Crammy Wipeout Project

What a great project:  learn about maths, athletics, nutrition, fitness to create an assault course at school:

Find out more here:   http://crammywipeout.weebly.com/

The project team have a great strapline:

'Whatever the weather, we're in it together'

"I want to take it home and stick it on my wall"

I've just been told that the student in the "Wind power? I`m a massive fan" project. wants creating this, wants to "take it home and stick it on my wall". This is true student ownership and engagement. This student is one of a small group who have asked if they can present at the school Teachmeet tonight to showcase their work. Of course they can!

I can wait to hear how and why they have been completely sol on this project and all it's technical glories. 

Photos of Project Fortnight

Project Fortnight - Week 1 Look Back from matthewtechno

Military Marching Band

The Military Marching Band gets some expert tuition from the Drum Major of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.

Scences from Project Fortnight

Great scences from the school yard. The life as a professional athlete project running Grid Iron drills, and the Military Music Project practising marching, before marching with instruments. I love the range of activities, the challenge and the attention to detail in this short video clip. 

Resilience

I witnessed a wonderful display of resilience yesterday, the "knitters" in the Science Learning Plaza were a picture of concentration and dedicated practice. Although they said it was frustratingly difficult they did not let this get in the way if them practising or anyone else.  

What has worked well in the Project Launch? How do you know?

Here's a selection from around project fortnight:

1.       The dog agility session, letting kids have a go at ‘crufts’ after practising dog obedience in the morning session

Students are enjoying starting their learning journey in their journals. The project launched with a visit from the deputy head of the school we will be visiting and she introduced the school and project to the students. They had a wealth of questions and were visibly excited about the project. Today, students have conducted their own research into the different types of SEN they will work with when at the school. They have also begun to learn Makaton, to the Mr Tumble ‘Hello Song’. 

Cinema inspiration and talking of personal experiences to get the students ‘hooked.’ They’re highly motivated because they see building the assault course as a challenge and have taken ownership of it.

The transport media team  have been thrilled at the manner in which the Y9 lads have organised themselves. A full class discussion about what would equate to success with this project produced broad areas of interest. The lads then placed themselves into these broad groupings and came up with a mini action plan. The quality of their thinking was really good and they thought laterally too, coming up with ideas we had not thought of. The groupings were fair in number and composition, which was also a bonus. Andrew Soulsby blew me away by suggesting he follow a “producer/director” role, advising some groups and facilitating others. All in all, a really positive start, as the structure worked the way we hoped, but without us having to impose it.

 I was impressed by everyone's commitment - they're all more than happy to 'muck in' and seem fired up by the competitive element & the idea that we're up against other schools, therefore what we produce must be top quality. 


We used Video connect, followed by compare and contrast recycling vs upcycling (students make connections and clarify their definition of upcycling). Literacy taboo allowed students to develop their understanding of key vocabulary, as well as break the ice within their new groupings. During the design session students were able to not only select raw materials, but give justifications as to the wider implications of the project in terms or economic value, artistic creativity and sustainability.

To launch our project we showed news articles/ real stories of people surviving in the wilderness. We then did a continuum line to see wether the students would do that to survive. This seemed to hook the students into the project as well as linking it to the hunger games. 

A great selection of projects

Students in year 7 , 8 and 9 have been able to choose from a wide range of teacher designed projects. each students pick their preferred three and we endeavour to get every student one of these choices.

Project warm up

The "Break Out" project encourages an active and healthy lifestyle.   Here they are using the field the get students warmed up and ready for learning during their launch this morning.

A great Project Introdcution

I loved the introduction to this project, which just goes to prove you  can study the world through just about anything.

The students are studying world war one, particularly on a local level. The students are producing a cycling map, which sets up trails that then inform visitors of local history. The combination of content knowledge, engaging activities and a purposeful product are all key motivational strategies for this project.
This slide show highlights the big picture of the project, has teaching prompts and questions to teach the content, highlights and makes relevant enticing trips out on bikes, and includes the practicalities to make the project run smoothly.

What a great way to learn history and about your local area.

Project Introduction- World War One on a bike from DKMead

School as Base Camp

Over the next two weeks Project Fortnight will undertake 63 trips from school, including the World Challenge trip to Ghana. Some are on foot, some visit our project "clients", some are active, some are artistic, some are cultural, some are community ventures, some are fact finding trips. All are part of engaging students in schooling and are opportunities to think like geographers, runners, entrepreneurs, writers, artists, scientists, horticulturists, designers, cyclists, musicians, historians etc.

The idea of "school as base camp" is not a knew one, but has been summarised neatly by  Learning Futures  defining it as :
School as ‘Base Camp’: A genuine 21st century school should be a base camp rather than a single destination – a place where students meet to explore learning opportunities that take them into their communities, onto the web, and to local businesses and employers. It should also be a hub that creates connections with families, and with learning partners beyond school.


Stay tuned for updates from the trips to find out what the students learn as a result of them.