XP East

Parents and students session at Opportunities Doncaster Live event

Doncaster Racecourse has an event on Thursday 7th March 3.30pm – 6pm for anyone wanting to take their student around. Suitable for Year 10 & 11.

I was waiting for permissions to publish previous work placements but thank you to a parent for suggesting sharing LOGOs to give students and parents/carers ideas to work from when thinking about making choices. I feel super silly for not thinking of it myself!

Beautiful Work This Week

Expedition Stories: LKS2 @ Plover

This week we’re proud to share the beautiful story LKS2s Expedition from last term ‘Coming to Doncaster: why then and why now?’. The incredible work from the students is on display outside the school for the community to see – make sure you go and check it out!

Being Human: Beautiful work in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead

This week beautiful work created by students at XP Gateshead was curated and unveiled at the QE Hospital!

‘What does it mean to be human?’

As part of their learning the students considered what makes a human both in a scientific way, through study of the gas exchange, circulatory and reproductive systems, and with regard to culture and religious beliefs when studying the Abrahamic faiths and the sanctity of human life. 

Students then began the analysis of the tone and structure of successful speeches, and used this learning to write persuasive speeches on the topic of organ donation. 

The theme of how humans and their societies and cultures grow and develop was then explored. Studying the development of humans from a single cell, through childhood, and puberty and onwards to adulthood. Adding to this theme we also considered our evolutionary past. 

Students also worked with an expert to explore innovations and advancements that are being made around the world to help and support the development of humans. Alongside this students met with experts in organ donation, Dharmic faiths and Humanist beliefs  in order to reflect upon who we want to be and how we can be the best version of ourselves. 

The students were then challenged to create artwork to promote organ donation, and reflect upon what it means to be Human. Students also gave a speech expressing what they think it means to be human to parents and experts. 

This work displayed at the QE hospital is the result of XPG’s community collaboration and celebrates what it means to be human and how together we are stronger.

The work has been well received already and Gateshead NHS have shared this post about working with the students at XPG!

XP on the TV!

We’re on TV next week!

XP Doncaster will be featured in a BBC Two documentary to be aired on the 7th March.

Multi award winning TV company Tern TV, spent several days filming with us last summer, with the presenter Darren McGarvey, who won the Orwell prize for his book ‘Poverty Safari’.

The filming was for the second of three documentaries, which in order focus on Justice, Education and Health, titled: Darren McGarvey: The State We’re In.

Claira Salter, our Principal of XP Doncaster said:

“We love to share what we do across the XP Trust, welcoming over a thousand visitors and delegates from all over the world in the last year alone. So, when we were approached by Tern TV to take part in the education documentary presented by Darren, it was a real opportunity to engage with an even wider audience here and for our students to participate in the process of interviewing and film making.”

“We are looking forward to seeing all three programmes and are delighted that the spotlight will also be on Doncaster and the communities and partners we are proud to work with.”

All episodes are available on BBC iPlayer now and the Education documentary will be broadcast on Thursday 7th March at 9pm on BBC Two. 

Top of the Blogs

Weekly update for parents @ XP Gateshead

Kindness changes everything @ Norton Infants

Family Learning Y3/4 @ Green Top

Fantastic artwork in Year 9 @ XP

Fieldwork Fun at Yorkshire Wildlife Park @ Plover

C26 Celebrations @ XP East

Science Experiment @ Carcroft School

Year 3 are Magnetic! @ Norton Juniors

We’re looking for an awesome Learning Coach at Plover School!

Find out more about the role and apply here to #JoinOurCrew

Share your stories with us!

We now have a new dedicated news email so that you can send your stories, updates or ideas about potential news articles directly to us in Comms.

It might be something you or your students have achieved, a charity you’re supporting or anything at all that deserves a wider audience.

Write to us at [email protected] –  we want to hear about it, write about it and celebrate it!

On Wednesday we welcomed back our personal safety from Instincts Training to deliver another session, this time focussing on internet safety.

We began by discussing whether we thought the internet was good or bad. Whilst we agreed that the internet is a good place (especially for gaming!) we recognised that it does have its bad/dangerous points, too.

Students were presented with several scenarios to encourage them to reflect on their online behaviours, such as:

• Have you ever shared anything online about someone online that you knew they wouldn’t want posted?
• Have you ever liked or shared a mean post about someone?
• Have you posted something using someone else’s account?
• Have you ever spoken to someone online who you didn’t know?

These questions helped to generate some mature and well thought out discussions around the internet, interacting online and how to spot online dangers. It was reassuring to know that on the whole, Y7 are a savvy lot.

We’d like to appreciate all our Y7 students for the Integrity, courage, compassion shown when sharing and listening to crews’ experiences.

Mrs Parker & Mrs Watson

You can find out more about the role and apply here to #JoinOurCrew

What. A. Morning!!!!! We had the pleasure this morning of sharing over 40 praise postcards for our wonderful Y11s, written by staff. We also had in-person appreciations from crew leaders and teachers who had made themselves available to join us!

As you read the postcards, you’ll get a feel for how hard Y11 are working, and how impressed we really are. As phase leads, these brought us to tears, actually – we are so proud of C26 and of how far they’ve come.

There’s also a really powerful message at the end from Jurgen Klopp – take this away from football, and apply it to Y11. We’ll get through the tough times together, as crew! ❤️

Keep going, Y11. You’ll achieve amazing things!

All pupils in C27 have been given the opportunity this term to visit the University of Bradford to improve their knowledge of Higher Education. This local university is only around an hour’s journey away and offers a wide range of courses and entry requirements. Some pupils who have already visited other universities commented that “It was good to learn that not all universities are the same.” 

During the day, we visited a mock courtroom to discuss a fictional case of criminal damage presented by a university lecturer. This activity was a favourite, with some describing it as “absolutely brilliant.” Pupils enjoyed learning about how the court system is organised and the different roles of defence and the CPS.

We also toured the extensive engineering department, and it was fascinating to hear from the engineering students about their research into the products we all use every day such as shower gel. Pupils were encouraged to handle samples and see how the viscosity altered as the product was heated or cooled. Our pupils were really interested in how the engineering department uses equipment such as robots and CT scanners to develop complex equipment such as artificial hands.

Miss Cross