Well, as another term draws to an end, I have had the opportunity this week to see more fantastic work from our students.

On Tuesday, I visited our Bridging the Gap students, Dom and Ellis over at The Royal Oldham Hospital. You may remember from my previous blog that Ellis recently gained paid employment at the hospital within the cleaning services department. It was an absolute joy to see Ellis ‘on the job’. He was working on the wards with his colleague Paul (a long standing supporter of BtG) and he was very proud and passionate about his role. He said (unprompted!):

Bridging the Gap is such a brilliant project Mr Wood, it has helped me to learn the skills that I need to get a job and now I have a job! I’m doing brilliantly and I’m really proud of myself!

Well, if that isn’t a reason to get up and come to work each day, I don’t know what is! Well done Ellis and well done to his job coach Amanda for supporting him to gain employment.

I then got the opportunity to shadow Dom whilst he was working around the hospital as a porter. This is a role that many of our students have gone on to paid employment within – most recently Liam who left last year and is still working full time at the hospital.

Dom once again showed great skill, knowledge and understanding of his role and worked well alongside his colleagues. Well done Dom!

I finished my morning joining the boys for lunch – well I say joining them but actually I sat with job coach Amanda as the boys quite rightly were sat with their work colleagues! Just brilliant to see, very much a part of the team!

Now for some updates from our pathways students…

For our pre-interns, the last few weeks of term have been all about finalising pieces of work, achieving qualifications and saying goodbye.

In our tutor sessions, they have been working on their final drafts for their speaking and listening presentations. This week the students shared their presentations to the group and all the students passed with flying colours. Well done Dom, Fahad, Josie, Kieran, Rezaul, Charlie, Jason, Luka, Zanub and Dylan for all your hard work..

Our students have also been making Spring and Easter decorations for the Atrium Cafe; they enjoyed learning how Easter is celebrated around the world as well as painting their decorations..

This has been the students’ final week on their second placements and they have been busy making thank you cards for the members of staff who have helped them in their work placements.

At the Atrium, Josie was sad to be leaving. She said she was going to miss all the staff and miss doing the trolley run but she promised Toni that she would come and visit when she was free..

Zanub, Dom and Tom made chocolate Easter baskets for the staff at First Choice Homes Oldham and to help raise money for the Pennine Animal Shelter, while Edward from Future Finders helped to decorate the Atrium. Both Dom and Zanub have said they have enjoyed the variety of the jobs and wanted to thank Becki, Sammy and Toni for all their help..

At David Lloyd Dylan, Rezaul and Luka got thank you eggs from the staff and were keen to show off their gifts..

Here is an update from our job coach Tisha and the David Lloyd Club Crew!

Luka and Dylan have come to the end of their journey at David Lloyd Club and have said their goodbyes.

Kath, one of the head chefs, had a few kind words to say to Luka..

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The DLicious restaurant assistants also had words of encouragement for Luka. He has worked hard and impressed so many with how his confidence has grown and the valuable work experience he has gained. It’s safe to say Luka will be missed..

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Here is Dylan having a chat to Helen the Personal Trainer about his whole personal training journey and what he has learnt..

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He also received a good luck card from one of the gym members Joe and a crate of his favourite drink… IRN-BRU!

Here he is giving Helen a good workout..

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This shows how much Dylan has improved and how he is ready for a change of placement next term, starting with the RSPCA!

Rezaul is here giving Kath a thank you card he made. Rezaul has done very well and really enjoyed his time on placement..

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Now our job coach Bethany has an update for us on our work experience placements at the RSPCA and the Atrium cafe..

Another busy half term for our students! On Thursdays we have seen Sophie and Nathan W. complete their work experience and they have both progressed really well. Their main job was spending quality nurturing time with the cats, and from the pictures below you can see just how well they have done..

We also have two more students, Kerrie and Nathan R., from the Learning Centre who have been attending the RSPCA on Fridays for the last term. Like Sophie and Nathan W., they have really enjoyed spending quality nurturing time with the cats..

It’s safe to say that all the cats and students have benefited! The students have all learnt fantastic skills. They have been able to change and adapt to the cats they are working with who all have different personalities and different things that they enjoy. It’s been a really positive experience and the staff at the RSPCA have been really impressed with all the students and how their confidence has grown with the staff and cats.

On Thursday afternoons Millie and Kaitlin from New Bridge have been completing their work experience at the Atrium cafe. Both have thoroughly enjoyed their time at the cafe doing the trolley run for the staff at FCHO. The girls have built up good relationships with the staff and have worked really hard on their customer service skills. Becky at the Atrium cafe has mentioned how well the girls have done and how much progress they have made..

Kieran has also come to the end of his placement at the RSPCA, as our job coach Hayley explains..

