Hundreds of students took part in this year's annual Christmas Showcase. The concerts featured acts including instrumentals, short plays, choral and classical arrangements and dances. Performers included Year 7 choirs, the Orchestra, Year 13 BTEC group, lower and upper school dance groups as well as Year 10 drama students.
Students from Year 7 received a free book from the Library as part of the Bookbuzz programme. Over 180 books were wrapped by Sixth Formers Jennariece Robson, Louise Sharpe and Sasha Thompson and handed out to students during tutor time.
Drama students from Year 9 have been entertaining Beanfield and Gretton primary schools with a shortened version of the story 'A Christmas Carol'.
Earlier this year two Year 12 students and a Year 10 student joined Beliefs, Philosophy and Ethics teacher Ms Coombe on the World War I Centenary Battlefield Memorial tour.
Following the Engineering week students participated in at the start of the month, where Network Rail led STEM days (science, technology, engineering and maths) at ten schools across the region, four students, Imogen Lincoln, Matthew Brown, Tate Eppy and Amelia Sulch along with science teacher Miss Reynolds were invited to visit their headquarters in Milton Keynes for an experience day.
The four students were chosen for being particularly engaged and working well as a group and were amongst eight other schools from the midlands taking part in the day.
Students are incorporating techniques they learned in a theatrical workshop into practical work for their GCSE coursework. Students from Brooke Weston and Corby Technical School had a workshop with renowned theatre group Frantic Assembly.
This week saw the launch of the Year 7 boys' premier league reading challenge. Introduced by Librarian Wendy McCabe, the students split themselves into teams of five, with each team representing a football team in the premier league.
Every student needs to read as many books as possible before the end of season. Each book equates to a goal and the more goals scored the higher up the league table the team goes. A review sheet about the book has to be completed before a goal is awarded, with stickers given for the goal and put on display on the league table in the library.
In celebration of the Duke of Edinburgh Scheme’s Diamond Anniversary DT technician Mr Darren Hooper has recently completed a 12 hour mountain bike race plus a separate cycling expedition up Mount Snowdon to raise funds for local D of E projects.
Mr Hooper completed the gruelling 12 hours of mountain biking around Minley Manor in Reading, only stopping for one or two minutes every lap, and later went on to bike to the top of Mount Snowdon, raising £150. He said ‘I didn’t get the chance to do D of E when I was at school. So when I heard about the Diamond D of E challenge I knew it was something I wanted to do. I love challenging myself and pushing the boundaries of my comfort zone.
Year 9 students took on practical challenges including building bridges out of paper and level crossings from Lego during a STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) day run as part of Tomorrow’s Engineers Week.
This is a nationwide initiative where companies from across the country visit schools to set challenges and practical activities. Network Rail led STEM days at ten schools across the region and students from each will visit their headquarters in Milton Keynes later this month for more challenges, including a programming session on level crossing control.
As part of a national initiative to increase awareness of STEM careers, science teacher, Ms Reynolds, recently took part in a trip to Iceland.
Organised by the National Science Learning Centre, 15 teachers nationwide applied to go to Iceland to learn about its diverse landscapes and provide their students with varying contexts when teaching.
During the trip they took part in a 185-mile golden circle tour, when they experienced waterfalls, lava fields, volcanoes and geysers, where the power of the water and steam erupting from the ground due to the extreme heat is incredible.
Three of our students recently took part in a competition at the iconic Sadler’s Wells theatre with one of their teams winning a title in the hard-fought contest.
Charlotte Smith, Cameron Pickering and Caoimhe Magee all perform with Starlight Dance & Musical Theatre School. Several of its teams took part in the Mardi Gras dance competition at Sadler’s Wells where around 60 teams compete in different categories. Caoimhe was delighted when her team came third:
Intrepid explorer and adventurer George Bullard was the guest of honour at our 2016 Prizegiving where he spoke about his latest adventure, kayaking thousands of miles from Greenland to Scotland.
He and fellow explorer Ollie Hicks paddled 1500 miles from Greenland and ended up 66 days later (and just a fortnight ago) on the beach at Balnakiel Bay on the north of Scotland. They travelled via Iceland and the Faroes and navigated the dreaded Devil’s Dancefloor before becoming marooned on North Rona for a week, surviving on rainwater and wildlife including limpets and sea birds.
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