The first half term has gone so quickly, and it has been another busy one for all our students and staff. It is great to see how well our Year 7 students have settled into our school community. They have adapted brilliantly and shown an excellent attitude to learning in their first term. It was wonderful to see so many parents at the Tutor Information Evening at the start of the month. The partnership between school and home is crucial to the success of our young people.
Our Year 11 and Year 13 students have been working extremely hard in lessons and it is very clear they are committed to their studies and to being successful in the summer examinations. Last week we started the 100 school day count down to the summer exams and I took the opportunity to speak to students about what they can do to make the next 100 days count and what support is on offer. Mock exams are taking place on our return, for both Year 11 and Year 13 students. These are taking place a little earlier than last year so that students have more feedback and information about their achievement levels, before we enter the Christmas break. I know our students have been working hard towards these exams and I wish them good luck.
Our Year 5/6 Open Evening was a big success with over 400 people in attendance; it was standing room only! Once again it was a great evening with lots of activities for the children to get involved in. We continue to be oversubscribed in all year groups, which is due to the collaboration of our school community, our staff, students, parents and carers, who all work together to make Meden a school where young people want to come to learn and succeed.
I have seen so many examples of the hard work taking place in lessons and have been thrilled that so many students are taking advantage of the extracurricular opportunities on offer. The amount of ATL points given out to students is at a record high, with over 140,000 awarded so far! I am constantly amazed that the hard work and dedication they display in school, and this extends to the activities they enjoy outside of their school day. The response to our new Excellence Exhibition has been overwhelming. This is where, every week students can showcase work they are proud of and get 10 ATL points and positive text home. You can see a selection of this work in this newsletter. I am thrilled to see so many students who are as proud of their work as we are.
As we approach the start of a new term, we will be commemorating Remembrance Day as a whole school community, with a service of remembrance on Monday 11th November. The whole school community will observe 2 minutes silence, the last post will be played and our students leadership team will be reading poems of remembrance. As a school we feel that Remembrance Day is important. It gives us the opportunity to honour those who have served and sacrificed for their country and community and to pay tribute to the emergency services and their families. Any of our students who are in cadets, scouts, guides, St John’s, etc, are welcome to come into school wearing their uniform on Monday 11th November.
Finally, thank you all for your continued support of your children and our school. Enjoy your half term holiday!
kind regards
We see examples of amazing work every single day in school. From September we have launched our weekly Excellence Exhibition where students can gain recognition for the work they are most proud of.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
During lunch time on a Thursday each week, we set up our kiosk complete with balloons and funky music and encourage students to bring a piece of their work which they are proud of to show us. In exchange they receive a special Excellence postcard and a headteachers recognition award which is worth 10 ATL points
The number of students visiting us to show us their work has been phenomenal and we have seen so many different examples from every subject. It is amazing! Here are some examples of the great work demonstrated to us.
We are very proud of you! Keep working hard to be the very best you can be!!
MENTAL TOUGHNESS CURRICULUM
Since September 2024, every tutorial has been having 1 lesson of Mental Toughness
What is mental toughness?
Mental toughness is a combination of resilience and confidence. It is a state of mind and as such can be developed and improved?
Why is mental toughness important to us at Meden?
With rising mental health issues and pressures for our young people, we want to help to build mental toughness in our students. Mental toughness lessons at Meden will help students to build their resilience and the ability to bounce back from setbacks, and also, to help build their confidence and the ability to take advantage of opportunities. We want all our students to survive and thrive, not just whilst they are with us at Meden, but in their lives.
What do we do in the mental toughness lessons?
We focus on the 4 C's and helping students to ACT not APE.
We teach students explicit strategies of how to build their mental toughness, such as journaling, healthy habits, goal setting, positive words and self-care.
