Newsletters

GHS Connect - Monday 30 September

From the Head

I can’t quite believe that this is the fifth week back in school. The last few weeks have absolutely flown by and so much has been achieved already. I’d like to start by thanking all of the HODs and TLR holders for such positive exam review meetings. There are many things to celebrate and just a few tweaks to make as we move forwards. Obviously, each area will have specifics but common themes included the following:

- An outstanding commitment to do whatever it takes for all students;

- An incisive approach to maximising success in the exam through better question selection and analysis of examiner reports and mark allocation;

- A huge range of interventions on offer, mostly well attended;

- Thanks to pastoral teams for their support;

- The benefit of the use of ‘teaching packs’. These allow students to keep all of their notes in one place - great for weaker students, or those with poorer organisation. See ‘In Focus’ for an example.

- The benefit of using clear, accessible revision materials.

- The need to model explicitly to students - the use of visualisers is especially helpful;

- A pressing requirement to improve the performance of boys;

- The need to be more aware of what works for SEN students;

- A school wide commitment to improving the attendance of some 6th formers;

- Greater time for some subject interventions.

What became very clear to me in all of the meetings is that there is an intellectual approach to raising achievement in this school. Rather than simply rattling through the content and hoping for the best, teachers are thinking really carefully about the specifics of the requirements of each question in each exam, employing an intelligent strategy to maximising marks and thinking carefully about which teaching and learning method is best used where.

Thank you to everyone for the huge amount of work that goes into working with our students. You are all making a massive difference. By way of illustrating this, I thought everyone might like to see the short film that has been put together by students to celebrate Haydar’s birthday. What the film shows is that not only do our students LOVE Mr Shah, but most importantly they love him for his support, his patience and his never faltering belief that ANYONE can succeed in Maths. I’ll have to get some lessons of my own sorted soon…… :) Enjoy the film at T:\Common\SHA's birthday

Mia

Learning and Teaching

A round up of all the great learning and teaching strategies we’ve noticed being used around school this week….

Spotted!

> Adam, maintaining high levels of challenge when teaching students in 9x5 about feminism in Victorian England.

> Louisa pre-teaching vocabulary to A Level Psychology students to help them access tricky course content.

> Sabina deftly modelling how to simplify fractions with year 8.

Have you tried….

A super easy one this week!

We often write up a list of key words on the board, but how often do these remain unused, a sign of our good intentions rather than vocabulary actively addressed in lessons?

Next time try ticking off key words as you deliberately use them with a class and indicate when a student tries to use the more sophisticated vocabulary or technical terminology in the lesson.

In focus: Attendance Week Update

Well done to everyone for the big push on attendance. We saw great performances from most Year groups during attendance week, with an overall average of 96.7%.

The correlation between attendance and achievement is well documented, but did you know that students are far more likely to come to school if they believe that their subject teacher notices their absence? Once they return to school, a quick word from a student’s subject teacher can work wonders. Telling them that you missed them, that it wasn’t the same without them and that you are glad they are back, makes them realise that not being there had an impact on you. If they feel wanted, they are more likely to try harder to be present next time. Try it!

Noble & Sarah

In focus: Not Following…….

Please take a moment to remind students of the key messages from last week’s assembly - not following others and having the strength of mind to make the right choices.

Out and about

It’s been great to see so many productive Post 16 lessons as we’ve been out and about this week.

Here’s an example of Jo Leaver-Cole’s pack that her Year 12 class are working from. The students were very keen to articulate how helpful they found it in structuring their studies.

It was also fantastic to see Year 10 enjoying such great Science lessons during a quick tour of C Block last week. Many students were engaged in a practical, but those who were not were receiving fantastic teaching through the form of strong, focused questioning and engaging class discussions. Thanks to our fab Science team!

Thank you to Sarah who accompanied Year 12 to see a pop concert in German by the German band 'Brotmueller'. In Sarah’s words, "the whole event was in German and Manav, Miles and Duchane felt they had understood a good proportion of the language and the songs : it was great to see them following along with their lyric sheets. The photo shows us on stage with the band."