Weekly Newsletters

• Open Classrooms – an initiative whereby teachers welcome colleagues into their classrooms over the course of a two week period with the aim of sharing best practice
• Teaching Trios – a series of meetings and lesson observations involving three teachers from different Faculties across the school designed to promote collaboration and reflective practice
• ‘Come Teach with Me’ – a Ken Stimpson take on the popular TV show with the focus being on learning rather than fine dining!

They also shared a report on the impact of these initiatives on the quality of learning at our school since last September and our proposed next steps to improve things even further.

The evening concluded with the parents and carers present providing us with some feedback on a survey that we intend to publish soon regarding the most effective practice at Progress Evenings.  We are currently involved in an international project to gather information on high quality parent consultation events.

Please note that our final Parents’ Surgery of this academic year will take place on Wednesday 22 June – 18:00 until 19:00.

Year 8 Progress Evening

Thank you to all the parents and carers who attended this week’s Year 8 Progress Evening.  We know that parental support is one of the strongest indicators of a child’s good performance at school, therefore we really do appreciate you showing your support.  Attendance on the night was 72% with Excellence House recording the highest attendance on the night. 

Middle Leader Meetings

At the end of every half-term, I meet with every Middle Leader within school (Heads of Faculty and Heads of House) to discuss the progress of the students within their care.  This is a large commitment in terms of time but the information that is shared always proves to be invaluable.  We use these meetings to share important data about the performance of individual students in every one of their subjects and highlight where they are performing particularly well or need to improve.  We also use these meetings to highlight excellent practice and share this across other Faculties or Houses within the school.

Best wishes

Richard Lord
Principal

During the glorious sunshine, we were able to get all our questions answered about both the academic and social aspects of being a university student from an SU representative, as well as taking part in a political lecture on race in America and coming up with our own political examples of spoken word. We even managed to squeeze in eating an ice-cream when on a tour of the whole university campus!

All in all, everybody seemed to enjoy the activities on offer and agreed they had all learnt something new about university across the busy day. Ten out of the twelve attending students also now feel they may consider university study in the future! Following the success of the trip, we hope to work with the University of Warwick again in the future in delivering a different experience of education to more of our students at KSCS!

Emma Donohoe
Learning Mentor

1) Learn your key terms, definitions and formulae. You will certainly have to define at least 5 key terms in Paper 1 and if I were a betting man rather than an economist, I would have a tenner on you needing to use at least two of the ratios in either Paper 1 or Paper 2.

2) Revise the key differences between similar terms. Can you explain the differences between a private limited company and public limited company? What about the private vs public sector? Or how about the differences between the primary, secondary and tertiary sectors or job, batch and mass / flow methods of production? Or gross and net profit? You get the picture! Students typically get these types of concepts confused and as such they are popular examination fodder with examiners - do not fall into their trap!

3) Attempt every question and do not leave blank spaces! A lot of Business Studies is common sense, so if in doubt, have a guess. Leaving a blank is the only guarantee of 0 marks!

4) When you sit Paper 2, remember that there are at least 15% of the marks for APPLICATION to the case study. These are easy marks but you must use the insert you are provided with on the day. Highlight the key information and use it to improve your answers. Remember, do not use the words 'product' or 'services' but refer to the specific product or service the business provides, whether that be tools, suits, hotel rooms, boat hire or whatever this year's case study refers to.

5) Make use of your revision guide,  exercise books, class notes and past examination papers. By now you should all have taken home your various exercise books, folders and past examination papers completed as PPEs and for homework. Make sure you read through your books and notes, highlighting the key terms and definitions. Have a look at your past papers and see where you lost easy marks - do not make these same mistakes again! You should also spend some time reading your CGP Revision Guide and on the internet making use of the excellent online resources, including those from SAM Learning, Business Studies Online, BBC Bitesize and Tutor2u. However don't waste your time playing the silly online games - revision doesn't have to be boring but it needs to be productive!

Finally, I will be available this Friday and next Friday afternoons (3.20 - 5.30) and on Sunday mornings (15/05/14 and 22/05/14) between 9.00 and 12.00 for some final revision (Paper 1 this week, Paper 2 next week). 

Good luck and remember, proper preparation prevents poor performance!

Kevin Abbott
Assistant Principal