Students have been set two quizzes in Google Classroom.
One is on the Rock Cycle and the other is on the Particle Model.
Students should do each quiz repeatedly, making notes in Google Keep on any mistakes until they regularly get high scores again and again.
The deadline for this work is Wednesday 17th November at 5pm.
As part of Remembrance, this morning in Crew we have been reading the poem ‘In Flanders Fields‘ to help us to better understand the symbolism of the poppy, the sacrifice that others have made to afford us the freedoms we enjoy and how Remembrance is now about all servicemen and women that have have given their lives for our country.
We’re off to a flying start in the National TTRockstars competition.
For the average score per students we are ranked fourth in the region for Secondary Schools.
Our students handed Mr Deviit, Mr Dobson and Mr Said a drubbing in the Rock Arena with some face-melting times table knowledge!
At the moment Class 1 have the edge over Class 2 in points scored and average points per student. We’ll keep on rocking for the rest of the week.
Special shout outs to Tyler S and Finley for some incredible performances today!
Maths Week England starts this week!
We will be carrying out a range of activities across the week but TTRockstars will play a big part.
XPG are taking on the country in TTRS! We are competing against other schools in a times table competition for schools in England. The competition will run from Monday 8th November 2021 to Thursday 11th November 2021.
Competition hours are limited to 7.30am to 7.30pm and to support player wellbeing there is a daily 60-minute limit per player. Once a player goes beyond 60 minutes between 7.30am and 7.30pm on a given day, they will still earn coins but will no longer earn points towards the competition. Those 60 minutes do not need to be played in one block – they can be spread throughout the competition hours.
Every morning from 8am students will have a new Maths puzzle set on student notices to get them thinking. Student can find this by searching for notices in their google drive.
Every morning there will also be a stimulus image for students to discuss what maths they see, helping them to recognise that Maths is all around us.
There will be a series of challenges at lunch times this week in Room G3 – e.g. an Escape Room, Logic Puzzles, Building Structures and designing a Maths Poster.
Is your son or daughter a keen baker? Do they fancy a challenge? This week they can put their maths and baking skills to the test along with their creativity and come up with a maths inspired bake. Entries need to be in school on Friday morning and after judging, they will be available to eat at break with a donation to our Poppy Appeal.
As mentioned above, for the third year running, TTRockstars are sponsoring the Maths Week event and are holding a times tables competition for schools in England. The competition will run from Monday 8th November 2021 to Thursday 11th November 2021!
So we want students to get playing times tables Rockstars across the week! This will be the only extended study set for maths this week.
#mathsisawesome
Dear Parent/Guardian
It’s been a busy first week back at XP Gateshead. Last week students carried out their first fieldwork working with experts in the North East as they found out more about the geology of our coastline and the history of our mining communities. The inclement weather on Wednesday was no barrier to our students and why would it be? These are young people who have rowed across lake Ullswater and camped out in the open in the Lake District – they have already proven their resilience and their courage. My science class presented all they had learnt to me on Friday afternoon and we will be making use of this learning in our final products and in the rest of our expedition this term.
Our students also took part in CAT tests – these are cognitive and spatial tests which help us to determine a starting point or baseline academic grade for students. The result of the CAT tests will be used to establish an initial Minimum Expected grade (ME). We will use these grades to consider the academic progress of each of our students throughout their time here and will report back to you on this in due course.
Also last week we had our first virtual visit by our Education Expert who was a trained and experienced Ofsted inspector. We have an EE visit 4 or 5 times during the first 2 years of opening as a new school. He will write a short report about each visit for the Department for Education (DFE) which in due course will be shared with me. We welcome support and advice from experts in the field and we are looking forward to getting some feedback. I am pleased to say that I am expecting this to be a very positive report for our school.
Through the week I also attended Director Led Conferences which are part of the Trust’s quality assurance procedures. This is where Heads of schools across the Trust report back to Trust Directors on Performance, Wellbeing, SEND, and Curriculum.
We will be taking time in school to pay our respects and to remember those who have laid down their lives or been injured in defence of our freedoms and of the values we hold so high. Students will be reading relevant texts or poems in crew and Mr Dobson will be preparing resources and slides for crew on Thursday. We will also be coming together as a community to observe a minute’s silence and to think about what we owe to those who have sacrificed so much.
It is also Maths week and Mrs Mosley can hardly contain her excitement. Throughout the week we will be hosting maths based activities and entering time table rock star competitions. We are hoping to win the XP Trust medal as we compete against other schools in our Trust.
As mentioned at the start, DLCs are part of XP Trusts quality assurance procedures. This week Mrs Mosely will attend the SEND DLC and I will attend the curriculum DLC. Normally we attend these by google hangout however on occasion we will join colleagues for face to face meetings in Doncaster. We are also part of instructional networks across the Trust, for example Mr Said is an instructional lead and facilitates curriculum networks across the Trust where he meets with and trains other colleagues. I will be joining Headteacher colleagues on Friday for our termly Head teachers network.
Our focus this term will be on expeditions and completing really high quality (Beautiful) work. We will build on the work done so far and will use the Minimum Expected grades (MEs) (established in CAT tests) to assess student work and be able to report back to you in due course on academic progress.
Please remember to complete lateral flow tests for your child on Sunday and Wednesday evening and as important, please ensure these results are entered into our spreadsheet. This is an important part of keeping our community safe and our school open and I really appreciate your help and support in this respect.
As usual please get in touch with crew leaders in the first instance with any questions or queries or just to tell us how things are going.
Best wishes
Mark Lovatt
Principal
On our fieldwork this week, a member of the public asked us about our studies and Charlie came to talk to her. Rhona was so kind as to send a card to Charlie and to our staff to thank them for taking the time to talk to her.
What a magnificent piece of work from Charlie. Our students are already making a positive impact in the community and promoting their own brilliant work and strong culture.
Well done Charlie, and thanks so much to Rhona. The card was also read out in our community meeting this morning.
We are a little ahead of schedule and should be back at school for around 4.00pm.
We now have poppies for Remembrance Day available for students to purchase in reception. In addition there are a limited number of wristbands and small pins, £1 each.
We estimate that we will be back at school very slightly earlier than planned, at 4.10pm.