This term I have seen Kieran learn the tasks and routines at the RSPCA and pick up more responsibility along the way..

Kieran is absolutely fantastic at nurturing the cats and knowing what they need to then move on to their new homes. Kieran has been putting all his cleaning experience to good use at the RSPCA and has been sweeping up when he has recognised certain areas need it, as well as cleaning all the surfaces down and helping Fahad with the windows of all 23 cat pens!!!

Kieran’s goal whilst working here has been to walk the dogs. He has progressed through giving the dogs their treats when they show the right behaviours..

..to being asked to accompany the staff on duty when walking the dogs after they had seen the progress he has made. Kieran was absolutely over the moon with this! We are all very proud of Kieran and the skills he has gained whilst working at the RSPCA..

I would like to thank all of the staff at the RSPCA for the support and guidance they offer to our students whilst on placement. Our students have had a fantastic term here and have gained some brilliant transferable work skills as well as enjoying the work on placement and meeting all the friendly helpful staff. Thank you again and we hope you all have a fantastic Easter.

We now have an update on our students’ Functional Skills work from Mrs. Hartley-Pardoe..

It has been a fantastic half term all across Functional Skills Maths and English. There have been some FANTASTIC results in English and many students have completed Entry 3, Level 1 and Level 2 Functional Skills qualifications. The learners have all worked extremely hard this term and have all made outstanding progress.

We are all incredibly proud of every single learner for the wonderful growth they have made, not only academically but also with their personal skills; many have grown in confidence which is so lovely to see, it is certainly a reminder as to why we chose this profession.

In English, we have been focusing on reading this half term and Pre-Interns have been enjoying Anthony Horowitz’ Stormbreaker. The learners are all hooked and working on their deducing skills to predict, based on what we have read, what might happen next. We have also applied (*must burn after reading*) for the Secret Services at MI6 ourselves, filling in an application form and writing a cover letter detailing our fantastic crime fighting skills – maybe we will all be joining the likes of 007 and Alex Rider.

The Pathways group have been rallying together in their rebellious quest for equality whilst reading George Orwell’s Animal Farm. We have been having very deep, analytical discussions on the ethics of Napoleon’s tyrannical ways. Working together we have been extracting implicit meanings from the text; reading between the lines to work out what the narrative is symbolising. We have also been looking at and analysing the use of rhetoric devices in the novel and applying them to our own writing of persuasive speeches.

In Maths this term we have been measuring anything and everything we can. Working with time, speed, distance, lengths, widths, areas, perimeters – you name it, we have measured it! The learners have made such excellent growth with their geometry this term. Working through working out areas and perimeters through to Pythagorean’s Theorem and Trigonometry. We have worked on many projects with measurement, the students’ favourite being the paper aeroplane race; hypothesising whose plane would go the furthest based on height, the learners made aeroplanes, threw them and then measured the distance each plane travelled. We recorded the measurements and analysed them, looking at the mode, median, mean and range of the results before we compiled the data.

Another project the learners enjoyed was our end of term project; utilising everything they had learnt over the term, the students compiled their knowledge and became architects for a few lessons to design their own mansions, using a variety of skills to build, decorate and furnish their masterpieces.

It has been a very exciting term, and the learners have developed in many areas of their mathematical knowledge, so much so that many of them will hopefully be sitting their Functional Skills Maths assessments next term.

What great work this term, we are all so proud of every one of our learners and staff members alike. Well done everybody!

Our Digit4ll students kept up the hard work for their enterprise, making sure they completed all their orders before the Easter holidays. They finished another filming and DVD production project for St. Anne’s Lydgate Primary School..

..and delivered a lanyard order to St Anne’s Rugby Club..

Two more satisfied customers judging from the pictures, well done team!! Don’t forget to visit their website http://www.nbenterprise.co.uk/ to keep up will all their news and maybe even place your own personalised order.

To end our week, all of our students took part in the Teen Tech ‘City of Tomorrow’ day. To launch the day, a team of tech experts from Teen Tech came in to do a launch assembly, and this launch really did take off! The theme of the two days was to design a city on another planet in the future. What technology would we need? What problems would we face? The students loved the presentation that talked about Neil Armstrong right the way through to future technology and augmented reality. They were completely engaged and inspired by Ali and the team and then set off in their classes to get on with their designs! We will bring you the pictures after Easter but take it from me, they did a brilliant job!!!

I’ll leave you with a challenge from Mrs Needham for the Easter holidays – how creative can you be with Maths?

I’d like to take this opportunity to wish all of our students, families and staff a restful Easter. I am very excited to be flying off to Miami tomorrow with friends for a well deserved rest! We will see you back in college on Tuesday 23rd April.

Daniel
Head of Key Stage 5 Pathways

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