Newsletters

Design a Christmas Card competition 

We recently asked our year 7 students to design a Christmas card and win a prize of an Amazon voucher.

We had a number of designs but finally chose one which seemed appropriate for 2020.

Well done Anabelle.

Year 7 Endangered Species Homework

The Geography team would like to congratulate all Year 7 entrants for their wonderful endangered species homework, which was part of an optional homework set to all of Year 7 as part of their rainforest study.

The standard was really high this year but Lois Hare 7I has truly gone above and beyond in creating her Orangutan advent calendar!

Miss Wood was so excited she insisted on posing for a photo with the project and Mr Skipp was so impressed he has awarded Lois an Amazon voucher for her outstanding contribution.

A huge well done from Mrs Tuckey, Miss Wood, Mr Powell and Mr Mirza.

Mr Little and some of his Outdoor Learning group have been busy creating the scene to be displayed at John of Gaunt for the Trowbridge Christmas nativity trail.

The scene will be in position from Sunday, see the trail website for details! 

Year 8 have been donating food and toiletries this week to support our local Storehouse Food Bank. Our student council thought this was a really beneficial to do considering what people are currently going through. 

We would like to thank all our students and their families for donating food and toiletries to such a wonderful cause. We hope that the families that receive these items have a lovely Christmas. 

From Year 8 

Year 10 & 11 Christmas 2020 Food Bank Appeal

This year the 2 year groups worked together to collect donations in their tutor groups to be given to Storehouse Trowbridge.  We have been overwhelmed by the generosity of our students & their families.  Items donated included tinned goods, biscuits, toiletries & dried pasta.  We are looking forward to delivering our donations by the end of term.

We would like to thank everyone involved.  Merry Christmas everyone!

The Year 10 & 11 Teams ??

Charity Week

We have had a lot of fun raising money for our chosen charities this week.  

A lot of produce has been given to the Storehouse Food Bank - thank you so much for all of your generous donations.  We've been really touched by just how supportive our school community has been of this worthy local cause.

We've also raised several hundred pounds that will be allocated to the year group's chosen charities; each year group member's contribution will go specifically towards that year group's selected charity.  We'll be able to give you updates of final totals in January as we're still collecting money through activities running today.

Our student leadership teams have been very creative in terms of the activities offered.  Amongst this week's activities we've had a Sixth Form Santa Dash, a staff egg and spoon race, tuck shops, art competitions, raffles and a Christmas shop.

We wish you all a safe, healthy and happy Christmas. 

The DTP/MenACWY vaccination for the current Year 9 cohort and any Year 10/11 students who have missed their dose to date will be given this on 18^th January 2021.

The HPV1 vaccinations for current Year 8 boys and girls and current Year 9 boys and girls who have missed their first dose last year, along with any other students who have missed a dose that is due, will be given on 27^th April 2021.

Further information will be sent out to parents as soon as this is available from the School Immunisation Team. However, if you have any queries please contact them on 0300 247 0082

Lost Property

We are holding a substantial amount of unnamed lost property. If your child has lost an item of clothing, please can they see Mrs Lee in reception or should you wish to pop in then please email reception@jogschool.org to arrange a convenient time. 

Face Covering Exemption Cards for dedicated school bus travel

Should any student be exempt from wearing a face mask on a school bus due to a medical condition, we can issue them with an exemption card.

Please contact snichols@jogschool.org if you wish your child to have one.

Parentpay for School Meals

Please can we remind parents/carers to check the balances on their children’s school meals accounts and top up where necessary.

Please contact the finance office if you have any queries with payments.

Thank you.”

The library is looking great! Snowflakes courtesy of Imogen W in Y11 and paperchains made by Lucy, Reece, Anabelle and Charlotte in Y7 is helping it feel festive.

This term, the Y7 and Y8 students have been reading and quizzing on Accelerated Reader. So far they have read an impressive 12,889,430 words!

Some students are doing very well! In Y7 the students with most words read is Erin C, who has already read 391,183 words! She is followed on the top list by Lucy M, Charlotte W, Luke P, Megan L, Anabelle B, Xavier H, Wes M, Kyle W and Sienna K. Top words in Y8 is held by Olivia C with 438,927 read. She is followed by Rhyley J, Mason D, Katie S, Ryder G, Aimee F, Joseph C, Lauren W, Ruby S and Gabriella F.

So many of our students have grown in confidence when it comes to their reading. It’s always my favourite thing to see! There are some real reading superstars in Y7 – too many to mention – but a big shout out to Finley L in 7G who is doing amazingly!

I have a new book in the library, It’s called ‘Everything all at Once’ by Steven Camden. It is a collection of poems about one week in a secondary school. If you are curious what a school week can feel like, give it a read! I wanted to share the prologue with you:

What’s it about then?

Well,

It’s about the tapestry of moments, woven of a thousand threads.

Different versions of the world swirling inside a thousand heads.

We go from the biggest to the smallest, dropped off. Left to fend,

In the secondary school jungle jumbled enemies, new friends.

It’s a war zone. It’s a haven. It’s a stage full of bright lights.

It’s a series of scary alleyways walked on a dark night.

Always moving. Unforgiving.

Full of music. Full of living.

Zoom in. One mind. Split screen. Another mind. Another mind.

Another mind. Another mind.

And another mind.

All together. Same place.

Same walls. Same space.

Every emotion under the sun. Faith lost. Victories won.

It doesn’t stop.

Until the bell. Now it’s heaven. Now it’s hell.

Who knows? Not me.

I just wrote what I can see.

So what’s it about?

Here’s my response:

 It’s about Everything. All At Once.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Mrs Bruton 

Knowledge Organisers

I wanted to take the opportunity to thank all of you who responded to my request for feedback on knowledge organisers earlier this term. This feedback has been invaluable and I wanted to explain what has been done as a response.

The purpose of a knowledge organiser is to give students a resource to help with reinforce the key elements of a subject each term. Therefore, it should link directly to the content covered in class, supporting students when recapping and revising this key content. However, this should also provide some guidance for you all on what your child is studying in school and also what the key content is in each subject. They can therefore be used for self-quizzing, revision activities, identifying gaps in your child’s knowledge and also supporting them in lessons as a work sheet.

Following your feedback, we have decided to make adaptations to the knowledge organisers to optimise the impact they have on promoting student progress.

This will include:

• Using colour coding to help students navigate the layout
• Including the title of the unit they will be covering
• Making sure all content is directly linked to what will be covered that term
• All key vocabulary will have definitions aside
• Highlighting a challenge box where students can look to supplement their knowledge on this topic

To show you what this may look like, I have attached an example beneath. These changes will be put in place for Term 4.

Thank you again for your support and feedback and I hope you have a lovely Christmas break.

Alex Hamilton-White

Lead Practitioner