This year has been an amazing academic year at Meden School; students have worked incredibly hard and achieved so much. Reading through the stories in our newsletter is a wonderful reminder of some of the amazing things that happen at Meden School on a weekly basis.
The end of the academic year is the perfect opportunity to celebrate the successes of our students and recognise the hard work they have consistently achieved. The Meden Celebration Evening we hold every year enables us to celebrate students who have shown excellent Attitude to Learning throughout the year. It was a great evening, full of both celebration and reflection with so many remarkable individual student successes. It was a privilege to be joined by guest speaker, Danielle Brown, who inspired us all with recounts of her amazing Olympic career against all the odds.
Meden Prom is the highlight of every year for our year 11 students and staff. It was amazing to see our Y11 students dressed to impress at Thoresby Hall and enjoying every minute of the evening. They were able to let their hair down and celebrate the end of exams with their friends. Their conduct was impeccable, and they did themselves proud on such a wonderful occasion. We wish them all the best for the future and look forward to seeing many of them return to Meden College this September.
As our Year 11 students have left us, we prepare for the arrival of over two hundred new students in Year 7 and it was great to meet them during our transition days and to welcome them into the Meden Community. They were incredibly enthusiastic during all activities and lessons and demonstrated an excellent Attitude to Learning. We cannot wait to see them all in September in their new uniform and to hear about their summer adventures.
The end of term signifies the end of an era for the members of staff who leave us to enjoy retirement or to go on to pastures new. This term we sadly say goodbye to the following members of staff:
We are truly grateful for all for their hard work and contributions to the community at Meden School and wish them every success and happiness for the future.
Being oversubscribed yet again this September , we have also had to expand our staff team at Meden School, and we are looking forward to welcoming the following staff to the Meden Community in September:
Finally, it is important to appreciate our Meden students, of whom we are extremely proud. They have continued to conduct themselves with determination, understanding, and respect. Their unwavering dedication to working hard and being kind cannot be overstated. Working together to support our students is so important and I would like to thank each and every member of our school community for their continued commitment and support of our school.
I wish you all a lovely summer break and I hope you are able to spend some quality time with loved ones.
I look forward to seeing everyone back at school in September for another fantastic year at Meden School.
Best wishes
"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more you learn, the more places you’ll go." – Dr Seuss
WRITING COMPETITION
Students in Year 8 and 10 have been working on their own creative writing stories to be entered into a competition to get their book published. After weeks of judging, we finally have the results:
YEAR 8:
YEAR 10:
Winners have received a copy of their book, a voucher and certificate which has been provided my Mansfield Building Society. In addition, a company called B Jephson were blown away with our entries and generously donated £1000 to spend on new books for our library. Well done Meden & thank you local businesses!
Here is a link to the work they have produced: WRITING COMPETITION WINNERS
As a school, we are incredibly proud of our talented students. We are passionate and keen to share the students creative flares - judging was difficult due to the amount of entries we received and the high bar of talent! Thank you to all that entered. We look forward to next years story competition!
THE BIG READ
This term students in all year groups have taken part in their termly BIG READ. During the big read sessions students have had the opportunity to read and listen to staff read while they follow the text. They were then be given the opportunity, via the big read sessions to explore the big ideas in the text and learn more about what it can teach us about the world. To celebrate pride month, we read a selection of LGBTQ+ texts.
KS3 read an extract from the novel Love Frankie, plus a comic extract from Heartstopper and discussed challenges and stereotypes that the LGBTQ+ community still face.
KS4 read and discussed recent news articles focused on where in the world it is still illegal to be non-heterosexual and also an article that looked at how the UK is celebrating pride month this year and the importance of the event.
DID YOU KNOW
"Not reading at the expected level puts children at an increased risk of experiencing unemployment and poor health as adults."
"Technology can provide a route into reading for traditionally reluctant less engaged readers."
"Strong reading skills have been shown to improve children’s academic attainment across a range of subjects, including English, maths and science"
National Literacy Trust
Here is also a link to the National Literacy Trust website to helpful tips and information https://literacytrust.org.uk/
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT READING RECOMMENDATIONS
Each term, recommended reading lists will be shown here to support with your child's curriculum in school.
This term we have recommended additional reading for students to delve into from the English department. CLICK TO ENLARGE
THE LEARNING ZONE (LIBRARY)
CAN YOU HELP SUPPORT OUR LIBRARY?
STUDENT LIBRARY NEWSLETTER
Our talented Student Library Association have compiled a newsletter of their own.
Please click on the link below to read the full article.
This half term saw the whole country voting in the elections, so as part of the Personal Development sessions at Meden School we wanted to educate the students and give them the opportunity to take part in Mock Elections in school.
