Time Reading and Sketching

 Celebrating Difference

With last month being Pride month, we thought June was a perfect time to showcase some of our fantastic books in the Library that embrace and celebrate the LGBTQIA+ community. We have a wide variety of fiction books that include all different types of characters along with some interesting and informative non-fiction books relating to subjects such as a gender, the history of the community and how to celebrate being different. 

Take a look at our display below, which features some fantastic artwork created by students in Diversity Club. The display was put together by two Year 10 students who recently completed their work experience in the Library. 

The work experience students also worked on our 'Time for a Summer Read' display, which presents some books perfect for a summer holiday read! If you fancy a story about a summer romance, or about an exotic country, come and check out some of the books we have on our display. Now is the perfect time for students to start deciding what they want to read over the Summer holidays, so make sure you come down and find your Summer read! We have a Summer Reading Adventure activity page available for students to collect from the Library and complete over the Summer if they wish, which has a range of different reading inspired activities to complete. Mrs Jones (previously Miss Dodds) would love to hear all about students' Summer reading!

As the term draws to a close, please ensure that any overdue Library books are returned to the Library or are renewed with Mrs Jones ready for the extended holidays. The Library will be back open on the first day, Tuesday 5^th September, ready to welcome new and returning students to the Library. Watch this space for a 'Read Around the World' adventure coming soon...

Mrs M Jones

Discovery Space Manager

Year 8 Art

Great work from year 8 students studying the work of the artist Ian Murphy! 

Lots of well-done postcards coming home in sketchbooks this week! 

Boarding the Tour Bus

 Winston in Liverpool

On Monday 6th July- Thursday 9th July, the music department took 58 students to Liverpool for our first music tour since 2019. 

                               

We left bright and early on Monday morning with a coach and trailer full of excited students and a huge variety of instruments. On arrival we took a self-guided Magical Mystery Tour of The Royal Albert Docks and then returned to the hostel for dinner and Board Game Night, organised by the Year 10s.

On day 2 we were up early for a visit to the British Music Experience in Liverpool where the students were able to interact with exhibits showing music from the 1940s onwards and even play instruments and watch a ‘live’ hologram performance by Boy George. We then did a flying visit of the famous Beatles statue before setting off for our first concert at Strawberry Field. It’s hard to say whether the staff or students were more excited to perform in a bandstand shaped like a giant drum in a location that plays such a key moment in Beatles (particularly John Lennon’s) history and the rain held off long enough to perform to locals, tourists and friends. After the concert, we packed up the coach and headed to Crosby Beach where we were able to get up close to the Anthony Gormley statues, collect sea glass, explore rock pools and play games on the beach. We then went back to the hostel for dinner and a quiz organised by Ollie, Athidh and Archie. Despite the best efforts of the student teams, of course the staff team were champions and absolutely didn’t flaunt the win!

On our 3rd day, we walked through the wind and rain to discover our boat tour was cancelled due to ‘technical difficulties’ but thankfully The Museum of Liverpool was just around the corner and welcomed us in. We had a couple of hours exploring the exciting history of Liverpool, watching a knight’s reenactment and even singing karaoke. We then walked into the centre of Liverpool for a spot of shopping, where the staff were delighted to be dragged around one of the biggest Primark’s in the UK and various other thrilling shops. After a quick lunch, we got on the coach to the beautiful Birkenhead Park, which took us across the River Mersey and onto The Wirral. We had a tent to protect us from (some of) the wind and set up for our second and final concert of the tour. We performed a variety of music from Big Band, Orchestra, Session Band and Brass Band and the local families really enjoyed dancing and singing along. We then had our final dinner back at the hostel followed by Karaoke organised by Liv, Evie, Sadie and Emilia, as well as a Mario Tournament organised by the Year 7 boys. The favourite performance was by Aditya and we even had time to embarrass Hamish one last time by celebrating his birthday. 

Our final morning was spent packing and loading the coach for the long journey home. Mr Drake kept everyone entertained by announcing personalised awards for every single student on tour, which had everyone laughing and cheering despite the exhaustion. 

We arrived back at The Winston Churchill School in our fabulous tour t-shirts, weary but happy from such a fantastic tour. The planning for next year’s tour has already begun!

-Mrs Connie Antony, Assistant Director of Music and Tour Leader

An Evening of Outstanding Music

 Young Musician of the Year

On Thursday 29th June our Winston Young Musician of the Year for 2023 was crowned in the Performance Space. The evening saw a record 17 finalists take part, with each one giving a phenomenal performance to give our adjudicators an incredibly challenging decision. In the end Liv and Emily were awarded joint 3rd, Ollie 2nd and Josh (for his outstanding piano performance) was crowned our winner. The Music Department would like to say how proud we are of all the students who took part. We are incredibly lucky to have such an amazing set of musicians to work with. 

We’d also like to give a special mention to Year 10 student Will who ran the lighting, sound and cameras for the evening.

Being at Work

 

Work experience week

Last week, nearly 300 of our Year 10 students took part in work experience.  They worked in all sorts of different roles and industries, practising their skills, such as communication, listening, asking questions, planning and collaboration.  They have been completing work experience diaries and will spend some time reflecting on what they have learnt and achieved, to help them in the next stage of their career journeys.

It has been a difficult year finding placements but students and families have shown great resilience and continued to look for opportunities right up until the start of the week.

We would like to thank all the businesses for providing valuable careers education opportunities and help our students get ‘ready for work’.

Feedback from the employers shows how worthwhile work experience can be:

 

“All students have been polite, respectful and helpful”

 

“Great interaction with students, both verbal and non-verbal”

 

“shown an interest in what she has been asked to do and has picked up things very quickly. We hope she has enjoyed her time with us”

 

“Extremely polite, hard working and has exceeded all expectations on every task that has been given. Happy to make her a job offer when she turns 16 years old”

 

“a great addition to the team this week and a credit to the school”

 

“very polite young man. He is keen to learn and has taken great interest in the work our Mac Operators do in our Design Studio”

 

“useful work with our computer software. He has installed virus checkers, Deleted unnecessary software and multiple copies of items. He has updated passwords and made sure our computers run well. He has also shredded some of our archived documents”

 

“Very polite young men. Both of which were very good at sorting problems out, that were thrown at them. Their communication with customers was also excellent”

A few students completed work experience in school and also took part in virtual work experiences in an area of their choice.  These 'on demand' work experiences are designed for young people and can be found on the Springpod website, as well as our FROG Careers site.  They are worth considering during spare time, as they give insights into many different industries and careers.

Our in school students enjoyed an inspirational talk and workshop on future work and skills with Dr Andy Adcroft from Surrey Business School.