We do deep breathing to help reduce stress and anxiety, lower blood pressure and feel relaxation in times when they are overwhelmed
Try it - we do the box method
MENTAL TOUGHNESS MURAL
To promote our mental toughness curriculum, we have had some local artists Luke and James from iMAGESKOOL come into school, they did a design session with some KS3 art students and returned in October to spray paint an area of Meden School. The mural was fully designed by our students, based on the mental toughness curriculum and learning the science behind how we react to situations - our red brain and our blue brain!
The 'blue brain' where we are at our best – confident, collaborative and creative – and the 'red brain' where we become self-focused, impulsive and emotional, where we lack choice, linking to Meden's ACT not APE.
Big thanks to James and Luke from iMAGESKOOL!
Thank you to the students who designed and created our mural - we are very proud of it!
Attendance has always been important. Being in school is key, not just to academic performance but also for building confidence & improving resilience.
As you will be aware there is more focus than ever before on getting students to attend school and in August there were changes brought in by the DfE, around how schools must report attendance and fixed penalty notices.
Here is a link to our letter sent earlier this year if you missed it.
From September the way we report attendance to our parents/carers has changed.
Instead of giving you a percentage attendance for a period of time, we will now discuss your child's attendance to school in terms of
This is fully explained within the letter sent at the beginning of October. Here is a link in case you missed it.
14 day Attendance Challenge
To reward our students for consistently attending school, we launched our 14 day Attendance Challenge spanning the last 14 days of this half term. Students attending school every day up until the very last day of term, were entered in to a prize draw of their choice to be able to win one of the following prizes
Once all of the entries were in, the prize winners names were drawn.
Congratulations to the following students
“I have a passion for teaching kids to become readers, to become comfortable with a book, not daunted. Books shouldn’t be daunting, they should be funny, exciting and wonderful; and learning to be a reader gives a terrific advantage.” - Roald Dahl
WELCOME BACK TO SCHOOL: HERE IS A REMINDER OF OUR MEDEN READING MISSION
At Meden School, we aim to equip learners with knowledge, skills, and attributes to be able to do something about the injustices of the world. We aim to ensure our learners develop life-long reading, writing and oracy skills that allow them to communicate effectively in school, in the wider community and beyond.
BIG READ
Each half term, students take part in the Big Read. The big read sessions allow students to have the opportunity to read and listen to staff read while they follow the text. They will 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.
This half terms big read focus was on homelessness.
DID YOU KNOW?
Reading helps to support students beyond academic success:
Speech and Language Milestones:
Book Trust The Benefits of Reading
Here is also a link to the Book trust website for helpful tips and information www.booktrust.org.uk
RECOMMENDED READ FROM MRS GIBNEY 
Each term, staff from each subject will recommend books that will support students with their studies and that we believe students will enjoy. This term English Teacher and Head of KS5 English Mrs Gibney has given her recommendation:
"To Kill a Mockingbird is my all-time favourite book. I love how Harper Lee creates vivid characters through Scout and Jem with Atticus Finch being my favourite literary character. I feel it is important for everyone to read as it beautifully highlights the effects of racial discrimination. It's lessons are just as important today as they were during the 1960s."
LIBRARY
Library lessons are back this academic year and the students have been enjoying their class reads with their teachers. Here is a reminder of the library lesson structure:
What happens in Library lessons?
As such the library lessons are planned to in the following way:
CLASS READ - as a class, students read a chosen text. The book is read by the teacher as expert. This encourages enjoyment of the story and helps students to build on their vocabulary range.
ORACY TASK - students are encouraged to talk about an element of the class read, whether that be character development, plot twists and developments or central ideas and themes in the story. This supports students’ oracy skills whilst also allowing them to discuss key messages in the text. This ties into the whole school curriculum intent of challenging injustices and ‘doing something about them.’ The teacher provides prompts for this task.
BOOK PROMOTION - the librarian shares recommended reads to students to widen their reading choices and expose them to new genres. There is sometimes an opportunity for students to share their favourite books too.
