It was great to see most of Crew at the Y9 STEAM hangout on Tuesday where Mr Smith and Mr Said set them off with the immersion task, which was to go outdoors, do a bit of bird watching and take pictures of nature.

I’m lucky to live in quite a rural spot and do spend a lot of time outdoors either walking the dogs, running, or just pottering around my back garden.  But, as much as I enjoy being outside, I can’t say that I ever really stop, look or listen to my surroundings; I kinda take it all for granted.  So the immersion task to record how many birds we see has really made me take notice and appreciate what’s in my own back yard.  I’ve spotted sparrows, robins, blue tits, pigeons and goldfinches.  And those birds in the picture above flying over the fields behind my house aren’t actually called “them flipping noisy screechy things” like I thought, they’re actually black headed gulls!

But what I like the most about this immersion activity is that it’s something you can all together at home whilst out on your daily walks or just from your kitchen window (I never knew there were so many different birds visiting my garden!) Crew have access to the birding sheet via the STEAM google classroom, or contact me and I’ll send you one.  I’d love to see pictures of what you find on your walks or of the birds you’re spotting, so please share!

Note of caution: although this sounds like a lovely family bonding session I feel like I should give you a bit of a warning: Mr P and I have daily arguments over what some of the birds we spot are; we can’t agree if we’ve got thrushes or blackbirds nesting in our roof!!

There are also a couple of optional challenges you could all work on together: build a bird house or build a bug box.  Send in pictures if you make anything!

You can find out more about the STEAM expedition – including what the guiding question is – on the ‘Here Comes the Sun’ expedition website.

Praise

I couldn’t keep up with the amount of praise postcards that have been sent out to Crew this week!  Super proud of those who are continuing to work hard and produce high quality work, but special mentions go to Thomas, Tom, Aden, Ali and Noah.

I’ll share some of their beautiful work in a future blog post, but for now I’ll share what could quite possibly be my favourite praise card ever sent (from Miss Wilmot to Ali)

A huge well done to Thomas from me, too for sending in these pictures of him practicing his DofE first aid skills on his brother.  Great work, Thomas (and Lewis!)

Have a lovely weekend, all.  Stay safe.

Mrs Parker

 

As we come to the end of Week 6, I asked Crew to draw the 3 things that’ve made lockdown a little but more bearable for them.  Here’s a snippet of some of the …erm… better drawings we had:

Some form of technology featured on most of the pictures (there were some very strange looking phones drawn!) Technology is certainly making the lockdown restrictions more bearable and it’s great that we can use it to “see” friends, family and Crew on a regular basis.

Technology also connects us to the world beyond our own little circle and, earlier in the week, our very own Noah was invited by our friends at EL Education to choreograph and perform a dance. They had spotted his talent when he featured in this previous blog post.

Noah’s dance will be featured as part of a wider celebration from EL Education for their #BetterWorldDay – this year’s focus is on expressing gratitude for those working on the frontline during the Covid-19 crisis and I think Noah’s performance is a perfect and emotional tribute.

You can watch Noah’s full performance here in our weekly ‘This Week in the Trust’ update, along with catching up on all the other wonderful things happening across the trust:

Another highlight of the week was seeing members of Crew receiving praise from Miss Haughey and Mrs Sprakes for their efforts: Bryn, Kobe, Dakota and Aden have all be recognised for working hard in Maths and Spanish.

My appreciation cards went to Thomas and Tom for their consistent hard work across all subjects, and to Ali for always stepping up to Crew challenges, be it contributing to blog posts (see below) or leading Crew check-ins (she makes a cracking Deputy Crew Leader!)

Looking ahead to Week 7, we’re  kicking off a new STEAM expedition.  Kobe has already tried (and failed) to guess what it’s going to be about. Here’s a teaser for you – any ideas?

That’s all from me – I’m handing over to Ali!

Mrs Parker

And now please welcome our Guest Blogger, the fabulous Ali, giving her account of her experience of living in lockdown:

Hello! This is Ali, updating you all during this quarantine period. 

Honestly during this time I have been working hard and breaking this up by doing fun activities such as SFX makeup, that my crew saw during a check-in because I didn’t notice that it was earlier than usual. 

