Parents & Carers…………

Please update us with any new addresses or phone numbers as soon as possible so that we

can contact you directly and efficiently.

Thank you for your support with taxis when your child is unwell or has a medical/dental appointment. If your child is required for detention, the school will contact the taxi

companies for you.

We return to school on Tuesday 12th April 2016

Land Based Studies News

Rocket ScienceLand Based Studies students at Greenwood School have just heard they will be taking part in the Royal Horticultural Society’s Rocket Science Experiment.

The RHS Rocket Science project, in partnership with the UK Space Agency, is a UK wide experiment and a fun, interactive way to get students thinking about how plants might grow in space. It will help them understand the difficulties of living, growing and eating in space.

In September, 2kg of rocket seeds were flown to the International Space Station on Soyuz 44S. The seeds will held in microgravity for 6 months with British ESA astronaut Tim Peake taking charge of them while on the ISS for his Principia mission starting in December.

The seeds will return to earth in March 2016 and Greenwood School will be one of the schools to receive 100 seeds from space. These will be grown alongside seeds that have not been to space to see if there are any differences in growth. This will be useful information if to gather as seeds will be vital for any future space colonisation attempts.

Students will care for the seedlings, record their growth and observations over 7 weeks and enter data into a database. After all the data has been collected, the results will be analysed by professional statisticians. Leading scientists from the RHS and European Space Agency will interpret the results and draw possible conclusions, publishing their results on the RHS Campaign for School Gardening website. Cathy Chinn the Land Based Studies teacher at Greenwood School, says “We are delighted to be taking part in Rocket Science. It will be an exciting way for our young horticulture students to contribute to a National experiment and share their learning with the whole school community. Hopefully their experience with Rocket Science will encourage them to appreciate the links horticulture and science and also inspire them to find out more about careers in STEM subjects including horticulture, plant science and the space industry as a whole.”

If you would like to know more about Rocket Science you can visit the RHS Rocket Science Webpage https://schoolgardening.rhs.org.uk/Competitions/Rocket-Science-Experiment-Overview

Track the ISS online http://spotthestation.nasa.gov/sightings/#.VgLAf8tVhBc Watch a video of the rocket launch that delivered our seeds to the ISS:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9R7-gWKZZsg Follow on Twitter or Facebook

o twitter.com/rhsschools #RocketScience o facebook.com/rhsschoolgardening

Update

The seeds are back!

At 04:26am on Tuesday 2nd March, Commander Scott Kelly of NASA and Russian cosmonauts Mikhail Kornienko and Sergey Volkov of Roscosmos landed safely back on Earth in Kazakhstan. The seeds then travelled with Scott Kelly to NASA in Houston on a charter flight from Moscow, Russia and returned to the UK on Thursday. The RHS are now getting ready to pack them up so they can be sent to us with our Rocket Science experiment pack in April!

Cathy Chinn

Art News

As our school mascot, Forest the rhino, has his new design completed, our Zebra embarks

on his own journey towards becoming an exhibit in Southampton over the Summer. Forest

has been painted by key stage 3 students this term. The art work has been inspired by the

work of local artist Yvonne Coomber.

Following workshops led by Marwell zoo about their work to conserve the endangered

Grevy’s zebras and other wildlife, students entered a competition and voted for their

favourite design for the zebra. The design is awaiting approval from Marwell Zoo. Once

approved, the students will all have the opportunity to be part of his decoration in time for

his delivery to Marwell zoo in May. See zanyzebras.org.uk/

Year 11 art GCSE exams begin the second week after our return from the Easter holidays!

Students have completed some good coursework and have been preparing for their exams.

Starting points for the exam include,” from above”, “clothing” and “wish you were here”

paving the way for some exciting projects.

Charlene T.

Bianca Webb

The Greenwood School Council

The Greenwood school council for 2016 has recently been elected by the student body. The

new council students are from years 11, Holly and Olivia, year 10 Chris and year 8 Dexter.

So far this year they have suggested that students could have lockers for personal

belongings to be kept safe during the school day.

They have looked into activities for Sports Relief as the council has always been involved

with charity fundraising for the school. They have discussed about a choice of charity for

the school to raise money for and how they can raise money for that charity.

Calshot Residential

Pupils from Greenwood recently completed a two day residential at Calshot Activity Centre.

Eight pupils who went on the trip had the opportunity to take part in skiing, rock climbing,

archery, track cycling and high ropes whilst also staying overnight. The aim of the residential

was to get the pupils to gain more confidence, socially interact with others who may not be

in their peer groups and to enjoy themselves whilst doing activities that they may not have

the opportunity to do regularly.

It was a very successful trip with the instructors being impressed with talents that the pupils

have particularly in skiing and track cycling.

Josh Clayton

Online Support

The use of electronic devices provides our young people with many positive opportunities, but in school we have many examples of situations where the phones and tablets have been used unwisely. This can lead to many awkward conversations for pupils with the pastoral team with equally upsetting conversations for parents. With this in mind you may be interested in the following app which is designed to discourage young people from accessing inappropriate websites or from making themselves vulnerable to exploitation online. The app enables parents to add an app to their child’s phone so that any time a photo is taken, or they download a photo, the parent gets sent the image. It is therefore a means to help parents ensure that their children are safe from CSE. Please see the following link: https://www.selfiecop.com/

Exams

All Year 11’s will have an exam timetable with this Newsletter Any queries please contact the Exams Officer Karen Fisher Good luck

Term Dates

Return to school Tuesday 12th April 2016

May Bank Holiday Monday 2nd May Half Term Mon 30th May to Fri 3rd June

Last Day of Term Wednesday 20th July