Weekly update for parents – W/C Monday 11th July 2022

Dear Parents/Guardians

Welcome to our penultimate week of term. This week students will be completing ecology work in our local green corridor at Windy Nook. They will also be working on answering the guiding question β€œWhat is our relationship with the natural world?” which is from our current expedition – What a Wonderful World. In addition students will be working on their presentation of learning which will take place on the evening of 19th July at 5.30pm.

This week:

  • Monday Visitor from the states – Β We have a visitor from the States, Chris Dolgos. Chris is a teacher in an Expeditionary learning (EL) school in Little Rock. We look forward to meeting him and giving him an Ambassador tour of our school.
  • Tuesday ecology fieldwork – Windy Nook. Students will be working in the field as ecologists with an expert from the β€˜Friends of Windy Nook Nature Reserve’. We will be out of school for two hours, so all students will have lunch as normal .Please make sure that your child has:
    • Suitable footwear
    • Water
    • Sunscreen
    • A cap or hat.
  • PE will be on WednesdayΒ  this week. Please note that PE will be on Wednesday this week and students should bring their PE kit on this day.
  • Warm weather – Please make sure your child brings a water bottle to school and also a cap or hat if they suffer from sunstroke, and/or sunscreen if they burn easily. This is to cover outside breaks and lunchtimes although PE lessons are also increasingly outside.Β 
  • Parental Feedback – Thankyou to all our parents who have already completed our parental feedback questionnaire – If you have not already done so you can find the link here clicking here. We would really love to know what you think about our school (what we do well and what we could do better) and in particular would like to get feedback on our student SLCs.

Upcoming Events:

A reminder there is a G28 parents’ calendar here.

  • Summer Science exam – students will sit a summer science assessment which will cover all of the science they have learned from September. This will take place on Monday 18th July. We have set extended study which supports revision for this assessment over the course of the next couple of weeks. Students have a β€œlearning” map on google classroom to support and help structure their revision.
  • All of our staff will complete Day 2 of Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) training on 18th July. Mr Lovatt and Mr Said will be working with students on this day and along with their summer science exam students will be working on their presentation of learning (PoL) and also their final product from our current expedition.
  • The Presentation of Learning for our current learning expedition will take place on the evening of Tue 19th July at XP Gateshead. We will be sending more details in this coming week.

COVID updatesΒ 

We continue to ask parents to be vigilant, especially with the current rise in cases, and to test students if they or other family members of the family have symptoms. With your support we will continue to test students in school if they present with symptoms during the school day. We will also continue to keep windows open and to ensure our building is as ventilated as possible.

We do still have a limited supply of testing kits, so if you are in need and find it difficult to obtain tests, please do speak to your son or daughter’s Crew Leader.

As we have previously mentioned, we will make a decision on whether our final Presentation of Learning can be an in person event in as timely manner as possible. We will get back to you on that this week.

No Nuts in packed lunches please

We have students with severe allergies to nuts. Please ensure that no nuts or nut products are contained in packed lunches. Thank you in advance for your support with this.

As usual if there are any queries please do get in contact with your child’s Crew Leader.

Β Many thanks

Mark Lovatt

Principal