NEWSLETTER

3 September 2018 INSET Day

4 September 2018 INSET Day

5 September 2018 - 8.45am start for Yr7 & Prefects - 9.45am all other students

13 September 2018 - 9am to 10.15am Open Morning

18 September 2018 - 9am to 10.15am Open Morning

20 September 2018 - Open Evening - Early finish for pupils at 2.15pm

21 September 2018 - Late start for pupils at 9.45am

4 October 2018 - 9am to 10.15am Open Morning

29 October - 2 November 2018 - Half term

Welcome Welcome to our ‘new look’ school newsletter. This edition is packed full of news and achievements from all departments. Highlights include:

A history trip to Berlin. A science, technology, engineering & maths

roadshow with the RAF, Royal Navy and BAE Systems.

Band of the Royal Corps of Signals visit. Mentoring with Sytner BMW/ MINI. Celebrating our Great Big Dance Off Finalists. A Junior NBA initiative.

As we near the end of the school term, I would like to take the opportunity to say thank you to all students and staff for all their hard work, and to parents and guardians for their support over the last school year.

Mr I Barton Headteacher

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Events

Every Child Needs a Mentor

We are really excited to be working in partnership with Herman Stewart and his team from September. Herman is an award-winning mentor, author, speaker and is the founder and CEO of ‘Every Child Needs a Mentor’.

Herman and his team are bringing a new style of mentoring to Sandwell and we are privileged to be joining them at the start of their journey.

Herman and his team are passionate campaigners for young people and we have already experienced resounding success with some of our young people here at Perryfields.

Introducing your Student Leadership Team Congratulations to the newly appointed Student Leadership Team:

Head Girl – Holly Foster Head Boy – Louis O’Driscoll Deputy Head Girl – Molly Clifft Deputy Head Boy – Joel Adeyemi From left to right; Molly Clifft, Holly

Foster, Louis O’Driscoll, Joel Adeyemi

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Here at Perryfields we continue to promote a positive ethos both in and out of the classroom, and over the past couple of months a significant number of students have earned a range of rewards:

Students enjoyed hot chocolate with the Head in recognition of an outstanding achievement.

The top 200 students from across the school won an early lunch with free chicken and chips in two competitions.

Yr9 students were rewarded with a trip to the local Reel Cinema. In order to secure a place on the trip, for a two week period, students must have obtained no negative sharp points, been on time for all lessons and have

100% attendance. We had an incredible 53 successful students and they voted to watch the film ‘Sherlock Gnomes’.

A very excited group of students enjoyed the privately hired screen with popcorn in hands!

100 pupils from across the school took part in World Cup Football Friday with a surprise free Chicken Burger for positive SHARP points and zero negative points for the week before the big match!

It has been a pleasure to recognise and reward a whole range of students from across all year groups and we look forward to more similar rewards in the future!

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Pupils visited many key places including the 1936 Olympic Stadium, Checkpoint Charlie, the Reichstag German Parliament building and Sachsenhausen concentration camp.

As well as learning lots about history, pupils enjoyed many opportunities for leisure activities, such as an afternoon shopping in the Mall of Berlin, a meal at the Hard Rock Café and some very crazy, crazy golf!

The pupils also visited a number of museums to support their GCSE module on Germany. They included the Topography of Terror, The German Resistance Museum and the Museum to the Murdered Jews of Europe.

In these museums there were many harrowing stories about the victims of persecution in Nazi Germany and particularly some very upsetting information about the Holocaust.

The students were a credit to Perryfields as they acted with compassion and respect. Some gave donations to the Holocaust foundation and shared their feelings as they left the Museum to the Murdered Jews of Europe.

A massive thank you to Miss Leonard, Mrs Young, Mr Thompson and Mr Swingler for supporting on the trip. A special thanks to Mrs Parker for all of her help to organise the trip.

School Council The school council are planning and developing the content for a new school transition app. This is aimed at yr6s who are coming to Perryfields High School to allow them to get to know the school and to find the answer to any questions they may have. We are working closely with Gaia to develop the app and all of its content for the new 2019 intake. Some of the ideas for icons are above.

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“The Berlin trip was an amazing experience and very beneficial to our learning. It allowed us to see what life was really like and develop our understanding of Germany from 1919-1939. It was also full of fun and excitement.”

Libby Bayley and Eliot Brown

Berlin Trip

During the Easter holiday, 50 yr10 and 11 students travelled to Berlin for a GSCE history visit. The pupils had a jam- packed itinerary visiting many of the sites of the historical city, which was the base of Nazi power and the site of the famous Berlin Wall.

