Bulletin - 18th June 2010

Hi all,

This week -

Meeting on Tues

C26

3.15 - 4.15

This meeting will be an opportunity for collaborative planning for the new GCSE, thinking ahead to the away-day on the 13th July. Please bring along any materials that you have already begun working on, as well as any questions that you have!

Toni
Toni Gaughan starts with us to provide much needed admin assistance from Monday. She will be with us on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings, making a total of 12 hours per week. Please pop in and introduce yourselves, and obviously any letters, detention info or other admin tasks can now be directed through her. Phew!

English interviews on Tuesday
- we have four candidates for interview, and they will be in the English office at break time for tea and biscuits - you would all be very welcome to come along and meet them (no blueberry muffins this time; don't blame me, blame the change in government!).

TBO out on Weds at LT away-day

Thanks everyone!

Tom

Bulletin - 21st June

Hi all,

Many thanks to everyone for your contributions to the INSET day on Friday; it felt like a really purposeful day and we covered a lot of good stuff! I've tried to summarise views about the issue of reporting to parents and will send this around for you to add to or comment on if you would like to.

Admin Assistant

Rejoice! We have an Admin Assistant - all things being well (!), Toni will be starting work with us from next Monday.

Drama Staffing

Kate has asked us to provide four periods of Drama (KS3 I presume) - if you are keen to try this, please let me know ASAP.

Year 9 Assessment

Creative Writing Controlled Assessment

An overview of the specific requirements for this unit is found on page 16 of the specification here: http://store.aqa.org.uk/resourceZone/pdf/english/AQA-4705-W-SP.PDF

The marking criteria are on pages 38 and 39. I will print these out and photocopy; I've also ordered more specs from the board so you should get one ASAP.

The marking works like this:

Each creative writing task is marked out of 10. Students have to submit two, so they get a mark out of 20 for content. They then get a mark out of 10 for accuracy, which comes from looking at both tasks. I suggest therefore that we:

- use the criteria to give a content mark out of 10

- also give and record an accuracy mark for this piece of work

- the accuracy mark can then be adjusted later in the course when they do the second piece of writing.

For full guidance on Controlled Assessment in English, please see the document here: http://store.aqa.org.uk/resourceZone/pdf/english/AQA-ENG-ALL-W-TRB-CASSI.PDF

PLTS

Further to our discussion of the Personal Learning and Thinking Skills framework on Friday, here's the link to a site with ideas about how PLTS can be applied to English: http://curriculum.qcda.gov.uk/key-stages-3-and-4/subjects/key-stage-4/english/PLTS-in-English/index.aspx

National Curriculum Level Descriptors

On Friday, we agreed that we would use the general level descriptors for Reading, Writing and S and L to decide on end of unit grades (alongside the focused APP mid-term formative assessment points). This link takes you to a document which clarifies these descriptors, which have been recently revised: http://curriculum.qcda.gov.uk/uploads/Level_descriptors_English_tcm8-16283.pdf

Have a great week everyone,

Tom

Bulletin - 14th June

Hi all...welcome to the redesigned bulletin!

This week,

Lots going on this week, notably:
Netherlands vs. Denmark
Japan vs. Cameroon
Italy vs. Paraguay
New Zealand vs. Slovakia
Côte d’Ivoire vs. Portugal
Brazil vs. North Korea

Also, Year 10 Parents Evening on Thurs
Tues - Danni Quin in the department p1-4, observing and TA-ing as required.
TBo and EWa out on Weds at HODs conference.
Fri - Agile Teaching focused INSET Day

Thanks to all who've responded to the email regarding gained time and GCSE prep - I will be in touch very soon to confirm which colleagues have opted to work on which part of the course.
Have a great week everyone,
Tom

Bulletin - 8th June

Welcome back everyone, and I hope you had a wonderful, well-deserved break.

OFSTED

First of all, a massive thank you and well done to everyone for the effort that went into the OFSTED inspection before the break. I have seen a sneak preview of the report (I believe it will be amade available to all staff very soon) and they have picked up on a number of strengths in our subject, including student achievement and the quality of our use of assessment. This is really great news, and puts into focus the fact that we are a strong and effective team, which is highly successful in the difficult job of helping our students to learn (starting to sound like an OFSTED report now!). But it's true. Well done everyone and thank you for all the hard work and professionalism you all bring to the job.

This Term

There is a lot to do this term! I will be in touch ASAP with a run-down of what needs to be done, but obviously preparing for the new syllabus at KS4 will be a major focus. I may ask individuals or pairs to look at particular parts of the course, and will be in touch about this very soon - also Liz and I are meeting today to clarify the plan for year 9.

Party

As you may know I am something of an indefatigable party animal, as long as I am able to be in bed with a book by ten pm. With this in mind, you are all invited to a summer garden / drinks and nibbles party on the afternoon of Saturday July 17th at my house, directions to which I will send around. My wife is completing her GTP course imminently and is inviting the Eng department from Cherwell to celebrate, so if you are free and fancy it, do put it in your diaries! (More of a wine sharing than a best-practice sharing opportunity I would have thought!).

Have a great week everyone!

Tom