Newsletters

GHS Connect #6 Monday 11 October

From the Head

I wanted to start by thanking everyone for their contributions to Friday’s INSET. Hopefully, everyone managed to get their appraisals done as well as having the all important ‘child free’ day which we need every so often! Thank you to Gurvinder for organising the Macmillan coffee morning. It was lovely to be able to spend some time together for this very important cause.

My latest Covid update is a bit more positive I hope than last week. Students seem to be complying pretty well with the change back to mask wearing in communal areas, although they do of course need reminders. I will also point out that cases last week were a lot lower than the week before, which is promising, and that we have vaccinations scheduled from 18th - 20th October.

This week is our ‘wellbeing week’, a new arrangement we have put in the calendar this year, to make sure we have one week where there are no meetings. Tuesday is definitely a day to leave early, have some time to yourself and give yourself a bit of a breather! Another date for your diary, if you are a Year 7 tutor, is to note that tutors evening has changed to Wednesday 3rd November. The evening will be held on School Cloud. See this VLE announcement for more details.

Finally, I want to say a truly massive thank you to Will Halsey and Will Harrison who have both done an incredible job of getting our virtual open evening up and running. They really had to turn things around quickly, but managed to not only get it done, but also get it done in a highly professional way. Thank you also to Jen, Amandeep, Tara and Amit who contributed to the new videos. They were all brilliant!

Have a great week everyone,

Mia

Monday
Normal day.

Tuesday
No meeting - wellbeing week.

Wednesday
No meeting - wellbeing week.

Thursday
Interim deadline: Year 13

Friday
Normal day.

Learning and Teaching

Spotted!

A round up of some of the great learning and teaching strategies we’ve noticed being used around school recently…

• Sajjad Jaffer engaging his students as soon as they enter the room by having them answer the Do Now on their tables. Sajjad can then easily check and correct their answers as he circulates. There’s no fussing around with books; the students only need a whiteboard pen to get straight into his lesson!
• Tara Quigley jumping straight into feedback from an assessment to move her students on. As a 'Do Now' task, Tara gave a sheet to her Year 12 Biologists containing 9 different quotes from a recent assessment. These all contained common errors; students had to discuss why they were wrong and make their corrections. A really simple starter that engaged students from as soon as they entered the room and led to really detailed discussions.

Learning and Teaching:

Thank you to all colleagues who brought such energy and enthusiasm to the SEND training on Friday. There were some great reflections about how we best support our SEND learners and other students who may display similar learning behaviours. 

Just as a reminder, over the coming weeks and months we are going to be trying to improve the the following for our SEND students:

• Access (to task)
• Bridge to independent work
• Checking understanding of key groups

If you missed the training or you’d like another look at some of the examples of how to address these areas you can view the powerpoint here. For any questions regarding the training, please email Gurvinder/Caroline, Claire Secombe or Kelly. 

Kelly McCarthy

Inclusion and Pastoral

As I write this, it is World Mental Health Day and we are about to start our Wellbeing Week at school. Please make sure you take advantage no meetings to do something for you and get some headspace. I saw some friends last night who have introduced Event Night in their house - once a week, Monday to Thursday, when you have to leave the house to do something enriching. I really like the idea and am going to try and do it myself, starting this week with a long overdue return to the theatre…

I know that is not always easy for us and there have been some particular challenges this week with some very worrying behaviour from a handful of students. Please be assured that we are working hard to find the correct way forward for these individuals but are also here to support staff. Come and find me if you feel you need to and remember Jo and Tash, our counsellors, are also in school on Tuesdays and Wednesdays to support staff, if needed. This service is completely confidential and you can contact them on scp@greenford.ealing.sch.uk. 

Lastly from me, if you get some time this week, read this from BBC’s long reads, telling the story of Aliyah who has been through the care system - not only does it give an indication of what early trauma can do to a child, but it also illuminates how transformational those of us who work with children can be in their lives. It’s an excellent read!

Have a good week everyone!

Lou 

Inclusion Heroes!

Well done to this week’s Inclusion Hero:

Dan Siskin - as we are all increasingly encouraged to recognise both our own and other’s mental health needs, Dan used his Thursday morning to visit one of his students who is in residential care for mental health concerns, to reconnect that student to their normal teenage life and cheer them up with silly stories from school. Thank you, Dan! 

Character strengths at GHS

We wanted to showcase some great examples of how year 11 have been demonstrating our GHS Character Strengths this week around the school.

Courage
Hebe Westcott hosted an evening for the year 13 and year 11 Oxbridge cohorts. Year 11 showed courage by giving the year 13s feedback  on their personal statements:

Compassion
Each week, Joe Wilcox focuses on a key Character Strength with his form. This week, they were discussing compassion and writing down examples that go in a form book (right and below).

Responsibility
Our first cohort of Year 11s Study Club students are showing responsibility for their learning by using the time after school to work on their homework, revision and study skills:

Community 
The senior boys basketball team were working as a community after school, with Mark Harvey, perfecting their game skills:

Andrea and Noble

School photography

A few more of the teacher shots from our recent website photoshoot...