Newsletter 202.version 7 pub.pub

Remembering
The Christmas Fayre
The Christmas Fayre, held on December 16th, was a great success with all staff
and students making a contribution. It was pleasing to see our whole staff
working as a team at this festive time of year. It was encouraging to see
members of the community attending both as prospective customers and by
running their own stalls. Next year we hope to encourage more community stall
holders to participate and make this a Bletchley-wide event. Altogether, the
total raised was just over £1,081.
THE LORD GREY SCHOOL NEWSLETTER
A weekly newsletter for students, parents, staff, governors and friends of the school.
No. 202 Friday 13th January 2006
This newsletter will be distributed each Friday and will be published on www.lordgrey.org.uk.
Staff, students, parents or governors are welcome to contribute items of news or information.
These should reach Julie Stevens by 10.00am on Wednesday.
The up and coming new group “Pavlou and the Pavloids”
Particular mention needs to be given to the group activities. The
Karaoke, organised by Jo Trevenna and Jo McBride proved to
be a crowd puller, with guest appearances made by many
teachers who would not have looked out of place on the X-factor.
The up and coming group “Pavlou and the Pavloids” brought the
house down with their rendition of “I will survive”. Des Pavlou
afterwards admitted: “It was my singing debut….”
Andrew Maurer, Vivienne Hayle and the Teaching Assistants
Team’s Auction proved to be very successful, with special
thanks to the Sixth Form Senior Students who collected the items
from fellow students and the local community. The Auction
raised £113. The Christmas Carols and refreshments in the
Dining Room were very popular and created the festive
atmosphere which helped make the fayre such an enjoyable
event. Lastly, the Sixth Form Pantomime,
exceeded all
expectations and revealed that some of our male students enjoyed
dressing up a little too much! The Panto raised £86. It was really
satisfying to see Form Tutors working so well with their form
Sixth Form students in their pantomime regalia!
group. A special mention must be given to Shamima Ahmed
and 9H and Mike Hately and 10G whose forms, focussing on cakes and chocolates, raised most money. Congratulations also to
Chris Phillips, 10H and Andrew Brocket, 11E, who collectively raised £87 with the Film Fanatics Stall. Thank you and well done to all.
Happy New Year!
The new year has started extremely well with the news that Lord Grey has received a number of awards.
Firstly, the school has received confirmation from the Department for Education and Skills of being redesignated
as a Specialist Modern Foreign Language College. The school will receive additional funding until September
2009 which will be put to good use for students’ benefit.
Specialist Schools and Academies Trust
Excellence and Diversity
School Achievement Award
Secondly, being recognised as a high-performing specialist school, Lord Grey has been successful in gaining a
second specialism in Humanities. This will release even more funding for each of our students and help to bring
further areas of the school up to the national standards that we have now achieved in languages. The subject
areas of English, Drama and Citizenship will particularly benefit by enhanced resources. Exciting plans to
develop the teaching and learning in these subject areas will have a direct impact on all students’ learning, and
make a significant contribution to our partner institutions. We will be able to share Lord Grey’s best practice
with other schools in Milton Keynes and beyond.
Thirdly, Lord Grey has gained the Rugby Football Union (RFU) Development Award, which also will release
funding to promote the sport and to encourage students’ skills and potential.
I would like to thank all staff who have worked so hard to
attain deserved recognition and to move us forward in our aim
to be a learning community of the highest standards.
Adel Shirbini, Deputy Headteacher
“Excellence: Dare to Succeed”.
The Christmas Assembly
th
On Tuesday 20 December, the whole
school, staff and students, gathered in the
Sports Hall for the Christmas Assembly.
Our Headteacher, Des Pavlou emphasised
the true meaning of Christmas and then
took us through some of the highlights of
the term. Over 150 students helped to
celebrate her assembly including
Lewis Cozens, Chair of the School
Council, who gave an excellent account of
the School Council’s work throughout the
term.
Awards were given to many students
including Leo Watanabe for being the
Father Christmas bringing gifts! and The Lord Grey Orchestra
Language Linguist of the term.
Leo seems to be able to learn new languages easily, but we know it’s actually very hard work and the fact that he can now speak
French, Spanish, Arabic, English, Italian and Japanese, is extremely impressive.
