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Newsletter Issue 53Autumn 2015

“A good school with OUTSTANDING features.” Ofsted 2010

Dear Parent/Carer

Doug PettittDoug Pettitt, Head Teacher

We are delighted to report we have celebrated another excellent year of GCSE and A Level results. Congratulations go to all our Year 10, 11 and Sixth Form students who gained their GCSE qualifications this year. Our students achieved brilliantly in a year when the higher GCSEs grades were reported to be far tougher to achieve nationally.

Firstly, at GCSE, Travel and Tourism has led the way this year with 100% of students achieving a C grade pass or better. Well done to all of the students! Kingsmeadow’s tradition of excellence in the fields of Business and Geography has also continued with the percentage of GCSE students achieving C grades and above being in the high 60s - well above national averages.

Building on the recent successes of male students, our female students have achieved some outstanding results this year with 69.4% gaining a C grade or better in English and 62.5% and 71.4% respectively doing the same in Maths and Science. The theme of travel continues with 85% of our female students achieving a C or better in Spanish and a phenomenal 91% managing this in Art.

At A Level, we achieved an overall pass rate of 94% (including 40% A-B grades). Several students achieved 3 A*- A grades or equivalents, and there were some real success stories in both Years 12 and 13 who all exceeded their target grades. These students are widely acknowledged to have demonstrated outstanding attitudes to learning, which makes their results particularly pleasing. Many of our year 11 students chose to stay on at Kingsmeadow Sixth Form, where they are given the opportunity to study a wide range of courses both at level 2 and 3 in our state-of-the-art facilities. All our successful year 13 students gained their first choice at either university (Durham, Newcastle, Leeds, Sunderland), college, apprenticeship or employment. This was a first class achievement that we are all very proud of. On November 10th we will be celebrating many of these successes at our coveted annual awards evening.

A clear contributing factor for this success in external exams is the commitment our students show not just in lessons, but at home as well. To be successful, there has to be a strong partnership between school and home and I would like to thank our parents/carers for their continued support in helping us continue to raise standards and ensuring their child studies at home. Again, next year we expect students to be regularly completing home study and revision. I will be asking teaching staff to ensure parents know exactly what needs to be completed outside normal school hours. Parents/carers will be able to track any outstanding work via the weekly email home from Behaviour Watch. I would like to point out that students can complete home study any evening after school up until 4.00pm in our Learning Zone to access more specialist facilities if required. Year 11 and 10 students will also be required to attend period 6 sessions (2.45-3.45pm) this year and in the lead up to important GCSE exams. This will be explained in our Year 10 and Year 11 parents information evening on Tuesday September 22nd.

I am delighted that, for the second year running, parents of our new year 7 chose to sign up to the Google Chromebook scheme. This is a result of tremendous feedback from parents and students about the impact and engagement in their learning, especially at home. This means that year 7 and 8 students will now have direct access to online learning resources throughout the school day and a device that will help them engage in a range of projects and learning activities both in lessons and at home. The vision is that as each year moves in and up the school, Kingsmeadow will become a completely digitally inclusive school by the year 2018. We have also invested heavily over the summer break on new computer hardware across the school, as we believe access to information technology is critical in developing the skills of our students for their future employment.

Last year was a particularly successful time for Kingsmeadow in the world of sport. There we many team and individual successes that were recognised at the annual Gateshead Schools’ Partnership Awards. Rebecca Smails (Year 10) won the Sports Leader of the Year Award and our very own Kingsmeadow Games won the Sports Innovation of the Year Award. As a result of the number of students now participating and achieving in Sport at Kingsmeadow, we have calendered our inaugural Sports Awards Evening for Wednesday 30th September.

Throughout the year, students collect merit points for themselves and for their house. At the end of the year, the house with the most points wins a free trip out of school to a venue selected by the School Council. Well done to Angel House who were crowned champions for 2015! You will note that from September all students are to wear their house badge on their blazer to help identify students by their house as competitions run throughout the year in a range of subjects.

At the end of the summer term, we said goodbye to Ms Kelly, Mr Laverick, Ms Knowles, Mr Archibald, Ms Brown and Mr Rowlands who are all moving on to new and exciting challenges. We also said farewell to Cllr Joyce Forster (parent governor) Cllr Brenda Clelland (local authority governor) who have served us so well for so many years.

