Global and Local Responsibility
Thank you for sending us your photos of your VE Day celebrations. It was lovely to see you all getting into the spirit of it! A visit to the Year 8 Baccalaureate Conference Classroom this week was a perfect opportunity to make reference to this week’s guiding principle of Global and Local Responsibility. After an understandably disrupted and hesitant start to preparations for the conference, the children are now well and truly at grips with their topic, and have begun to drill deeper into their specialist area, thinking through related issues, definitions of key terms, and useful references to start off with. Now that they have completed their abstracts and definitions, the next stage will be mapping out the main body of their paper. This is a complex endeavour, and even more of a challenge this year given the fact that the pupils have to manage their group assignments remotely. However this has not stopped them working as effective teams, and it is fantastic indeed to see their skills of communication, leadership and critical thinking truly coming to the fore. I am really looking forward to seeing how some of the answers to their ‘big questions’ below will begin to emerge:
‘Will life be sustainable on Mars in a decade?’
‘Will it be possible to grow food in space stations in the future?’
‘What are the specific social and economic effects of a global pandemic?’
‘Will floating farms and aquaculture provide us with new methods to harvest crops in the future?’
‘What are the changes to sea life in the Great Barrier Reef, caused specifically by climate change?’
‘What are the potential implications of simulations on education, biological research and warfare?’
‘What is the impact of rising sea-levels on the people and habitats of the Arctic?’
The year 7s have a challenge of their own to focus on for the next few weeks. It is now an annual tradition in the Summer term for the year 7s to make Baccalaureate presentations to parents, staff and their peers. Given that we cannot meet in person to celebrate their achievements this year, we hope to be able to share as a year group. The children have already started collating their ideas, and I am really looking forward to seeing their presentations improve.
In Modern Foreign Languages this week…..
In French the year 7s have been addressing the issue of local responsibility by learning how to talk about household chores. It was wonderful to hear how many pupils are helping out at home at the moment, although they may just have been proving how well they had learnt their vocabulary!
One honest pupil answered the question ‘que fais-tu pour aider à la maison?’ with ‘je ne fais rien!’ Although not what I was hoping to hear, this answer would gain full credit in a speaking exam as it shows an excellent command of negation in French!
In Spanish the year 8s have been working on presentations about famous Spanish speakers. As Spanish is the official language of 21 countries there were plenty of people to choose from and the presentations reflected a range of interests, from football to art!