The Band of the Royal Corps of Signals On 13 March, the Music Department hosted a joint event with the Band of the Royal Corps of Signals. The day started with pupils being introduced to the band and the instruments within it, and then being treated to a concert given by the band where they performed pieces such as Pirates of the Caribbean and The Incredibles.

Following this, our instrumentalists were given a look into life as a military musician where they gained a greater understanding of the additional roles undertaken by the band and how they could become involved as a future career.

Our musicians also took part in sectional performance workshops led by the band where they developed their instrumental technique. They focused on performing pieces such as Skyfall, Star Wars and their favourite Wipeout. The highlight of the day saw over 50 Perryfields musicians, playing a variety of instruments from cello to trumpet of all standards performing alongside professional musicians from the Band of the Royal Corps of Signals in a joint concert to

members of key stage 3 and staff.

Our pupils were truly a credit to Perryfields and were fantastic musicians and role models. The Band Master commented how lucky we are to have such talented and focused musicians in a world where music education is facing so many cuts. All the pupils clearly enjoyed the day and asked if they could do it all again!

Yr10 Geography 10D1 and 10B2 have been making clay models of river landforms, in their geography lessons with Mrs Martin, to reinforce their knowledge of how they are formed.

The models will be painted and displayed in the classroom as revision tools. The models are of:

A waterfall A levee and floodplain A meander and oxbow lake Interlocking spurs

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BAE Systems Visit On 21 March, Yr7 and 8 were fortunate enough to receive a visit from the RAF, Royal Navy and BAE Systems.

They produced a lively roadshow demonstrating the use of Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths in the workplace.

The hope is that more young people will be inspired to take a deeper interest in STEM subjects and consider a career in this field.

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Product Design Innovation Challenge

Literacy Coordinators - All about us!

Ambition

Written by Poet Laureate Daisy Dodson

‘Reach for the stars’, They said ‘You’re going to do great’ They said. I wasn’t so sure. I was so much more. I wanted to do so much more. Not for them, though. For me. So I did. I worked hard. I still am. My dream is all I see. Up there In the sky. Now I see why they told me to ‘Reach for the stars’.

Our termly design competition this time awarded Oliver Montgomery the main award for most Innovative and creative way of upcycling a simple plastic milk bottle.

For his design he created a passive speaker for mobile phones, and now he will be entered into the prize draw for the end of the year along with the remaining winners of the Innovation Challenge.

There are eight members of Literacy Coordinators – we are all in yr9! We are passionate about improving the English Department and making sure all students feel comfortable when coming to us with any English queries.

At the moment we have an extremely successful Book Club which we hold every Tuesday Form on Week Two in N4. Hunger Games and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas are the books we are

currently reading. We have been designing our own book covers as well as having group discussions about our fierce, independent and iconic main character Katniss and our innocent, strong and naïve characters Bruno and Shmuel. Please see us on Wednesday lunchtime in N4 if you are interested!

We are also currently holding a Spring Writing Competition for all year groups where a prize will be up for grabs! See Miss Mathews in N4 if you are interested.

We are determined to make sure that all students at Perryfields love English as much we do, and are comfortable with the subject! We hope to continue our work for the rest of the school year and into the future.

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Yr10 Mentoring with Sytner BMW/ MINI

We have been working with Sytner Group in Oldbury to establish business links and mentoring opportunities with some of our yr10 students - Leak Kirby, Leah Flanagan, Joel Adeyemi, James Bell, Maten Aisaev, Jamal Chukwurah, Shreya Lall and Matthew Towsend.

Luke Phillips, Head of Business, visited the school twice and lead workshops with the students to raise their aspirations and

challenge their understanding of the world of work. Luke has shared his story and inspired the young people to 'make a plan' and take ownership of their future one day at a time. He is back with us again on the 26 April to work alongside the students individually so they can recognise their potential, engage their 'plan' and share their mission statement. Sytner Oldbury will be hosting some opportunities for work experience in the summer term with our students. A current student is now working in a permanent weekend role as a result of their work experience with Sytner BMW.

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Flexus dance workshop On 13 July, Flexus Dance Collective worked with some of our dance students to create a curtain raiser that they performed the following day at their performance of “Adjudication”.

Miss Lowe, said: “The two days were incredible. It was mind blowing to see what Flexus was able to do with our students in such a short period of time. The two days were quite intense but the girls took it in their stride and absolutely smashed their performance on the Saturday. Flexus could not speak highly enough of our students and we are excited for them to return on their tour next year. Well done to all the girls that took part, you were amazing!”

Great Big Dance Off Regional Finals

This year our KS3 Dancers Mollie Deakin and Mia Mclauchlan represent Perryfields High School in the Great Big Dance Off Competition.

Not only were the girls successful in gaining a place in the regional finals for this competition, their fantastic performance earned them second place in the competition.

