Dear Parents/Guardians
Welcome to another exciting week at XP Gateshead
We have been continuing with our new expedition – What a Wonderful World with the Guiding question: What is our relationship with the natural world?
Students have been doing some creative writing inspired by rainforests, completing their cave art, and learning about specialist cells such as nerve, muscle, red blood, and root hair cells. We will be starting to do some microscopy work in Science this week too.
We are beaming live to the world this week! Do Your Bit Radio Broadcast
This week our students’ radio broadcast of untold stories will be broadcast from Memory Lane Radio at 2pm on Friday afternoon.
Trailers for the show will be being broadcast all week. You can listen along live on Friday using this link.
Student Assessment Information and SLCs – Dates for your diaries!
Last week we shared updated assessment snapshots with students, giving information around their HoWLs and academic progress.
Students are updating their pledges at the moment. We will then share these pledges and assessment information snapshots with you at the end of this coming week.
The next set of SLCs (Student-Led Conferences) will be taking place in the fortnight starting 13th June. In this SLC, students will show you evidence of how they are working on their pledges.
You will be able to book an appointment for your child’s SLC from next week. At this time you will also be able to ask your child questions about their assessment information snapshot. Your child will answer these questions as part of their SLC too.
As part of this process, students will be reflecting on their HoWLs every week in Crew on Thoughtful Thursdays.
Visitors
We have received visits this week from Jane Sutton who is a member of our Local Governing Committee. Jane was looking at inclusive teaching and also reading across the curriculum. Jane said of her visit – “It is like you have taken the best of primary school practice and translated it into a secondary setting”. We are looking forward to Jane’s report which will be discussed at our next Local Governance Committee meeting.
We also had a visit from John Turner. John is an educational consultant who is currently working with Headteachers in Wales to see which bits of XP “magic” can be transported into schools he is working with. John thanked students and staff for the visit and was blown away by the students’ passion and enthusiasm for the school and by the quality of their work. We look forward to you visiting again John.
Transition meetings with new families
We will be starting 1:1 transition meetings with our new families this week and are looking forward to meeting new students and their parents. These meetings are opportunities to find out more about our new students who will be starting in September and for our families to ask questions to find out a bit more about XP Gateshead. In time, our newest families will be added to our Facebook Group so please do make them feel welcome. Our community is strong because we are crew.
New Staff appointments – admin+ post at XP Gateshead
We will be interviewing for an admin+ post this Wednesday afternoon which if successful will complete our staff recruitment for next year. All new staff will join us on 6th June just after the half term break and we have been busy planning their induction to XP Trust and to XP Gateshead.
“Above All Compassion” – XP the movie
The Edge Foundation UK have made a film about XP schools which premiered at the Samsung centre in London last week. Students have been watching some of the film in their community meeting on Friday. If you would like to watch the approximately 30 minute film then please click on the link below and enjoy. It is a powerful tribute to the aims and aspirations of XP schools across the Trust and the hard work of all the staff, students and parents.
You can watch the movie on Youtube here.
AR (Accelerated Reader)
Students should be reading their AR books for between 20 – 30 minutes each day and crew leaders will be checking on progress every Tuesday in crew. For students to be great learners, first they must be strong readers. It would be great if you could encourage your children to talk to you about what they are reading and help to ensure that reading continues on a daily basis. In addition we hope to start a new crew reader soon which links to our current expedition.
Lateral Flow Testing
Please complete a Lateral Flow Test with your child on Sunday evening (tonight), and again on Wednesday evening and complete our website with the results before sending your child to school.
Whilst Covid infections are still falling in the community, given the size of our setting this really helps us to keep everyone safe and for our school to remain open.
If you require any extra LFT kits please let us know.
We will continue to keep doors and windows open for ventilation so students are advised to bring multiple layers to school to keep warm. This is how we look after each other – #wearecrew
Guidance for isolation following a positive test
Any student who has a positive Covid-19 test result should stay at home and avoid contact with people for 3 days. As long as they are well they may return to school following the three days. There is no longer a requirement for students to test negative on the day when they return to school.
As usual if you have any questions please contact crew leaders in the first instance.
Kind regards
Mark Lovatt
Principal