Page 6 - Sancton_Wood_Times_Lent DPS

The Big Write Dragon’s Den

This term has seen another two Big Writes. ‘crime scene’ in the playground. The open
The first saw the children explore the season briefcase, missing shoe, old bicycle and the
of Spring through poetry. They added adverbs police tape made for a playground full of
and adjectives for effect and for the first time, excitement and some excellent ‘Big Writes’
personification. which took the form of stories, poems,
newspaper reports and diary entries.
The children had great fun giving things human
characteristics. They considered weather, The ‘Big Writes’ have really raised the profile
spring activities, nature and our responses to of writing amongst the children and it’s lovely
the seasonal change and the children generated to see the enjoyment they have on their faces
some fantastic vocabulary and ideas that they when we share good writing practice across the
could use in creating their own wonderful school.
poems.
The younger children were also able to get
involved discussing; Where had it all come Sancton Wood Senior School welcomed Nick Golding Nick Golding and Rachael Ainscough about their business THE HEAT - a gadget which cools your can).
from? Was the umbrella in the tree a sign that from Cambridge Angels to the Y10 Business students plan. The teams were very eloquent, persuasive speakers who Bronze: Selina (CANINE CAKES - handmade organic treats for
maybe Mary Poppins had gone to the dark side? Dragon’s Den competition. Pupils had been learning clearly believed in the businesses they had imagined themselves dogs).
The children were all enthused and spent time about starting a business, including how to write a running.
creating verbal stories and theories about the business plan. They then spent a number of weeks Every participant received a certificate presented in assembly,
crime scene. both in class and as homework working in teams to The standard across the board was very high but there were with the Gold winners receiving a trophy to display in the
The most recent kicked off with a fantastic create a business idea and write their own business some overall outstanding presentations and business plans. school cabinet at reception.
plan. One of the purposes of business planning is to
help a business secure funding, and so the Sancton
Y6 Transition Science Lab Wood Dragons Den was born. The winners were: As the event was such a success Mrs Ainscough hopes to be able
to run this yearly and Nick Golding has kindly agreed to come
Gold: Max Loubell, Miguel, Henry (TROVA - a restaurant, park-
back as a judge and critic. His comments were both supportive
ing and travel booking app).
Silver: Bosco, Ciaran, Antonio and Dani (BEAT
The teams presented their ideas and answered questions from
and aimed to raise standards.
Oxford Masterclass Senior Science
We’re very fortunate to have a specialist science lab for our Pre-Prep and Prep children
and it has been well used this term.

On the 17th of January, eight of our year 10 and 11 students went to the Oxford Masterclass.
This masterclass included lectures about epistemology, happiness through science and love
and relationships. The students especially found the love and relationships talk interesting
as it introduced the ideology behind Plato’s Symposium, mentioning the thoughts and ideas
of Socrates, Agathon, Eros and a few others. In this lecture Diotima’s ladder of love was also
introduced, giving the students a further understanding of the nature and ethos of love. The
masterclass ended with a debate on “which is more important: the mind or the body?”, allowing
the students to give their own opinion on the topic. Overall the event was very insightful for all the
students and left them with more questions than they started with. Written by Antonio.

