Specialist School

Posted Fri, 02/20/2009 - 12:42

Humanities Specialist School Our aims are to:  

  • Help our students to achieve the highest results they can
     
  • Help the children, young people and adults in our local community to improve their skills and so help regenerate the area
     
  • Prepare our students for global active citizenship and working life in a thriving, diverse and dynamic capital city.

Development Strands

Each specialist department is leading on a strand of school development.

English – literacy across the curriculum
History – thinking skills
Geography – multi-media approaches to teaching and learning.

Because of our specialist school status, the school has received additional government funding to help us to continue to improve and raise standards. These are just a few of the ‘extras’ we’ve been able to fund through our Humanities Specialist School status. 

  • Interactive whiteboards
     
  • Digital photographic equipment
     
  • Sets of books for classes
     
  • International visits
     
  • The school magazine
     
  • Theatre trips
     
  • Authors in school
     
  • Speakers in school
     
  • Rewards for students
     
  • Enrichment activities
     
  • A range of additional staff training
     
  • Time for teachers to develop exciting learning opportunities for students

Humanities Day 

Each year in June we celebrate ‘Humanities Day’. This involves the whole school coming together to focus on a Humanities theme.
This year Humanities Day as usual was a bright sunny day and the students were thrilled to receive pencils and highlighters which marked this special occasion, on their arrival at school.

The theme for the day was ‘Who Do We Think We Are?’ and the whole school was focusing on issues around identity, community and ‘Britishness’
The morning began with a continental breakfast served by Ms. Talon and Ms. Ricon. This was followed with a special assembly for Years 7 and 8. Our guest speaker was Carol Dixon from the government’s ‘Who Do We Think We Are?’ campaign. She talked to us about how we define our own identities and challenged us to question the things that we believe are typically British. For example, did you know the Great British Breakfast actually came from Germany?

We also had wonderful performances in the assembly from Edward Conteh 7RJY, Ms. Jary and 8DBR and the school choir.

There were lots of fun activities taking place in lessons, these are just a flavour – maths teachers posed as famous mathematicians and students were challenged to work out who they were; in English lessons students wrote some brilliant poetry entitled ‘I am’; in History Year 7 explored Olympic anthems and national identity; in citizenship classes explored the environment and how this influences our identity.
8VAT won the tutor group quiz and was treated to a special breakfast.
All in all it was a great day enjoyed by everyone involved and we’re already looking forward to next year!

The Crown Woods Learning Gateway

When we achieved Humanities Specialist School status in September 2005, Microsoft became one of our sponsors. This has meant that we can have free Microsoft software and licensing for the whole four years of the specialist school and should we be successful when we re-bid, the sponsorship will continue. We have taken this opportunity to install and run Microsoft’s Learning Gateway. This is a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) and communication system.

Having a VLE means that lessons, homework, learning resources and advice for students can all be loaded on to the school computer system. With remote access to the system via the internet and passwords, it can be accessed by students and their families 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It has the potential to revolutionise how students learn and study at school.

From September 2008 all the school’s learning resources will be on the Learning Gateway and there will be areas available to students to reach from home. This means they will be able to access resources for lessons they may have missed, personalised homework that has been set by their teachers, revision and self-study materials personalised for them or their class. They will be able to e-mail work in to their teachers and will be able to receive comments back.

Parents and carers will be able to see exactly what their children are learning at school and will have access to resources they can use to support them.

By the time we move into our new school buildings in September 2010, the Learning Gateway should be fully functional and operating. We look forward to using this very latest learning technology!

Adult and Community Learning

Adult and Community Learning at Crown Woods is thriving under the leadership of our Community Director Julie Taylor. Over 200 learners have benefited from our community provision which includes a range of evening classes, work with primary schools and work with outreach centres. For more information about provision for the year 2008-09 please look at the Community Education section of this website.

We have been a Humanities Specialist School for the last 3 years. Our specialist subjects are English, History and Geography.