At the start of this term, we have several new members of staff joining the school to help us continue to develop and further improve outcomes for our students. Ms Cleugh (Maths), Miss Slater (Maths), Mr Ridley (English), Ms Bell (English), Ms Ross (REAL / Art), Mr Lowdon (Cover Supervisor), Ms Martinez (MFL), Miss Tomlinson (IT Media Technician), Miss Cowburn (SEN Teaching Assistant), Miss Keys (English/Maths Teaching Assistant), Miss Greenup (SEN Teaching Assistant), Mrs Hoy (Science) and Mr Farthing (Science)

I hope you will enjoy reading about many skills, talents and achievements of our students and other news items.

Enjoy and achieve

Book Clubbers DelightOn Thursday 2nd July a group of year 10 students visited The Baltic and The Sage to soak up some culture before the rain came to soak us… This proved to be a delightful way to end a satisfying year in which we’ve read and discussed a feast of literature from ‘Gone’ and ‘Divergent’ to ‘The War of the Worlds’ and ‘The History of Love’. Along the way, we’ve encountered vampires, Victorian heroines, dastardly bullies and vanishing adults and, although there wasn’t quite the same mix at the Quayside, we did meet a harpist, a couple of papier mache aliens and a few hundred seagulls who kept us busy. Lovely.

Next year, Book Club will become Culture Club, with the aim of exploring a greater range of literary, historical, artistic, musical, theatrical and cinematic treats, and we look forward to welcoming students from across the year groups to join us.

For more information, contact Mrs McGarry.

Year 9 Visit Birthplace of Elizabeth Barrett BrowningA group of students from year 9 recently visited the birthplace of poetic icon Elizabeth Barrett Browning, planting flowers and reciting poetry in the driving rain.

Although the weather was against us, we got an idea of the splendid scenery our poet woke up to every morning, looking across the valley from rural Kelloe to the village of Coxhoe in County Durham. “Fantastic view she had, sir” remarked young bohemian Luke Scott, 14, as he contemplated the banks of ox eye daisies and lavender glistening in the rain.

The bluebells having been placed, the group retreated from the rain to the cover of the woods to recite the dedicatory ode written by us in her honour and leave it hanging on a young, ivy-bound sapling, where it will abide, witness to her immortal genius.

In the minibus travelling back to school with rain pounding against the roof, the students wistfully contemplated what life might have been like for the young Elizabeth. At least we now know where her love of nature might have come from.

Ode to EBB

O witness fair of love divine, To thee we offer this verse; Thy spirit lives on in the hearts of us, Love’s nature, which you nurse.

O let us bear your flaming torch Of love all the while. Let us remember thee every day, In a kind word, a kiss, a smile.

O muse eterne, your words live on, Whene’er two lovers meet. Your words as fresh as yesterday; As truthful, as timeless, as sweet.

United Kingdom Mathematics Trust (UKMT) Junior ChallengeThirty nine of our students entered the United Kingdom Mathematics Trust (UKMT) Junior Challenge on the 30th April 2015.

Congratulations to Ellie Walker who did exceptionally well and was awarded silver certificate and best in school, well done to Shay Dawson who was awarded Silver certificate. Also well done to David Farrimond, Loraine Papong, Hollie Smith and Stephen Scott who were awarded bronze certificate for their achievement.

The Man and the DonkeyIn my opinion ‘The Man and the Donkey’, directed by Jackie Fielding, has broken a new ground in war time plays, not only in terms of the play itself but in its staging also.

The play tells the story of John Simpson Kirkpatrick, a local young man who became a hero to Australians in World War I due to the way in which, as a stretcher-bearer with his beloved donkey Duffy, he saved many lives, carrying the wounded through the fighting to safety. Unfortunately, he lost his own life, on the 19th May 1915, while rescuing others and Australians still regard him as one of their War heroes. He originally came from South Shields and was a most unlikely hero, an ordinary young man who did heroic deeds but was a stretch away from an ideal soldier, not so much defying military discipline as seeming to think it as non-existent. All he wanted to do was save his comrades. In doing so he gave his life so that others may live.

It is a true ensemble piece and the cast move from character to character fluidly and effectively, adopting different body languages and accents with ease to adopt a new character. The cast never left the stage which kept the piece moving smoothly and swiftly through its 90-odd minutes.

The set had two levels: the lower served as South Shields beach, a trench and many other locations, while the upper, a wall of sandbags, was the battlefield of Gallipoli. The use of levels had your attention refined to individual aspects that kept you drawn until the very end of the play.

One unforgettable moment, in my eyes, was the use of the donkey itself, using two cleverly designed bags to mimic that of the animal.

