CamVC Activities Week 2018

Activities Week 16th—19th July Cambourne Village College Activity Booklet

INTRODUCTION: Activities Week, an annual action-packed week of fun activities and new experiences for students in Years 8 and 9!

Activities Week is an off-timetable 4 day week which will take place from Monday 16th to Thursday 19th July.

Please note that the school will be open on Friday 20th July as normal.

Due to the Year 7s being off-site on a residential trip, and the Year 10s being off-site on work placements, Year 8s and 9s will be taking part in a number of exciting and stimulating activities both within school and off-site.

These activities are a compulsory element of pupils’ timetables for that week.

This booklet contains all the information parents and carers need to help their child choose what to do during Activities Week.

WHAT TO DO: Read, Choose, Sign-up: 1. Read all the activities on offer carefully with your child and understand the associated costs.

2. Choose which activities your child would like to do, bearing in mind some activities are over 2 days and some are over 4 days. Please avoid choosing activities they have already done last year.

By way of explanation: Students can choose one 4 day activity OR combine two 2 day activities (for example Water Adventures for 2 days and Mediatek for 2 days).

3. Sign up: make your 4 choices by logging onto WisePay: under ‘Clubs & Activities’ choose ‘AW 2018’ and enter your child’s 4 choices (in order of preference), give your consent and pay a deposit of £12 by 26th March.

PLEASE NOTE: Pupils should prepared to do any of their four choices.

WHAT COMES NEXT… How we allocate places: 1. All applications will be reviewed, and pupils will be allocated 2 of their 4 choices (or one for a 4 day activity). This will be made known to pupils during the week beginning 23rd April (on a notice board at school).

Year 8 students need to be aware that if an option is oversubscribed, priority will be given to Year 9 students.

2. Parents will get notification of their child’s allocated activities via email, and WisePay will be adjusted accordingly for further payments to be made.

Payments can also be handed in to the office to Mrs Noble: please request a pre-printed envelope.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION / KEY DATES: The more expensive activities have a two month split payment plan, with payments due by the dates indicated below. The deposit payment of £12 will be deducted from the final amount to be paid.

Split Payment Plan Deadlines: 1st Payment: 7th May 2nd Payment: 4th June One-off Payment Deadline: 1st Payment: 7th May  26th March—Deadline for choices, consent and deposit payment to be made via WisePay Week of 23rd April—Activities placement announced and WisePay adjusted accordingly 7th May—Deadline for one-off payments and 1st split payments to be made 4th June—Deadline for 2nd split payments to be made

BURSARIES: Cambourne Village College makes available bursaries to help towards the cost of activities like these for those students who, because of financial hardship, would otherwise be unable to attend.

If you would like to apply for financial assistance please email Mrs Noble at pnoble@cambournevc.org in complete confidence, so that a way forward can be found.

FREE SCHOOL MEALS: Pupils who are in receipt of Free School Meals will be offered one of the following activities free of charge: Art Encounters, Let’s Get Crafty & Cooking, Spanish Fiesta, Stop Motion and/or Cryptography.

Please email Mrs Noble at pnoble@cambournevc.org to confirm your child’s preferences.

If your child would prefer to do other activities than those listed above, and if you require financial assistance with these, please email Mrs Noble.

ACTIVITIES ON OFFER: Discover Cambridge

Building Bridges

Let’s Get Crafty & Cooking

Stop Motion

Explore Science

Media-Tek

Sports Challenge

Cryptography

Dance Workshop

Art Encounters

Drama Workshop

Spanish Fiesta

Explore the Peaks

Mountain Sports

Water Adventures

Exploring Literature

DON’T FORGET...

- Pupils are required to put down their top 4 choices in order of preference.

- Pupils can choose a 4 day activity or combine 2 activities (for example Water Experience for 2 days and Mediatek for 2 days).

- If forms are received after the deadline of 26th March, students may not be allocated one of their preferences.

- Year 9 pupils should aim to choose something different from last year to avoid repetition.

Discover Cambridge — 2 Days This is a chance to explore parts of Cambridge you might not usually see.

You need to be prepared for a fair bit of walking and be keen to explore our city’s cultural heritage.

The itinerary includes: climbing Great St Mary’s Tower, a Cambridge Treasure Hunt (including King’s College Chapel, selected Colleges, the Round Church, picnic at the Botanic Gardens) and cream tea at Grantchester Places: 20 Location: Cambridge Lead: Mrs Moody Cost: £1 7

Let’s Get Crafty & Cooking — 2 Days A chance to explore different craft and cooking activities.

