Regents Review Winter '17

The Regents Review Winter 2017

DEPARTMENTAL NEWS Mathematics Innovative Teaching Week In November, the mathematics department took part in innovative teaching week along with all subject areas of the school. As part of this week Year 8 focused on deep end instructions. One question asked was ‘how much maths can you get from looking at a tube of Smarties?’ Students were given a tube of Smarties and a piece of paper. Students worked independently and creatively to answer questions, coming up with lots of different ways to apply their maths skills to Smarties.

Pi Club After the Christmas break Year 11 students will have the opportunity to attend mathematics breakfast revision sessions, fondly known as Pi Club, during the spring term. This will help them to prepare for their Pre Public maths exams in March as well as the lead up to their GCSEs in the summer of 2018. Students can come along to room 32 from 7.50am on Thursday mornings to benefit from this extra help but should also be revising independently at regular intervals at home, reviewing an array of topics covered over the past four years with particular attention given to those highlighted in the recent mock examinations as an area of weakness. Each student will be receiving an individual feedback sheet based on their performance in the mock examinations to indicate areas of strength and weakness. Students can then use resources available on and downloadable from the student drive as well as purchase revision guides and/or the Practice Papers Plus book from the school office (priced at £2.50).

Numeracy Ninjas This is an initiative which was introduced last year and one which we have implemented to help improve students’ basic skills. Students in Year 7 have really enjoyed tackling Numeracy Ninjas as their daily starter and are keen to see which belt they have achieved. Each year the GCSE examiner’s report highlights the impact of poor basic skills in leading to errors and we feel that the work we are doing, coupled with students’ own independent work to improve their times tables, multiplication and division, will be key in enabling students to make good progress in mathematics and, consequently, enable them to face the challenges of the new GCSE with increased confidence. Students in Year 8 now have a weekly Numeracy Ninjas lesson within their tutor time to continue their hard work from Year 7 on Numeracy Ninjas and it will be interesting to see the impact of this work within their maths lessons. This term we are celebrating the following students from 7BZ and 7GZ who have been working really hard on their Ninjas and have been improving week on week.

Mrs Barnes: 7BZ

Miss Ruberry: 7GZ

Ani Doncheva Artur Krassavin Wanessa Ostrowska Emily Goard Simone Sopterean Hannah Mole-Collins

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