September 2012

28 September 2012
Published: 28 September 2012

Last night we had a good turnout at the S1 Settling-In Evening.  It was lovely to meet so many new parents and it’s always nice to see some “old hands” as well.  Special thanks go to all the pupils who spoke and those who helped with front-of-house.  The school is only as good as our pupils and I think that we are in pretty good shape based on last night.

We had another well attended evening event on Tuesday when one of the Young Enterprise Teams held a fundraising Quiz Night.  There were moments when I was literally crying with laughter and whilst I was less than successful in the raffle (the PE staff cleared up), modesty prevents me from mentioning whose team won overall.

Other members of our community who have been “winners” are those who have done themselves proud in the Tyne and Esk Writers and the Library Service Young Writer of the Year Competition. There were 500 entries in total and although we didn't win, four of our pupils were short-listed:
Secondary Poetry (7 entries short-listed - 2 from Knox)
Cosmic Hill – Sophie Hay;
The Broken Heart, The Broken Mirror – Riona Bruce;
Secondary – Prose (8 entries short-listed - 3 from Knox)
The Shadow of the Beach and The Past – Riona Bruce;
A Matter Of Life Or Death – Caitlin Black;
Left behind – Charlotte Smith.
We will upload these pieces to the English Department section of the website over the next week.

Today we say goodbye to Mr Grant who leaves us to join the Science and Physics departments at Earlston High School.  He will be much missed by colleagues and pupils alike.  Mrs Johnston, a stalwart of the Office Staff is retiring today after 19 years.  We will miss her good humour, calm and common sense but wish her health and happiness as she joins her husband in retirement.
 

21 September 2012
Published: 21 September 2012

It’s always nice to start with some congratulations…
 

Firstly to the S4 Outdoor Challenge Teams:  Last Friday they did us proud, taking part in activities designed to promote independence, self-sufficiency and confidence.  The placings went as follows: 1st Place Knox Academy (Team 2)
Then:
2nd Place - Musselburgh Grammar School (team 2) 3rd Place - Ross High School 4th Place (joint) - Knox (Team 3) - Musselburgh Grammar School (Team 1) 6th Place - Knox (Team 1).

Secondly, three of our S3 pupils who are taking part in the Saltire Award received their first certificate crediting them with 10 hours’ of volunteering.

Well done one and all and huge thanks to the staff who supported each of the pupils in their endeavours.

 

More excitement is to come with the “Literacy Plus” volunteers who will be joining us for the first time in a couple of weeks.  Half a dozen or so people, are going to give up an hour (and in some cases, more) of their time every week to come in to support some of our S1-3 pupils in improving their literacy skills.  It is my aim to encourage and facilitate more community and parental involvement in the school, so if you have any ideas, please get in touch.

 

I am in the process of meeting up with S1 classes so that I can feed back to parents at the S1 Settling-In Evening on Thursday 27th September.  This is mainly an event for parents (although you can bring your youngster along with you, if you’d like) and usually lasts for an hour.  There will be an opportunity to ask questions and raise any concerns.  I look forward to seeing as many of the S1 parents there as possible – it’s a 6.30pm start.

 

The S6 go off to Dalguise for the Staff, S6 Weekend this afternoon.  I hope that the weather holds up, that said,  I can confidently forecast that a fine time will be had by all.  I suspect that there will be tales of derring-do on Monday morning and I look forward to hearing all about it.

Finally, we say "farewell" to Mr Andrew Lambert who leaves us today having been involved with Knox Academy as a teacher and Sports' and Physical Activities Coordinator on and off for the last five years.  We wish him well for the future.  We welcome Mr Steve Wands in his stead and look forward to working with him.

14 September 2012
Published: 14 September 2012

The Jewish festival of Rosh Hashanah will be celebrated between the 16th and 18th September this year (you can take the girl out of the RMPS classroom…) and that got me thinking about new starts.  We tend to leave starting afresh to significant times of the year and I wonder if we miss something by so doing.  I have been talking to the new S5 of late who, almost to a person, have commented on the intensity of S5 as compared to S4 and have said that they are working significantly harder than they expected to.  I suspect that there are some of them who are having “wobbles” wondering if they have chosen the right subjects, made the right choice to come back etc. and we have also had some pupils return to us this week having found that it wasn’t the right time to have left us after all.  Studying religions has shown me that there are actually many opportunities for new starts: the Muslim new year is on the 24th November, Hindi new year will be on the 11th April and for Therevada Buddhists it will be the 25th April next year.  So my message to all youngsters is to reflect on how the last four weeks have gone and to think about what they need to do to keep it going so well or to improve their experience – it’s never too late for a new start.
 

I took the opportunity to visit some S3 pupils in Science this week and came across pupils extracting DNA from kiwi fruit, making DNA helixes from marshmallows and Dolly Mixtures and working out whether you could snap a pencil in two using only three sheets of newspaper.  It seems that there was much learning and enjoyment to be had. 

Speaking of pleasant things, we received a heart-warming telephone call from an elderly lady in the community, thanking an anonymous pupil who helped her with her shopping in a local store at the weekend.  The lady wasn’t sure which year she was from but wanted to let us know that her efforts were really appreciated.  So whoever you are: well done!

 

Remember that the school is closed to pupils on Monday 17th and Tuesday 18th September.

7 September 2012
Published: 07 September 2012

Whilst visiting S2 classes this week I was particularly struck by the need for pupils to transfer skills across their learning.  I visited the Home Economics Department where I witnessed pupils making lentil soup (must remember that it’s the carrot that I check to see if the soup is done).  Later on in the week I headed up to Science where the pupils were doing an experiment and the teacher told them to “follow the recipe” – I had never really thought of it like that and it was interesting to see some pupils who had been very organised in their soup making being less so when it came to a science experiment.  Perhaps it’s all in the words we use to get our point across, and helping pupils to make connections between the different things that they learn.  That said, the pupils were working independently and learning from their mistakes, which is surely one of the best lessons for life beyond school.

I was delighted to welcome Sir Garth Morrison, the Lord Lieutenant of East Lothian into school on Tuesday for a brief meeting.  We talked of many things and it is one of my aims to get more members of the community into the school to see what we do and to learn why we do them.

The Parent School Partnership met for the first time this session on Wednesday night.  The issues discussed were diverse, ranging from the hand driers in the boys’ toilets and dress code to the recent exam results.  As problems with the Edubuzz platform persist the PSP website is inaccessible.  Please do not unsubscribe from it and if you need to get in touch with the PSP feel free to send correspondence to the school (either on paper or via email) and we will make sure that the message gets through.
 

 

Reminder: the school will be shut to all for the September Holiday on the 17th, and to pupils on the 18th as it is an in-service day for staff.