INDEPENDENT READING - students are given the opportunity to read their own chosen text silently. This encourages independent reading and reading for pleasure. During this activity, some students will further develop their reading by buddy reading with a trained sixth form students or with their class teacher. This is targeted support based on the reading text data and helps students to develop their reading fluency.
GOLDEN TICKET REWARD - at the end of each lesson, golden tickets are awarded for fostering a love of reading, sharing their book choices with the class, and for buddy reading efforts.
Culture Cards were launched in September, a new and improved version of our old expectation card and they have been a real success.
Students have embraced the concept of the cards and we have replaced a whooping 3485 cards this half term and the majority of these are because they are filled with 2 positive signatures.
759 students have received at least 1 positive culture card; this compares to 242 who have received at least 1 negative card.
When a culture card is logged you will get a message to say this. Please ask your child for details of why the signature is given. It will only be for the categories below:
POSITIVE signatures are given for
Each card completed with 2 positive signatures = +5 ATL points.
NEGATIVE signatures are given for
Each card completed with negative signatures generates a same day 20 min detention and -1 ATL point.
More details can be seen on MCAS. Click on events to see a calendar with different colour marks for positives or negatives
Click on any of the coloured dates for more details:
STUDENTS LOGGING THE MOST CULTURE CARDS THIS HALF TERM
Here is the top 10 students who have received the most positive Culture Cards this half term.
Congratulations to...
ATL REWARDS
ATL reports will be uploaded to your MCAS portal and you will receive a text. The following students enjoyed a movie afternoon and treats last week for working really hard to gain an amazing ATL Score. Well done everyone!
The first fixture of the new academic year was away at Manor school with the Y8 Boys football team on Tuesday 18th Sept.
In a very close and tense game, the students battled bravely to come back from 1-0 down after 5 mins to then take a 2-1 lead into the last 10 mins! Manor got a penalty not long after to make it 2-2 and penalties looked set to separate the teams.
Unfortunately, with about 3 minutes to go, a Manor student was left unmarked in the box and finished the chance to make the end result 3-2 to Manor. Some very disappointed boys walked off the pitch!!
Well done to :
Y9 BOYS FOOTBALL
Mr Buxton guides a Year group to the first win of the year!
On Thursday 26th Sept, our Y9 boys raced over the Tuxford school to play in the first round of the Town Cup before needing to get back for open evening! It was a complete domination for the 50 minute game. One of the best school performances I have seen for many years and the whole team performed extremely well and go through to the next round.
Well done to the following students:
Special mentions to Tas for an amazing defensive display, Alfie E for running his socks off for the team and in particular Brandon W. Brandon was initially a sub and got very anxious and upset at the thought of coming on, making a mistake, and costing the team!
He used his mental toughness to get onto the pitch with about 5 minutes left and give it his all. A final special mention to Jenson H, who was also a sub at the time that Brandon was struggling and acted like a true positive role-model to tell Brandon everything would be OK!
Y9&10 GIRLS FOOTBALL SUCCESS
On Wednesday 2nd Oct, our Y9 & 10 girls faced Sutton academy in the first round of the Town Cup.
The girls conceded after 11 seconds, and the nerves began. Through hard work, determination and the Sutton goalpost/cross bar- the game stayed 3-3 for a long period of time. Our girls hard work eventually paid off- eventually winning the game 6-3. Goal scorers highlighted below!
The team now move into the ¼ final draw and 2 more games away from a final at Field Mill!
Well done to:
YEAR 10 BOYS FOOTBALL
Y10 boys had their football town cup fixture on Monday afternoon.
Playing the current Mansfield and Ashfield champions from Y9 was always going to be a tough game and Ashfield came with a weakened team. The lads went 2-0 down by half time and confidence was knocked. A third quickly followed in the second half....
....BUT the Meden lads showed some true grit and determination to stay in the game and scored 2 absolutely wonderful goals to set up a nervy finish to the game.
The match ended 3-2 to Ashfield.
Well done to the following:
YEAR 10 GIRLS NETBALL
Our Y10 girls enjoyed a very competitive netball tournament at Quarrydale School on Wednesday 16th Oct after school.
