9 Mr Smith | XP East

Crew online check-in with Mandela

By J Smith2nd April 2020

It has been fantastic to have a Google Hangout from everyone in Crew Mandela. It seems a lifetime since we had to finish at school so abruptly, however all crew members are in good spirits and we discussed some ways that people have been keeping busy!

Everyone in the crew commented on how the new timetable has made routines much more manageable learning to be a solid structure of the day.

Big shout out to Alfie and Chloe who have been completing STEAM work to an excellent standard. Check out the pictures below:

Also a huge shout out to Beth who has been going above and beyond in Spanish Plus and completed all tasks to an excellent standard! well done Beth!

Our next Check in online will be Tuesday at 11:30 am. Holly is going to lead the check in- with a pub quiz style competition to follow. See you then!

Crew Mandela Passage Presentation

By J Smith23rd September 2019

Crew Mandela are continuing their journey towards starting GCSE choice. All students have begun their reflections from year 7 to year 8. It is hard to believe how much some of our crew has changed in such a short space of time, as shown in the video below!

The purpose of the passage presentation is to reflect on ‘what makes me ready to start GCSE’ We did this by following the below three case studies.

Case Study 1 : ‘Where I can be?’

Case Study 2: ‘How to get there ’

Case Study 3: ‘What makes me ready?’

Above all- Compassion

By J Smith26th June 2019

Crew Mandela have been investigating their habits of work and learning this week. This is to fully understand the ‘why’ behind the grades from teachers and understand how they can improve. Students have really taken ownership in the crew to investigate their own HOWLS. There has been a major increase in the crew average for Be Kind that we were especially proud of as a crew. As the sign reads outside the school front gates…

Above all, is compassion

SLC Preperation

By J Smith12th June 2019

The crew today have started their student led conference (SLC) preparation to be ready for the final parent meeting of the year. The crew have paid particular attention to selecting key artefacts of the expedition. The whole crew have decided that this will be the first SLC that they will deviate from the script and go ‘solo’. In past SLCs, students have prepared scripts and almost read this word for word.

It has been great to see the growing courage and confidence of crew Mandela, as they now have decided they no longer need this support and only work from bullet points when talking to parents. Great work crew!

What an evening!

By J Smith7th June 2019

Today as crew leader I was incredibly proud of the crew for showing the courage to once again speak in front of the entire year group and 50 parents for the latest HUMs expedition.

In particular, the moment where Corey spoke about his family to the audience brought the entire crowd close to tears! It was an emotional evening and all students produced high quality work, this was highlighted by Frida’s explanation of the Macbeth story and how this contributed to ‘fake news’

Chernobyl Discussion

By J Smith5th June 2019

This morning in Academic Crew, as I came in, the crew were already seated and in a deep discussion about the Chernobyl disaster. The Chernobyl disaster was a catastrophic nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986, in the No. 4 nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near the city of Pripyat, in the north of the Ukrainian SSR, near the Byelorussian SSR border.

Holly was leading the discussion and explained how radiation can affect humans and its damaging effect of DNA. We then investigated as a crew the most radioactive places on Earth. Links were made by Corey and Raven to the current joint expedition in STEAM and HUMS as the term radioactive had been mentioned during the immersion.

Building Circuits

By J Smith26th May 2019

The crew have conducted their own revision session on current resistance and voltage today. Corey and Raven led the revision session where students were asked to construct series and parallel circuits and compare the difference between current drops.

Raven noticed that when a component in a parallel circuit is removed, other bulbs and components still allow for electrons to flow, Raven also noted that this is why houses use parallel circuits and not series!

Almost Complete!

By J Smith16th May 2019

This week Crew Mandela have been completing their final products for expedition High Voltage. This has needed a number of high level skills from the crew including soldering, drilling, scoring and shaping the wood.

Outstanding crew support has come from Raven who has helped the entire crew to finish their designs and complete the base of the boxes. See the image below for a sneak preview of the final games.

Final Product Progress: High Voltage

By J Smith13th May 2019

8/E24 Have been working hard this week building their final products. We have used a number of new tools and equipment in our brand new building. As a crew we need to have all work completed by Thursday 16th of May. If any students have any game work unfinished we will be running a product lab in extended study for everyone to get caught up.