Dear Families

Welcome to the final week of this half term! 

It is hard to believe that we have only been together for 7 weeks having achieved so much!

The work of our Comms Team will bring this to light again this week when they return to XPG to install more new displays of our students from all three year groups. We are also hoping to agree final details for our external signage and look forward to the installation on site soon. 

There is more building work planned over the holidays as we get to the bottom of work required to ensure that our temporary space is of the high standard we need. Our huge thanks go out to the Gateshead teams who have continued to support us and the companies who have been contracted to carry out work on site. We are very lucky to be able to have the temporary space we have here at XP Gateshead.

G28 Crew Charity Events

This week saw the first of our Crew Charity events and Crew Stanton organised and ran a Halloween Disco for nearly 100 staff and students. They raised £245.81 for their chosen crew charity, Tiny Lives which is a charity in Newcastle that supports premature and unwell babies and their families. Our students loved the event with many dressing up for the occasion…

The night was a brilliant effort from everyone in Crew Stanton but I would like to praise standout work from Mason and Anya!

On Monday morning I will meet with representatives from all G28 crews to go through their plans for charity events in school this year.

G28 – How can structures help us to explain the world around us?

On Friday our local MP Ian Mearns worked with our G28 students as an expert for their current expedition. Our students had questions for Mr Mearns on Labour policy around social housing and also about his career as a politician.

Thomas Hepburn Memorial Service 2023

On Saturday 14th October some of our staff, students and families from G30 attended the annual memorial service for Thomas Hepburn at St Mary’s Church, Heworth. The service commemorates the life of Thomas Hepburn who spent his life working to improve the lives of miners and their families as well as being the founder of the Colliers United of Durham and Northumberland in 1825. 

It was a real honour to be invited to the ceremony where the acclaimed filmmaker, Ken Loach, spoke about Thomas Hepburn’s life and his fight for social justice as a leader of the first miners’ trade union. The service also featured readings from the local MP for Easington Grahame Morris, the Mayor of Gateshead, Cllr Eileen McMaster and the Reverend Lucy Moss. The Durham Miners Association Brass Band were wonderful and accompanied the service throughout.  Following the service, wreaths were laid at Thomas Hepburn’s grave and the Felling Banner group gave our students the great honour of laying their wreath.

Here’s a short film of the event made by Lonely Tower Film and Media.

Snapshots

Updated assessment information snapshots will be shared this week. For year 8 and year 9, these include HoWLs and academic progress. For Year 7 the first snapshot gives you an indication of HoWLs – we will put out a separate website post on Tuesday to help you to understand these snapshots.

Leaders of their Own Learning

Students in Year 7 and 8 have been considering how they can use our Thursday morning sessions to lead their own learning and become the best versions of themselves. Students have given us an initial indication of their preferences but please do discuss this at home. The sessions we have planned are:

• Targeted Support* – some students will be directed to these sessions
• Mandarin
• Fitness
• Creative writing
• Ethics and worldviews
• Personalised Research
• Art across time – learning about art history by making art
• Climate Action Plan
• Theatre – drama and performance
• French

These sessions will start on Thursday mornings after the half-term break.

Thursday morning sessions for Year 9 this year will have careers and Duke of Edinburgh as a focus.

Our week ahead 

PE sessions this week

Our PE sessions this week are as follows. Please ensure that your child has their  full PE kit.

All G30 students (Year 7) have PE on Monday this week.

All G29 students (Year 8) have PE on Wednesday this week.

All G28 students (Year 9) have PE on Friday this week.

Extended Study and taster sessions for clubs

As usual, we offer extended study sessions, from 3:15pm – 4:30pm each day this week Monday-Thursday. 

Our taster sessions for clubs at lunchtimes and after school continue this week. Students will continue  trying some sessions to help with decisions on weekly clubs they will sign up to attend after the holidays.

Early closure this Friday

Don’t forget that that school finishes at the earlier time of 1.30pm this Friday. This is to allow us time to “degunge” and set up for the next half term. Please make arrangements to pick up your children at the school gate for 1.30pm this Friday. As always, please be conscientious of our neighbours if parking as it is always very busy when students all leave school at the same time.

We return to school on Monday 6th November 2023. 

G28 SLCs

Advance notice that Year 9 will be carrying out SLCs early in the next half-term in the fortnight commencing Monday 13th November. Crew Leaders will be in touch soon to give you the opportunity to book a slot.

Thank you for your continued support through this half term and we hope everyone has a good holiday. We are looking forward to the next half term where we will be continuing to focus on our culture of beautiful work, character and academic success. Students will be adding work to our “beautiful” work portfolios and getting ready for student-led conferences and presentations of learning which will be an opportunity for you to see some of the work your children have been doing – more on this later.

