Spooky Library

 October in the Library 

The Library, this month, has been home to our Halloween inspired display full of spooky books for students to read. Whether it's a story about a haunted house, or a fantasy book about witches and wizards, the Library has lots of books on offer if you are a fan of all things scary!

Students in Year 8 have been inspired by some classic horror story tropes to come up with their own spooky storyboards. This has taken place during form times with a different tutor group visiting the Library each day. They have enjoyed working in small groups and being creative - they've also come up with some fantastic story ideas, so well done Year 8!

Our very popular Literary Pumpkin competition has returned, with even more entries than last year! Students have decorated their pumpkin to look like a book character or with a design inspired by a book and we've had some brilliant entries again this year. The students have worked hard on their creations and staff have been voting for their favourite; the winner will be announced on Thursday! This competition is also very popular with staff so we run a separate competition, with students able to vote this week for their favourite staff pumpkins. See some of the fantastic entries below from staff and students...which is your favourite?

As well as all the Halloween inspired activities in the Library this month, we were very lucky to be able to be part of a virtual author talk with Michelle Paver, an award-winning author famous for writing books such as 'Wolf Brother' and 'Viper's Daughter'. 7CM were fortunate enough to watch this event live, but other Year 7 classes have been able to watch a recording of the event in their library lessons since. Michelle talked about the extensive research she does before writing her books and it was fascinating to find out about places she has visited such as Alaska. She also answered some questions from different schools and 7CM were very excited when she read out one of the questions they asked about the inspiration behind her writing. It is always great to be able to hear from authors first-hand about their experience with writing books, their journey to becoming an author and inspiration behind their writing. The Library now has some signed copies of some of Michelle's books so if you enjoy her stories, come and check them out!

Our Remembrance Day display will be going up over the next couple of days so make sure you come and have a look after half term!

Miss M Dodds

Discovery Space Manager

Success at School

Language Learning at Winston

Year 9 German:

Charlie and Isaac said they wanted to teach part of a German lesson so after a bit of preparation they were given the challenge of introducing and teaching the Perfect Tense to their class. They were brilliant in this role and did a great job!

Year 8 French: 

Well done to all the students who have already achieved ten MFL reward stickers. This is a great achievement by this point in the term. 

Year 8 French

Congratulations to the Year 8 'cahier jaune' students who regularly complete challenging extension tasks during lessons.

Year 7 German

Well done to Lenny, Sonny, Harrison and Oliver who have been awarded multiple gold stars this term for exceptional contributions during German lessons.

Year 8 Netball

On Tuesday the year 8 netball team competed in the SJB netball tournament against other schools in the district.

From the get go, the girls gave it their all, winning their first match against SJB 6-2. Next we came up against Fullbrook, who gave us a tough game and when it was 1-1 with minutes to go, Winston dug deep and slotted another goal making it 2-1 win. 

We knew that the next match was going to be tough, up against Woking High who we have played previously this term but it was a hard fought battle, losing a respectable 6-2.

4th Round found us playing against Kings International, who we had not played against previously, the girls came out with a fantastic team performance, working the ball down the court quickly creating lots of shooting opportunities. the came out on top with an incredible 14-0 win, with some fantastic shots from Holly Fernandez. 

The girls then had a tough game against Salesians, sadly losing out on a win, but the girls did themselves incredibly proud. 

It was so nice to have the team competing again in tournaments and overall the year 8 team came a respectable 4th out of 7 teams.

Very proud of your performance girls, let's keep working hard. 

Learning in Action

 Ovid's Metamorphoses at the Sam Wanamaker Theatre

On Wednesday 13th October, GCSE Latin students ventured to Shakespeare's Globe to view an adaptation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. It was an entertaining collection of some of his best stories. Taking the train to Waterloo, we walked along the Thames Embankment, which was amazing in the late-afternoon, October sunset, with all the lights from buildings creating an unforgettable skyline. The theatre itself had a cosy, intimate glow as a result of the many candelabras and candles scattered about the stage, which brought us one step closer to an authentic Early Modern experience. The play adopted a profoundly Brechtian approach which grabbed our attention and occupied our mind through the combination of shocking and entertaining stories as well as the theatre's simplistic yet intriguing set design. Overall, it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening that has supplied us with plenty to recount and reminisce about in the days since. we are very grateful for this culturally enriching opportunity of which we will never forget! 