Playing against some very well-organised and competitive schools, they competed with great effort and teamwork throughout the 5 games they played. Drawing against Ashfield (who usually win most netball tournaments) was the highlight of the evening for us!
Well done to the following players:
YEAR 7 BOYS FOOTBALL
On Thursday 17th October, our Y7 Boys played their first ever fixture here at Meden school v Holgate in the Town Cup.
And what a game it was!!
1-0 down, 2-1 up and 3-3 by half time. Conceded early in the second half and were trailing 5-3 with about 10 minutes to go!
Two quick goals got us back in the game at 5-5 and the game went straight to penalties.
In a very tense penalty shoot out, unfortunately we ended up on the losing side with an 8-7 defeat.
An excellent performance by the team, who showed determination throughout. I anticipate a bright future ahead for this team. Fingers crossed! It's also pleasing to see a team made up of students from pretty much every class from M1-M7.
Well done to Mr Wiesztort for leading his first fixture so well!
Well played to the following students:
SHOT PUT SUCCESS FOR Y8 STUDENT
WELL DONE to Y8 Will Blagburn who achieved 3rd place for his Shot put performance in the Cleethorpes Open in September. As he continues to compete we will keep you updated with his achievements.
Keep up the good work Will, we are proud of you!
Here is a round up of some of the other amazing things happening around school this half term.
YEAR 9 SCIENTISTS GET HANDS ON
Year 9 students have been studying a topic about the Cardiovascular system. This involves learning the structure and function of the heart. Students got some hands on experience looking into the structure of a sheep's heart by conducting a dissection. Science experiments of this nature are invaluable to students as they enrich students' learning experience.
ECO WARRIORS
Students involved in Eco Warriors enrichment club, have harvested some great potatoes that were planted before the summer holidays. Next they hope to started planting some garlic. When not gardening, eco warriors lead our efforts on recycling and reusing in support of protecting our plane.
Are you interested in nature and doing what we can to protect our planet?
Join us on Tuesdays at 3:25pm or speak to Mr Sylvester for more information.
CAREERS IN THE ARMY
On 17th October, we welcomed in to school representatives from the Army to talk to students about the many opportunities available to them after they have completed their GCSE exams.
This was just one of the sessions offered to our students as part of our ongoing Careers Support.
If you need any further information regarding Careers support offered to students, then please contact Mr Hill. chill@medenschool.co.uk
EUROPEAN DAY OF LANGUAGES
LANGUAGES FOR PEACE
Congratulations to Will, who won the 'Languages for Peace' poster competition as part of the European Day of Celebrations.
Well done to the runners up Amelie and Willow.
DUOLINGO
Well done to Scarlett, Nevaeh, Nikita, Ruby, Erin, Morgan, Marina, Amy and Neo who all have over 100 days on Duolingo as part of European Day of Languages.
Winners - Morgan and Nikita who have over 500 days!
At Meden school we take every opportunity to show our support for worthwhile causes.
This half term the Meden College students organised an end of term event to raise money for Breast Cancer. There are so many worthwhile causes needing support and our choice this half term was a request from a student who has been personally affected by the horrible disease.
The cakes were a great success and sold very quickly.
THANK YOU FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO KINDLY DONATED CAKES FOR US TO SELL
The donations have yet to be counted but when we are able to give you a total amount raised, we will let you know. Thank you for your support!
As well as doing a non -uniform day and bake sake, the College students got involved by dressing up for Halloween, with some small prizes for the winners. Here are some pictures - they do look amazing!
AS CHRISTMAS APPROACHES...
Meden staff are getting involved with another local charity who are organising Christmas Gifts for Children who need them.
For more information contact Miss Wilson on awilson@medenschool.co.uk
Look out next half term for our Food Bank Campaign.
Thank you all for helping us to support others in need!
Meden School
Train to teach with the Nottinghamshire Torch SCITT