After Andrew Vernon, 8H won the draw for 100% Attendance, the Honours book entries were presented:
•
•
•
•
Natasha Lewis, 7G; Science winner of the “Salty’s” Challenge
Abolade Makinde, 9G; Extra curricular artwork
Luke Beacall, 9N; Single/Double Badminton winner
Lee Eastbury, 11E; producing Anti Bullying poster;
Father Christmas was able to find the time from his busy schedule to make an appearance to give gifts to some lucky students and
update us on the current House Points:
• Rome 1279 points
• Paris 1209 points
• Berlin 1160 points
• Madrid 1040 points
We were also entertained by the School Orchestra, by some imaginative Christmas-based Drama; the poem, “If” spoken by
James Austin; “Rocking around the Christmas Tree” by Andrew Bond and his band and other music from Ben Cutting,
Tony McGinley, Rumbidzi Mtisi, Renelle Neil, Leah Tyerman and the Fantini Sixth Form Choir. At the end we all joined in
singing “Away in a Manger” and “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” - a lovely way to finish the term and 2005.
David Smith, Assistant Headteacher
What Do Our New Logos Mean?
There is no doubt that each of our logos will, through their enhanced funding in the areas designated, help to improve opportunities
for students, staff and our community.
Languages
Andi Oakley, Director and Jonathan Day, Head of Languages, have with the Modern Foreign Languages Faculty, developed both
the redesignation bid throughout the school and the national platform on which our languages at Lord Grey are now operating. The
outstanding success in external examination results at GCSE and A level throughout the school and in Modern Languages has no
doubt played a key role in Lord Grey being redesignated as a Language College.
Students do have enhanced opportunities to participate in a wide
ide range of languages at GCSE and A Level, and to take part in
residential language immersion experiences such as Longrigg, or Language exchanges with our Partner Schools in France, Germany
and Spain. There are also opportunities for work placements abroad and students may benefit from cross-curricular initiatives in the
Socrates programme. Our new ICT and multimedia provision and home access for language learning are also motivating students
to make progress in literacy. Our four Foreign Language Assistants, in each of the main languages taught, are also assisting students in their learning.
Mobile Phones
Science - New GCSE Course
The official school policy is that students do not
bring mobiles into school. The school takes no
responsibility for the loss or theft of mobiles or any
other personal stereos or ipods. If you have any
queries or questions please contact me.
The present Year 9s will be the first group of students to take an
exciting new Dual Award Science course that is starting up in
September. To ensure that we have as much time as possible we
intend to start their KS4 work straight after the KS3 SATs tests in
May.
Linda Lennox, Assistant Headteacher
Year 11 GCSE Mathematics Coursework
All Year 11 students will start the second and final piece of
Mathematics coursework in the week commencing 4th January.
The coursework is worth 10% of the overall GCSE grade. The
deadline for submission is Friday 27th January 2006. As with
all coursework, it is imperative that the work is completed and
submitted on time.
Simon Bloomfield, Head of Mathematics
As part of the National Primary Languages Strategy, Lord Grey staff are leading the way in ensuring language entitlement in Key
Stage 2. Every Tuesday, sixteen primary postgraduate students from De Montfort University are tutored by Jonathan Day, Head
of Languages and Nicola Palmieri, Head of Spanish. The role of these students by September 2009 will include providing
language classes to all primary children.
Twilight lessons in Spanish and English are also now provided to several classes at Abbey, since its merger with Banco Santander.
Lord Grey is taking an increasingly active role within the local business community.
Humanities
Our new Humanities award will initially help to target the subjects of English, Drama and Citizenship and thereafter all areas in
Humanities. The award will “give voice to our tongue” allowing students to consider the culture and society associated with the
language spoken. This award will foster an understanding of human values and attitudes, past and present, exploring how society is
organised, developed and changed. A rigorous four year development plan, designed to improve standards as a whole and to raise
performance and participation in Humanities, has been prepared by Adel Shirbini, Deputy Headteacher; Jan English, Head of
English; Jo Trevenna, Head of Performing Arts; Jo McBride, Head of Drama and Kate Martin, Head of Citizenship.
In short our aims are to:
•
Build on proven strengths to establish Lord Grey as a centre of excellence in our newly designated subjects
•
Break new ground in the teaching and learning of these chosen subjects
•
Use ICT imaginatively to enhance teaching and learning
•
Develop and share best practice techniques for raising educational standards
•
Offer a wide variety of vocational and academic routes for students of all abilities equipping them with relevant skills
•
Enhance provision to offer students enriched opportunities
•
Motivate, enthuse and excite students by allowing further opportunities in learning
•
Introduce an enterprise and international focus to all work, linking with the local community.