I have been keeping in contact with my close friends everyday and having frequent exercise (while of course staying a safe distance from people, which I would do anyway). 

Of course at these very unusual and difficult times it’s impossible to stay positive all the time so to increase these times I have been doing activities I enjoy such as: baking, writing, reading and watching great movies (mainly Marvel and Jurassic Park). During this time I somehow managed to make a cake that was supposed to take 15 minutes to bake and took 50 minutes to bake. Clearly I’m a magician. I also managed to fill an entire piece of paper with badly drawn fish, I’m running out of ideas for things to keep me occupied.

Friday is usually Community Meeting day – the time of the week when we are invited to make appreciations, apologies and stands.  So, here are mine:

An Appreciation

We spend a lot of time appreciating one another at XP East – and rightly so!  I’m missing our Friday community meetings where we’d get to share our appreciations for a student or member of staff with the rest of the school; those stand-out moments of the week that really made a difference and realising that, quite often, the smallest of actions can have the biggest impact.

A staff appreciation board has been set-up online for us to pass on our thanks to colleagues who are helping us through this strange time, for whatever reason.  I’ve really enjoyed reading the little notes that have been left for people and it once again proves how important it is to have the right crew around us during this strange time.

So, as I was adding my own appreciation for a couple of colleagues this morning I did begin to think about everyone else who deserves a massive appreciation.

And that’s you lot. My Crew Finch Parents who have sort of become accidental members of staff!  I really do mean it when I say that I couldn’t do my job without your full support. You’re ace, you are.

An Apology

Today I sent out a copy of the work tracker to parents and students.  This outlines all the work that has handed in (or not!) over the last 5 weeks.  My apology is that I didn’t get this information out to you sooner, as there is quite a lot of information on that spreadsheet to go through.  I’ll update on a weekly basis and I pledge to send it out every Friday, meaning that we can pick up on any issues sooner.  Just let me know if you want to arrange a google hangout with me to discuss progress.

A Stand 

At our last academic check-in I had several Crew members tell me that the reason they hadn’t completed their HUMS work was because they didn’t understand it.  I was more than happy to help them with this and set up a HUMS Support Hangout where we could go through the tasks together.  Despite accepting the invitation and assuring me that they would have a go at the three tasks I’d set beforehand, nobody turned up for the session.  So my stand is, if you say you want help and I offer that support to you, please have the courtesy to show up for the session.  More support sessions will be on offer and if you are invited, it’s because we’ve identified that you need some help to complete the work.  You’re not on holiday, remember 🙂

I’d like to appreciate those of you who are working hard to completing the work that’s been set.

An announcement (in case you missed it!)

We have made some changes to how we’re delivering DofE.  These are highlighted in this blog post and I’ll go through it with Crew during Tuesday’s hangout.

That’s all from me!

Have a lovely weekend, stay safe, and I’ll see you next week!

Mrs Parker.

 

 

 

I spend every day looking for Silver Linings and encourage Crew to do the same. To be honest, they are harder to find on some days than others, but one of the best Silver Linings of the week came from Crew’s weekend check-in (slightly delayed until Thursday because of the Easter break.)

Now, weekend check-ins are usually dominated by tales of X-Boxing, You Tube watching and sleeping.  And there’s nothing wrong with that! But there’s been a shift…

We’ve had the most beautiful weather lately and Crew have certainly been making the most of it.  They checked-in with stories of Easter Egg hunts, epic bike rides, longs walks, board game playing, baking, DIY (!), running, interval training and even compost heap making!  Yes, there was some Netflix binging in there too, but we’re only human, right?! (Plus, I’ve got some fab recommendations for my own binge-watch list!)

So the Silver Lining we took from this week’s hangout is that lockdown is making us all unplug from technology and spend more time with family.  I’m super pleased that Crew are doing more physical activity, especially as I’m known to bang on and on about the positive impact physical activity and being outdoors has on our mental health (you see, Crew – I was right!)

Meanwhile, if you are struggling to find your own Silver Lining, have a read of this news story, showcasing 99-year old Captain Tom Moore’s fundraising efforts of the NHS (although I’m sure you’ve already seen it!) An inspiration to us all.

