Weekly Newsletters

For the best part of an hour and a half we visited many classrooms and met many students and staff causing me to glow inside.  Why?  First of all the quality of teaching and learning was so focused.  Members of staff attentive in all sorts of capacities to personalise learning.  The level of care and interest was equally high, members of staff committed to looking after our students and supporting them in a wide range of ways that is too broad to mention in this newsletter.  Finally, I felt a deep pride in the way our students, potentially your child, showed such a wonderful level of politeness, engagement and care for the school as a matter of common practice.

On departure the visitors shared with me their glowing comments and it left a lasting impression on me,  sharing this so publicly.  I am proud to come to work to make our school a better place every day.  We are so fortunate to have the richness of the four most vital ingredients that make a good or better school:

1. High quality teaching staff
2. Superb students
3. Engaging and committed parents/carers
4. Quality provision

I look forward to seeing some parents at the Year 11 Progress Evening on Tuesday 20th March.  If you have not yet booked appointments then I urge you to do so as the evening is aimed at closing any gaps in the next two months before the start of the public examinations.  Please click here to access our online parents booking system.

Please note that the school will close at 3.15pm on Thursday 29th March for the Spring holiday.  All students return on April 16th at the normal school time.

Best wishes

Bryan Erwin
Principal

A creature so amazing you cannot forget it!

Being one of the largest animals on the planet can sometimes have its challenges from eating enough food to maintaining an ideal level of body heat. It’s safe to say that each of these animals have very different techniques to facing these ever present obstacles but maybe the most significant of these belong to the largest land mammal of all, the elephant! The elephant is distinguished by its high level of intelligence, methods of communication, complex social structure and interesting behaviour…

Imagine weighing over 12 tonnes and having to live in the African savannah where the sun is constantly beaming down on you, chances are that you will start to get very hot very quickly which is very dangerous and could even lead to death. Unfortunately, unlike humans, elephants do not have as many sweat glands as they need to counteract the constant heat. Instead they have evolved to have the fascinating ability of creating hot spots throughout their bodies where the blood is moved closer to the surface of the skin, which enables heat to be lost much more efficiently. In addition to this, elephants have two other ways of keeping cool: ear flapping, which creates a breeze around the elephant, and bathing, as the water from this produces a cooling effect when it evaporates from the creature’s skin. With all of these techniques added together elephants are able to keep their body temperature at a constant 36°c.

The most important thing to any elephant, of any species, is family. They will form deep bonds between one another and create very close knit groups of related females called a herd (male bulls tend to be very solitary). These family groups are led by an older, more dominant female called a ‘matriarch’. When on the move, elephants will travel in single file led by the matriarch, calves will hold on to the tails of their mother for both protection and to prevent getting lost. The most intriguing aspect of these groups is their ability to grieve for loss. Much like humans, when an elephant dies the rest of the group have been known to remain in the spot during a mourning period that can last for several days. Telltale signs of this grief can be sad eyes and drooping ears even to the extent of an obvious expression upon the elephant’s face.

Finally, the last issue that elephants have to face is how to talk to each other and the way they overcome this is truly fascinating. They use a combination of verbal and non-verbal methods. When saying they are very verbal animals I am not exaggerating, loud trumpeting sounds can be heard across the savannah signifying to just about everyone their excitement. These sounds can also be used to alert others to danger or even aggression depending on their frequencies. Scientists have also discovered that it is very common for elephants to generate sound that can be heard for several miles further re-enforcing my earlier point. Despite being well versed with their voices, when it comes to non-verbal communication the humble elephant exceeds expectations. If they come across another of the herd elephants can be seen to wrap their trunks around each other, similar to how we would give our family and friends hugs as a sign of affection. Speaking of trunks, elephants can use the way they hold their trunks to give messages to others, for instance a male elephant will raise his trunk if threatened or if posing a challenge himself, yet if a trunk is hanging downward this usually means that an elephant is in a friendlier, hospitable mood!

Mrs Young
Subject Teacher: Science