Students leading the way – quite literally!
My blog this week is one I have been looking forward to writing for a few days.
As you know I love celebrating the achievements of our students and this week I have a couple of things to share which, for me, are very special.
Firstly, I want to congratulate Fearne in Year 10 who has recently been selected to represent West Yorkshire’s U15 County Netball Squad. This is in addition to her selection for Bradford Schools and her wider commitments to netball in school and beyond. Netball is in her family and Fearne has worked extremely hard to gain this selection and recognition. She is dedicated to her sport and is incredibly humble about her ability and successes. I am thrilled that she will have the honour to represent her county this year and I wish her every success for the season ahead.
In other student news I would like to mention Sian in Year 13. Sian has been a feature of many of my blogs in recent years but this time it is for something completely different. Sian play badminton to an elite level and competes to county and national standard in her sport. Last week Sian was asked by the PE department to lead a professional development session for them on badminton with a focus on skills and techniques that could be used to support even better lessons for all students across school. Talking to the PE staff afterwards they all recognised that it could not have been easy for her leading a group of adults, let alone her own teachers! However, she was brilliant and led one of the most valuable professional development sessions the team has experienced. Her knowledge, teaching points and progressive practices were stunning. The team learned so much and acknowledged that Sian’s input will have a huge impact on the shaping future work in badminton to ensure students will enjoy lessons and make stronger and faster progress than ever. Well done Sian and thank you.
My final piece of student news relates to Year 9. Currently those students are choosing their GCSE options to begin in June. It is an exciting time but also a time where many of them have to grow up quickly and begin to consider their futures in a manner that they have never experienced. As part of the process they have been preparing for months with their tutors, talking to family and friends and, last week, sitting with senior staff to discus their choices and future aspirations. I spent three days last week talking to over fifty of them and they were magnificent. I was staggered by their maturity, by their confidence and mostly by their levels of ambition for their future. I reminded them of their entitlement to a good life and the need to work hard along the way. They totally understood and their desire to be fundamentally decent young people who are ready for the future beyond Beckfoot and I felt privileged to be in their company for each of those meetings.
On Tuesday we had a Year 7 Maths based curriculum day. Normal lessons were suspended and replaced with a day focussed around the development of maths skills and a focus on instilling a love for the subject through different experiences. Well, what a day which began with the students taking on the task of being Codebreakers of Bletchley Park. This was followed by a maths murder mystery, the maths of the Aztecs; the maths in Morse Code and finally a maths based quiz. The levels of engagement were wonderful as was the sheer enthusiasm of the students to get involved and enjoy everything the day had to offer. I want to thank Mr. Braid, Mr. Mallatrat and the entire maths team for making the day such a phenomenal experience for our students.
Lastly, I would like to draw your attention to our newly developed Family Workshops. This is in place of the old Family Forums that have been a feature of the school for some time. In making the change we asked for feedback via our Local Schools Committee (LSC) and this led us to re-examine our provision. Families told us they wanted more focus on the following:
Wellbeing - Embedding reading and learning habits
- Online safety
- Metacognition and revision
- Exam readiness
- Future readiness
So, we began last Thursday with a session on wellbeing and what we are doing at Beckfoot. The session was led by Mrs Denham and supported by our Place2Be manager, Rachel and our Education Mental Health Practitioner, Elle. It was a great evening with presentations, discussion and lots of questions. It felt good and the feedback has been great. Thanks to everyone who attended and asked for the presentation to be shared with them. We are planning the above sessions as I write and will share dates and times in the near future.
Take care
Simon