All in all, the play ‘The Man and the Donkey’ was deeply moving; a well written piece about a fascinating topic and performed by an excellent cast.

Katie Pharoah Y10

Chromebook SchemeFollowing on from our hugely successful year 7 Chromebook scheme, which gave each student in the year group access to their very own Chromebook, we are extending this programme to include our incoming cohort of new students.

The Chromebook Scheme is a fantastic opportunity for students to be part of an exciting and innovative time at Kingsmeadow, as we build upon the work we have done using cloud technology and Google Apps for Education.

We showcased the scheme to parents and carers last summer, by visiting local primary schools and through our launch evening which took place in school. Both proved to be valuable opportunities to experience the powerful technology we hope to make available to our students

However, if you missed the event either at Kingsmeadow or at your primary school, but are still interested in signing up to the scheme, there is still time to do this.

Please contact Mr Thompson on 0191 4606004 or email lthompson@kingsmeadow.org.uk, who will be happy to talk you through the signing up process.

Google ClassroomIn September, we will be launching an exciting innovation at Kingsmeadow in the form of Google Classroom, a piece of software designed to integrate with our current suite of Google Apps for Education which we have been using in school for the last two years.

Google Classroom is designed to help teachers create and collect assignments paperlessly, including time-saving features like the ability to automatically make a copy of a Google document for each student. It also creates Google Drive folders for each assignment and for each student to help keep everyone organised.

Students can keep track of what is due on the Assignments page and begin working with just a click. Teachers can quickly see who has or hasn’t completed the work and provide direct, real-time feedback.

Google Classroom will initially be used within our REAL teaching groups, but we will be rolling this out to all subjects within a few months.

Use your Loaf!On 18th June, a group of Year 9 Food Technology students and Mrs Ellis spent the day at Newcastle University in a Use Your Loaf workshop.

The day began with a visit to the Robinson Library where students worked with Mrs Sara Bird where they were given unique access to a selection of some of the rare books in the Special Collections section, including a very large book containing life size anatomical drawings used by surgeons and a 17th century recipe book. The students were also shown and actually allowed to very carefully handle documents by King Henry VIII and Queen Victoria.

They then went on to transcribe a 17th century recipe for cake bread, that hasn’t been eaten in nearly 400 years, into modern English.

Upstairs, in the university food laboratories, the students listened attentively to Professor Chris Seal who explained how making bread, the equipment used, and indeed the grains used in the 17th century differed to the present time.

They then worked together in small teams under the guidance of Professor Chris. First, the groups made the cake bread from the 17th century recipe. Next, the groups made another bread loaf using a more modern recipe. Finally, the teams compared the two breads, looking at how differently they each looked and tasted.

The students were taken on a tour of the NU Food kitchen, where ideas for new products are tried out using industrial size equipment to determine how well they meet the design specification. They also taste tested samples of bread containing different amounts of salt in the individual tasting booths. The very same tasting booths that are used by local food manufacturers when they need to taste test new products!

The students thoroughly enjoyed the whole day, particularly the making of the 17th century cake bread and did themselves and Kingsmeadow proud.

Textiles Students Visit Fantastic Showcase

Last term, year 8 and 10 textiles technology students visited Cleveland College of Art and Design based in Hartlepool. The College/University were running their end of year showcase which is a chance for graduates to display their talent and gain contacts from industry.

The show displayed amazing work from all courses such as “Fashion Production”, “Costume Design and Interpretation”, “Textiles and Surface Pattern” and other design based courses such as “Graphic Design”.

The show was a fantastic opportunity for the students to gain inspiration and collect photographs for their coursework. It also gave the group a chance to see the opportunities which lay in the design industry and future career and further education prospects.

I’m an EngineerLast term two year 9 classes took part in an online initiative called ‘I’m an Engineer’ where students had a chance to chat to real engineers who work in the energy industry. Students created interesting and sometimes difficult questions for the engineers to answer. At the end of the session, students got a chance to vote for their favourite engineer. The students found it very rewarding and loved that they could find out more about the industry they are interested in.

The engineers from each zone had to nominate a student to win a prize. Matthew Blackburn was selected from the energy zone and won a £20 gift voucher for being engaged, thoughtful, fun and overall, great student. Well done Matthew!

Last term, four year 9 girls took part in a zombie apocalypse challenge at AMEC in Gosforth as part of Women into Engineering Day. They were part of four schools who took part during the morning session.

