Gordano School Newsletter

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Arnold May
5 years ago
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com/gordanoschool Diary Dates: Monday 1st-Friday 5th June Wednesday 3rd June 2015 Tuesday 9th June Wednesday 10th June Satuarday 27th June Physics Week (activities throughout the week) Price and

Hall) Head s Blog It really is summer season in school!

1 Gordano School Newsletter No.16 Friday 22nd May Attendance Line Year Attendance Line Year 12 and attendance@gordanoschool.org.uk Term dates and past newsletters can be found on our website Diary Dates: Monday 1st-Friday 5th June Wednesday 3rd June 2015 Tuesday 9th June Wednesday 10th June Satuarday 27th June Physics Week (activities throughout the week) Price and Buckland Uniform fitting event 3-6pm (New Conference Room by Main Reception) Year 8 HIV Workshops Zakhele Group Zakhele Group Drama workshop Zakhele group concert with Gordano Students 7pm (Colston Hall) Head s Blog It really is summer season in school! I can hear a lawnmower outside my window, our Year 11 and Year 12 pupils are deep in their exams season and the weather has turned wet and rather cold. Let s hope for a sunny half term. The last few weeks have been busy ones for our pupils inside and outside school. I am so often amazed by the achievements that our students accomplish in addition to their lives in school. Our own Ten Tors team completed the 35 mile challenge so congratulations to George Coulson, Lorna Hills, Ryan Kay, Polly Smale, Warner Stephens and Molly Wyatt. I know that a good number of our pupils will also have completed Ten Tors with Scouts Teams, for example Joel Strouts and Chris Morris both did the 55 mile walk and Caleb Stride and Tom Green did the 45 mile event. Really well done to them and indeed to any others that we haven t heard of. This is real character building stuff! There have been a number of other individuals that I ought to mention: Shayla Williams in Year 8 came third in the World Baton Twirling competition in Italy recently; Dylan O Brien became a National Champion at Jiu Jitsu and Ben Penhale took Gold in the South West Swimming

2 Finals in 200m Butterfly. I m sure that we will have more details in due course on the website or in the newsletter. If your thoughts are turning to ordering next year s uniform you may want to note the fitting event by our supplier Price & Buckland in school on 3 rd June from 3pm to 6pm. Price & Buckland are our main suppliers and Mark Hill also holds stock at the Sports Shop. They have different approaches to pricing so you may want to compare prices before buying. The uniform items are identical from both suppliers. While on the issue of uniform can I ask parents of girls to be firm in your interpretation of uniform guidelines on skirts? Our suppliers carry approved products. Unfortunately we have had to ask some parents to replace uniform items in recent weeks whey they had been guided by their daughters liberal interpretation of our rules. Dark grey only and no clinging Lycra styles, please. Your support is greatly appreciated. Lastly, can I wish good luck and steady revision to our Year 11s, some of our Year 10 mathematicians and Sixth Formers as they do their exams. It will all be worth it I am certain Shayla s Got Talent Year 7 pupil, Shayla Williams featured on Britain s Got Talent on 16th May as a member of her baton twirling group. Shayla is currently 3rd in the World for baton twirling, and performed very well in front of the judges, with all four judges sending her through to the next round. Used Revision Guides Needed If you don't know what to do with all your Revision Guides after the Exams, then we have a scheme to pass them on to next year s students, with any money raised going towards our partner schools in Kenya. Please bring them in to the school and leave them either at Reception, The Library (when returning school textbooks) or at the Sixth Form Office. Thank You, Mr Williams Ben Penhale takes Gold Congratulations to Ben Penhale of Biscay House, who has just competed in the South West Regional swimming championships 50m pool. The Year 7 pupil achieved a Gold medal in the 200m Butterfly event, completing it in the heats in 2:39:86, then in the final about ¾ hour later in 2: The second round of the championship will take place at Millfield School on30th & 31st May. Ben has also been invited to the South West Regional training camp in September.

