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I’m getting this posted on a training day for us, so everyone is doing various sessions on all sorts of aspects of school life. I know those days can be difficult for parents, so I hope it’s been an OK day for you too. They can be annoying, so the least I can do is to reassure you that the activities that are happening are meaningful and important, and the whole team is working very hard

There have also been four busy days, some of which you can read about below! I hope you enjoy it and there’s something there for you!

Then of course there are a few days off, which I hope are filled how you want them to be. When we get back it’s a 7-week half term, during which of course we’ll be doing exams and thinking a lot about transitions & other arrangements for next year. Busy times but good times!

It was lovely to see a few of you writing stories this week – and to join in! Thanks for your support and all the best

John S

😊 from John & the PHS Team 😊

Literacy

Becky, our Literacy Specialist Lead, leads a team that improve all aspects of literacy, including this year a lot of handwriting and oracy (it’s OK, she’ll be going into explain all of that) as well as reading, phonics, books and all sorts!

THE NEW LIBRARY & WRITING A STORY!

It feels like just like we were introducing our new books and topics for the start of the term, and we’ve hit half term already!

This week has been filled with a lot of library chat again, as we’ve established a team with staff from all curriculum pathways to help make the final decisions about details. We spent time going through staff and student suggestions for the categories that they would look for, and we’re getting there! Just a LOT of books to label and organise now 🙂

Whilst the library will be built over half term, it will take us a little while to get the books sorted and all the final touches done, so we’re looking at ‘Grand Opening’ on the week commencing the 30^th June. We understand that this might be a bit tricky for some students, as they’ll want to be able to explore it straight away but we hope it’ll be worth the wait! Whilst the library area is closed we continue to have fantastic classroom libraries, our local Killingworth library, as well as access to Pickatale online library.

On Thursday this week parents and carers of students in the ELTBA pathway had the opportunity to join us in school for a coffee afternoon, which this time focused on writing. Coffee afternoons are always a great chance for parents to come together, share experiences and chat, but where possible we also like to be able to pass on a little bit of information about something that we’re up to in school too! This time parents & carers had the option of joining in with different writing activities with their child or young person.

We’ve mentioned ‘writing for pleasure’ on the blog before, but it really is just creating opportunities for us to enjoy writing tasks of our choosing, without the pressure that comes with it being a ‘job to do’! When we discuss ‘writing’ in this way we mean any form of recording or written ‘output’, however is easiest for the student to get their message and ideas out. We had a couple of different story writing tasks, and also an opportunity for both students and their adults to look forward to their half term and have a think about what they might want to do.

We were too busy chatting and looking at fab stories to take any photos (sorry!) but here’s the form we used to think about the half term- feel free to pinch the idea to get your child or young person writing at home, and both of you can jot some May half term holiday ideas?

Happy Reading, Happy Writing & Happy Half Term! 

School Values

JoJo loves doing jobs for adults in school and having responsibilities. He likes to take the jugs back to the kitchen after lunch and chat to the cooks. JoJo is such a good helper! Having responsibilities helps our pupils build confidence and self-esteem, develop life skills and prepare for adulthood. JoJo is demonstrating the school values of respect, resilience and teamwork!

SMSC

World Day for Cultural Diversity

In 3KH for World Cultural Day, we have been thinking about how we are different from each other. Pupils have asked their peers about their hobbies and interests. They have noted any similarities and differences between themselves and their friends.

World Bee Day

This week in 4OW students have been learning about the importance of bees and the impact they have on our ecosystem. Students engaged in taking turns to read information from an informative PowerPoint all about bees!

After completing ‘Bee Day’ themed colouring and wordsearches, students took part in a bee hunt where they tried to find as many bees as they could. Unfortunately, they couldn’t find any!

Club of the Week – Gardening Club!

Ben’s been doing a fantastic job with Gardening Club. He’s got a great group of students too. Let’s hear from Ben and then see some funky pictures!

