Newsletters

GHS Connect #4 Monday 26 September

Mia's notes

I hope everyone is feeling rested after the weekend.

Last week started with the excitement of the Year 7 and 11 photos - thank you to Dan and the whole of the Year 7 and 11 teams for your support with what is always a tricky exercise! As the week went on, we managed to secure alternative provision for some of our more challenging Year 11s - well done Noble! - and, with a few exceptions, continue to enjoy a largely incident free week.  Thank you again for all that you are doing to ensure that the school remains a calm, happy and productive place.

This week, we have a visit from the new LA advisor, Corinne Gill, on Thursday and I want to thank everyone who is involved in this. When she comes in, myself and Amandip will be sharing details of our excellent exam results at all levels. I have no doubt that she will be extremely impressed.

In other local authority news, it would appear that there has been a huge influx of students coming in from abroad into London - some are refugees, others are economic migrants. At the same time, some of our students are moving out of the area for various reasons, often due to being rehomed. We therefore have a small number of vacancies, and will pick up a few casual admissions in some year groups, so don’t be surprised to see some new faces over the next few weeks.

Next week is, of course, our open evening. I know that people are taking this opportunity to update displays and tidy up. Thank you in advance and thank you for everything else you are doing to promote our school in the very best light.

Have a lovely week,

Mia

The week ahead

Monday
European Day of Languages - details on VLE staff announcement here

Tuesday
Meeting: Year team / Pastoral 3.15pm - 4.30pm

Wednesday 
No meeting

Thursday
SLT chat, coffee and cake 3.15pm - 4pm 

Friday
Normal day

Notes
Year 11 and Year 13 assessment week

Learning and teaching: Spotted

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

Learning and teaching: Access strategies

In line with our ABC training at the start of the year, I have been thinking about how I improve explicit vocabulary teaching with my year 11 literature students so they can better access our set text ‘An Inspector Calls.’ I found a very neat 5-step process in the book Teaching Walkthrus:

1. Specify and define the words
2. Say the words-chorally, in pairs and rapid fire to individuals 
3. Read the words in context
4. Practise using the words verbally and in writing 
5. Engage in word based retrieval practice. 

This week I focused on the first two stages but was surprised  at how difficult some students found it to pronounce unfamiliar vocabulary correctly.  It struck me that, until now, I had often skipped over this stage of verbal reinforcement, probably making it difficult for my students to remember and spell new words. However, after using the strategy above, instead of saying that the character of Sheila is a golddigger, the students can use the word materialistic; the character Gerald is no longer a suck-up but a sycophant. 

This week, I’ll be working on the remaining stages so that this vocabulary is embedded and readily available to students as they write their essays.

Kelly

Bright Spots

This week I am sharing 3 bright spots. Keep them coming and keep looking out to see if you have brightened someone else’s day!

Sukey Mathadu: nominated by Tam Ashley  

Tam has nominated Sukey because she has done a fabulous job this year with getting the Year 7’s paperwork in order and onto SIMS. She has worked like a trooper communicating with parents, staff and pupils to get the job done and then taken care of all of the tweaks after day one! All of this whilst being efficient, hardworking, proactive and ALWAYS having a smile on her face. Thank you Sukey!

Clive Joseph: nominated by Phoebe Henderson-Barnes

Phoebe has nominated Clive for always, without fail, being there to run the table tennis club, every Wednesday. This is a club loved and really appreciated by students. Thank you Clive!

Ben Gunn: nominated by Lou Grimley

Lou has nominated Ben for brightening up her day by putting in place incredible planning and resources for her first Year 9 Drama lesson on non-naturalistic drama. Year 9 produced 5 non-naturalistic performances, entirely due to the hard work he had put in. Thank you to Ben!

Ending and Sending

Please can all staff ensure that you are “ending and sending” students at the end of your lesson by “dismissing at the door”. There are some lovely pictures below where staff are modelling the correct way to end & send students, supporting excellent behaviour in the corridors, once they have left the lesson. This is a brilliant opportunity to PIP (Praise in public) those students who have been superb in your lesson!

Mark

Youth mental health day

Youth Mental Health Day was on Monday 19 September.

Youth Mental Health Day (YMHD) encourages understanding and discussion of mental health in young people, enabling them to live happy and healthy lives all year round. Each year, the day aims to get young people, and those who support them, talking about how to improve mental health.

Mental health concerns for young people have multiplied in recent times and one in six young people aged 5-16 have had a mental disorder. Youth Mental Health Day is here to provide hope by getting young people engaged in discussions and activities about how to improve their mental health, YMHD goes beyond awareness and breaking the stigma surrounding mental health, into tackling the heart of the issue.

YMHD was founded by stem4, a charity that supports young people to build positive mental health.

Niloo

Inclusion Heroes!

This week's award goes to Will Hirtzel and Noor Al-Musawi for an incredible turn-out at Chess Club. The library was so packed, I couldn’t see who was running the club at first but did manage to spot them eventually…