Alice Linton-Butt competing in Regional Pageant Heat Local resident Alice Linton-Butt has been selected to compete for a place in an exciting beauty pageant being held in Disneyland Paris!

3 Alice Linton-Butt competing in Regional Pageant Heat Local resident Alice Linton-Butt has been selected to compete for a place in an exciting beauty pageant being held in Disneyland Paris! Alice from Portishead has been chosen by the Face Of The Globe organisation to compete at a regional heat being held at Weston Pier on 24th May. The contest has four age categories ranging from 5 years with no upper age limit. Alice, who is 16 years old, will be competing in the teen category from which, if she is selected as one of the 5 representatives from that group, will be invited to Disneyland Paris in October 2015 to compete against girls from all over the World! Alice currently holds the title of Miss England Inspiration and hopes that this International pageant will be her next success. Holiday Dates for You may remember we placed an article in a recent Newsletter advising parents of a difference in February half term dates with other schools in the coming Academic Year. We would like to make parents aware that this variation also applies to the Easter Holiday in the Academic Year. Not only do our holiday dates vary to some schools in neighbouring areas, but schools within the same Local Education Authority differ. Once again, we are aware that this may cause some difficulties where siblings attend schools in Bristol, BANES and Somerset Local Education Areas. However, we would like to remind parents/carers that we cannot authorise student absence for holidays, taken from Gordano School in term time, due to different holiday dates in a neighbouring Education authority and it is highly likely that a Fixed Penalty would be issued even under these circumstances. Rod Bell Deputy Headteacher

Young Performers compete in Bristol Poetry SLAM Congratulations to all of the Year 9 Pupils who took part in the recent Word in the West Poetry Slam.

4 Young Performers compete in Bristol Poetry SLAM Congratulations to all of the Year 9 Pupils who took part in the recent Word in the West Poetry Slam. All of the pupils involved in the competition performed well. Gordano pupil, Charlotte Garrett was awarded runner up and is through to the national round of the competition, and her fellow performer, Robyn Coetzee, also performed really well under pressure. Robyn and Charlotte will be working alongside professional poet Sally Jenkinson in Portishead Library over the school holidays (23-30th May). Ten Tors Event 9-10th May This year s Ten Tors event attracted over 2000 entrants, with 365 teams involved. All the students involved had to set off at 7am on Saturday, and had to finish by 5pm on Sunday. The teams involved were forced to navigate over various routes, and were required to visit 10 Tors over boggy moorland and rocky hills. The Gordano School 35 mile Ten Tors team consisted of Ryan Kay, George Coulson, Molly Wyatt, Warner Stephens, Lorna Hills and Polly Smale. The team not only completed the expedition by 2.30pm on the Sunday but did so in high spirits and showed great determination and Gordano spirit! The event itself is run by the Army, and calls upon students to independently navigate, camp and to manage themselves on Dartmoor over the two days whilst completing the route. All the teams involved started their training for this event in November, and have put in a great deal of time over long weekends to prepare for the event itself. Well done to all the students who took part in this event. Members of the Explorers section of Scouts who attended the event included Chris Morris and Joel Strouts, from Gordano, who both competed in 55 mile teams. Caleb Stride and Tom Green also competed in 45 mile teams. The competition age limit is 19, so hopefully everyone who took part in this year s event will go on to take part in 2016.

Rogue knitters cast a woollen explosion over Gordano School Grounds A mysterious group of rogue knitters has targeted Gordano School in a highly colourful yarn-bomb this May.

Reports of the unusual decorations first started coming in on Friday Morning (15 th May), and it seems that the stunt may have an underlying message linked to the unusual colour scheme.

It seems that students in the school may have taken direct action in order to drum up more knitters in the area to come forward and help with this scheme.