Students had to complete tasks successfully in order to survive the apocalypse. Challenges included building a shelter using mathematical skills, finding somewhere suitable to build their

shelter and how to make clean drinking water. Students successfully used engineering, maths and science skills to complete the challenges.

It was an excellent insight into engineering, and the girls were able to work with and ask questions to real engineers.

Christian Bible ProjectSome year 8 students entered a Christian Bible Project in June 2015. They worked tirelessly in class and at home researching the resurrection and the road to Emmaus in order to produce 1000 words in the form of a diary, a story or a letter to the Roman Authorities. Year 8 were asked to imagine that they were present at the event and to write accordingly.

The four winners of the competition are invited, with their parents and teachers, to attend a ceremony in London where

they will have a tour of Parliament and tea at the House of Lords to receive their prizes.

Abby Cass produced work of a very high standard in the 26th year of the competition running and the number of entries across the country was incredibly high. Through Abby’s hard work she has won 2nd prize in the competition and will be invited to attend the ceremony in London. She has also won £250 for the school!

Congratulations to Abby for her hard work and commitment to the competition entry!

Progress ChampionsThis year has seen some outstanding performances from our students both in and out of the classroom. Year 7 have settled into Kingsmeadow life superbly; we expect great things of our Year 11s from the exam series that they have recently sat and the data suggests that many students in all year groups are not just meeting, but are exceeding the challenging targets we have set for them.

It’s been a pleasure to see students from right across the school spectrum show the resilience and determination to succeed. With this in mind, now is an ideal opportunity to celebrate the achievements of those students in Years 7-10 who have shown themselves to be leading the way on the path to academic success. We would all like to offer huge congratulations to our progress champions.

Women into Engineering - Zombie Apocalypse

Thursday 25th June saw yet another amazing night for our year 11 leavers. The Prom was held at the Gateshead Marriott and was a fantastic venue for our Oscars themed event. Everyone arrived in style and looked very glamorous on the red carpet. Special awards were given out to staff and students on the evening by our newly crowned Prom King and Queen Will Rayne and Molly Brown. The students partied until they dropped and had a fantastic evening.

Special thanks must go to Mrs Williamson, Mrs Boult, Mrs Forster and Mr Bland for helping to organise the event and to Mr Paul Harrison at Digital Dreamz photography for his use of the photobooth and his fabulous camera skills.

Year 11 Prom

Staying Healthy

The PE Department will be hosting an annual Sports Awards Evening on the 30th September. This event will be by invite only. We believe this is an excellent way to round off a superb year of school sport, highlighting and celebrating the outstanding commitment and progress made by individuals, teams, academic achievements across sport leadership and physical education at Kingsmeadow.

Sports Awards Evening

Primary School Pe Cluster

Rowing RoadshowWe hosted a rowing roadshow in partnership with Gateshead School Sport Partnership. Students in year 7 and 8 completed a competitive individual row against other students in their year group. Points were added up and the results were collated to see which was the winning house. Overall Year 7 Tyne house won their competition and year 8 Baltic house won.

QuadkidsKingsmeadow organised Quadkids, an athletics event, for the Primary Cluster Students. This event covered 4 disciplines: 50m sprint, 400m run, standing long jump and Javelin.

In our Cluster the Year 1/2 event was won by St Aidans. The Year 3/4 event was won by Dunston Hill with Caedmon coming second and both went on to represent the Kingsmeadow Cluster at the Gateshead finals. Dunston Hill did very well coming third out of 14 schools competing.

Year 5/6 RoundersDunston Hill and Caedmon had great fun playing a mixed school rounders tournament, not only did they learn the skills of rounders but they enjoyed making new friends.

Staff CPDThe Kingsmeadow PE cluster had the opportunity to receive some Outdoor education CPD to introduce into their PE curriculums. It was great fun and very well led by Andy from B Outdoors. Staff took loads of ideas back to school and Dunston Hill and St Aidans have already put some of the activities into practice.

Sainsburys School Games MarkWe have achieved Silver Sainsburys School Games Mark that recognises all the intra and inter sport offered at Kingsmeadow. As well as lunch and before school activities; Sports Leadership is also credited in the mark.

Sainsburys School Games We entered an online blog competition to tell Sainsburys School Games about sports leadership in our school. We won the competition and the prize was £400 to spend on equipment. We have bought tchoukball equipment to introduce the sport into the curriculum. It has already been tried out in core PE in Year 10 and 12.