As usual if you have any questions about your son or daughter please get in touch with your child’s Crew Leader in the first instance or email general enquiries to [email protected].

Julie Mosley

Dear Families

Open Evening

On Tuesday we held our Open Evening and welcomed over 350 people to our school. As you know, on evenings like this our students take centre stage and as always, they shine.

Families attended 4 sessions – XPG Mythbusting, Beautiful work, Character and Academic Success. Every session, apart from the Mythbusting one, was a showcase ran by students who shared the work done at XPG and answered questions from their audience.

Exit ticket feedback was really positive and our students definitely communicated our culture well with very few questions left unanswered. The confidence shown by our young people and their ability to articulate what we do and why we do it is stunning and we are extremely proud and grateful to all students who were involved. A thank you to families too who supported this event.

Personal Development at XPG

We also received some feedback this week from an external review of personal development at XPG. Areas of personal development include: developing responsible, respectful and active citizens; promoting equality of opportunity; promoting an inclusive environment; developing pupils’ character; giving pupils the qualities they need to flourish in society.

The feedback was positive and included the following

“Crew and the Expedition curriculum, as well as routines such as Common Mission, Community Meetings, Field Work all serve to ensure that students know what they are learning in order to shape their character, and work towards being positive members of society.”

“The interlinked approach to personal development means students can talk about how and why they learn as they do, how it will help them in the future, and why it is important.”

“Students can articulate themselves very well, and confidently. This is the case within Crew, in lessons, at social times, and when interacting with adults – even when they do not know the adult.”

“The school ensures that statutory regulations around RSHE are implemented and thanks to the repeated and lived-out protocols, as well as the consistency of the approach to the different elements of the school day, the students are knowledgeable of the RSHE curriculum and are able to speak sensitively about certain matters.”

“Students show each other and adults respect at all times. This is evident in learning and Crew, as well as at social times.”

An area for continued development is our careers programme – how we support students in their next steps, from GCSE and further education choices, making them aware of the diverse future pathways available to them and what they need to do to achieve their goals. Our work continues this year, look out for our website updates.

G30 What do the communities of NE England owe to the miners? 

The character of our G30 students continues to impress us. It is hard to believe that our year 7 students have only been with us for 6 weeks when you see them in and outside of classrooms, look at their high quality work and hear them speak about their progress. The experts who work alongside G30 have continued to praise their hard work, craftsmanship and quality and the respect they exhibit towards each other and staff who work with them. 

As part of their expedition, our Year 7 students have interviewed  songwriting expert Joe Solo, a folk musician, in preparation for their work in taking stories of the mining community and immortalising them in song.

They also carried out fieldwork at the location of the former Whitburn Colliery and Marsden Village near to Souter Lighthouse in South Tyneside working as geologists and archeologists.

G29 – What does it mean to be Human?

High quality work has continued in art this week with students capturing the most expressive object in the known universe – the human face. Students have been developing their skills in monoprinting.

In STEAM sessions, after carrying out heart dissections earlier in the week, students have been learning about the human reproductive system and normalising discussion of our reproductive organs. Students have been fantastic at showing kindness and understanding to each other and discussing such important learning maturely. 

G28 – How can structures help us to explain the world around us?

This week students have been digging further into their anchor text Lord of the Flies, which examines what happens to a group of children when the adults are not their to provide structure. In addition they have also started to create isometric drawings and using CAD software to create digital designs of their Lego moulds in order to create plaster casts of brutalist-inspired structures.

Our week ahead 

PE sessions this week

Our PE sessions this week are as follows. Please ensure that your child has their  full PE kit.

All G30 students (Year 7) have PE on Monday this week.

All G29 students (Year 8) have PE on Tuesday this week.

All G28 students (Year 9) have PE on Friday this week.

Extended Study and taster sessions for clubs

As usual, we offer extended study sessions, from 3:15pm – 4:30pm each day this week Monday-Thursday. Please ask your son/daughter about extended study and support them in their organisation. Where students continue to struggle to get organised or need additional support we will direct them to attend Extended Study sessions after school on Mondays and Thursday with Mrs Mosley and Mr Said.

All Extended Study tasks are posted on Google Classroom. Year 7 parents should receive an invite to receive weekly Google Classroom updates this week.

The schedule for setting extended study with deadlines can be found here. More information on our rationale for Extended Study can be found here.

Extra -Curricular Clubs

Students have signed up for some taster sessions for clubs this week and next. We offer clubs at lunchtimes and after school and students will be able to try some sessions to help with decisions on weekly clubs they will attend after the holidays.

As usual if you have any questions about your son or daughter please get in touch with your child’s Crew Leader in the first instance or email general enquiries to [email protected].

Thank you as always for your ongoing support.  There is more in us than we know #WeAreCrew.

Julie Mosley