We are very happy to introduce our first PGCE student, Julia De Bretton-Gordon, who is in the final term of her PGCE in Secondary English with the University of Leicester. Julia is working with our consultant, Brittany Wright, who is an education researcher, former Head of English, and Teacher Training Hub Lead. It is a real privilege to provide placements for PGCE students, demonstrating our high-quality academic provision, as well as the capacity of our team to develop and support others. We are extremely proud to be working with the next generation of teachers, developing their understanding of SEMH needs and drawing on their enthusiasm, expertise and energy as they engage and inspire our students. Julia has forged positive relationships with staff and students already, injecting real excitement into lessons with lots of drama activities! In this photo, Julia is playing the role of the narrator in a ‘whoosh’ activity focused on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. All staff have had training on how this technique (originally devised by the Royal Shakespeare Company) can be used to introduce or recap key events and characters within a text.We are certain that Julia will be an outstanding member of the Oakwood team and we look forward to seeing her develop at the school as she gains experience.

Just outside the front of the school we have undertaken wild meadow planting around the attenuation tank. The results look amazing and are attracting lots of wildlife. Here are some terrific pictures to show the beautiful plants and flowers, and a particularly lovely shot of a butterfly that has been attracted to the area. Our pupils are looking forward to monitoring the wildlife over the Summer and learning about the amazing flora and fauna right on our doorstep!

It’s not every day that you get to jump out of a plane. But that is what our staff member Alex is doing on the 1st June in Nottinghamshire.He is raising money for the charity Place2Be – a children’s mental health charity with over 25 years’ experience working with pupils, families and staff in UK schools. They provide mental health support in schools through one-to-one and group counselling using tried and tested methods backed by research.

They help by:

• Providing support early to spot mental health problems before they develop and help children cope with challenges throughout their lives.

• Using an effective therapeutic approach which is backed by research and combines several ways of working.

• Offering a menu of different services, including advice and support for families and school staff, to build resilience and raise awareness of mental health across the whole school community.

It’s a great cause and you can help Alex in his charity fundraising by donating via the below link. https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Alexander-Hulme…

The staff at Oakwood welcomed two lovely ladies from Hens for Hire last week….Miss J and Miss M. They will be residing at the school for the next 12 months. All our staff participated in training with Claire Peach from Hens for Hire, during which they were shown how to handle the hens, plus how to maintain their Eglu and Hen House, carry out daily checks as well as how to give the hens health checks.The Hens will give Oakwood students the opportunity to experience hen keeping and Incubator Hatching.

The Hens will become part of the Oakwood family to teach our students to connect with the environment, and animals in both an urban and rural setting. We hope that hen keeping in school will be fun and rewarding. Adding hens to our setting, increases student engagement and enriches activities, and can be linked in with all areas of the Na-tional Curriculum.

Hens are a creative and distinctive aid to teaching the National Curriculum, in areas such as Maths, English and Literacy, Art and Science, as well as offering great time for our students outside by ‘hen watching’ and caring for the hens. Our post Covid Recovery & Reconnection curriculum supports and helps pupils and staff adjust to new normals, and supports all areas of learning, mental health, and well being.

Hens for Hire only hatch rare and pure breed poultry in partnership, and all of the chicks return to Pages Poultry at the end of the hire period. We are really looking forward to the next year and bringing you regular updates about Miss J and Miss M, our two lovely hens.

Oakwood Community School has been collecting donations to go to the Vita History Foundation who have been driving into different towns in Ukraine and dropping off supplies.

Thank you to Eurokey Recycling Group for making it happen so efficiently. We will continue to try and support the people of Ukraine in any way we can.

During Oakwood’s recent STEM day we set our pupils the tasks of building bridges and creating shelters. They were judged on their creations and we are happy to announce the winners were……

Best Structured Bridge: Class 2

Best Tent (waterproof and durable): Class7

Best Tent Design: Cedarwood

Best Comedy Tent: Class 4

We think they all deserve a big round of applause for the fantastic way they approached the tasks, the way they worked together to solve technical problems, and for their final creations. Well done everyone who took part!

As part of our recent STEM day we set our pupils the task of building bridges. We told them to imagine they were working for a major engineering company, where there was a competition to build a bridge across a local gorge. The winning company would win a huge contract, a financial bonus and their bridge would be built over the gorge which would in turn bring them more work.

The gorge was 1 mile (1609 metres) wide and 1/2 mile deep (804 metres) at its deep at its deepest point. Each class team was responsible for their own design and the building of the scale prototype bridge. The bridge had to be 1 metre long and from the ‘road’ and 50 cm high from the ground.

Each team could only use the following resources:

• String

• Card

• Straws

• Tape

As you can see from the pictures our pupils were incredibly creative in approaching this problem and the finished bridges looked amazing. Practical tests like these really engage our students and encourage them not only to work as a team but also to develop as range of useful later life skills.

For a second task as part of our recent STEM day we set our pupils the task of building a shelter. Working as a team students had to build a shelter that could house at least 2 team members and protect them from the wind, rain and sun. Each team could use any of the materials provided but the shelter had to meet the brief!

The team had to take into account several things:

The shelter needed to be strong

The shelter needed to keep the water off

The shelter had to protect team members from the sun.

Students needed to think about materials. What would be strong? What would keep you dry? What material reflected the sun? At the end of the session, the judges tested all the shelters with wind (natural wind, was a very windy Day!), rain (a bucket of water) and sun (a torch). To see how each tent held up to the elements. Our pupils enthusiasm was incredible and their shelters showed great ingenuity.

There’s very little we do in life that doesn’t need the support of others to be truly successful, so developing teamwork skills at an early age is a useful thing to do. As part of helping our young people develop their skills in this area we held a STEM day at Oakwood on the 31st March.

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths. All the careers in these areas need a wide range of both practical and transferable skills, and what better way to develop them than by setting practical tasks so our classes could develop teamwork and other abilities.

First task was Bridge Building…..how did our young people get on?….stay tuned for more posts that give the answer!

It’s not every day that you get to jump out of a plane. But that is what our staff member Alex is doing on the 1st June in Nottinghamshire.

He is raising money for the charity Place2Be – a children’s mental health charity with over 25 years’ experience working with pupils, families and staff in UK schools. They provide mental health support in schools through one-to-one and group counselling using tried and tested methods backed by research.

They help by:

• Providing support early to spot mental health problems before they develop and help children cope with challenges throughout their lives.

• Using an effective therapeutic approach which is backed by research and combines several ways of working.

• Offering a menu of different services, including advice and support for families and school staff, to build resilience and raise awareness of mental health across the whole school community.

It’s a great cause and you can help Alex in his charity fundraising by donating via the below link.

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Alexander-Hulme…