The votes were submitted and 89% of students took part. The results were as follows:
What a great experience for the students and one which doesn't happen that often. The local media got hold of our campaign and asked if they come in to school and talk to some of the students for the local BBC news.
BBC FILMING
On June 24th, Meden students met with a news and current affairs producer from the BBC, learning how to shoot television programmes and think about what could be captured at Meden for a transformation project later in the year.
The producer was so impressed with the mock election plan and the filming the students captured that he visited Meden on July 9th to interview them about what they'd learned, why young people voting matters, and how they felt about the whole experience - with the footage airing on BBC East Midlands.
Being on television is daunting for anyone, yet the students were so confident and articulate, offering some brilliant insights and reflections about the electoral process and how their Personal Development sessions supported them. What a wonderful experience having Meden students seen and heard across the entire region!
A huge well done to everyone involved. You've made yourselves, your families, and the school very proud!
Local MP Visit
Following the elections we were contacted by local MP Steve Yemm who wanted to visit the school. It was a pleasure to welcome him and whilst here he took the opportunity to meet students and staff and talk about how he may be able to support the school.
This academic year has been filled with so many opportunities for our students to escape the classroom and be educated elsewhere and this term has been no exception
AMEY CHALLENGE CUP
The “Amey Challenge Cup” was first held in 2015 and aims to showcase engineering as an exciting career choice for girls. A group of our Y9 students attended this event where they got to participate in an “Apprentice” style engineering challenge in their team of girls with prizes at stake.
The girls, as you can see not only learned alot from their experience but also had a great time!
EMPOWERING POTENTIAL
This half term we sent two groups of students to Melton Vale Post 16 centre to join hundreds of students from each of our trust schools for a day of networking, aspirational talks and activities.
The programme, which was fully funded by DANCOP (Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Collaborative Outreach Partnership) was aimed at being able to support all students to make informed choices about their future.
DUKE OF EDINBURGH
Students working towards their Bronze DofE award, certainly had the weather on their side as they completed their compulsory expedition earlier this half term. The DofE scheme is growing in number with an increased amount of students beginning their bronze award in the new academic year. The new year will also see some of the bronze award students complete their silver award
The DofE experience is an amazing opportunity for students and it helps them to grow and challenge themselves in so many ways that traditional classroom education cannot achieve. It is pleasing to see the scheme grow and become increasingly popular with students.
GEOGRAPHY FIELD TRIP
As part of their GCSE Course in Geography, students in Y12 visited Castleton in the Peak District. During what was a lovely day, students measured the river level at different sites and investigated the impact that tourism has had on the town.
It is always a wonderful experience for students to put the theoretical content of the course in to practice as they participate in hands on investigations.
CHOOSING BOOKS FOR THE LIBRARY
Student librarians and competition winners were given the opportunity to visit the Education Library Service to choose some new books for our school library
The students were overwhelmed by the choice available and had a great time choosing.
This half term has been a great term for the library and we have received some much needed financial donations to help us restock our library and encourage students to read.Local resident
Mr Purvis kind donated a number of items to school recently and due to his love of reading wanted to give to our students by way of a donation of to help us buy more books.
Are you interesting in supporting reading at Meden School? Why not Sponsor a shelf. Contact rkennedy@medenschool.co.uk for more information
A LEVEL BIOLOGY GO TO WALES
A Level biologist visited Wales during the last week of term to conduct a 3 day field work study as part of their course. Students from both Garibaldi and Meden visited The Drapers Field Centre, Betws-y-Coed where they spent 3 day completing studies, investigations and learning more about sampling and collecting data for their studies. The trip involved students
The work the students completed on the trip will enhance their knowledge and will give them a better understanding of the types of investigations they would have previously only been taught in a classroom environment.
SEND STUDENT IN SKEGNESS
The last week of term the whole Inclusion Team and some of our most vulnerable learning were given the opportunity to leave sunny Warsop and head for the coast. With many of our students rarely leaving the village, this trip gives our students an experience that some of them may never have.
Students and staff enjoy a fish and chip lunch and time to spend on the attraction there. What a great day!
It was great to see so many of you at our showing of Matilda Jr and what a treat it was!
We noticed that many of you just couldn't resist dancing and singing along with the performance. It was wonderful to see.
We were sold out on both evenings and the students put on a great show. Here are some photos.
Huge congratulations to all those involved, not just the main cast but everyone who played a part behind the scenes.