Gateshead Sport AwardsRebecca Smails year 10 won the Sports Leader of the Year in the Gateshead Sports Awards. This is due to her commitment to sport and physical activity and sports leadership in and outside of school. Rebecca has dedicated a tremendous amount of her own time throughout the year to assisting with and taking a lead in the smooth running of events.

A few examples of her work include:

• Assistant coach year 7 Netball Team

• Coaching at Kingsmeadow rowing club for KS3 students

• Umpiring Year 5 Netball Tournaments

• Officiating Sportshall Athletics and outdoor Athletics Competitions

• Sportability – attended a sportability course

• Durham County Schools Athletics Data Input – Pentathlon

Gateshead Sport Innovation AwardWe won the Sport Innovation Award. We were successful due to the fact that the whole school takes part in a variety of challenging and exciting activities in houses to compete for points. Also our opening and closing ceremonies, which recognises outstanding performances, efforts and attitudes.

GATESHEAD SCHOOLS ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIPSKingsmeadow entered the Gateshead Schools Athletics Championships giving our students the opportunity to represent their school and possibly the County. After finishing 2nd overall in the Shot Putt, Molly Reynolds (Year 9) qualified to represent Gateshead in the Durham County Athletics Championships.

County Champion: Molly Reynolds

Molly threw a personal best of 8.60m in the County Championships at Monkton Stadium winning the competition and became County Champion. She went on to represent County Durham in the Inter County Championships at Gateshead Stadium; a massive achievement competing against the best Shot Putters in the North East.

U14 Durham County Pentathlon Competition

Year 7 and 8 students competed in the Durham County Pentathlon Competition at Monkton Stadium where all students completed 5 events throughout the day including hurdles, long jump, high jump, shot put and 800m

Individual Successes: Abby Cass & Jack Kelly

Abby Cass in Year 8 finished 6th overall out of 60 competitors from other schools across Durham County. Jack Kelly in year 7 achieved a personal best of 1.36m in the high jump finishing first in that event.

Lobley Hill Fundraising Event

Miss Pattison’s dedicated gymnasts performed at a fundraising event at Rutherford football club on Saturday 30th May in an effort to raise money for Kingsmeadow student Ellie Watkinson to go to New York with her performing arts group.

Gateshead Schools Rowing ChampionshipsAfter representing Kingsmeadow in the Gateshead Schools Rowing Championships and finishing in the top 3, 5 students qualified to represent Gateshead in the County Championships at North Sheilds: Jasmine Wilson (Year 7) Amy Williams (Year 9) Chloe Thompson and Rebecca Smails (year 10) and Jemma Coulson (Year 11).

County Rowing Championships

After representing Gateshead at the County Championships Rebecca Smails, Chloe Thompson (year 10) and Jasmine Wilson (year 7) qualified to represent Tyne and Wear at the Regional Rowing finals at Durham University as a result of finishing in the top 2 in their age group. Prior to the competition students were given the opportunity to experience rowing in the rowing tank, one of Durham University’s state of the art facilities. Jasmin Wilson year 7 finished 5th, Rebecca Smails Year 10 finished 4th and Chloe Thompson finished 6th from all students across Northumberland, Durham, Tyne and Wear and Teesside.

Football BootsIf anyone has any football boots they no longer use we would be grateful if you could donate them to the PE department please.

Chair of Governors UpdateAs I write this we are starting a new school year, with much to celebrate and to look forward to. We welcome new students and their families and hope that they will enjoy their time with us, benefitting from all

that the school has to offer. Year 7 students will have their new Chromebook, an exciting and very valuable aid to their learning. Meanwhile we wish every success to the students who have moved on to more study or to work. We also welcome new members of staff to our vibrant and exciting school.

The summer term was marked by the Ofsted inspection which took place soon after the beginning of term. The inspectors found much to praise. They could see the progress the school is making and were very impressed by the behaviour of the students. The inspectors noted the hard work of the school’s teachers and the new teaching and learning initiatives to improve student achievement. Their report (on the school website) is very positive. We were disappointed in the overall judgement of ‘requires improvement’ but this reflects historical exam results. All the school’s staff are working very hard to secure improvement, with growing success. The inspectors could see this.

The A-level and GCSE results which came in August contained some spectacular successes as well as some disappointments. The school’s drive for improvement was reflected in the achievement of many students. The governors send their congratulations to the students involved and to their teachers. This year the Head Teacher and his staff will be pursuing the initiatives which have already raised achievement and will be addressing subject areas where improvement is still needed.