Rugby
The Rugby Football Union (RFU) Development
Award has been presented to Lord Grey; our newly
received certificate is now hanging in the Pavilion.
Andrew Soper, Teacher of Physical Education was
responsible for drawing up our development plan.
The plan focuses on three main areas; Player/student
involvement, School Community relationships and
Coach Education.
Grateful thanks here are due to Andrew Soper, who writes, “I am very pleased
with the Development Award Status, as the three year development plan that we
designed was drawn up to suit Lord Grey School, showing how Rugby can really
develop here. The funding will bring in coaches from the RFU, Active Sports and
Buckinghamshire to coach students in lessons and after school clubs, as well as
helping Lord Grey staff with coaching techniques. I hope that the plan is fulfilled
in three years’ time, where we will see a lot more students playing the sport of
world champions!”
A Rugby Club for all students is running throughout the school year. Currently,
the focus is for Year 7 boys and girls and Year 8 girls. The club is on Tuesdays
3.30-4.30p.m. Please come along and give the sport a try for 2006!
Despina Pavlou, Headteacher
January Examinations
All students sitting GCE/VCE/
GNVQ/GCSE examinations this
month have been issued with a
personal timetable. This indicates the
venue and seat number for each
examination. If there are any queries
regarding these examinations, please
contact me in the Examinations
Office on 01908 626110 or email
[email protected]
Margaret Cutress, Examinations Officer
The major difference between old and new GCSE courses is that
the content is divided into two distinct sections; one that is largely
devoted to learning the necessary skills of a scientist (which
follows on beautifully from the KS3 course) and one that is much
more focussed on concepts and facts. Both sections are examined
separately and lead to separate GCSE passes. Our present course
has always been worth 2 GCSEs; in future students will take two
distinct examinations. In common with most secondary schools we
intend to prepare the majority of our students for the skills based,
core Science paper for the end of Year 10 and then the concept led
Additional Science course at the end of Year 11.
If any parents of Year 9 students, would like to know more about
these changes, I will be giving a short talk about this at the Year 9
into Year 10 Preference Evening on Thursday 2nd March and I will
be available for individual questions afterwards.
We, in the Science Faculty are very positive about these changes,
they will allow us to teach science in a way that can engage more
of our students successfully without undermining the standards
necessary for further studies in post 16.
Philip Owens, Head of Science
New Arrivals Congratulations to:
Rachel Jones who gave birth to a baby
girl, Maya, on Sunday 18th December;
weighing in at 7lb 2oz.
Sisters Do the Double at Judo!
Jordan Creamer, 10K and Melissa Creamer,
7F both won two prestigious awards at the
Leicester and Northamptonshire Judo
Competition on Sunday 11th December.
Jordan secured the Bronze trophy for
under 50kg and Melissa took the Silver
trophy for the under 35kg category. Both
Award winning smiles!
are very proud of their awards and are
looking forward to the International Judo competition in
February.
David Smith, Assistant Headteacher
BA Honours
Stacey Coppock, a previous student at
Lord Grey, has just completed her
d egr ee in Geo gr ap hy at the
University of Plymouth, and has been
awarded a First Class Honours
Degree. We are all pleased to share in
Stacey’s success and wish her many
congratulations.
David Smith, Assistant Headteacher
Charlotte Carron who had a baby girl
on Christmas Day. She has been named
Martha.
Mothers and babies are doing well. Many congratulations.
Linda Lennox, Assistant Headteacher
The Lord Grey School
Showcases Local Talent
On Thursday 19th January, we are
hosting a Rock Concert, Jockstock,
featuring three very talented local
bands: Terrapin Trainstation,
FIRETYPE and Son of a Gun. The
event will be held in the main hall.
Doors open at 6.30pm and no entries
will be allowed after 7.30pm - so be
there on time or miss out!
Terrapin Trainstation take to the stage at 7pm for a thirty minute
set. At 7.45 pm, FIRETYPE take to the stage for forty five
minutes and, finally, Son of a Gun are on stage from 9pm. The
event will finish at approximately 10pm.
Tickets are available from the Sixth Form Tuck Shop or
Jo Trevenna. Refreshments will be available on the night from the
Lord Grey Association.
Jo Trevenna, Head of Performing Arts