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News from the Senior Department
This week in Geography
Year 6 are learning all about Plate Tectonics in Geography this term. 6C investigated what happens at different plate boundaries when two plates meet using clay and cardboard! The cardboard was the earth’s crust, each piece a different tectonic plate, and the coloured clay was the mantle. 6C investigated what happened at a conservative plate boundary, a constructive plate boundary, a destructive plate boundary and lastly a collision plate bouundary. The classroom was filled with volcanoes, an occasional earthquake and even some fold mountains! Lots of fun was had by all and hopefully this will help pupils to remember the different types of plate boundaries and what happens at each one.
Year 7 Shakespeare Workshop
On Tuesday 10th January, Year 7 had the wonderful experience of having Jennifer Rigby from the English Speaking Union to host an acting workshop and help us polish our performances. “I found the workshop very interesting and helpful. It helped my confidence to get to practise with a real actress, and I thought that she somehow managed to engage and excite everyone,” says Benedict from Year 7.
Jennifer showed us how to notice the hidden stage directions. She also taught us about the life of William Shakespeare and how his plays reflect his life. We are looking forward to taking part in the Performing Shakespeare competition in the forthcoming weeks, and we are excited to see who will be selected to represent Beechwood at the regional finals.
This week in TPR
As part of their TPR lessons, Years 6 & 8 have been looking at the work of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and this year’s theme ‘Ordinary People.’ Some have watched videos of a survivor of the Cambodian genocide and others from a Rwandan survivor. Together they have made a Memorial Flame display in the TPR classroom. Each child has made a cut out of their hand and added it to this very thought-provoking display.
The experiences of people affected by the Holocaust, Nazi persecution of other groups or other genocides, serve as a reminder that ordinary people, like us, have a part to play in stopping this from ever happening again and seeking out and bringing to justice for those that sadly suffer it again.
The Imperial War Museum, London has an excellent permanent exhibition in their Holocaust Galleries, for older children and families who want to find out more about the topic.
Mr Wood
Head of TPR
This week from the Learning Support Team
This week we have been extremely proud of a group Top Former learning support pupil who created and presented two separate assemblies to the Middle Department and the Senior Department. The groups’ aim was to share their knowledge and experience of different types of Neurodiversity, the impact this has had on their learning and the support they have received from the Learning Support department, subject and form teachers at Beechwood.
This project evolved after being shown a film about how difficult it had been in the past for individuals with dyslexia (1970s). The group were horrified to see how pupils had once been treated and were very thankful that their own experience of Neurodiversity was that of support and understanding.
The pupils were keen to inspire fellow pupils that it is, “Alright to work in a different way and to be proud of who you are”.
Louis one of our former pupils recorded a special video before he left and this is what he said…
”Today’s assessmbly is about neurodiversity and how it’s okay to be a different learner, it’s okay to be a faster learner but no one is smater than anyone else. Everyone is bright in their own way. We have different abilituies in different things. Something that one person is good at, another person might not be so good at. Someone could struggle with maths or someone might struggle with English, whatever the case is, we are all equal and as smart as each other, just in different ways. If you have dyslexia, if you have dyscaculia, if you have dysgraphia, if you have ADHD/ASD or anything else that can affect your learning you should be proud of it and you should never doubt yourself. Ever! ‘
We would like to congratulate, Ava S, Millie G, Edward G-S, Louis M, Lucci F, Will W, Hector G and Charlotte P.
Mrs Brown and Mrs Savage
Heads of Learning Support
