the school gates and encourage more of our pupils to walk or scoot now the weather is getting warmer.
We hope that by doing this, the school entrance will be a safer place, encouraging more families to walk and cleaning up the air quality in the process.
We understand that not all families are able to walk the whole way to school due to distance, parental work commitments or a variety of other reasons, but one way you can help is by taking part in a Park and Stride initiative.
This is a simple initiative where parents and carers are encouraged to park their car approximately a 10 minute walk away from school and then walk the rest of the way with their children.
We would like all parents to try and park in Charlton Road or surrounding streets and walk the rest of the way, at least one day a week (ideally more).
Thank you for your continued support.
Road Safety
Children in EYFS took part in a lesson to learn about road safety and to highlight safer ways to travel. They covered crossing the road, safer crossing places, travelling safely and safer journeys.
They enjoyed getting involved in the activities and are looking forward to a visit from our local lollipop man, Dave.
Walk to School
We need all our community to help us in maintaining our TfL Stars accreditation by continuing to support our initiatives - Walk to School, Car Free Day, Big Peddle etc.
As the school reaches its maximum capacity, congestion at the start and end of the day will become an issue so please help us by reducing car use. We all need to play our part!
WOW Badge Competition
Children from schools around the country were invited to take part in the Living Streets annual badge design competition.
The theme this year is 'Wonders of the World' and its a great opportunity for our schoool to take part in a fun, engaging and educational competition.
The children did some fantastic designs but we were only allowed to send off a few entries. Well done to Erin (Yr 6) and William (Yr 5) whose designs were chosen to be sent off on behalf of the school.
Accreditation 2019
We did it again! Our Lady of Grace has retained its Gold status for a further year with an amazing reduction of car usage by parents. Thank you to everyone for supporting us in making travel to and from school more sustainable and safer for our children.
Car Free Day
What a fantastic day everyone had taking part in one of Londons biggest events - Car Free Day.
With the assistant from the local police, the road outside school was closed to vehicles and staff, parents and pupils came to school on their bikes, scooters, parking and striding or walking.
There was a great atmosphere and a real thumbs up from parents and carers.
Children from various years also went out on to the street and draw some amazing pictures and slogans to support the message of climate change and sustainable travel.
Here is what some of our parents had to say:
- I just wanted to pass on my thanks to the school and particularly the local police who helped the car free day happen. I was talking to many people who said the community atmosphere on the street was so special and most importantly the kids really enjoyed the walk there & playing outside the school. Things like this really help to bring there school and the local community together. In the words of my 7 year old daughter ‘it was such an amazing exciting day!’. Please can we do it regularly!
- I wanted to congratulate OLOG for participating in the free car day last Friday The drop off for Louie felt safer and calmer with cars not being allowed in front of the school. I hope we have more of these days.
Poster Competition
Staff, pupils and Governors are continually working to improve sustainable travel to and from School as well as helping make parking around the school site safe.
The School Council ran a poster competition for pupils about safer parking outside school (refer to Pupil Voice section) and have taken part in many other initiatives like Bikeability (Year 6), Car-Free Day, Walk to School Week and The Big Peddle.
We have also had a representative from the Road Safety Team at Greenwich Council visit our Year 4 pupils to talk about the important road safety messages and the Green Cross Code.
Travel Survey
Thank you to all the parents who completed our travel survey. The results of this are listed in the file below:
Big Pedal
What great support we had from parents, carers and children in taking part in the Big Pedal challenge. Lots of you swapped your cars for bikes, scooters and put your walking shoes on for this activity. Well done to everyone who joined in.
GOLD - 2018
I am delighted to inform you that we have achieved GOLD accreditation from the Transport for London travel scheme.
Thank you to parents, pupils and staff for helping us achieve this by really getting involved in all the different travel initiatives we run.
The Head Boy & Head Girl represented the School at the STARS Primary Gold Awards Ceremony at The Kia Oval, London. They took part in workshops and looked at more ways to help improve sustainable travel.
Walk to School Week
How great it was to see so many parents and pupils taking part in Walk to School Week. This really helped reduce congestion outside the school and the children had fun walking or scooting to School with their friends or cycling with their parents. Thank you to everyone who took part.
Travel Survey
Thank you to all the families that completed the travel survey to try and help us understand what how children travel to school and what initiatives you would like to see at the school to encourage safe, healthy travel. The results can be read below:
Parent travel survey - results
Silver Accreditation - October 2017
We are pleased to announce that we have been awarded the Silver award in recognition of our achievement in active and safer travel initiatives.
