Blog

Blog week ending 1st March

Posted on: 01/03/2024

Student Leader Sonia F of Year 13 led a special assembly to mark the Chinese New Year. This year is the year of the Dragon which in the Chinese zodiac represents prosperity, luck and power! Sonia outlined traditional celebrations and customs and explained the meanings behind the dragon dance and lion dance before sharing some amazing video footage of the dances. You can watch the footage and see Sonia’s presentation by clicking here.

Our Modern Foreign Languages and Music departments celebrated Chinese New Year with a singing competition and showcase! Year 7 students wrote and sang songs in Mandarin using their learned knowledge, a significant task given they have only been studying Mandarin since September – but they certainly rose to the challenge! Special congratulations go to our winners; Sophie Y, Ella M and Rebekah O for their wonderful song and performance. Our Year 8 students both wrote their songs and composed the music - excellent work! Our winners were Louise D and Phoebe N showing great musicality as well as a creative display of mandarin vocabulary. Thank you to Year 9 who entertained us with a brilliant performance.

Departments across the school offer an exciting range of extra-curricular clubs and societies such as the below for MFL – all Clubs are advertised in the relevant departments and during lessons.

There is a comprehensive package of student GCSE and A Level revision resources and support sessions available during lunchtimes, after school and during our Year 11 Revision Weekend. All structured and drop-in sessions are with subject teachers and allow students to target specific topics as well as provide a general overview and sample questions across the curriculum. All session times and locations will be advertised in the relevant departments. During lessons students will have been working with examination style questions but additional emphasis will be provided during all sessions. Mr Harrision, Head of Maths will be leading the Year 11 Revision Weekend on the 22nd to 24th March where students will be completing revision sessions in Mathematics, English and Science over the weekend interspersed with exciting outdoor activities at PGL in Marchants Hill, Surrey.

Maximising Success Workshops with Years 10 and 11. The Life Skills Company recently delivered a session to students to help them optimise their learning and revision.

For a limited time period only, The Life Skills Company are offering parents at WGSG the opportunity to view their Parent/carers’ Briefing for Maximising Success. The 28-minute video covers:

How teenagers can revise effectively, proactively and enjoyably;
How we as parents/carers can support our teenagers.

You can access the Parents Briefing Maximising Success video as follows:

Please note the video will only be available to view between today Friday 9^th February and Thursday 15^th March inclusive.
Click on the following link: Maximising Success Parent Briefing
Use the password: smartlearner

National Reading Champions Quiz 2024. Students participated virtually in a cross-regional heat in the library. The winner of each heat will participate in the final in London in June. WGSG entered two teams. Mr Preston, Deputy Head of English and Mrs McKenna, teacher of English visited during break time to motivate and cheer the students on. The quiz is aimed at keen readers. All questions are based on fictional titles and involve book titles, characters, authors, brain teasers and story details. Well done to our intrepid book lovers, who put in a wonderful performance despite not securing the winning slot to the final.

Team A - the Chocolate Oranges

Aimee Marie C 7C

Acshana R 9A

Valerie A 9C

Kareen N 9H

Anasuya K 7R

Team B - the Fox's Favourites

Meera W

Tomisin A

Lithi S K

Riddhi K

Shevonne I

Our annual WG6 Cultural Trip to New York had an amazing time creating memories, broadening horizons and inspiring life goals. Mr Colledge, Head of Business Studies and Economics works with students to create a stimulating itinerary that inevitably includes a visit to New York’s famous financial district as well as endless opportunities to enjoy the quintessential New York experience! As you can see from the below, it was a huge amount of fun too, featuring the Rockefeller Center, Grand Central Station, a snowy central park, ice-skating and more!

Sportshall Athletics Competition. Year 7 and 8 were invited to take part in the Sportshall Athletics competition at Cobham Hall on Thursday 29th February. The students had an absolutely fantastic time. When they were not competing, they were cheering on their peers and congratulating one another no matter the result.

The track events were tough, with some outstanding performances being shown by the competing schools, but this did not faze our students, who gave it their absolute all. We were strong in the field events, putting in some distances, particularly on the vertical jump and long jump events. Overall, we are pleased to say Year 8 came 6th out of eight schools and Year 7 came 1st place out of six schools. What an achievement particularly for our Year 7 students! We hope a number of these students consider joining outside Athletic clubs as they did themselves and the school proud.