Written by 10E-Latin

We're so glad that theatres have opened back up as they provide such an enriching experience for our students, Mr Fisher will be keeping his eyes on the box office for more Classically inspired productions.

Understanding DNA 

On Wednesday 7CR had the opportunity to extract DNA from strawberries. Dr Gonzalez guided them how to correctly mix the buffer , adding the ice-cold ethanol and then look at the DNA strand under the microscope.

Fractional Distillation

On Thursday , Mr Spain refreshed the practical skills of chromatography with 9W-E and 9C-G attained from previous years. For the first half of the lesson, they separated ink, while during the second half they watched the demonstration of Fractional distillation. Here, they observed distillation of "wine" , which was made up of water , ethanol, and food colour. They were able to identify that  different liquids have different boiling points . This introduced them to the topic of fractional distillation of crude oil and cracking , too.

Great Engagement in Learning

 Let's Bake Bread

Year 9 took up the challenge to make ,bake and present their Focaccia bread in 55 minutes. The Italian bread needed to be out of the oven and presented to me to be photograph by the end of the lesson. This is the first practical of three into their scientific investigation of a yeast-based product.

The smell of the delicious focaccias . The outcomes were delicious looking and from student feedback I can see that they were a definite success with their families.

Mrs Vadi 

Subject Leader Technology 

Year 7 using sewing machines to make their pencil cases

Empowerment Poem (Love Yourself)

By Mia 

 

Idiot,

You aren’t stupid; you just need more support with learning,

Careless,

You still care; you are just a risk taker,

Ugly,

You aren’t ugly, you’re unique!

Show-off,

You are just proud of what you have achieved,

Too confident,

People are just jealous of your courage to speak up

Worthless...

You aren’t worthless; you just need to find your worth!

 

---(Message)---

Don’t let people’s criticism get you down! Let’s turn it into a compliment. A way to improve, and a way to understand that you are all amazing. You can accept yourself for who you are, and not what people want you to be.

Written as part of the work in Winston Extra Lessons inspired by the theme~  

Be your Best.

Year 9 PE

Mrs Lyddon’s Year 9 PE class have been trying out a variety of different activities that can develop teamwork as part of their sports education unit of work.  This week they used a parachute and it has been a fun and engaging way to promote teamwork, cooperation and practice social skills, whilst offering health benefits too.  Such as, it can be a great way  to reinforce muscular fitness, by bringing awareness to how your arms feel after participating in the activity. Students also understood that physical activities using resistance (from the parachute) can contribute to their muscular fitness.

“This activity was so much fun and it was so good to see everyone laughing and smiling throughout the lesson.” Freya 

Preparing for GCSE Science

 Year 9 Biology GCSE Practical

9CG completed their first required practical for their Biology GCSE which involved looking at Osmosis occurring in plant cells. Students had to apply the science skills they developed in KS3 to their new knowledge on cell transport. Students had to accurately measure volumes of different concentrations of sugar solution and complete scientific calculations. Every student worked extremely hard. 

DNA from Strawberries

8CE practiced how to use the microscopes today, a skill they learnt in year 7. Students collected DNA from strawberries and put the DNA on a slide to view under their microscopes. Setting up microscopes is a difficult skill to develop with the many little parts, including changing the objective lenses, fine and coarse focus dials. 8CE are now experts at getting the slide in view to see their specimen. 

  Bat noises and echolocation 

Echolocation is normally difficult to detect with the human ear. Mr Philcox used his personal Magenta bat detector to demonstrate to 9W2 how bats use ultrasonic frequency to navigate and communicate. The signal generator attached to the detector was able to take the inaudible high frequency ultrasound that bat use and converted them into frequencies between 100 hz and 12Khz. This way the students were able to listen to the pitch the bats produce that otherwise would be too damaging for the human ear. During the lesson, the student`s combined their biology and physics knowledge : They looked at the structure and function of the human ear and how it converts soundwaves into an electrical signal that the brain recognises and translates into something we understand. "

UV LIGHT 

" In science today, Dr Gonzalez`s class , 11W1, experimented with ultraviolet light sensitive plastic beads . The white beads turn into different colours, when exposed to the 3 different types of UV light. The students learnt about visible and invisible wavelength of light and its effects on eyes, skin, and cells . The participants used water, sunlight, UV lamps and various colour filters with laser pointers to investigate the colours produced, helping them identify the type of UV wavelength. "