News and Stars from John & the PHS Team Friday 10th February

Hi everyone

A lot of special days, and focus on specific things at the moment – and they’re all good things and things that we should be celebrating and exploring. Please do have a look at some of them below – they are interesting, important and good

I hope you’ve all had a good week and that your children have got something from the school and what they’ve been doing. It’s certainly nice to see it getting lighter in the mornings and evenings when we are arriving at the school and leaving

There was the PTA AGM this week too, so thanks to all who made that, on Teams or otherwise – the more the merrier. And I know some of you are coming in for Coffee & Catch-up next week too

All the best and have a great weekend when it arrives for you. Take care

John and the Percy Hedley School Team

We celebrated Number Day last week!

As promised here are some fantastic photos of our students taking part in some fun activities for the NSPCC Number Day last Friday. And here are some details about what they did

• 6PH’s class looked at an NSPCC infographic and analysed the data around Keeping Children Safe
• 4RR and LD traced their feet and measured different distances around school
• TW class used number bonds and found patterns with their numbers
• 4AJ used scales to measure ingredients in Cookery
• 6LWC and 6NC completed work in Lifeskills, reading the timer on a toaster and the scale on a kettle
• 4CH made an interactive story called ‘Bob’s Last Number’ where they asked word problems and you had to select the correct answer, combining both Number Day and Storytelling week! Clever stuff!

They were lots of other amazing activities taking part across school such as a number treasure hunt and Andy singing. Really good to celebrate days and topics like this, so well done to all involved! Have a look at some of these activities!

There’s still time to take part in some of these fun activities that you could do at home

• Count how many clouds you can see
• Baking
• Measure a distance with your feet
• Sing ’10 green bottles’
• Shopping within a budget

The NSPCC have launched a free 10-minute digital training, which is empowering every adult to know what to do if a child needs help, and where to go if you need support yourself.

Message from the NSPCC

• Half a million children suffer abuse and neglect a year in the UK
• But there’s something we can all do to change that
• That’s why we’re encouraging every adult in the UK to complete the 10 minute training session

Listen up and learn a little with our Connect the DOTS training. We’ll show you where to go if you need support, and how to speak up for children who need it. Because that little bit of knowledge can help keep a lot of children safe

You can sign up here

Funky DJ Thing of the Week

This term, we have a new set of budding DJs in our Key Stage 4 Radio Group as part of our Enrichment Curriculum. Keeping things topical, they have been busy compiling a Valentine Day’s playlist for Hedley’s Radio, based at our college.

Dominic, Owen, Andrew, Matthew, Drae, Leighton and Dylan have chosen their personal favourites related to the theme and then sensibly edited a long list of songs having listened to each other’s choices.

Those in the group that wanted to record introductions to the songs made MP3 recordings of themselves as DJs and sent them with the finalised list of songs.

It was broadcast to coincide with one of our lessons and is also being broadcast each evening at 7pm until Valentine’s Day when it will appear at 10am, 1pm and 7pm.

If you wish to hear one of the broadcasts, the app for the radio station can be downloaded onto Android devices.

Reading

This is from our very own Literacy Squad! Yeah, we have one of those!

Next week sees the arrival of the Usborne Book Fair!

To encourage Reading for Pleasure and to support our students with their literacy skills, the Book Fair will be hosted on Tuesday 14^th and Wednesday 15^th February

All students will have the opportunity to visit the book fair if they wish, where they can purchase book(s), with support. It will be a ‘buy on the day’ book fair, so students will need to bring their money in so that they can purchase their book on one of the 2 days. Books range in value, with an average of £6.99 – £9.99 each.

A letter has gone out with more details, but in a nutshell the Book Fairs provide a wonderful opportunity to encourage and support reading, as well as providing books for our own Percy Hedley School library.

For every book bought, Usborne will donate a portion of the value raised to our school, in the form of FREE Books! So a huge thank you to our local Usborne Partner, Vikki MacDonald from Mini Macs Magical Bookshop for helping to bring this event to our school.

Happy Reading

School Library and LGBT+ History Month

The Buzzards of 6PH have once again been helping to organise our library. They’re a dab hand at alphabetising, sorting, and labelling a whole host of new books for our library. So a massive thank you is in order for them.

To kick-start LGBT+ History Month and work alongside the theme of this week’s Appropriate Accreditation assembly, we’ve been browsing our collection for range of fiction and non-fiction texts that can help provide information and insight into the LGBT+ movement of the past, and how things are today.

