At Muntham House School, we offer Bronze and Silver Awards from the Duke of Edinburgh (DofE). The award is an opportunity to discover new interests and talents, whilst also being a tool to develop essential skills for life and work. The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award is a nationally recognised accreditation. 

Completing an award involves: helping the community or environment, becoming fitter, and developing new skills, self-confidence and self-esteem. 

Any young person can do their Duke of Edinburgh’s Award: regardless of ability, gender, background or location. Achieving an award isn’t a competition or about being first – it’s all about setting personal challenges and pushing personal boundaries.

Through a DofE programme, young people have fun, make friends, improve their self-esteem and build confidence. They gain essential skills and attributes for work and life, such as resilience, problem-solving, teamwork, communication and motivation – enhancing CVs and college / university or job applications.

When your child does their DofE programme, they'll develop the skills and attitudes they need to become more rounded, confident adults. Qualities that colleges, universities and employers are attracted to. So when you support your child's pursuit of their Duke of Edinburgh's Award, you're investing in their future. 

You can expect to see your child develop in the following areas as they work through their DofE programme:

- Self-belief and self-confidence

- A sense of identity

- Initiative and a sense of responsibility

- A real awareness of their strengths

- New talents and abilities

- The ability to plan and use time effectively

- Learning from and giving to others in the community

- Forming new friendships

- Problem-solving, presentation and communication skills

- Leadership and teamworking skills

Intent

Through the Duke of Edinburgh Award, pupils will develop their independence skills that foster resilience, further strengthened by being able to set long-term goals through the completion of their Duke of Edinburgh portfolio. Furthermore, pupils will gain a greater understanding of how to plan for the future, through their expedition preparation and evidence submission of their portfolio work.

Implementation

Duke of Edinburgh sessions in school is planned with expedition preparation in mind. All sessions revolve around problem-solving and require individual and group work so that pupils can find the best working method for themselves. This reflects the intent: for pupils to build resilience through problem-solving. Pupils require a good understanding of their environment in order to become the resilient outdoor learners we aim for. Sessions that involve foraging, environmental care and protection and upcycling of materials are incorporated into the Duke of Edinburgh curriculum to assist with this.

Impact

The impact is measured through practice and qualifying expeditions. Each half term, pupils are given the task of navigating as a group through a route they have designed, be that on foot, kayak or canoe, or bicycle. Alongside half-term assessments, pupils are measured on how well they work together as a team, how self-sufficient they are and how they approach problem-solving.