Newsletters

GHS Connect #18 Monday 3rd February

Mia's notes

Thank you very much to Fuad Mohamed and Niloo and Angela for an outstanding Somali coffee morning last week - really well attended and well received.  Thanks also to Will Halsey for his superb organisation in running yet another Careers Fair - a great event!

Thanks to Andrea, Fay and the L&T team for the SEN CPD - it’s so important to break down concepts for our SEN learners, but it’s not difficult to do, if we just imagine how hard we would find doing something for the very first time without being told explicitly what to do.

We have had lots of L&T and achievement messages lately, and it’s important we don’t feel overwhelmed. I want to reassure everyone that getting good outcomes for students boils down to 3 core elements - 1) Great L&T, 2) Knowing what our classes need and ensuring we plan for that, 3) Ensuring that independent learning is structured, accessible and, of course, completed!  To focus on these, we just need to continue with our non negotiables:-

MEET/GREET students at the door. 

Activate learning with a DO NOW. For exam classes, this should now be RETRIEVAL PRACTICE.
 
CIRCULATE the room with purpose, and intervene with learning where needed.

Use targeted PRAISE.

END/SEND to control how students exit the classroom with clear direction over how to access SUPPORTIVE AND PURPOSEFUL INDEPENDENT LEARNING TASKS.

Thank you for everything you are doing to support students to achieve great results.

Mia

The week ahead

Monday
Normal Day

Tuesday
No meeting due to Year 10 Subject Evening

Wednesday
Briefing in the library - 8.15am

Thursday
Year 10 Subject Evening. Check your appointments here
Pizza, Coffee and Chat in the library from 3.10pm 

Friday
Normal Day

Notes
Year 13 Interim 2 Due
Year 12 Mocks

Breaking News - Cambridge Offers

We have two students who have been offered a place at Cambridge.

Asha Barreh: 13I - Land Economy at the University of Cambridge (A*AA conditional offer)

Elias Alrubaye: 13B - Engineering at the University of Cambridge (A*AA conditional offer)

Congratulations to them, and of course to all the teachers who have taught them.

Learning and Teaching - Pride in our Routines

Trigger Words are a versatile oracy strategy as they can be used to support multiple types of talk. For example, they can create an open structure which supports both dialogic and exploratory talk.

This week, Ben Dupres shares his top tips on using them to facilitate these:

• Choose open or discursive content.
• It doesn't need to be retrieval but can be a check of broader prior knowledge.
• This is a useful tool to introduce a topic with.
• The chosen words can be concepts or ideas.
• It can be used as a Do Now.
• You can be spontaneous with them so it doesn't take much planning.
• They are a good prompt for debates and discussions.
• Your subject knowledge should be strong.

We want to hear your voice! Please take a moment to complete this survey- anonymously - and let’s co-create our next steps.

How should we expect students to speak when using Trigger Words? Explore more about the case for disciplinary oracy here.

CPD Training Follow Up

"Inclusive learning environments ensure that every student, regardless of their abilities or needs, can access education that supports their growth and potential and ensures that all students can not only participate meaningfully in the classroom but feel a sense of belonging at school." Shout Out UK

A reminder that the slides from last week's CPD training on SEN can be found here. Please take these strategies into your practice.

Inclusion Updates

Child Protection

How Safe is WhatsApp for Children - NSPCC

WhatsApp is one of the most popular instant messaging apps, used by over 2 billion people in 180 countries. It allows you to send and receive messages, as well as make voice and video calls. You can connect with people individually or join group chats where lots of people can contribute. All you need to set up a WhatsApp account is a phone number. However, children and young people can easily subvert the restrictions placed on its access. Although rated at 16+, all that is required is a phone number. All it takes is one child in a class to be on WhatsApp, and all the others will wish to join. This can lead to increased vulnerabilities for child users. The NSPCC has released its own analysis about the dangers of the app. If interested, please follow this link.

SEN

Exams Access Arrangements - Please can I remind all staff that the deadline for exams access arrangements for Year 11 and 13 has now passed.  We are unable to take students forward at this stage. 

Dyspraxia Article

Read below and find out more information on how to support children with Dyspraxia.

https://senmagazine.co.uk/content/specific-needs/dyspraxia/23056/dyspraxia-2/

Inclusion Heroes

I wanted to say a huge thank you to Niloo, Angela and Fuad for running the Somali Coffee Morning and delivering a session on Mental Health support.

Thank you for your support and ongoing work with our vulnerable cohorts.

Gurvinder

Bright Spots

This week's Bright Spots have been nominated by Amandeep Phull who says:

I would like to mention the following staff/teams for always having a ‘can-do’ way of thinking. They have been fundamental in the running of all the parents’ evenings, and I am so incredibly grateful for their hard work and support:

• Alan
• Sarah Packman
• Kiran in reprographics
• Hebe
• Mitie Team
• ICT Team
• Sharon

If there are any concerns about Equality and Diversity (staff)  at GHS please contact A Johal (DHT)