Y1 explored capacity and measurement with a brilliant practical session and undertook Photographers
This term has seen many transition activities over at our Senior School. This makes our Bateman Street an experiment to test different roof materials for the Three Little Pigs and their houses. It Y10 Visit to Tube Welding Institute (TWI) at Granta Park
site become a familiar environment with a lovely question and answer session with Y7 about life in the got very stormy and wet in the lab! Gallery and Tate
senior school, staying for lunch and taking a tour of the building with our Head Girl and Senior Prefect. Y10 travelled to Granta Park Research Development to visit TWI by special invitation. Students
It also gives them access to lots of new opportunities to learn and exciting experiences. Britain Trip participated in a range of talks, tours, and activities throughout the day. Initial talks were fascinating
and covered topics on the History of Energy and where it’s going in the future; how geothermal
French and Art lessons have been taking place in Bateman Street’s specialist subject teaching rooms. Y11 Art students attended a workshop and energy works; and on the manufacture and the use of wind turbines as well as solving some of the
They have taken part in an interactive science workshop and went to watch the performance of The exhibition at the Photographers Gallery and problems encountered. We then broke into groups for a series of activities. Pupils were given a site
Crucible. They were really captured by the standard of acting and beautiful singing performances. They Tate Britain last Monday to support their tour, learning about different welding techniques and the different jobs and groups that exist at TWI.
attended a Maths workshop with Y8, investigating when to use the £20 or 20% discount using real-life preparation for the GCSE exam. Students Students also heard about creating different environments to stress test their materials and about
problems, an English workshop on the Holocaust and a participated in a range of drama activities with explored the history and science of photography some of the excellent technology being developed to identify faults in materials under stress, using
Y10. using The Photographers’ Gallery’s own camera ultrasound.
obscura and worked collaboratively to produce
a pinhole camera. This is a form of remarkable Two further sessions gave students the chance to work as a team and solve problems together, within
Spruce Up Victorian technology that brought moving strict time limits. One involved programming a lego mindstorm robot to follow a line and stop when
Y2 carried out an experiment to find out how blubber keeps penguins warm, plunging pictures to people, long before cinema was it encountered a break or different colour tape - emitting a noise or alert before continuing. There
Improvements to St Paul’s Rd are ongoing with a spruce up of the school hall and ICT room, renovations to their hands into icy cold water, one hand covered in just plastic and the other in plastic invented. was lots of trial and error involved but most teams did a very good job in the time allowed. The other
our Y1 classroom and a lovely new library. with a layer of fat (blubber). session involved “welding” chocolate into sturdy bridges, following their own design. These bridges
were then destructively tested to check how much load they could take. It was fascinating to learn
Y5 used the Science lab for Options Evening about how understanding a material’s behaviour under stress can help with load bearing and design.
News their investigations into In the final session, people in a variety of roles talked to our Y10’s about their jobs, what they studied,

solubility. They looked at
Reporters scientific method, thinking Recently Year 9 have picked their GCSES. To help them with their decisions an Options and how they ended up in their roles. A common theme was that most didn’t know what they wanted
about the variables they
Evening was held on the 30th January. Each teacher gave a short speech about what their
at age 15, chose A levels because they enjoyed the subjects and through deciding what they didn’t want
have to take into account,
course. After the talks, families were able to walk around the school, and visit the classrooms
and how to design subject would include and parents were given a booklet with extra information about each to do, emerged into their final fields. TWI offers apprenticeships at many different levels - from post
16 through to Masters. This offers a way to earn while you learn and it was really useful to learn more
Y1 and Y2 became news reporters following some great a fair test. They also carried with the specialist teachers. Here they could talk directly to them and ask personal questions about that option. TWI also told our students that they can offer work experience for a week. It was a
drama in the dining hall. Amanda and Mrs Jones had out experiments to test the about the subject. It went on until six thirty and this gave parents lots of time to chat and very successful, educational, and incredibly fun experience for all involved.
a (staged) calamitous accident and the two classes thermal insulation properties think about their child’s GCSEs. A sheet was given out for the confirmation of their choices.
joined together to create brilliant news reports on the of a number of materials. There are five blocks consisting of the subjects and students were allowed to pick one from Back in the lab
incident through role play. Some children volunteered each. Overall they picked between three to five subjects for GCSE and a week was given
to give a report in front of everyone and everyone had for them to pick their final decision. It was an exciting evening which will shape their lives Back on school grounds, the biology department covered a required practical with Y10 students. Every
the chance to practice using their phrases, tone of voice forever. pupil learned how to safely work with bacteria, from heat sterilising equipment, to handling nutrient
and factual information that a reporter would use. agar and using a wire loop to transfer a colony of bacteria without contamination onto a new agar
Written by: Jess and Maddie in Y9 plate. They went on to investigate the effects of different antibacterial agents in the growth of bacteria.
It looks as though we have some budding microbiologists among the cohort.Written by Leah, Y10.