‘Move to the Beat’ Dance show 2018

On 1 February we hosted Perryfields High School’s Annual Dance Show at the Crescent Theatre. This was a huge success and all pupils were fantastic both performing and in behaviour! The dance show is a crucial performance for both KS4 and 5 students as this is their assessment for the BTEC qualification. All students should be very proud of themselves as they worked very hard to ensure they did their best during their performance. Congratulations and farewell to the yr11 and yr13 students as this was their final Dance show at Perryfields High!

Good Luck for the future and remember to keep dancing!

Year 10 BTEC Dance: Motionhouse Workshop and performance Our yr10 BTEC dancers were given a fantastic opportunity to work with the globally recognised, professional dance company ‘Motionhouse’. The pupils spent the day learning repertoire from some of Motionhouse’s work, as well as acrobatic lifts and movements and getting to know some of the dancers from the company. Pupils were also able to go the Forest Arts Centre in Walsall to watch two performances by Motionhouse!

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All of their hard work and dedication paid off as they placed third across the whole country! (There were only 5 points between third and first place)!

We’re all extremely proud of them. Well done!

Junior NBA Perryfields were enrolled onto an exciting initiative created by Basketball England called ‘Junior NBA’ for the second year running. The initiative helps promote youth basketball, and encourages yr7 pupils to experience competitive basketball. The NBA league format means that the school will play in a minimum of 8 league games (tournament style) and then, if successful, will progress onto the ‘play-off’ stages. Each school has been allocated an NBA team to represent, and we are proud to be representing the Washington Wizards. We have received a full Wizards kit and Spalding NBA match balls to complete the competition.

The members of Perryfields STEM club have already achieved amazing success with three projects so far this year.

The motion detecting self-contained wildlife camera was a project that really inspired students to solve the problems by combing their knowledge, ideas and research from computing, technology and science. It is intended to site the camera unit at a variety of locations around the school grounds to capture wildlife activities at night using the infrared camera sensor.

Real Madrid Football Development Tour 2017 In April 2019, the PE department will be heading out to Spain for their second football development tour. Current yr7-10 pupils will be flying out to Madrid to visit the giants of European football; Real Madrid.

The trip will include; training with Real Madrid coaches, matches against Spanish opposition, sightseeing in Madrid, a tour of the Bernabéu and even a visit to the Warner Brothers theme park.

Extra-curricular headlines Yr7 Rugby team win the RFU Schools Tournament. U16 Basketball Team win Sandwell League. U16 Basketball team finish third at the Blackcountry

Games

U14 Basketball team reach the final of the YBL league, unfortunately finishing runners up to GSA.

U16 Basketball team reach the YBL final. KS3 Trampolining squad finish third in Sandwell

KS4 Trampolining squad finish third in Sandwell Yr9 Volleyball team finish second in Sandwell Golf Club launches at Perryfields! U15 Cricketers second in Indoor Tournament and

semi-finalists in south Staffordshire Cricket Cup. U13 Athletics qualified for Black Country Games. Yr8 Rugby third in Sandwell Tournament. Yr7 Jnr NBA qualified for Play-offs.

Congratulations to all pupils who have taken part in extra-curricular activities.

Follow @perryfieldspe on Twitter to keep updated on all fixtures, results, clubs, trips and revision sessions. Tap ‘settings’, ‘notifications’, and ‘turn on notifications’ on our page to never miss a tweet.

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The RAF 100 year celebration projects have been undertaken with the building of gliders and a flying competition. Thibault Lacroix flew his glider design the longest distance. Future plans include construction of a radio controlled model plane.

Students have built a model car that self-navigates around objects and is powered by a Hydrogen Fuel Cell. The only fuel put into the car is water and the hydrogen produced using solar cells. A truly green vehicle! Inspired by this latest project, a larger car capable of transporting students has been started.

STEM Ambassadors: Ben Carter, Conor Cassey, Amy Cole, Joe Kendrick, Luke Povey and Nathaniel Witsey. If you would like to join the STEM club or know more about the various projects, contact Dr Rowlinson (J10) or ask your science teacher. Could you be part of the future?

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RFU Programme Perryfields have been enrolled onto the All Schools Programme where the RFU will support Perryfields Rugby for the next 3 years. This includes the school receiving free expert coaching, brand new equipment and a Canterbury rugby kit. Four lucky pupils will be chosen to attend a workshop in October, where they will learn the history of the England shirt, the pride associated with it and then, use their school badge, motto and history to design a meaningful rugby shirt for the school with Canterbury’s professional design team. This is a great opportunity to develop rugby at Perryfields and we look forward to working with the RFU.

