“The good quality of leadership throughout the school is driving the development of teaching and learning …”
Ofsted Inspection Nov 2007
Specialist School Information
Year 4 Term 2
Summary of achievements and progress
Year 4 2009-10 Term 2: Summary of achievements and progress
The Spring term has proved to be particularly busy for our Specialist departments, building on the successes of last term and developing a vision for the future.
Accelerated Curriculum for our more able
As part of our commitment to the Specialist Schools Programme, the Science department has, for the first time, accelerated 63 Year 9 who started their GCSE Science exams this year. We are absolutely delighted that a fabulous 50 students gained a grade A or A* in their first GCSE exam. Our ‘accelerated students’ along with Mr Stender and Mrs Hackshaw can be justifiably proud of these achievements and we are looking forward to receiving their next set of results in the Summer term. Furthermore, another 21 Year 9 students have opted to study Triple Science, meaning that in total, an outstanding 84 Year 9 students will be studying the three separate Sciences at GCSE.
This term, we have seen the arrival of Adrian Dunkley, Assistant Headteacher responsible for Maths, and Rebecca Henderson has been made Acting Leader of Maths. These excellent appointments have already made a real impact in the world of Maths, with regular attendance of Year 10 and 11 students to after school and Half term revision sessions. We are extremely confident that the personalised intervention given to our students will pay dividends in their GCSE exams, as our module results indicate that our Year 11 students are performing better than where we were this time last year.
Community links
As a Specialist Science, Mathematics and Computing College, Tanbridge House is eager to share its passion for these subjects to the wider community. Therefore, when Trafalgar Infant school approached us to support their Science day, we jumped at the chance.
Trafalgar Infant School
On Thursday 11th March, Helen Turley took 15 Year 10 students to Trafalgar Infant School, where, during the morning, three THS staff, ably supported by the THS students, delivered three different Science activities on Light, Chromatography and Acids. These activities were designed to engage and stimulate the KS1, Year 2 students, who were fascinated by the practical activities on offer.
Becky Wycherley, Deputy Head of Trafalgar Infant School, said 'Wow! What a fantastic morning. Our children haven't stopped talking about it and sharing their experiences. It was not only the excitement of the investigations but also the thrill of working with 'big' children!'
Helen Turley said 'This was a wonderful opportunity for our students to be outstanding ambassadors for the school. Teaching 6 and 7 year olds was going to be a new experience for them as well as for me and they seized the challenge without any questions or problems. They displayed a level of maturity beyond their years, which was commented on by both THS and Trafalgar staff. I am extremely pleased with the event as a whole'.
Primary School Investigative Work
We continue to work collaboratively with our Primary partner schools in the specialist areas, this term through Year 5 investigative work with Shelley Primary school. As always, the students are enthralled at experiencing Science in a real-life laboratory and leave with a new insight into what learning Science at THS is really like. Furthermore, the Maths department has started its superb gifted and talented sessions for Year 5 students, taught in gender-specific groups, where they have been learning, among other things, about tessellations.
Curriculum Enrichment
Our able Year 10 students have also benefitted from the excellent community support that we have received from our pioneering ‘Business Breakfasts’. Three representatives from Ceres Power took time out from their work to talk to our students about their ground breaking work on Clean Fuel Cell Technology. Our students said that through this talk, they gained a better understanding of the careers available to them in the field of Science, and it has inspired many of them to pursue Science at A level.
Science club continues to engage our students through activities such as making ‘snot’, exploding cans and fire writing. We are hoping that the students can use their ICT skills to write a ‘Science club blog’ to share their learning and love of science with the school community.
National Science and Engineering Week
An important aspect of our Specialist status is to extend opportunities for enrichment activity through the specialist subjects. This year, the whole school celebrated National Science and Engineering Week which had the theme ‘What on Earth?’
Year 7 ‘What on Earth … are endangered animals?’
Year 7 activities kicked off on 12th March, when the whole of Year 7 were 
treated to a fantastic talk by ‘Animazing’, learning about a range of unusual animals, ranging from a Tarantula and Scorpion, to an Albino Hedgehog and Wilson the Skunk! The animal which caused the most interest was an endangered snake, whose species has fewer numbers in the wild than the Giant Panda.
In Science, students researched endangered animals and produced a poster and presentation on their chosen species. The best posters have been submitted to a National competition, whilst the best presentations, as voted by their classmates, were then delivered to the whole of the year group duri
ng assembly. The aim was to develop a persuasive argument to encourage the year group to choose their species for sponsorship. Delivering a presentation to 260 students is extremely daunting, yet I was immensely impressed at the confidence and maturity that the students demonstrated in completing this task. As a year group, the Giant Panda was the unanimous winner, and THS will be sponsoring this animal for a year through WWF.
This work was supported by the MFL department, in which students produced posters in French encouraging people to save these endangered animals.
Students in Dance and Music were inspired by a range of animals to compose and choreograph music and dances to represent their chosen animal – the students thought that this was fantastic, as can be seen in the photos.
Maths, ICT and English also supported NSEW through Creative Writing, calculating why the Giant Panda is endangered in terms of bamboo consumption, and using flash animation to make an interactive quiz.
Year 8 ‘What on Earth …Earth and Space’
Earth and Space is a topic which always inspires students, so we couldn’t resist investigating meteors and their impact on the Earth.
In maths, students got to grips with gravity calculations, studied the relationship between the Earth and the moon in Geography and History, and wrote creative stories about the flight into space.
An inter-tutor group competition ensued in PE, where groups were challenged to run as far as each of the planets, by using scaled calculations and working as a team.
The week culminated in Simon Ould bringing his Space Odyssey Inflatable Planetarium to school. The whole of year 8 visited the planetarium throughout the day and were awe-struck by the fantastic presentation and commentary.
In particular, the display of stars in the sky over the North and South poles was fantastic. We also opened the planetarium to our Primary school students and year 9 parents and students after school. The parents loved the opportunity to experience this with their children.
Year 9 ‘What on Earth … is weather?’
The Technology department took the lead for Year 9, supporting Year 9 students in designing, making and testing land buggies. By changing the design of the buggy and the shape of the sail, students were able to make the buggy travel further.
Science further extended the idea of using wind as an energy source by investigating wind turbines. Using card, students made different sized turbines and measured the amount of electricity generated. Using the data collected, students then made human graphs!
In Maths, students had fun investigating whether ‘Southern softies have better weather than Northerners’ and presented their findings in video format, whilst in ICT, students constructed their own weather forecasts.
Students in drama made freeze frames to illustrate the impact on humankind over the last decade – can you identify the themes from the photos below?