Captain Tom

DofE

So, keeping with the outdoor theme, if we were at school we would be preparing for our practice DofE hike (this was scheduled for the end of April.). Obviously that won’t be going ahead, but we are looking at ways that students can carry on working towards their Bronze Award.  Hopefully I’ll be able to share the new plan with you within the next couple of weeks, but there are lots of options in the proposal for the physical, skills and volunteering sections that can be done safely at home.

That’s all for this week.  I look forward to checking in with Crew next week, and I’m really excited about Thursday’s quiz session!

Stay safe,
Mrs Parker

 

Crew Task

It’s very easy at the moment to focus on the things we haven’t got and all the things we are missing out on.  It’s easy to think we’re “stuck at home” when, in fact, we’re “safe at home” and that’s the mindset we’ve been fostering in Crew.   So whilst it’s more than OK to be missing people and things, this week’s Crew task was to list ‘ten things you feel grateful for in life’ to make us really appreciate what we have got available to us right now, at this time.  Crew are continuing to work on this task over the Easter weekend, but here are some highlight’s from Tom’s list:

• a healthy life
• parents
• pets

and from Ali’s list:

• the love and support people are giving me
• understanding family
• the love and support people are giving to me

and a lovely image of Noah’s list who has presented his work beautifully!

I’m so looking forward to reading everyone else’s lists; they’re certainly making me reflect on what is truly important right now.

This was one of the brilliant suggestions from the Action for Happiness Coping Calendar we’ve been dipping in and out for our Crew check-ins and weekly tasks.  Here’s a copy of the calendar just in case you want to try some of the challenges too:

Crew Hangout

Almost a full house for this week’s check-in, but we’re still missing the same 3 or 4 Crew members every time.  I have emailed these students about this.  Please remember that these hangouts are really important, just as our daily sessions are at school, so I and the rest of Crew expect everyone to attend!

This week’s Crew check-in was led by Megan, who asked us “if you could only have one birthday present to last the rest of your life, what would it be?” An interesting range of responses from Crew… Thomas would like his own fishing pond, Kobe would just like some headphones and Ali would like another lightsaber (!)

We had an academic check-in just to make sure everyone was on track and it was great to hear Tom offering advice to Thomas who was struggling to access some work on classrooms.  Still Crew!  It was also nice to welcome Mr Smith along to our hangout, who wanted to check-in with Crew Finch and check that everyone was getting on OK.

We decided to just have the Tuesday hangout this week, as we’re off school on Thursday anyway for the Easter break, but Crew know they can contact me any time over the break if they feel like they need a 1:1 check-in with me.

An Appreciation

I’d like to end with an appreciation for Megan who unknowingly made a difficult day better for me by sending me a really lovely email. Such a small act of kindness had a huge impact on my day.  So, number 1 on my list of things I am grateful for is:

• Crew

Have a safe and enjoyable Easter break, everyone.

Mrs Parker x

Timetable and tracking progress

Mr Portman released the new timetable on Monday and feedback from students has been positive. This will be updated every week with specific task details, so make sure you sign-up for website alerts so that you don’t miss this and other important posts.

I’ve been keeping track of academic progress and went through this with Crew during Thursday’s hangout, reminding them all of what needed to be done and by when.  I’ve asked them to start using their Google calendar and to get into the habit of checking it everyday.  Work due dates and hangout invites will all appear automatically in the calendar.  Students can get to their calendar by logging onto the website and selecting it from the ‘other apps’ section:

Checking in 

It’s been a wonderful week of catch-ups, not just with Crew but with other staff, too.  The Y9 Phase Team (that’s Mr Smith, Mrs Poncia, Mr Pearson and myself) are meeting once a week just like we did when we were in school. We use this time to update on Crew, student progress, resolve any issues, make sure that every one is getting the support they need and plan for the week ahead. So yes, it’s business as usual – we’re just doing it in our living rooms instead!

I’ve also spent this week catching up with Crew individually.  I really enjoyed this 1:1 time. It was great just to chat outside of our whole Crew hangouts and to find out how everyone’s coping with the whole lockdown situation.  I’m also really pleased that most (not all!) are really focussed on their school work and are producing some beautiful work.

