SCIENCE
Year 8 studied mixtures and solutions. We talked about the difference between them and the students learned many new terms, such as a solute, a solvent, soluble, insoluble, saturated, dilute solutions and . Also, we had a practical session where the students investigated how solubility of a substance varies with temperature. They worked in small groups and used sodium chloride as a solute and water as a solvent. The task was to count the number of spatulas which dissolved in a certain amount of water at three different temperatures. All students enjoyed the session and were able to make good scientific conclusions.
Year 9 students started a big topic on Quadratics and have learnt how to factorise monic and non monic quadratic expressions and how to solve quadratic equations using null factor law. They have also solved various worded problems requiring setting up and solving quadratic equations and constructing appropriate graphs.
Year 10 studied oxidation and reduction reactions. The topic is quite challenging, however, as we continued practising, the class was able to distinguish between oxidation and reduction half-equations as well as oxidising and reducing agents. Students also practised writing ionic equations and spotting spectator ions. Then, during a practical lesson, the class was split into several groups and worked with metals and some salt solutions. They made predictions if these reactions would go or not, using the Reactivity series of metals. Then the students mixed the metals with solutions and made their observations checking if their predictions were correct. In one of these reactions we got pure silver which was a very exciting part of a lesson! Well done Year 10 and keep it up!
MUSIC
In Secondary, Year 7 started with the Sonority City Unit. We explored ‘the Layout of orchestra’. The students found the definitions for the Timbre and Sonority, the unique sounds or tone quality of different instruments.
Year 8 continued with Dance Music. This week the students explored Waltz Dance Music. The students listened to a collection of Waltzes by Strauss called ‘Voices of Spring’ and explored special features which belongs to each of them.
Year 9 finished with Samba music and it has been a great journey. The students performed ‘Samba de Janeiro’ as an ensemble. The students also started with the Hook and Riff Unit. We have been learning to recognize what hooks, riffs and ostinato are and where they occur in songs.
ENGLISH
It has been a significant week for years 11-13 as they have been sitting their mock exams. I would like to congratulate all students in these years for demonstrating a mature and conscientious attitude towards their preparation and the manner in which they have sat their examinations. Meanwhile, year 9 have been continuing their study of Sherlock Holmes and have now begun to read ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’. Year 10 have been closely evaluations characters in their drama study and partook in a class debate this week.
FRENCH
In Year 7, we finished our topic “Les pronoms toniques” and “moi aussi moi non plus”. Now, they know how to speak about someone else in French and how to say : so do I / neither do I.
Year 8 and Year 9 learnt how to write correctly the sentence with an adjective when it’s masculine and when it’s feminine. There is a general rule to know, when the final letter is “d, s or t”, we just need to add “e”. However, we studied the cases when the ending changes and it was a bit harder. Then we studied the different article “un” and “une’. We will still speak about this topic next week.
Year 10 finished our topic about “Mon école”. We worked on a description of a school. They had to find in a list the wrong suggestion. Then, they listened a track about the daily life o f a student and they had to answer to the questions. Finally, they had to write a essay (130 words) about their school. The level was high but they did their best.
ICT
This week in ICT Year 8 continued with their Hyper-Text-Markup-Language and were looking at the ordered list tags and adding pictures to the website. Year 9 and 7 continued exploring Minecraft Education and programming which included exploring sequences, loops, while loops and nested loops. Moreover Year 13, 12, 11 sat their iGCSE and A level mock examinations.
GEOGRAPHY
Year 7
This week year 7 students have finished the previous topic which is Volcano and Earthquakes and they have started to learn a new topic which is Weather and Climate. In this topic students have had an opportunity to define the term Weather and Climate as well as making the differences between the two. They have also learned about the element of Weather which are temperature, precipitation, clouds sunlight, humidity, wind and visibility.
Year 8
Year 8 students have learned about the impacts of tourism and they have had a discussion on how tourism can results into positive and negative impacts on the destination countries and the local population. Through the color code worksheet students managed to divide the effect of tourism into economic, socio cultural and environmental. Finally, students were given an opportunity to present and to talk about their answers on the worksheet.
Year 9
Year 9 have started the new topic which is Volcano and Earthquake. In this week, students demonstrated general knowledge and understanding of the term volcano by linking this lesson with the structure and three layers of the earth, which are Crust, Mantle and Core. Students demonstrated how magma erupts from the mantle to the earth crust.
Year 10
This week year 10 students have learned about River processes, which are Erosion, Transportation and Deposition. In addition, students did a presentation on the importance of the rivers. Students presented some examples of very famous rivers in the world such as river Nile in Egypt and river Han in Korea. In their presentation students discussed that water in the river can be used for irrigation purpose, domestic purpose tourism and generating electricity (Hydroelectric Power).
HISTORY
Year 7
Year 7 students started new subtopic under Middle Ages topic which is murder of Thomas Becket. In this week, students have had an opportunity to be independent enquirers and develop a general understanding as to what happened to Thomas Becket and what was the position of the church in relation to politics during Middle Ages.
Year 8
Year 8 students have finished the topic of British Empire by discussing and explaining why the British Empire might be classed as good and bad. Furthermore, with the aid of different pictures and statements from various sources and articles students have identified the drawbacks and benefits of the British Empire for both Britain and the colonies like India and Australia.
PSHE
This week year 7 students are proceeding with the topic of “Be Mindful”. Students had an opportunity to do variety of mindful activities that enabled them to understand the importance of paying attention when doing a specific activity. A worksheet that require a deep focus was given to students and relaxing piano music was played in the computer to support them focusing on doing a mindfulness printed worksheet.
ART
