This week As we enter December and start to look forward to Christmas, as if on cue, the weather turned frosty this week and the site team were busy with the salt spreader around the grounds. Inside, we were grateful our heating system is working well (most of the time!) and were uplifted in assemblies by some brilliant playing by Guillermo playing a guitar solo piece. Following his performance we were encouraged to think about light, how it can also…
This week With Year 11 starting their mock examinations, as is usual at this time of year, our main assembly moved to an alternative rota for Years 7-10. This week’s theme focused on Peace. This follows on from our Remembrance assemblies a fortnight ago. The assemblies began with cast members from our Wizard of Oz school production speaking about their experience in the show, followed by a recording and photo montage from the production. We may now have Over the…
This week Anti-Bullying week was launched with Odd Socks Day on Monday followed all week by assemblies on the same theme. These began with a brilliant performance by our Black Box drama students. The assembly was then based on information from the Anti-Bullying Alliance and included a powerful video read by young people from across the UK who had experienced bullying themselves. Students were encouraged to speak out against bullying and to not be bystanders when they see people being…
This week We have held Remembrance assemblies all week with all year groups. These included speeches from two of our fabulous History Ambassadors who talked about the origins of the poppy as a symbol of remembrance and the famous poem, “In Flanders Fields”, by John McCrae. At the end of assembly we all stood, observed the Last Post (played by one of our musicians) and held a minute’s silence. As usual, no doubt many of our students will also be…
This week We managed to escape the worst of Storm Ciarán on Thursday to welcome hundreds of Year 11 students and their parents/carers to our Sixth Form Open Evening. It was great to see so many of our own students keen to find out what life in the Sixth Form is like and to consider which of the many subjects we offer would interest them the most. We were pleased to see such a large number of students from other…
Autumn term – reflections on the term so far We started this year with assemblies that emphasised the special community that exists in a school and our school in particular. We encouraged students to support each other to live by our values of Respect, Responsibility and Honesty. There have been so many examples of this so far this year, from charity fund raising (e.g. Jeans for Genes Day), to the Year 7 team building days, our fantastic Open Evening guides…
We are piloting a new initiative this half term, and would welcome your feedback. Please email the Office for the attention of Mr Eynon with any feedback please. We’d like to share, with you, a small selection of the wonderful work that students at Darrick Wood School have completed this half term. Open Evening this year was a resounding success, and students who represented the school, both on the evening and through display of their work, were complimented by our…
This week Assemblies this week have been themed around Black History Month. The assembly was prepared and led by students and Mr Guest, Head of History and Politics. It started with a recording of students performing Benjamin Zephaniah’s Melting Pot, acted out in one of our Food Tech classrooms. Many students were involved in researching the assembly’s focus and were able to share the achievements of black women in particular. Students were encouraged to join our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion…
This week Thank you to parents of students in Year 11 for attending our Year 11 Parents’ Information Evening. From the comments received we understand this was an evening that parents really appreciated. We will be sending home copies of the presentation by email early next week. Assemblies this week have focused on the theme of Forgiveness – how we need to learn to forgive not just others, but also ourselves. We were also lucky to hear from Mr Wright,…
Excitement has swept across School this week as our Book Fair began on Thursday. We are proud to see so much enthusiasm for reading for pleasure among our pupils who have visited the fair so far. Every book sold at the fair helps earn free books for our school. Please be sure to remind your child to visit the Book Fair in the Reading Realm (our Library) before next Wednesday!