A massive well done to Thomas for working exceptionally hard on his maths and for smashing his MEG!

And well done to Kobe for working hard on his Art task.

Crew hangouts

Crew hangout time is my favourite time of the week!

Tuesday’s check-in was led by Ali, who asked us to choose three people we’d want to be stuck in a room with. We had to choose a celebrity, a family member and a friend.  I had to google some of the celebrities the young ‘uns came up with – never heard of them!  We then had a group discussion about the new timetable (which got a big thumbs up from Crew Finch!) and shared ideas on how we can strike the right balance between “school time” and “leisure time.”

Noah came up with Thursday’s check-in: If you could be any age, what would it be? The majority of Crew seem to think that 18 is the magic number: the age where they become an adult, leave school, buy cars and… go to the pub!  As mentioned above, we also had an academic check-in.  Just a couple of Crew members needed a gentle prod to get the work done (and we’ve had individual conversations about this, too), but other than that I’m really pleased with how everyone’s doing.

Every time I talk to Crew I mention the importance of self-care and why we must look after our mental wellbeing during this time.  I encourage them all to switch off their consoles, get off social media, leave their rooms, go outside (observing social distancing measures, of course), get active, try something new or just do something they love!

So, with that in mind, we’ve decided to launched a new weekly feature called Lockdown Leisure (I know, it’s terrible – if you’ve got a better name, let me know!) Here, we’ll be showcasing some of the things we’re getting up to with our new found spare time at home.

So, ladies and gents, Crew Finch present <<insert fanfare here!>>

Lockdown Leisure, Edition 1 – featuring Noah, Tom, Ali and Mrs Parker!

• Tom isn’t able to go to the gym or play Basketball at the moment, so has taken up running.
• Ali has been spending quality time with her cat, Thelma (cute pet pics are always welcome!)
• I’ve been crocheting rainbows!

And finally, I’m going to leave you with these stunning photos of Noah who is still managing to practice his dance.

Stay safe, everyone.

The picture above captures what our new Crew room looks like – thanks to Bryn for the screenshot of us in action!

As you can see, we’re still checking in regularly via Google hangouts.  Just a couple of students missing from yesterday’s session – I can’t stress how important it is that you all log into these Crew hangouts, guys!!! I do expect 100% attendance wherever possible!

As well as the whole-Crew hangouts, I’ve been checking in with individual students too and will continue to regularly schedule these in with all of Crew while-ever we’re working from home.

A few have already told me that they’re struggling to adapt to working alone from home so we’ve booked in some timetabling sessions where we can create a personalised timetable that works for them.  And I’ll make sure that there are lots of wellbeing breaks scheduled in, too!

As I’ve said to Crew all week – I don’t really care what your day looks like or how you manage your time as long as work is handed in by the deadlines set by subject teachers!

On a personal level, at the beginning of the week I really wasn’t sure how we could continue to ‘be Crew’ during this time and it was making me quite anxious. That was on top of everything else we all have to be anxious about, like keeping ourselves and our families safe and the more personal one of “Will I ever be able to buy pasta again?!”

Well – I’m finishing the week feeling a lot more positive and reassured that we will continue to be Crew whatever the world throws at us. And it made me realise:

Crew isn’t just “something” that happens in a classroom in school. Crew is more than that. Crew is part of us. Crew adapts to be whatever it needs to be.

I, for one, have found great comfort in that.  Thank goodness for technology!

Mums/dads/carers:

Your children have been absolutely amazing adapting to our new ways of working and most of them are managing to stay focussed on their classwork and submitting tasks on time.  I will continue to support them throughout this.

I would also like to take this opportunity to say that I’m also here for you.  If any of you ever want to chat about any worries or concerns you have about your child during this time, please don’t hesitate to email me to arrange a call or even a hangout – I’m getting quite used to seeing my face on the big screen!

Oh, and don’t forget about the Parent Support Centre that’s been set up to help you get your head around how work is being set and accessed online.

Meanwhile, I’ll continue with these weekly updates.  I can’t wait to see how our Crew sessions develop!

And finally, because it can’t be said enough:

Stay safe everyone.

Mrs Parker x