We were pleased to see that students also had a lot of fun last term, culminating with the Kingsmeadow Games in which so many students shone. The new house system has generated intense competition and excitement in very positive ways; the Head Teacher has promised to include governors in these houses so we will be cheering our respective houses on. The school sports teams impressed us with some very good results too.

Governors have continued to be very involved with the school, visiting to see lessons underway, talking to staff and of course holding their own meetings. We continue to progress and monitor the REAL strategic plan and will be holding regular discussions with senior staff on the themes of Relationships, Engagement, Achievement and Learning. We also support the school’s excellent pastoral care arrangements.

We look forward to another full and rewarding year, with more challenges and excitement!

Sarah DiggleSarah Diggle, Chair of Governors

Making a positive contribution

Black History Month Black History Month (UK) 2015 begins on Thursday, October 1 and ends on Saturday, October 31

Info can be collected from http://www.blackhistorymonth.org.uk/

Student VoiceThroughout 2014-2015 Kingsmeadow Student Voice have been working closely with students to get their voice heard throughout school, this has led to some positive changes.

As a result of ‘You said, We did’, Student Voice have introduced the following changes:

• The summer uniform;

• Maximising the minimum homework deadline to 48 hours.

• Contribution to changes in the new Kingsmeadow House System.

A small team of form group representatives have started to raise money for FACT (Facing All Cancers Together) by holding a cake sale, fund raising activities will continue during the academic year.

Learning for Life DayOur Learning for Life (L4L) programme this year has provided our students with a wide range of inspirational and thought provoking lessons, designed to give them an insight into the wider world.

We have six L4L days throughout the year, where we collapse our time table so we can deliver a range of lessons based around Social, Moral, Spiritual and Cultural (SMSC) and Personal and Social Health Education (PSHE).

Activities taking place this year involved students working with the Northern Architecture group on the rebuilding of Dunston Staithes, fire safety talks from Tyne and Wear Fire Service and a whole range of health and fitness and healthy eating activities to name but a few.

This year our Sixth Form students also took part in a range of enrichment activities, led by our dedicated Sixth Form staff.

Kingsmeadow GamesFollowing on from last year, we enjoyed yet another great day at the Kingsmeadow Games. All the students including our up and coming year 7, participated in fun sporting activities all day. Students were competing against each other trying to gain points towards winning the competition. The four houses, Baltic, Angel, Tyne and Sage arrived in force wearing with pride their house colours and were welcomed in to the Kingsmeadow games by their house heads and house captains.

Following an energetic opening ceremony which consisted of; a gymnastics display, a fun staff warm up and the national anthem, the athletes dispersed to begin their activities and let the battle commence for the winning house of the Kingsmeadow games 2015.

Scores were collected from each activity throughout the day and after a weekend of suspense the results were announced. The closing ceremony on Monday 13 July revealed that Baltic regained the title for their second consecutive year.

WELL DONE BALTIC HOUSE

House SystemThroughout the academic year students have had the opportunity to gain merits awarded for ‘attitudes to learning’. The students gain these merits for personal reward and House success. In the forthcoming year there will be lots more events/competitions available for the students to take part in and achieve even more merits towards their final score at the end of the year 2016. House competition events such as Kingsmeadow bake off, Kingsmeadow mastermind, Spelling bee challenge, Kingsmeadow games will be organised for students to participate in throughout the year and continually gain merits for their respective houses.

Successful students this year have been rewarded with the opportunity to go to Lightwater Valley. All students in positive points within the winning house of 2015 and students in the three runner up houses with +450 points have been allocated a gold/silver ticket inviting them to come along and enjoy the reward trip.

Overall house results from this academic year 2014-15 are:

WELL DONE ANGEL HOUSE

1st

3rd

2nd

4th

Staying Safe

Active Tuesdays 1.45 - 2.45 pm Every TuesdayFor the past two years, Active Tuesdays have provided a whole host of engaging and creative activity opportunities for the students of Kingsmeadow. Delivered by a variety of staff and professional coaches, there’s something for everyone at Active Tuesdays, ranging from Arts and Crafts to Rugby delivered by the Newcastle Falcons. The uniqueness of the programme allows students to develop different interests and skills every half-term, providing the opportunity for students to experience up to six different activities of their choosing over the course of each year.

