G28 Weekly update – w/c 11th October 2021

Dear Parent/Guardian

I hope you are well. Welcome to our weekly update for the week commencing 11th October.

Last week was a very busy week for us with our first Local Governance committee meeting, roll out of iPads for students, our virtual open evening for new and prospective parents and students and topped off by hosting a Trust executive and Heads meeting on Friday ! Our students have stepped up to the mark on all of these occasions and I thought they were particularly brilliant in our live virtual open evening transmission.

This week is our last week of term before the half term holiday where we will all have a much deserved two week break – hard to believe how quickly the time seems to have gone! Students will be continuing with their expedition work – from the ground up, and also their maths expedition looking at mathematics and numbers involved in food waste. We will also be continuing to use our iPads in lessons and will begin to set extended study tasks for students. We hope to have the issues around the appstore resolved at the start of this week. Apologies for the delay around this.

HoWLs

Students will continue to discuss their Habits of Work and Learning in academic crew this week and will make pledges as we focus on how we can be the best versions of ourselves. We are really proud of how honest and reflective our students have been during this process.

Covid testing

Please continue to give your child a lateral flow test on Sunday and Wednesday evenings and please ensure you enter the result into our online form. This is really important and not only helps to keep our community safe and our school open it also avoids wasting important time on Monday and Thursday mornings in crew when we have to chase up testing. We really appreciate your support in this.

Parentpay

We will begin adding charges to lunches taken to parent pay this week including back dating ones from previous weeks. It is worth noting that you can add credit to parent pay in advance, you do not need to wait until charges are added. If you are having any issues setting up your account please contact your daughter or son’s crew leader.

Early close this Friday

Don’t forget that we will be closing early this Friday at 1.30pm to allow us time to β€œdegunge” 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.

After school clubs

We now have Monday – Mixed Fitness, Tuesday – French, Wednesday – Extended Study, Thursday – Minecraft & Football/Multi-sport. This week we will be starting a book club with Miss Tatters on Wednesday lunchtimes. Ms Tatters was on her way this weekend to collect the first reading club books from Waterstones in town.Β 

Random acts of Kindness

Finally we would like to appreciate a few students in particular: Isla, who has left appreciation cards for staff with delicious cupcakes she baked herself; Ethan who baked cookies for other students on his own birthday and Daniel also who made delicious chocolate brownies for the first lunchtime book club. We are all appreciative but have also gained weight!

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 focussing on our academic work and beginning to add work to our β€œbeautiful” work portfolios. We are also hoping to organise a mini student-led conference before Christmas 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 please do not hesitate to contact your children’s crew leader in the first instance.

Best wishes

Mark Lovatt

Principal