There was plenty to celebrate in this week’s Upper School assembly. Firstly, I would like to congratulate our brand new team of senior prefects, who will join the Head and Deputies on the pupil leadership team. Well done to Nia, Zoe-Grace, Harry, Dan, Nathan, David and George who went through a process of applying for the role, followed by an interview. They impressed us with their thoughts about leading by example, as well as role models who have inspired them in the past, and also came up with some ideas of how to reach out to the younger years, and be visible, despite the restrictions we currently have in place. Miss McDonald presented the children with their new ties and pins, and I am sure they will be wearing them with pride next week.
We look forward to welcoming applications from Year 8s in the next round after Christmas. Congratulations must also go our new Upper School team of pupil council representatives who were presented with their badges in assembly. Well done to:
8D Nia 8KM Jaden 8RD Jimi 8K Louis 7W Charlie 7L Mehdi 7T Arjun
A further well done must go to this week’s ‘Sports Stars’ in the Upper School. A new award, this is in recognition of children who have impressed us with that extra level of effort and performance on the Games pitches. Kavish, Emmanuel, Dan and Nia are our most recent winners- congratulations.
Form Presentations
7T have continued with their presentations designed to ‘teach us’ something new. Freddie shared his origami which was simply amazing. It was lovely to see his brilliant talent and enthusiasm in something that we may not normally see in school. Aarav chose to talk about gaming consoles - something Mrs Thompson certainly needed an education on! Arjun taught us about a new game that is becoming very popular amongst pupils, and what was clear is that whilst a topic may not be everyone’s cup of tea, we must stay with the times and embrace change whether we like it or not! Well done 7T, I can’t wait to hear what you present next.
In the Upper School classrooms this week….
Geography Year 7 are coming to the end of their first CE topic: ‘Earthquakes and Volcanoes’. This means that next week they will have an assessment that will test their understanding of the topic. All details are on the Google Classroom and I would encourage your child to read them and prepare carefully for the assessment to ensure their mark truly reflects their ability.
Year 8 are revising map skills this week having completed the ‘Population and Settlement’ topic from their CE course. This will mean that their next prep will be revision-based to ensure they are ready for an end of topic assessment in week 11. All children will be given an OS map to use during their classes and I would encourage you to let them guide you on any local walks over the weekend to see how well they are progressing- good luck!
English Year 7 red have been planning a narrative via imagining they are a minor character in 'Hamlet' out for a walk through Elsinore Castle! They have made excellent use of peer support through taking their partners on a picture prompted verbal plan of their journey through the grand castle. Everyone was a risk taker through standing up and sharing their best sentences, and Miss Senior was very impressed with their constructive, thoughtful peer assessments against the success criteria. In the green set this week, the children made the most of being outdoors to rehearse their own version of Act 1 Scene 1. This led onto some writing of wonderful diary entries in-role as Horatio, Marcellus or Barnardo.
French Year 7 pupils have been working on their presentation about ‘themselves and family’ and have also started looking at a variety of translation tasks. They will continue developing their speaking skills in class as well as at home in preparation of their oral assessment in week 10.
Year 8 have been focusing on using different tenses in their reading and writing and have developed better strategies to tackle translation and grammar activities. They will all complete an internal assessment next week to identify areas of strengths and areas of development.
Maths Year 7 have consolidated their knowledge of factors, multiples and primes incorporating HCF, LCM, prime factorisation to calculate square roots and venn diagrams. It has been a busy week but children have enjoyed applying their knowledge to problem solving contexts.
Year 8 have been busy solving equations and inequalities including solving algebraic equations with fractions - what you do to one side you must do to the other! It has been wonderful to see the children's confidence grow as they have repeated the process gaining speed, accuracy and fluency of a topic which appears on every future school and GCSE paper.
Creative Arts Don't forget to check out the Creative Arts section to see all the fantastic things Upper School have been up to in Music, Art and Drama.