Page 3 - Abberley Adventures - Feb 2022

ABBERLEY ADVENTURES
3
Academic Life
The Spring Term is always a busy one with revision for Mocks for the senior years and the younger pupils being more settled and able to move forward with their learning at a greater pace. After the challenges of last term, the children have settled straight back into the normal routines and lessons and good progress has been made by all. We’ve enjoyed some excellent educational trips and our Year 5 and 6 children enjoyed their first-ever Maths challenge at Cheltenham College. The amazing speech competition finals were also a great highlight and we have enjoyed some superb Lindisfarne Lectures including ‘why large animals are so rare’ and ‘Mega Fauna’.
Each year, Shrewsbury School reaches out to schools around the country inviting them to take part in the ‘Sir Philip Sidney Essay Writing Competition’. As soon as the Year 6s came back in January, they were given the challenge of writing 500 words on the theme, ‘What will the 21st Century be remembered for?’ All Year 6 pupils brainstormed, researched, planned and composed their essays, which were submitted in mid-January. Nina Gabb and Georgia Pound were selected by Shrewsbury as finalists after including topics such as the monarchy, technology, sport influencers and, unsurprisingly, Covid-19, in their essays. The girls were invited to visit Shrewsbury for an afternoon of workshops and prize giving with finalists from other schools; an afternoon that proved to be both brilliantly inspiring and enormous fun! A big well done to all the students who worked so hard to write some very impressive essays.
During our staff training sessions at the start of term, teaching staff focused on ‘Cognitive Challenge’ and ‘Metacognition’, two concepts designed to stretch the children’s understanding, knowledge and skills. It has been fantastic to hear of and see the innovative teaching that has been going on in this area and the positive responses from children when they have been put in ‘the learning pit’, as we call it. Lessons need to be pacey and challenging as it is when being stretched that children learn – not when they are sitting within their comfort zone!
The new Apple TV’s have been joined by new iPads for the majority of staff and we have plans to introduce more of these devices during the year and then more still over the Summer. Technology is key to education and we are looking forward to extending how it is used in our classrooms to ensure that our teaching and learning is as effective as it can possibly be. As has already been mentioned, we will be introducing individual devices for our older children from September to ensure that they have access to the best that educational technology can offer. These devices will be very carefully managed and the relevant parents will be written to soon with further details.
Next half of term will be just as busy on the academic front with a range of trips and exciting events for children to be involved in. We will kick-off with a talk from Tom Newman of Malvern College on study skills, which we hope to become an annual event. There will be a Prose-Reading competition to look forward to and a range of trips to stretch and develop our children.