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HEAD TEACHER'S NEWSLETTER
It was apt that in the week that included United Nations Day, our House assemblies focused on the importance of Children’s Rights outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the work we will be doing to achieve the Silver Rights Respecting Schools Award. More detail is noted below.
School was busy with S1 Parents’ Evening and Study Skills for Senior Phase, with several further information sessions for parents coming up in the next few weeks too.
I meet with the Head Pupil team fortnightly and this morning’s agenda was busy. We discussed Children in Need fundraising plans for 17 November, the final arrangements for next Thursday’s Fright Night, anti bullying ideas, how to address some anti social behaviour in the toilets, Pupil Voice assemblies, the prefect lunch duty rota, the busyness of the canteen, and Remembrance Day plans in school and at The Mall.
It’s always a pleasure to end my week discussing various important issues with such a mature, enthusiastic and solution focused group of young people.
Wishing you all a lovely weekend,
Jodie Hannan
Key Dates
Tuesday 31 October: Musselburgh Learns S1 Maths for parents, carers and S1 pupils 6.30-7.30pm
Wednesday 1 November: Senior Phase Curriculum evening for all parents and carers of S4-S6 pupils 6-7pm
Thursday 2 November: Fright Night for S1 pupils 6.30-8.30pm
Tuesday 7 November: Musselburgh Learns N5 and Higher Maths for parents, carers and S4-S6 pupils 6.30-7.30pm
Tuesday 14 November: Employability and Pathways evening for all S1-S6 parents and pupils
Staff
Welcome to ...
Mrs T Forgan who joins us in the office: it’s great to have her on our team.
Farewell to ...
Mr Dias, English, who leaves us next Friday for a permanent post at Broughton High School. Thanks to Mr Dias for all his hard work this year and we wish him well with the next steps in his career. This temporary full time post will be advertised shortly.
Maths S1 Musselburgh Learns
On 31st October from 1830 to 1930 there will be an opportunity for S1 Students and their parents to come to school for an event focussed on promoting mathematics and numeracy. There will be an introduction from Mr Harpham about the aims of S1 Mathematics this year. Following this there will be an opportunity to do some mathematics in a parent/child partnership. There will also be a handy booklet to take away that will help with methods of learning maths in S1.
Musselburgh Learns: Senior Phase Curriculum Evening
Wednesday 1st November 2023
All parents/Carers of S3, S4 and S5 pupils are invited to attend our senior phase curriculum information and Q&A evening on Wednesday 1st November from 6-7pm.
The format of the evening will include a brief introduction from the Headteacher, a presentation outlining our curriculum model, a panel question and answer session with Curriculum and Pupil Support Leaders and informal conversations with refreshments.
In advance of the evening and to ensure that we are targeting areas that parents/carers are most keen to hear about, please submit question/s using the QR code below. These questions will be directed to the appropriate Curriculum or Pupil Support Lead and answered in person on the evening or afterwards in writing with all parents.
Some of our most common questions relate to understanding what a subject involves, how parents can support their children at home and where to access study materials. However, we would like to hear what is most important to you. Please use the QR code below to submit your question/s, these must be submitted by Monday 30th October 2023.
Musselburgh Learns
Learning in Musselburgh isn’t just for the pupils! This week, five of our Curriculum Leaders worked in school with four Curriculum Leaders from Dunbar Grammar with a focus on self evaluation, how we observe learning in classrooms, how we give feedback to encourage excellent learning and teaching and working with the language of HMIe (His Majesty's Inspectors of Education). Staff were able to visit a range of classrooms and discuss techniques to provide feedback to staff with ways to improve how young people learn and improve their attainment. We look forward to the second round of this collaboration in Dunbar later in the term.
Musselburgh Learns: Takeaway in 10
We know we have a wealth of teaching and learning knowledge and expertise in our school, and Monday’s Inservice day was an excellent opportunity to learn from a number of our colleagues in short workshops ranging from how to use Artificial Intelligence in classrooms, to retrieval practice, to maximising student engagement.
Staff feedback was incredibly positive, and we will continue to focus upon learning and teaching as our core business on every Inservice day. Our focus on learning and teaching this session will culminate at our Musselburgh Learns Festival collegiate session in May 2024.
Senior Phase Study Support Programme
Rights Respecting Schools
We have already achieved the Bronze award and used this short clip in assemblies to raise all pupils’ awareness of childrens’ rights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS-fdwNfg0o.
We are now working towards the Silver Award and will achieve this by advertising children’s rights in the newsletter; departments and faculties will link course topics into individual rights; pupils will continue to have a role promoting childrens’ rights at information evenings within the school, including setting up a RRS Information Stall; rights to be embedded on starter slides of each lesson across the school as well as at the beginning of all school presentations; we will have awareness days in the same style as existing European day of Languages, Black History month, World book day, LGBTQ events/activities through the year.
S1 Fright Night
Fright Night 2023: Thursday 2nd November, 6.30pm - 8.30pm. Tickets are £3 and available to buy on ipay - parents/carers have been emailed with details. S6 pupils have organised this event for S1 - there will be a disco, a haunted tour and a tuck shop (cash only).
Tech Donation Box - Edinburgh Remakery
This week we welcomed Asrar Qazi, the Carbon Project Officer at Edinburgh Remakery who was delivering our Tech Donation Box. Pupils will hear all about this next week during assemblies.