Girls Computing Club Yr8 girls have been working with our I.T Partners Gaia to learn industry standard 3D modelling and sculpting software called Mudbox 2018. We meet weekly to learn from a professional 3D animator and sculptor to create our own wonder woman action figure. The software is complex and very sophisticated but we are making progress and learning how IT may impact the jobs and careers we select.

Yr5 Computing A class of yr5 pupils from Perryfields Primary School visited the school to experience computing in our fully equipped IT suites. The 30 pupils were taught computing; including coding and digital editing. They also witnessed some state of the art technology called Talking Heads provided to us by Gaia. Gaia talked to the pupils live via a skype connection as an animated character.

Mr Harris and his class used

the IT suite and learnt about coding in Scratch, building blocks of code and learning about variables and loops.

Yr8 Green Screen Project 8A2 have been planning, scripting and filming a project using green screen technology on a topic of E-Safety. We are working closely with Gaia to

create a short film that can be shared with our students to inform them how to stay safe online.

Gaia have been supporting us via Skype, advising students and guiding them through the process. The pupils have been working in groups to research their topic including; hacking, global information, fake news and viruses.

They have then storyboarded their ideas and composed a script. They will film their short film with the green screen and Gaia will make their movie come to life by following their detailed plans. We will be showcasing the film to parents at the end of term.

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Who Put Bella in the Wych-Elm? For their final BTEC performance, Miss Harris’s drama group devised a piece around the local legend of who put Bella in the wych-elm. After being inspired by a documentary made by paranormal investigator Jayne Harris, the group created a twenty minute production based around the theories explored in the film. Jayne and her company were so impressed with their drama production that they made a film from it! The students and their parents were invited along to a special 75th

anniversary event in April at Stourbridge Town Hall where the film version of the group’s production premiered. When their names scrolled at the end of the film, the students celebrated in classic Perryfields style, with Katie Ball declaring “I’ve finally made it!” Very well done to Hania Ahmed, Katie Ball, Beth Box, Rory Colhoun, Joe Cooper, Pavandeep Dhadwal, Taurai Dzimwasha, Demi Leigh Kavanagh, George Kidney, Jamie Nicole Powell, Loane Schenoick, Aaron Singh, Sean Wignall, Joshua Willcocks and Eloise Woodward. Perryfields is very proud of them all.

USA 2018 On Thursday 24 May, 44 pupils and Miss Fradley, Mrs Guest, Mrs Harris, Mr Briggs, Mr Fentem and Mr Ding had a very early start to the Perryfields High School 2018 visit to the West Coast of America.

After meeting at 5am at the Co-op, they travelled to London Heathrow where they boarded flight BA285 bound for San Francisco. British Airways staff especially complimented how pleasant and polite our pupils were during the long 11 hour flight.

On arrival at San Francisco airport the group were met by Alan, their first American tour guide, and spent a brilliant evening at the Fisherman’s Wharf pier, famous for sights of Alcatraz and the local sea lions. After seeing the man-made sights of San Francisco and California they saw amazing natural wonders including some of America’s most famous National Parks at Yosemite and the Grand Canyon. Some staff and students experienced a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon and others went on an indoor roller coaster at New York New York in Las Vegas. Over the course of the tour they stayed at 7 fantastic hotels and pupils and staff worked well together to get ready for each part of the journey. The trip included a brilliant day at Universal Studios and a tour around Hollywood and Los Angeles by James their final tour guide, before spending time shopping and sight-seeing at the famous Santa Monica beach and pier. The group then headed to Los Angeles airport for the long flight home before heading back from Heathrow Airport.

This whirlwind trip of a lifetime was amazing and full of many wonderful memories sure to last forever.

The school Twitter page has many updates from the trip and we hope to produce a photo bundle for pupils.

The Great Big Spring School Clean Up at Perryfields

On Friday 23 March, yr7 students took part in The Great Big Spring School Clean Up as part of the national Keep Britain Tidy campaign to raise awareness of the problem of litter and clean up the environment on our doorstep. A local Sandwell charity called Litter Watch came to Perryfields with plastic bags and litter pickers and the students went outside to clean up the school after lunchtime. Yr7 did a great job cleaning up the site and collected approximately 123 bags of rubbish!

It was a great event and the yr7 participants should be proud of their efforts and contribution towards making Perryfields a cleaner and more environmen-tally friendly school.

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For more examples of acceptable and unacceptable

uniform, visit www.perryfieldshigh.sandwell.sch.uk

Stay in touch:

Website: www.perryfieldshigh.sandwell.sch.uk

Twitter: @Perryfields_sch

Examples of acceptable uniform:

Unacceptable uniform:

Non-elasticated tailored trousers

Full box pleated style skirt

No tight trousers (elasticated material)

No fashion trainers or leather pumps

No bandana headwear of any colour

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