G10

Student Voice represent our student body, participating in key discussions and decision making that impact students in school. One vital role is as part of the interview panel for prospective teachers, and (some) support staff roles. This week students formed part of the interview process for Teacher of Computer Science candidates. In addition to providing insightful and useful feed-back students are adept at putting candidates at their ease and making them feel welcome.

G13

Our PE department deliver Orienteering lessons as part of our commitment to outdoor adventurous activities (OAA). Working in conjunction with Dartford Orienteers our school has two courses with fixed points set up across the site. Orienteering is an exciting outdoor adventure sport which involves navigating around a course using a detailed map and sometimes a compass.
The aim is to navigate between a set of control points and decide the best route to complete the course in the quickest time. Aside from the cardiovascular benefits of taking part, orienteering develops problem solving and decision-making abilities which in turn build confidence and teamwork skills. Dartford Orienteers stage a range of family friendly challenges and events – all open to all ages and abilities to find out more and to sign-up please click here.

Year 12 Politics students made a trip to Parliament in Westminster to learn about the workings of the UK Government, an integral part of the A Level curriculum. Upon arrival, the students undertook a guided tour of the Palace of Westminster and had the opportunity to stand inside both the Houses of Commons and the Lords and learn about the processes and history of our political system. This was followed by a question and answer session with Dartford MP; Gareth Johnson. Mr Johnson was asked questions on a number of issues including his Private Members Bill seeking to end the Expansion of ULEZ, his voting record and his thoughts on reforming the House of Lords. After a short lunch break, the students attended ‘Home Office Questions’ in the House of Commons, which included some lively and heated debate before seeing the Speaker of the House make a statement on the issue of a vote around tensions in the middle east.

Many thanks to Mr Johnson and his team for organising a terrific day.

B11

G12 As you may be aware, International Women’s Day is fast approaching, and we would like to take this opportunity to share with you our plans for an exciting new way to celebrate this year – an International Women’s Day Conference in the afternoon of 28^th March. We are passionate about inspiring our students to pursue careers in a wide range of different fields, without letting stereotypes hinder their success. It is vital to educate the next generation of women in the workforce about how to seize the opportunities that are available to them, and this conference will be the perfect first step.

In light of this, we would like to invite any interested female parents/carers to be present as some of our distinguished guests, sharing your personal stories. If you are interested in taking part, please complete the Microsoft Teams Form using the link below, filling in your name, your job, and your industry at the earliest opportunity. We are trying to gather a wide range of industries (i.e. medicine, finance, fashion, etc.) and so will appreciate all applications. It would be good to include as many as we can, although we do have a limited number of spaces and will try to ensure each industry is represented. International Women's Day Guest Presenter Parent/Carer Invitation (office.com)

We understand that you must have very busy work schedules, but we hope that your diaries can accommodate this pivotal celebration of women in industry. This conference is a sixth form led project which we are all incredibly enthusiastic about, and are glad to have some of the senior, more experienced students helping the younger ones as they explore female empowerment together. Thank you for your support of this new event, and please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions.

PFA Update. ‘Nearly New’ School Uniform Shop – We have a range of ‘pre-loved’ uniform in excellent condition for sale at very reasonable prices and any donations of surplus school uniform are most gratefully received. For details & price list or to make a uniform donation, please contact wgsgpfa@gmail.com

Congratulations to our Monthly Prize Draw winners! All cheques will be available for collection from reception from Monday 4th March.

Dec 1st prize £100 Ms Liese Dallarda- Collison

2nd Prize £50 Neil Tovey

3rd Prize £20 Joanne Tick

Jan 1st Prize £30 Shaun Smith

2nd Prize £15 Ruth Craib

Feb 1st Prize £30 Abiodyn Adenihun

2nd Prize £15 Lia Lampton

Forthcoming Dates;

WG6 Articulation FINAL at the National Gallery – 12^th March

Year 13 A Level Psychology Grade Booster Workshop – 18^th March

Year 7 EI Presentations Evening 5.30pm-6.30pm – 20^th March