The Gardening Club team have been hard at work getting our seeds planted and our bamboo plant re-potted in time for half term. I think the hose pipe was proving a bit of a struggle to tamed for one member of our team

Thankfully we had a watering can to hand

FANTASTIC JOB GARDENING CLUB!!!

Lesson of the Week! Daniel’s Gardening!

Oscar has been doing Outdoor Learning with Daniel, and Daniel has been great! Let’s hear from Oscar and then see some of the pictures. And by the way I tasted the radishes and they are super! Love em! Well done all!

Daniel has been growing a range of fruit and vegetables in outdoor learning including radishes, potatoes, beetroot, tomatoes, and strawberries.

Daniel has been caring for his plants everyday and is even taking some home in the half-term holiday to look after them. He can’t wait to share them with others in the school once they are fully grown

Therapy Star of the Week!

Love Therapy Star of the Week! Especially when it’s Toby!

Let’s hear from Ash!

Toby has grown a lot this year and has been working hard to build up his strength to help him maintain his movement. Here he is walking to a Rebound session in his walker and then working hard on the trampoline. He particularly enjoys listening (and singing!) to Backstreet Boys or NSYNC for motivation

Toby the Therapy STAR!!!

Backstreet’s Back!

Behaviour for Learning (BfL)

Aylisha and Corin have developed the BfL Group and are working on supporting our pupils all the time on the best way to be in all situations.

If anyone has any queries or would like more information about this, please feel free to get in touch with the BFL team

• aylisha.holland@percyhedley.org.uk
• c.orr@percyhedley.org.uk

Early Years – The Ducklings!

Let’s get the latest update from what’s been happening down in the fabulous Early Years, hear from Kerry, and also see some lovely pictures which show what sort of a week they’ve had and what they’ve been up to

Another busy week in Early Years!

This week we focused on “’The Zoo Vet’. This is an animal story which follows a week in the life of a zoo vet as he finds the perfect treatment for different animals. The children enjoyed making medicine for the animals using water glitter and different coloured paint. They used bandages to fix broken bones, they gave the animals a bath to reduce temperatures and finally we had a sensory experience with colourful green saving foam and the elephants to make their colds better.

During bucket activities we made shadow scenes using the silhouette of the animals and paint

We followed the story of Handa’s surprise cutting and exploring the fruits and then printing with them, our tuff tray represented key events within the story. The children had great fun exploring

We have also enjoyed lots of time outside and letting off steam with the soft play

We have a have had some lovely fine motor work this week using our toys to help develop our pre-witing skills

Come with us next term where we will be following on from our land animals and we will be taking a deep dive under the sea to find out what’s down there, looking forward to you coming with us

Exams with Kat!

Lots of exams and arrangements going on at the minute, and Kat sorts all of this out for us. Let’s hear the news!

I hope everyone is doing well!

Lots of work has gone into the set up and registration process of all examinations taking place this academic year

We have just completed and submitted work for the Entry Level Certificate Qualifications students completed – Results will be available in August.

We have also started examinations for the summer series for Functional Skills Maths and English and GCSEs and we are very busy with examination days in our school.

So much hard work has gone into the preparation to get to this time of year, and we would like to wish all students the very best of luck.

In the next few weeks students who sat exams this season will bring home an information letter regarding how to contact the exams team on results day, which includes a consent form that should be completed to allow us to pass on results details to parents/guardians – as ultimately the results belong to the students.

There are lovely things happening around all those exams in school in this half term and next, so there is a lot to look forward to

Thanks Kat!

School Lunches – new summer menus, vegetarian days and all sorts!!!!!

Our summer menus are proving really popular! Love em!

You can find them by clicking on the button below.

And by the way, here’s the Indian menu we had yesterday! A Taste of India!!!

In terms of ipay accounts: unless your child is in receipt of Free School Meals or Bursary, you should ensure your iPay account is topped up before meals are taken. Thank you for your understanding and continued support in helping us to provide good quality and nutritious meals for our children

If you have any questions or need support with your iPay account, please don’t hesitate to contact the school office

And finally……it’s that time of year again……..oh yes…………………..

…..from John & the Team here at PHS

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