5 Rogue knitters cast a woollen explosion over Gordano School Grounds A mysterious group of rogue knitters has targeted Gordano School in a highly colourful yarn-bomb this May. The blue and red decorations, covering trees and main entrance to the school, have been attracting the attention of passers-by and traffic heading into Bristol and Clevedon. Reports of the unusual decorations first started coming in on Friday Morning (15 th May), and it seems that the stunt may have an underlying message linked to the unusual colour scheme. Gordano School is currently asking for members of the local community to knit v-necked navy and red uniform jumpers for the charity Mend the Gap. It seems that students in the school may have taken direct action in order to drum up more knitters in the area to come forward and help with this scheme. Francoise Johnston, Mathematics teacher and leader of the Gordano School Knitting club said, We would like to send out a message to rogue knitters in the community who are looking for a new project to get their needles into. We d love donations of v-necked navy or red jumpers in sizes between age We only have a few more months to produce these jumpers, and any help from the community would be most welcome. Any jumpers donated are destined to be used as school uniform for children in Kenya. Acrobatics pair win Gold We d like to congratulate Grace Monchar, and her acrobatic partner Paige, who took part in the UK National Development Pathway acrobatic gymnastics finals on Sunday. The pair gave two outstanding performances to take the gold medal and have become the 2015 Grade 5 Women s Pairs National Champions. We wish them every success for the future. Insect hotel Installed for Portishead in Bloom Project Year 7 pupils have been prepping a space outside our garden areas to install an insect hotel this May. The small structure has been donated to the school by the Portishead in Bloom committee and is part of a wider project to encourage wildlife and nature into different areas of the Portishead community. The students are looking forward to taking a look and seeing what creatures take up residence in the enclosure.

6 Picking up/ Dropping Off A gentle reminder to parents when you are picking up and dropping off students. Please could you avoid using the main entrance as a drop off/ turning point parking zone as this is causing a hazard and putting the students and pedestrians at risk of an accident. It also has a knock on effect for the local traffic. Thank you Year 12 Futures Week 29 June 03 July 2015 During Futures Week, Year 12 will find out about many of the options available when they leave school in September 2016 this may sound a long way off, but University applications start this autumn so we need to give everyone as much information as we can now. The week will start with a focus on higher education, then look into school leaver programmes and apprenticeships followed by a morning considering options such as taking a gap year, volunteering abroad, sandwich degrees and the new apprenticeship degrees. The emphasis then changes from information to experiences that will help to build strong CVs and Personal Statements. This starts on Wednesday 1st July with a unique opportunity to take part in a national business competition for schools especially tailored for us at Gordano. Finally, on Thursday and Friday, Year 12 (and potentially Year 13) have the option to visit one of three universities; two employers arrange their own work experience; or sign up for one of the many employability skills workshops that are being delivered exclusively for us by companies such as Lloyds Banking Group. We want everyone to enjoy the week and get the most from it. It has been designed to give our students an advantage and to help them succeed. As part of that, we d like everyone to wear business attire for the business competition on Wednesday please. Thank you. Mrs Tate, Post 16 Careers.

Year 10 Pupil selected to swim with England Team Year 10 pupil Niamh Allanson-Campbell, from Fitzroy House, has just been selected to compete with

Niamh currently trains with the City of Bristol Synchro Club, and recently won with this squad at the recent English Championships.

7 Year 10 Pupil selected to swim with England Team Year 10 pupil Niamh Allanson-Campbell, from Fitzroy House, has just been selected to compete with the England Synchronised Swimming Team. Niamh currently trains with the City of Bristol Synchro Club, and recently won with this squad at the recent English Championships. Niamh has attended various training camps since she qualified to train with the Squad in January, and was thrilled to learn that she has been selected to compete with the team in Croatia and Italy. She commented, It's a real honour and I'm very excited to take part.

Congratulations, Rebekah! We re proud of you.

Congratulations, Rebekah! We re proud of you. 020 8663 4199 info@lpgs.bromley.sch.uk It s a relief to have got through January without any setbacks due to weather. All of Years 11, 12 and 13 have now experienced their trial exams and are now preparing