INSIDE THIS ISSUE Issue 10 4th February 2011 Lord Grey News OPEN FORUM UPDATE NEWS FROM THE LANGUAGE FACULTY FUNCTIONAL SKILLS LETTER YEAR BOOK AND HOODIE SPORT UPDATE REWARDS APPRENTICESHIP FAIR MATHS CHALLENGE FORTHCOMING EXAMINATIONS DIARY DATES Reminder for Year 10 Students Year 10 Work Experience selection is now well under way. Please can I remind all students and their families that the forms MUST be completed and returned to Mrs Gill Mohan by NO LATER THAN Friday 11th February 2011. Students who require help selecting their placement can see me in room T12 during lunchtime from 12.45pm - 1.15pm Amanda Dickinson, Head of Business, ICT and Work-Related Learning Faculty On the evening of Monday 31st January, we held the next of our Open Forum for Parents. The focus was homework and increasing use of Insight. It was an extremely pleasant, successful and informative evening with a number of interested parents joining us. Members of our Lord Grey Association were also on hand, as was Madeleine Carrington, Chair of Governors. Mr. Smith, Mr. Handyside and Mr. Page answered questions alongside myself and the Lord Grey parents raised some very interesting questions. We were able to demonstrate our new Parent Portal, Insight, and lots of parents told us that they had started to use it on a regular basis. We demonstrated how homework can be put up via Insight and how a teacher can quickly do this. We also looked at the receiving end of Insight and what parents and students will see at their end with regard to attendance, examination entries, reports, linked documents and homework tasks. The parents reported that the school’s communication over homework is much improved this year; however, they also suggested that there is still room for further improvement as some areas are still not setting homework on a regular basis. There was a real feeling of the staff and parents pulling together to try to improve the school and to crack the homework issue. Different pressure points in the homework cycle were discussed, such as when public exams are looming and the different types of homework that can be set were outlined. Parents were reminded that homework can sometimes take the form of on line or electronic tasks, ongoing projects, quiet reading or learning vocabulary for a test. Sometimes homework might be to take an Accelerated Reader quiz or sometimes it might be to practise a song, dance or drama routine in readiness for a presentation. Thus, homework is diversified away from always being a worksheet or an exercise from a text book. Parents were reminded that students should do forty five minutes of reading of a good quality fiction book if no formal homework is set on an evening. Parents were also reminded that web sites such as GCSE Bitesize, S-cool, My Maths and Sam Learning are excellent tools for homework. All in all it was a most enjoyable and informative evening and it was great to see so many supportive parents. Tracey Jones, Headteacher Open Forum Update
Transcript
INSIDE THIS
ISSUE
Issue 10 4th February 2011
Lord Grey News
OPEN FORUM UPDATE
NEWS FROM THE
LANGUAGE FACULTY
FUNCTIONAL SKILLS
LETTER
YEAR BOOK AND HOODIE
SPORT UPDATE
REWARDS
APPRENTICESHIP FAIR
MATHS CHALLENGE
FORTHCOMING
EXAMINATIONS
DIARY DATES
Reminder for Year 10 Students Year 10 Work Experience selection is now well under way. Please can I remind all students and their
families that the forms MUST be completed and returned to Mrs Gill Mohan by NO LATER
THAN Friday 11th February 2011.
Students who require help selecting their placement can see me in room T12 during lunchtime from
12.45pm - 1.15pm
Amanda Dickinson, Head of Business, ICT and Work-Related Learning Faculty
On the evening of Monday 31st January, we held the next of our Open Forum for Parents.
The focus was homework and increasing use of Insight. It was an extremely pleasant,
successful and informative evening with a number of interested parents joining us. Members
of our Lord Grey Association were also on hand, as was Madeleine Carrington, Chair of
Governors.
Mr. Smith, Mr. Handyside and Mr. Page answered questions alongside myself and the Lord
Grey parents raised some very interesting questions. We were able to demonstrate our new
Parent Portal, Insight, and lots of parents told us that they had started to use it on a regular
basis.
We demonstrated how homework can be put up via Insight and how a teacher can quickly do
this. We also looked at the receiving end of Insight and what parents and students will see at
their end with regard to attendance, examination entries, reports, linked documents and
homework tasks. The parents reported that the school’s communication over homework is
much improved this year; however, they also suggested that there is still room for further
improvement as some areas are still not setting homework on a regular basis. There was a
real feeling of the staff and parents pulling together to try to improve the school and to crack
the homework issue. Different pressure points in the homework cycle were discussed, such
as when public exams are looming and the different types of homework that can be set were
outlined. Parents were reminded that homework can sometimes take the form of on line or
electronic tasks, ongoing projects, quiet reading or learning vocabulary for a test. Sometimes
homework might be to take an Accelerated Reader quiz or sometimes it might be to practise
a song, dance or drama routine in readiness for a presentation. Thus, homework is diversified
away from always being a worksheet or an exercise from a text book.
Parents were reminded that students should do forty five minutes of reading of a good quality
fiction book if no formal homework is set on an evening. Parents were also reminded that
web sites such as GCSE Bitesize, S-cool, My Maths and Sam Learning are excellent tools for
homework. All in all it was a most enjoyable and informative evening and it was great to see
so many supportive parents.