PRIZES WINNERS
Meden Matilda Reading Challenge
This term, the library ran a reading challenge linked to the school's production of Matilda. Students were given a list of Matilda's top 10 favourite books and asked how many they had read or could read before the production's opening night. We had over 40 book reviews completed and our WINNER was Lailah Gill in Year 7 having read and completed 7 book reviews!
Well done to Lailah and our runners Lucy Moody and Miley Wright.
Quiz winners
Winners of the prizes for the quizes have been notified but I still have a couple of prizes uncollected for
Ethan Middleton Aged 15
Elsie Kennedy aged 6
Please get in touch with office@medenschool.co.uk to arrange collection over the summer.
COMING NEXT....students will be back next year with another exciting performance...watch this space!
If you took the opportunity to visit our annual Art Gallery this half term you will agree that we have some incredibly talented artists at Meden School.
This year we were able to showcase work from all year groups and the range of styles and the quality of work was something we are very proud of at Meden School. Here are some examples.
Year 7 work
Year 8 work
Year 9 work
PRIMARY ART
As part of the Y6 Transition work with Sherwood Junior School, Mr Smith and Mrs Streets were invited along to complete the difficult task of judging an art competition they had been doing. Some of the art work is amazing and we look forward to working with al the students when they arrive with us in September.
Aren't they brilliant!
Well done Jude!
Firstly we just wanted to congratulate Jude Stvenson who we featured in our last newsletter for winning gold in Hungary in Kickboxing.
Just a few days ago Jude competed at the BMF MMA show in Barnsley which is the biggest junior Mixed Martial Arts show in the uk and won his competition
Congratulation Jude!
OTHER SPORTS NEWS
ROUNDERS - Year 7 and 8
On Wednesday 3rd July, a group of Year 7&8 students went to Quarrydale school to compete in a mixed rounders tournament.
7 school attended in total: Meden, Quarrydale, Brunts, Jo Whit, Selston, Sutton and Kirkby
We played Brunts and Kirkby first. The team won both games and therefore qualified for the final v Selston.
Through some magnificent fielding, tactics and teamwork......the group ended up winning the tournament
MANSFIELD SCHOOLS ATHLETICS
On Saturday 8th June, a few Y10 students went to represent 'Mansfield schools' at the 2024 Athletics county championships. This was based at Harvey Haddon stadium in Nottingham.
Students had qualified for this event by finishing 1st or 2nd in the Mansfield schools sports day a couple of weeks ago up at Berry Hill.
Students involved- and event they had qualified for.
Henry won the bronze medal in the javelin.
Emma won the silver medal in the 100m and won gold in the 200m.
Both Henry and Emma will now complete at a competition in Stoke on Saturday 15th June representing 'Nottingham schools' in an East Midlands wide event.
Well done to all those involved, what a great achievement!
SPORTS DAY
We finally got to have our annual Sports Day, full of fun, great competitive spirit and a chance for our athletics to show their skills.
Thank you all for your impeccable team spirit, we hope you had a great day.
Thanks to Mr Sylvester aka DJ Fade for entertaining us and to the local residents for tolerating our noise!
In order to streamline communication with school we have created some dedicated email addresses that you can use to communicate with key staff from September.
Hopefully by using email to communicate more non urgent matter, it will help to free up the phone line that can often get very busy.
Please also remember that a lot of information is available at your fingertips via your MCAS app. Please take the time to download the MCAS PARENT APP as we will be using the app more often to communicate messages to you.
All the information you need to set this up is on our website CLICK HERE
As with all communications, we aim to respond within 1 working day wherever possible but during busy times this may take slightly longer. Often though we can respond within a few hours depending on the time of day but for teaching staff it can often take longer depending on their teaching commitment that day.
MCAS APP
I cannot stress the importance of you accessing the MCAS app. If you haven't already downloaded it please do this asap. This spp is your window in to your child at school and you have the following information at your finger tips
From September we will be sending you less text messages and more notifications through the app so to ensure you do not miss anything, please download the app in readiness for September.
Instructions are on our website. CLICK HERE
If you don't know your password then use your email address and click on the forgotten password link. If we have your up to date information you will be sent a link to reset.
Email office@medenschool.co.uk with any queries.
LETTERS TO PARENTS
I appreciate that at certain times of the year we have lots of information that we share with our parents/carers and understand that it may seem a lot.
I wanted to remind you that all the key letters that are sent via email to you are stored on our website in the Letters to Parents section
Go to www.medenschool.co.uk
Click on INFORMATION
Then LETTERS TO PARENTS
You reach this page https://www.medenschool.co.uk/page.php?p=letters
Each of the key letters is listed here for you to access - we will be adding to these regularly
Meden School
Train to teach with the Nottinghamshire Torch SCITT