Welcome to the summer term at Redwood

Redwood School

Firstly I hope that you enjoyed the Easter break as we start what is going to be a very busy term indeed. The first few days back in school have been very positive and everybody has settled back in their routines really well. As ever the standard of pupil uniform is excellent.

Marathon Man
We are delighted to report that Damian McNulty, who was competing in the London Marathon to raise funds for Redwood School, completed the 26 miles in just over 4hrs – a fantastic achievement. Damian will come into school in the near future to speak to staff and students about his challenge and also give an update on the fundraising. Our `Redwood 26` challenge has helped to push up the money raised. Once again thank you for your support and a huge thanks to Damian.

6th Form Internship
I am delighted to report that one of our Internship Trainees has secured a placement and potential full time position with a local company. Maria has proved to be an excellent student, a wonderful ambassador for the 6th form and fully deserves this opportunity. Well done Maria.

Key Stage 4 Pupil Exams
May and June will see some of our Year 11 and Bridging Course students taking exams in a variety of courses. Already the following students have passed their Functional Skills Maths exams at level 1 - Gary O, Jack G, Kallum R and Ben J, while Ellis B, Gary O, Kallum R succeeded at level 1 Functional Skills ICT level 1 and Ben J at level 2. Well done on these excellent results.

Transition Processes
The summer term will focus on the transitions of pupils moving from primary schools to Redwood, Key Stage 3 to 4, Key Stage 4 to 5 and the Bridging Course and 6th form students to adult services. This focus will support students in what can sometimes be a stressful period moving from schools and departments.

After School, Youth Clubs provision
The comprehensive after school clubs programme starts week commencing Monday 28 April including the evening youth clubs on Tuesday and Thursdays and the Saturday morning youth club.

KS3
A couple of Mr Jackson’s art group have designed some Easter eggs for a competition, a winning design will be chosen and prizes awarded on Friday.

7B visited Salford Museum and wore real Victorian clothes on a Victorian Street. It was really good fun and they were able to handle Victorian artefacts.

In Maths this term 8 and 9 Blue and Purple are going to be very busy trying to improve on their minute addition and subtraction challenges, learning about fractions, equal sharing, analogue and digital times, bar graphs and different ways of representing data.

Year 8 and Year 9 are going to be investigating a range of materials and finding out about their properties in science this term. 8 and 9 Yellow are learning to identify plants that we eat as vegetables and fruit. They will be developing their observational skills and locating the seeds inside the fruits. Mrs Sheerins was very proud of 8 and 9 Green who managed to sort all of the foods into the right food groups on the very speedy interactive task as part of their new PHSE topic.

KS4
4M and SSC have been celebrating St. George’s Day in Art. 4M wove red and white flags with a St. George’s motif on it. Whilst SSC made a large George and the Dragon collage.

Miss Greehalghs’ English group wanted to show their appreciation to Karen McGarry who runs the LRC at Oulderhill. The group go to the LRC every week to look at books and do research and accreditation. They always find Mrs Mcgarry very helpful and nice.
Kallum has completed a British Gymnastics Examining Board qualification in Trampolining and Gymnastics Club Judging. He scored 80% in his practical and 68% in his theory. He had to watch lots of videos and live performances of trampolinists and was then judged on his judging abilities. Excellent work Kallum.

SEB made some fabulous Easter biscuits before the holidays.

We received the following statement from Matt Stocks, Development Manager, (Children and Young People) for Greater Manchester Sports Partnership:
Sincere thanks to Garry for doing such a sterling job at our VIP ceremony on the 1/4/14. I was informed that he spoke wonderfully and his story was truly inspirational. He should be extremely proud of what he has achieved and is certainly a role model for other to follow.

KS5
A big well done to Maria who has just secured an Internship placement with Safeguard in Oldham. This week she had a formal interview with 3 executive members of the company. They were all really impressed with her and said “she is a very confident young lady”. From Monday 28 April she will start her training to be a receptionist, which will hopefully carry on and lead to more training and paid work in July. Well done Maria, we are all so proud of you.

6th Formers have come back and settled straight into their routines.
13 of our 6th Formers took part in work experience interviews. At various times throughout the day, students visited their new employers dressed to impress.
Two of our 6th Formers, Ian and Sheraz came back extremely thrilled with how their interviews went. Smiling and giving the thumbs up sign Ian said, “it was brilliant, I got the job.”

Sheraz shared how he would be working at the Chrysalis Day Service and tasks he would be expected to undertake. He said “I’m really looking forward to going there in a few weeks time”.

Mandy Stanley our work experience co-ordinator said she was tremendously proud of all the students who took part in the interviews. ” They were great ambassadors for 6th Form and really gave it their best in their individual interviews. I can’t understand why some of them were nervous about it at all, they did GREAT.”