The boxes will stay in schools for around one month and will provide an easy and secure way for students and their families to donate their old personal tech devices to be refurbished and reused. Having these boxes placed in schools enables young people to become part of a project which encourages achievable actions that support the climate and help make Edinburgh a Greener City.
Our Assemblies next week will inform pupils about e-waste, its impact on the environment, and explain how the Tech Donation Boxes provide an achievable and accessible way people can take action, whilst promoting environmental sustainability and supporting our people and our planet. A portion of all the repairable devices that are donated to us are gifted for free to members of our community who are facing financial hardship in order to help them overcome digital poverty and social isolation.
In 2022, we saved 83,087kg (CO2e) in CO2 emissions – equivalent to 100 million smartphones being fully charged, or 1,400 trees grown for 10 years. If you have any old devices that you no longer use and would like to be part of this refurbishment project, please drop them into our Tech Donation Box at the front of the school.
Geography Trip
The geography teacher’s mantra of “there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing” played through my mind as we took our Higher and Advanced Higher students to the Water of Leith on Wednesday 25th October to complete a river study. Pupils certainly looked the part as they put on the waders, wellies and waterproofs with one student remarking “Miss, you must be in your Happy Place today!”. Although some pupils might have taken a bit of convincing that standing in the river in pouring rain was a good idea, by the end of the day many didn’t want to leave! Pupils spent the day learning fieldwork techniques, developing their knowledge and understanding of the hydrosphere and gathering data that can contribute to their coursework. We would like to thank Ruth at the Water of Leith Visitor Centre for her tuition and guidance on what was a fabulous day of outdoor learning at its best!
Mrs Orsi, Mrs Dias and Mr McNaught
Christmas Market Raffle Donations
This week our Inclusion and nurture groups have been out on the streets of Musselburgh handing out letters to local businesses asking for donations for our Christmas raffle. Our raffle will be drawn at the MGS Christmas Market on the 2nd December. So far, we have kindly been donated a gift voucher from Ravelston House, 10 gift vouchers from Bayne’s and a donation from Pound Stretchers. We really appreciate all support from our community and if you would like to donate a prize for our raffle you can hand donations into the school office or you can email Carrie McLean, Curriculum Leader Inclusion and Nurture, at admin@musselburghgrammar.elcschool.org.uk and we can arrange to pick up any donations. We thank you in advance for your support.
Blythswood Shoebox Appeal
URGENT - LAST CALL FOR DONATIONS!
We have 17 filled shoeboxes being collected at the end of next week. If you have a filled shoebox that you would like to donate, or items that could be put into boxes, please hand them in to school by WEDNESDAY 1st Nov at the latest. Items needed include: hat, scarves, gloves, toiletries. Please send donations in to Miss Ferguson, Mrs Dias or Mrs Orsi. Thank you for your support
SCP Update
SCP classes cancelled - Thursday 2nd November
SCP classes will not go ahead on Thursday 2nd of November with the exception of Languages and SCP ESOL as the College Graduation Ceremony is taking place and lecturers will be attending. All other SCP pupils should not attend college on this day. Where possible, lecturers will upload work/resources to Moodle or Teams for pupils to access remotely.
Please note that the Introduction to College (SCP) classes will still be going ahead at Milton Road on that day
ALL ELWorks courses (FA courses, Construction,etc…) are running as normal on that day.
Notes from the School Office
In order to reduce the number of absence texts going out to parents, please remember the following:
If your child is not attending school, we must be notified by 8.30am at the latest
If a pupil arrives or leaves at any time other than first thing/last thing, they must sign in and out of the building. This is also for fire safety reasons.
Thank you!
Sports Announcement
During Girls and Women in Sport week, Thea Cooke, Ellie Petrie and Hannah Scott were also away representing MGS in the Scottish Schools Road Race Championships at Pittencrieff Park, Dunfermline. All the girls' hard work at our running club sessions certainly paid off as they all achieved good results and had strong runs! Well done Thea, Ellie and Hannah!
If any pupil would like to start up running or develop their running technique our running club is on every Tuesday 3:45 - 4:45pm at Pinkie. For more information pop in and see Miss Hall in A45 or email on jhall1@elcschool.org.uk
Active Schools
Before the October break we celebrated Women and Girls in Sport Week (2nd to the 8th October). During this week we showcased our girls only sport and physical activities that already run here at MGS and invited pupils to come along and try them out! Our Young Ambassadors; Eleanor Myles and Summer Gargaro also ran some new girls only lunch time clubs, some of which were a roaring success and will now be part of our weekly offerings. It was great to see so many girls get active with us during this week and try out something new!
We still have lots of spaces left across our whole programme, and pupils can be signed up at any time throughout the school year, spaces permitting. For our full offerings please see our Active Schools timetable below:
Annual Young Entrepreneur Prize 2023
Debate Club
Debate club starts in Miss Dudley’s classroom (D3) every Wednesday lunchtime after the October holidays.
If you want to build your confidence, improve your speaking skills and want to be heard, debate club is for you. Debate club is an informal, fun club to help you get started with debating. Bring your lunch!
Lost Property
There are lots of items of lost property in the Medical Room. Please check if any of them are yours.
Employability Pathway 2023
Please save the date, all welcome. If you are a business or know of any businesses who would like to secure a spot. Please contact the school or alternatively email, employability@musselburghgrammar.elcschool.org.
Newsletter Archive
There's an archive section on the newsletter site with all of the previous newsletters organised by date. It can be viewed by clicking on 'Archive' in the menu or using this link: https://bit.ly/ht-newsletter-archive.
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