Tracey Jones, Headteacher
Open Forum Update
On Friday the 17th December, 2010 our Spanish class
decided to have a tapas party. We all had to bring in
different foods e.g. chorizo, bread, fruit (for the non alcoholic sangria), Spanish ham, olives, lemonade and fruit juice. The sangrias were very tasty and Miss Reynolds was
kept very busy having to top it up. Everyone had some
French bread (even though it was a Spanish party) with
some of the Spanish ham. We all tried new food and
drink, and found new things that we liked. It was a lot of
fun!
Spanish Translation El 17 de diciembre nuestra clase de español decidio tener
una fiesta de tapas. Todos nosotros tuvimos que traer
diferentes comidas, como por ejemplo chorizo, pan, fruta
(para la sangría sin alcohol), jamón español, aceitunas,
limonada y zumo de frutas. La sangría estaba muy rica y
Miss Reynolds estuvo muy ocupada repartiendola. Todos
tuvimos un poco de pan francés (aunque era una fiesta
española) con un poco de jamón espanol. Todos probamos
comidas y bebidas nuevas, y descubrimos cosas que nos
gustaron. ¡Fue muy divertido!
Ehlana Crowson, Year 9
News from our Language Faculty
Lord Grey
French
Exchange
Students
Hit the
Headlines in
France!
News from our Language Faculty
Introducing Markus, our German Teaching Assistant Guten Tag! Ich heiße Markus. Ich bin 25 Jahre alt. Ich komme aus Saarlouis. Das ist eine kleine Stadt in Deutschland. Sie liegt
im Südwesten von Deutschland, nahe der Grenze zu Frankreich. Deshalb hat meine Stadt auch einen
französischen Namen.
Ich studiere an der Universität des Saarlandes (das Saarland ist die Region, aus der ich komme)
Englisch und Geschichte. Ich möchte später Lehrer werden. Es macht mir Spaß, als Assistent hier an
der Lord Grey Schule zu arbeiten. Außer Deutsch und Englisch kann ich auch Französisch und Latein.
Es macht mir Spaß, Sprachen zu lernen.
In meiner Freizeit lese ich gerne und gehe gerne ins Kino. Ich höre auch gerne deutsche Musik,
meine Lieblingsband ist "Die Ärzte."
The first student to visit Miss Reynolds’ office with five facts about
Markus, will win a MyStickers prize.
French Exchange 24th – 29th January 2011
As soon as we arrived at the school
in Cluses we saw our partners and
got to know them and
had a little bit to eat.
We went back home with
them to their houses, had
dinner and then went to
bed. I lived on a farm
with 120 goats!!
25th January 2011
We went to the school in
the morning and had three lessons. I
had science, maths and then form
group. I went to lunch in the canteen
with all the English students except
the students that went home for
lunch.
After the lunch break we all met up
in the foyer and walked to the super
market which was a ten minute walk.
Everyone bought loads of food and
drink, mainly sweets and
coke. When we finished
shopping we went back
to the school foyer and
waited for our partners.
After school we played
activities such as; ps3,
face book, ice-skating
and more.
26th January 2011
All of us went to Geneva in
Switzerland. We then went to the
Victorinox shop where Sophie and
Kimberley made a knife. A lot of
students bought penknives with their
names engraved. Afterwards we went
to the park and had some lunch. We
had to run to catch a boat to go
across Lake Geneva. We went
shopping in the old town and then
walked to visit the Patek Phillipe
Watch Museum,
where we spent an
hour looking at old
watches. We
returned to Cluses
and went home
with our families.
27th January
2011
We went ice-skating in Cluses. Some
of us were better than others! We
then had over an hour to go
shopping and we all bought lots of
souvenirs. We went to school at
lunchtime and some of us went to
lessons with our partners.
28th January 2011
We all went to Annecy. We visited
the old prison and walked around the
old town. After lunch we had to find
specific places in
Annecy with our
partners and take
photos to prove we
went there. We all
then walked to a
shopping centre to
do some
shopping.
Ms Fogerty went to
her favourite shop
and spent lots of Euros!
In the evening we had our party with
lots of French food and French music.
We played a game did lots of
dancing!
Saturday and Sunday we spent time
with our host families doing lots of
winter activities. Some of us went
ice-skating and skiing with our
families. We all had a great time with
no injuries!
31st January 2011
We met at 6.45am to come back to
Milton Keynes. I would like to say
thank you to Miss Fogerty for taking
me and Miss Reynolds for organising
the trip!!
By Frankie Norton
The 120 goats I lived with!!!
Functional Skills - Examinations
Year 11 Reserve your Year Book and Hoodie. For more information/order form, speak with
Mr Henry, Mrs Dunn or Student Services.
Lord Grey v St Pauls
U14s On Wednesday 12th January the Year 9 Netball Team
played St Pauls. We started off really well and at the end
of the first quarter we were leading 6-0. We carried on
our lead through the second quarter and then again
through the third quarter. In the last quarter St Pauls
started to come back but we still came out with an
excellent win16-10.
Well done and thank you to the Year 8 students who
played with us, Rachel Wooldridge, Emily Dickinson and
Kiera Greengrass.
Player of the match for Year 8: Emily Dickinson
Player of the match for Year 9: Alex Snihur
Well done to everyone who played:
Emily Trowel, Emily Brotherton, Amy Alderman, Toni
