Oswestry School is a local independent day and boarding school which caters for pupils from Reception to Sixth Form. Each year there is a large intake into the Sixth Form with many students coming from home and abroad. With around 40 new pupils entering the Sixth Form, this year has been no exception. The purpose of today was to look at teamwork development and to give all the pupils a chance to get to know each other a bit better while enjoying some fun challenges.

I was working with the same group of nine students during the course of the day. Whether by design or chance, seven of these nine are new to the school this term which meant that there was no previous experience on which to base their working relationship. This certainly made for an interesting day, with some very reserved characters slowly come out of themselves as time went on. They attempted a number of tasks with varying degrees of success. However, it’s always worth remembering that it’s the process that’s important with this type of session, rather than a successful outcome on the task itself. Let’s face it, there is a lot to learnt about how we deal with failure, both as individuals and as teams!

All the tasks that they faced required different skills and encouraged different characteristics. These included generating ideas, making the most of resources, planning, cooperation, communication, prioritising, time management, logic, strategy, trust and self sacrifice.

It was certainly great to spend the day with the group, and good to see confidence and communication improving. So my thanks go to each and every member of the team. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.