What an absolutely cracking start to the year. Both year groups across both schools have been absolutely on it! Some of our Y10 students are already getting smart by creating revision resources to help them over the next 2 years, whilst our Y11s have come back ready to work hard for their GCSEs.

This week we held our first year group community meetings and, as you can see from the slides below, we already have lots to celebrate!

Year 10 Appreciation Slides:

Year 11 Appreciation Slides:

Crew blogs:

Your child’s Crew Leader will keep you up to date with what’s happening in crew via their crew blogs. You can find these here:

A couple of reminders:

We have asked all students to re-familiarise themselves with our dress code policy. We understand that our lack of uniform allows students to express themselves, however we do still have guidelines. If students persistently break the dress code guidelines, they will be challenged and required to complete after school reflections. We want to avoid this, so they can attend revision sessions instead to achieve their best grades at GCSE level!

Could we also ask for your support please in ensuring your child comes to school every day with appropriate equipment. This should include a pen, pencil, ruler, water bottle, and fully charged device (we don’t allow students to work on mobile phones). In Y10/Y11 we find devices are used a lot more, so please make sure students are bringing their chargers to school too! It’s vital that they have access to these devices to achieve their full potential through work in sessions and revision. Students may find it beneficial to have a notebook for revision material too, but that’s personal preference!

As ever, please feel free to contact us if you have any questions and we look forward to meeting some of our Y11 parents at our work experience launch on Wednesday 14th September 🙂

Mrs Parker (E25/E26 Phase Lead, XP East) and Miss Cocliff (X25/X26 Phase Lead, XP)

C26 and C25 GCSE geography students had a lovely time on Friday at the Longshaw Estate in the Peak District. They were collecting data on the width, depth and velocity of the river at two sites so they could analyse whether there were changes downstream to support Bradshaw’s Model.

In our lessons preparing for the fieldwork, students had to select our hypotheses, consider the suitability of the site and any risks involved as well as justify our sampling and data collection methods. But, we’re only half way through!  Next steps in our upcoming lessons after the fieldwork are to present and explain our methods of data presentation and evaluate the enquiry. During our evaluation of the enquiry, students have to consider any problems with their data collection methods, limitations of the data and suggestions for improvement. Finally, they will evaluate the extent to which conclusions are reliable.

No wonder Dylan, Rosie and Marcus fell asleep on Friday and Rihanna needed a hot chocolate boost – all this hard work is tiring!

On Friday 1st July, Y9 and Y10 GCSE Geography students (Common Mission/Leading our Own Learning) will be going on fieldwork to Burbage Brook at the Longshaw Estate, Peak District. 

This is a required part of the GCSE and we will be studying changes downstream along the river.  If your child is in year 9, this is similar to the fieldwork they have undertaken as part of their expedition –  but the GCSE version and at a different location! 

Please find attached the kit list which details everything students need to be prepared. 

Students need to be at school by 8:15, ready for a quick briefing and ready to leave promptly at 8:45. We should be back at the end of the school day, traffic depending, and students will keep home updated with the travel progress. 

Any questions, please email me at [email protected] 

We’ve got about 20 students here either undertaking independent study or taking advantage of the support on offer from our Student Coaches to produce some high quality revision notes.

Some of the boys have even snuck in a game of chess during a ‘brain break’ – still developing their mathematical and critical thinking skills 😉

D6 runs every Saturday morning during term time, 9am-12.30pm, over at XP. East. It is open to all Y10 and Y11 students.

Working hard and getting smart – that’s what we like to see!

Keep up the fantastic work, Y11, we’re so proud of you!f

Mrs Parker & Miss Cocliff x

Last week Crew Anoa’i, with the help of some of our friends from Crew Ali, took on the task of degunging our school. We had a week of cleaning up, making sure our school was clear of rubbish and ready for session time.

On Monday morning, we took our turn to litter pick around the school grounds. We quickly gathered the equipment from reception and headed out to the back field. The grass was wet and there was a chill in the air. The whole crew took turns to use the pickers and collect as much rubbish as possible. We moved with great pace and found many different things on our journey around the field, including a large tub of ice cream!

Throughout the week, we ensured our crew room was spotless for others to use. We tucked the chairs under after using them and we sanitised the tables. We also cleared the room of any lost property and bits of rubbish left from the previous day.

On Friday morning, we went into ‘degunge mode’. This included us carrying out our weekly class pack check. Everyone in our crew has a ‘degunge’ duty, where they count and check all of the equipment in our crew’s class pack. 

Once this was complete, we then moved onto tidying up our library. A handful of our crew took charge with this task, ensuring all of the portfolio folders were stacked appropriately in neat rows. They finished this task in record time and joined the rest of us in our crew room, to help sort the lost property. 

Sorting the lost property included us taking all of the lost items out of the box, taking a photograph of the items and then folding them back up to be placed in the box once again. As there were a lot of lost items this past week, all hands were on deck. We even had a system in place to speed up the process. We had Jacob, Woody, James, Fin and Denim on unpacking duty. Then Nikodem, April and Thea on photograph duty. Moving onto the next step, we had Zach H, Faith, Lucie-Mae and Zach M on folding duty. To finish the process, we had our friends from Crew Ali (Ruby, Ruben, Charlie and Caiden) on packing duty. With this amazing team, we managed to complete all of our degunge duties in just 15 minutes! That’s a record for Crew Anao’i. 

The last step of our degunge process was to sanitise the tables and put the chairs up on to the tables. This then allowed Miss Mitchell to hoover the room after we had gone home. Then our crew room was truly spotless!

We have thoroughly enjoyed the degunge process and wish to continue this next term.

Don’t forget to check the latest Lost Property post on our website to see all of the lost items. Remember to claim your lost belongings before Friday 5th November.

Thank you!

#LeaveNoTrace