Watch this space, as some of the students of post-16 have identified some LGBT+ non-fiction books that they would like to see in our library.

It’s really wonderful to see our library growing and diversifying to support all of the different people that we know, both inside and outside of school!

Thank you Literacy Squad – marvellous stuff for one of our key priorities

LBGT History Month

Accreditation Pathway have been celebrating LBGT+ History Month this week, learning about the abolishment of Section 28 and the Stonewall riots in assembly.

Watch out for inspirational quotes from LBGT+ legends displayed around school throughout February.

We now have some lovely inclusive stories in our library which we feel better represents the diversity of society we live in today. As part of LBGT History month, classes have been reading some lovely stories including “I am NOT a PRINCE!” about a very proud young frog princess.

After a rise in use of inappropriate language used by a small number of students in Key Stage 4, we have been providing some intervention sessions to educate about the protected characteristics under the Equality Act and how this is enforced within schools, colleges and workplaces. The students responded really well and provoked some interesting conversations! If you are concerned about language your child is using at home and would like some support, please contact me via email: j.ferguson@percyhedley.org.uk, or speak with your class team

Managing Feelings

This half term the topic across school has been Managing Feelings; let’s have a look at what some classes have been up to….

2HB have been thinking about feelings that may place us in the yellow zone. This week we have been focusing on ‘worry’. We read and discussed the story Ruby Finds a Worry by Tom Percival.

The class then identified something that makes them worry and considered ways to shrink this worry. We are learning that it is normal and okay to feel worried at times and that talking about our worries can be helpful.

2LL have been trying strategies to help us feel better when we feel sad or angry. Chloe picked sitting out on a mat with an adult to help her when she feels sad!

4CH have been learning about what the difference is between “liking” and “fancying” someone. Students then applied their learning to scenarios in Heartstopper to decide if the characters liked or fancied each other.

6PH have been learning about unkind comments and how this impacts self-esteem. Again we have linked this to the protected characteristics and the physical and emotional effects derogatory comments can have on people.

Attendance

Thanks for the feedback on this, it’s all very helpful.

One thing that someone asked me to make clear was that this isn’t just a PHS thing – schools will be doing this all over the country, special or otherwise. It’s just a tightening of the rules and ways of doing things, which happens from time to time in all areas of our work. So although it is difficult for us in some regards, it will be for others as well, and we are all understanding the boundaries and rules.

So many lovely things happen in the school every day, and we just want our pupils to be a part of that as much as they possibly can. Of course appointments, health and other difficult things sometimes get in the way of that. We really do understand that. We’ve been working closely with North Tyneside Council, as we are required to do, on this.

The draft policy is on the website. I appreciate some aspects of this topic are hard.

Lesson of the Week – Awe & Wonder!

The Robins are investigating the awe and wonder of chemical reactions by painting fizzy pictures with bicarbonate of soda and coloured vinegar or making the non-Newtonian fluid gloop. Drae and Bobbie – excellent stuff! Have a look at them!

Stars of the Week!

With added School Values!

OK, here we go……………

The ELTBA Star of the Week is…..

ACCREDITATION Stars of the Week! – Teamwork with Finny and Benjamin!!!!! Resilience and Respect with Andrew and Kacey!

Finny and Benjamin both showed wonderful teamwork playing tag rugby in PE.  They played so well and really enjoyed it.  Well done, great to have rugby STARS!!! in the school. Congratulations, guys!

All of 4JH –for Teamwork – for working as a team during lessons to complete tasks together

Andrew – Resilience – for coping with difficulties this week and working hard with staff to do tasks to help stay calm and in the green zone

Kacey – Respect – for coming into a new school and respecting the rules of a new class

Really god to have so many from this Pathway – well done all. STAR!!! Quality!!!

ENGAGEMENT Star of the Week! Kian with Resilience!

This week the team are nominating Kian from Kingfishers for Star of the Week. Kian has made brilliant progress in such a short space of time with his VOCA, having only got it at the start of this academic year. This week at the cafe, Kian independently made his own choices on his VOCA and was excited when he heard it aloud, Brilliant stuff, Ki, you are indeed a STAR!!! for this week. Well done!

Makaton Signs of the Week

Children’s Mental Health Week

Health/Healthy Mental Health Okay Talk Listen Feel

And finally…..

I hope everyone has a happy and healthy week 

All the very best to all of you at home, from all of us here at the school