Activities enjoyed by students this academic year:

• Arts & Crafts • Beauty School • Bee Club

• Boxercise Bootcamp • Cycling • Dodgeball

• Drama • Fencing • Football • Google App Academy

• Gymnastics • Handball • Hockey • Let’s Cook

• Quick Cricket • Movie Making

• Newcastle Falcon’s Rugby • Summer Games

• Tchoukball • Yoga / Pilates

Activity choices on offer next academic year from September - October 2015:

• Arts & Crafts • Bee Club • Board Games

• Cycling • Dodgeball • Drama • Gym Fit

• Gymnastics • Hockey • Steel Band • Yoga / Pilates

“Students enjoy a wide range of additional activities in their Active Tuesday sessions.”

- Ofsted 2015

Holidays During Term TimeDue to amendments (April 2013) that have been made to the Department for Education’s Pupil Registration regulations to address attendance issues, it has been made clear to Head Teachers that they should not grant leave of absence during term time. The Law does not grant parents/carers an automatic right to take their child out of school during term time. It is a common misconception that students are allowed to take up to ten days holiday in term time in any academic year.

As a result of the revised regulations, the governors at Kingsmeadow School have agreed to amend our current Attendance Policy and adopt a standard practice of: not authorising any family holidays in term time. If parents/carers, contrary to what the school has said, still decide to take their child out of school for a holiday then the absence will be recorded as unauthorised. This can lead to the involvement of

the Legal Intervention Team and the possible issue of a ‘fixed penalty notice’ amounting to £60 per child per parent/carer which increases to £120 if not paid within the first 21 days.

I realise that some parents/carers will find these measures rather severe but we are following the new legislation and acting with other schools in the local authority including those within the Kingsmeadow cluster. I hope you will support our continued efforts to raise attendance and attainment.

Changes to PA (Persistent Absence)

From September 2015 there has been a change in Government Policy regarding PA (persistent absence). Any student with attendance less than 90% will be classed as a PA. As a school we have a proactive approach to attendance and therefore interventions will be put in place for any students who are likely to fall into this category.

WHAT DOES 90% ATTENDANCE LOOK LIKE?

90% attendance means that he/she is absent from lessons for the equivalent of one half-day every week.

? Mon Tue Wed Thur Fri

Absent half a day every week

? Sept July

Absent for four weeks

90% attendance rate means that he/she has missed the equivalent of four whole weeks of lessons in the school year.

Sept July

Y7

Y8

Y9

Y10

Y11 Half a year absent from school

Continued attendance of only 90% of the time over your school career will result in you missing the equivalent of about one-half of a school year

Every School Day Counts365 DAYS IN A YEAR 190 SCHOOL DAYS IN TOTAL ABSENCE

100% attendance 190 days attendance 0

95% attendance 180 days attendance 2 weeks absence

90% attendance 171 days attendance 4 weeks absence (approx)

85% attendance 161 days attendance 6 weeks absence

80% attendance 152 days attendance More than half a term absence

75% attendance 143 days attendance 9+ weeks absence

Every Minute CountsLATENESS LOST LEARNING

5 mins late each day 3 days lost!

10 mins late each day 6.5 days lost!

15 mins late each day 10 days lost!

20 mins late each day 13 days lost!

30 mins late each day 19 days lost!

Congratulations To The Following Students Who Achieved 100% Attendance In 2014-15Stephenson, Sophie 7KMason, Hannah 7GLazenby, Natasha 7SThompson, Kieron 7SThompson, Daniel 7IGill, Ryan 7GPringle, Anya 7IChoudhury, Nahima 7KWilson, Jasmine 7KWiggins, Aimee 7GSmails, Harry 7KBrooksbank, Aaron 7KPapong, Loraine 7IMason, Cameron 7I

Bradshaw, Lauren 8GCowley, Olivia 8KMalia, Ben 8KRobinson, Thomas 8KMcNichol, Matthew 8NAshton, Logan 8GGraham, Jazzmin 8N

Keenan, Sarah 9SSwan, Kirsten 9IBautista, Lea Reign Angel 9NRocks, Jack 9NGarner, Damien 9SMellor, Kieran 9NVickers, Jade 9NJohnson, Morgan 9I

Robson, Emma Neve 10ILizinde, Keith 10GKeenan, Chloe 10NShield, Reece 10KForster, Jordon 10NTague, Jay 10KOrmston, Lewis 10KMulherron, Callum 10SAdams, Jack 10MKennedy, Shania 10SSimpson, Reed 10SLawson, Bethany 10SBradley, James 10MWilson, Niall 10NSmails, Rebecca 10M

Half Term ...........................................................................................................................................................26-30 October 2015

Two Occasional Days ................................................................................................Friday 20 and Monday 23 November 2015

Christmas Break ................................................................................................................. 22 December 2015 – 2 January 2016

