Class challenge

By A Parker24th January 2018

Today 7 Pioneer were given total control of their learning: they had to teach the session!

They were given 40 minutes to make sure that they – and their classmates – could explain the physical changes of solids, liquids and gases with the overall aim of completing the following worksheet (from memory) by the end of the session:

As teachers, it was interesting to see how the students worked together as Crew to organise their time in order to maximise learning.  They broke the lesson down into chunks allowing enough time for independent research, sharing knowledge, plus some time for revision, before they had to complete the worksheet by themselves.  This will be peer assessed during our next session.

Great work, Pioneer!

 

 

C24 MyMaths Extended Study

By J Smith24th January 2018

Students have 3 exercises to complete in MyMaths. These are additional practice questions for our Chefistry expedition on:

Ratio and proportion.

At this stage students should not worry about whether they are too easy or too hard, as each task increases in difficulty.

The username is:

xpschool

The password is:

rectangle137

Students then use the details I shared with them in class to get into myportal.

 

The deadline for both classes is Wednesday at 8pm.

What does 4.5 Behaviour look like?

By A Parker21st January 2018

That was the question posed to 7 Pioneer this week (4.5 being the highest level of achievement.)

The class were asked to consider how they could help to minimise distractions and disruptions in class, so that our time spent in lessons learning is more effective.  Students worked in small groups, before reporting back to the class.

The groups came up with some really good ideas, including: stick to lesson protocols; don’t call out; put phones/devices away when not in use; have on-topic conversations; be respectful to peers and staff;  use ‘kind’ language; and arrive to class on time with all your equipment.  Mr. Portman will be collating all the suggestions to create a ‘4.5 Behaviour’ poster which will be displayed in classrooms.

This was a powerful exercise because it’s the students themselves who have defined and agreed what 4.5 behaviour looks like, and are therefore more likely to hold eachother (and themselves) accountable when standards slip.

 

Why toast and popcorn ? Immersion Steam.

18th January 2018C Duffield

As part of our immersion last week students from Pioneer and Explorer spent a session making notices and wonders, Looking at bread and popcorn kernels. The groups discussed how it might link to our new expedition. The bread was toasted and the popcorn cooked, students made notices linked to the changes that had taken place, including the smell, the colour the shape and size.

Both classes worked extremely hard during the session it was great to hear their theories about how toast and popcorn linked to the expedition.

Chefistry Immersion Week

By J Smith14th January 2018

 

Chefistry is our next Year 7 expedition, running between January and February for STEAM. The guiding question for the learning expedition is:

“What have physics and chemistry got to do with cooking?”

We kicked off our immersion week by visiting King Asia food. The students had a great experience seeing how food goes from an idea, to mass production and distributed nationwide. Below you can see short clip of the students trying some King Asia food. Unfortunately, we could not film inside the main production halls. This is where the students were able to see some amazing food machines, including a rice cooker the size of a lorry! You can find more information about King Asia by clicking here.

To Kill A Mockingbird

By Jamie Portman14th January 2018

On Friday we read the opening chapter of ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ by Harper Lee, as part of our immersion week. This will act as the expedition’s anchor text – something that will underpin our studies throughout. We will study the historical context of the American Depression during the 1930s, and also focus on the novel’s central themes of identity, prejudice, racism, equality, and making stands against what you perceive to be wrong.

Parents and carers can order their own copy here should they wish to explore the text at home with their child for £5.24. Books are provided for students in class.

 

 

International Slavery Museum – Liverpool (Immersion fieldwork)

By Jamie Portman10th January 2018

Yesterday we visited the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool as part of our ‘immersion week’. This is a period of time where we immerse students in content linked to our forthcoming expedition, often involving fieldwork and input from experts.

Our guiding question has not yet been revealed, as students need to make educated guesses as to what the expedition content and themes will be about.

This term, HUMAN (humanities subjects) and STEM (science, technology, engineering and Maths) will be taking part in separate expeditions.

We would like to thank the museum for their support and expertise. Students’ behaviour was respectful and courteous throughout, and as you can see from the video they were totally engaged in the powerful subject matter.

 

For or Against HS2? The Great Debate

By C Duffield1st January 2018

 

 

 

As part of Human, during case study 3 students learnt about the future of rail and how it will impact on Doncaster’s community.  Students were introduced to the HS2 and the debate that is currently ongoing.  After closely studying both sides of the debate students were encouraged to make an informed decision as to whether they were for or against HS2.

 

 On the last day of term Explorer and Pioneer came together to debate whether they felt HS2 was a beneficial or not. Students spoke with amazing clarity around the points they were making, they were respectful to each other listening intently and responding in a professional manner to counter argue points.

After listening to all the arguments for and against, a student from each side of the debate made a closing speech. At this point the panel gave everyone to the chance to change sides if they felt they had been persuaded by the opposition. Nobody moved to ‘against’, 1 student switched to ‘for’ and 4 students were left undecided.

   This was a fantastic way to end the term and our very first expedition in XP East, students were eager to argue their point and did so with passion and knowledge.

 

Dear George from Y7 Pioneer…

By Jamie Portman13th December 2017

Dear George,

I just wanted to let you know that we used your recent work on ‘What does the community of Doncaster owe to the Railway?’ in our lesson yesterday.

After accidentally seeing and hearing you present your work to the whole of Y7 Pioneer, I knew that I had to share your work with my own Humanities class – 7 Explorer. Miss Poncia shared your Google Doc with me, and we copied and pasted a paragraph onto a side of A4 paper, and then glued it onto some larger paper.

During session 5 (just 3 lessons after hearing your work) I put students into groups of 5 and they took part in a carousel activity where they looked at each one of your paragraphs, in order to see what success looks like, and made annotations.

I phoned your Dad to praise you for your wonderful work, and to thank you for working so hard on it. 7 Explorer were very impressed and we will continue to look at the annotations during the last few lessons on our final draft.

Thank you, and well done George!