Half Term ......................................................................................................................................................... 16-20 February 2016

Easter Break ...............................................................................................................................................24 March – 8 April 2016

May Day .......................................................................................................................................................................... 2 May 2016

Half Term ........................................................................................................................................................30 May – 3 June 2016

Break up for summer ............................................................................................................................ Wednesday, 20 July 2016

Holiday Dates

Year 10 and 11 Motivational Evening ............................................................................................................ 22 September 2015

Sports Awards Evening ................................................................................................................................... 30 September 2015

Awards Evening ................................................................................................................................................ 10 November 2015

Post 16 Open Evening ........................................................................................................................................ 1 December 2015

Parent/Carer Consultation Day (PCD) 1 ............................................................................................................. 9 February 2016

GCSE Exams Begin ..................................................................................................................................................... 16 May 2016

Year 11 Prom ............................................................................................................................................................... 30 June 2016

Year 6 Transition Week ............................................................................................................................................... 4-8 July 2016

Year 6 Induction Evening ...............................................................................................................................................7 July 2016

Parent/Carer Consultation Day (PCD) 2 ...................................................................................................... 12 July 3.00-6.30pm

Parent/Carer Consultation Day (PCD) 2 .................................................................................................13 July 8.30am-1.30pm

Year 7 Awards Evening ............................................................................................................................................................. TBC

Kingsmeadow Games ..................................................................................................................................................15 July 2016

Other Useful Dates

International Links

Nepal update…After presentations from myself (Mrs H Shaw) and the World Challenge team, I’m pleased to be able to announce that we now have our flights booked for Kingsmeadow’s first ever World Challenge trip to Nepal in the summer holidays of 2017.

We have a mixture of year 9 and year 10 students who were all inspired and excited enough to convince their parents that they would commit to the responsibility of fundraising the amount they need to be a challenger.

We’ve been impressed with the commitment so far … we’ve already had cake sales, raffles and bag packs, all arranged by the students themselves.

One of the next stages in our World Challenger journey is to carry out a fitness test so that we can record our fitness now, and then again just before we embark on our expedition, in order to ensure that our fitness levels are good enough for what lies ahead!

Our challengers are:

Year 10

Dylan Ashall, George Brown, Ben Chatto, Sophie Dixon,

Rebecca Smails, Reece McCullough, Dylan Somerville,

Jay Tague, Rebecca Walker

Year 9

Adam Dobson, Jack Rocks, Kirstin Swan, Hannah Hood,

Shauna Wilkinson, Niall Pomeroy

Good luck to them all as they embark on a challenging but rewarding journey of a lifetime!

Spanish TripThe Spanish trip to Calella/Barcelona is fast approaching. Just as a reminder, the dates are Thursday 22nd October to Monday 26th October (although we arrive home in the early hours of the Tuesday morning!)

Students are getting very excited now, and are constantly asking questions about the hotel, the visit to the Nou Camp stadium and the day in Port Aventura theme park! Watch this space for details of a parents meeting nearer the time!

Ski Trip to the French AlpsWe are looking forward to our skiing trip to Tignes in France scheduled during the Easter holidays 2016. If any new year 7 students would like to join us please see Mr Bolam for more details.

Last term the Seniors Club, along with guest Maxine Webb, went to Newcastle Civic Centre to visit the Lord Mayor.

They toured the Silver Gallery, were shown the mace and the sword used by the mayor and signed the visitors’ book, recording a special day out.

Kingsmeadow Seniors Club Visit The Lord Mayor Of Newcastle

Visit SchoolIf you would like to know more about life here at Kingsmeadow and are interested in the quality of education we have to offer, I would be pleased to hear from you. You may have missed or not been able to make our Open Evening or you would simply like to see the school while it is in session. I often arrange tours of the school during the day for parents to help them choose the right education for their children.

You can arrange a visit by contacting my PA, Mrs Rodaway on 0191 4606004 or by emailing arodaway@kingsmeadow.org.uk. You might also wish to visit our school website www.kingsmeadow.org.uk where we have just posted a short film about life at Kingsmeadow. I am confident you will be impressed with what you find.

Doug PettittDoug PettittHead Teacher

Community News

Kingsmeadow Games Winners – Angel House

E-learning

Fundraising for Nepal

Active Tuesday

Kingsmeadow Community SchoolMarket LaneDunstonGatesheadNE11 9NX

Tel: 0191 460 6004Fax: 0191 426 3920www.kingsmeadow.org.uk