The cost of this activity includes all craft materials and cooking ingredients for 2 days.

Places: 40 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mrs Taylor Cost: £1 5

Explore Science — 2 Days On one day, a chance to visit the Zoo in Banham to look around and have a discovery presentation from the zoo staff or to look around the Leicester Space Centre and have a presentation in the planetarium.

On the other day students will have a local wild animal group come in to bring in animals and then go to the cinema in the afternoon.

Places: 30 Locations: Banham Zoo or Leicester Space Centre, and Cambridge Light Cinema Lead: Mrs Hodgson Cost: £34

Sports Challenge — 2 Days Try experiencing a range of new activities and learning new skills!

Pupils will experience activities that are run by local clubs and professionals..

The focus will be on engaging in non-curriculum based sporting activities (golf, archery and clip n climb).

Places: 40 Locations: Cambourne VC, Bourn Golf Club and Clip n Climb Cambridge Lead: Mr Rogers Cost: £42

Dance Workshop — 4 Days Spend 4 days learning Street, Contemporary and Jazz dances under the expert tuition of professional Bodyworks dance tutors.

You will be learning dance routines to perform with full costume and a real live audience at the end of the week! No previous dance experience required—both boys and girls welcome.

Places: 30 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Bodyworks Cost: £54

Drama Workshop — 4 Days A chance to explore the script of Beauty and the Beast.

- Performers will learn and perform songs & the script - Musicians will arrange and perform the band parts - Dancers will choreograph and perform dance routines - The Technical Team will write lighting cues/designs as well as sounds effects to support the musical Explore, Stage and Perform the Musical!

Places: 30 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mrs Fenn-Goode Cost: £1 0

Explore the Peaks — 4 Days This is a great opportunity to take part in four adventurous activities in the Peak District National Park set in a stunning outdoor environment.

Caving will appeal to you if you have a sense of adventure and a desire to explore! You will see an extraordinary world of underground caves and mines, letting your torchlight guide you from one place to the next…

You will also take part in mountain/hill walking, gaining an understanding of mountain weather and learning valuable survival techniques.

You will have a unique opportunity to try canoeing on a canal in beautiful countryside. Other activities that may be offered include abseiling or rock climbing, mountain biking, zip wire, and more! Depending on the number of you that opt for the Peak District, you may be able to choose between these activities.

Explore the Peaks (cont’) This trip is suitable for you if you enjoy the great outdoors. No experience in any of the activities is necessary.

Although the outdoor activities included in this trip are fairly easy , a reasonable level of fitness is required to complete the mountain/hill walking.

The cost of the trip includes all activities, equipment hire, accommodation for 2 nights, meals, transport, entrance fees, and guided tuition from qualified outdoor instructors.

Places: 20 Locations: Cambourne VC (1 day) and Peak District (3 days) Lead: Mr Burgess Cost: £21 2

Mountain Sports — 2 Days Experience a variety of mountain sports at the Snow Centre in Hemel Hempstead, the Big Rock in Milton Keynes and Bounce in Milton Keynes.

Day 1—4 hours skiing instruction Day 2—90 mins climbing instruction followed by 1 hour trampolining Places: 40 Locations: Hemel Hempstead and Milton Keynes Lead: Mr Bellis Cost: £1 20

Water Adventures — 2 Days The focus of this week will be to develop skills on water in a variety of vessels.

Places: 30 Location: Nene Park Trust Peterborough Lead: Miss Curtis Cost: £95

Spanish Fiesta — 2 Days An introduction to some of the most famous fiestas of the Spanish speaking world.

Find out the history behind them, how they are typically celebrated (including sampling some traditional foods!) and create your own masks and models.

Places: 30 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mrs Hirst Cost: £6

Art Encounters — 2 Days A 2 day course on Urban Art. You will learn spray can stencilling and Urban Art style illustration techniques. Wear old, scruffy clothes!

Places: 25 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mr Yeates Cost: £8

Media-Tek — 2 Days The focus of this activity will be to discover how computers interact with the world. Make your own self driving car and wirelessly connected As part of this activity you will take part in a range of challenges that will test your engineering and design skills. You will also be using a BBC MicroBit computer to control a range of sensors and outputs, building on your previous projects in computer science. You will then have the skills to build a self-driving robot controlled by the MicroBit computer, which will give you a small taste of the challenges faced by engineers building full sized self-driving cars.

Places: 20 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mr Wikramaratna Cost: £1 8

Cryptography — 2 Days The focus of this activity will be to look at different techniques of encrypting data. By the end of the sessions students should be able to encrypt and decrypt messages using different cryptography techniques.

Day 1: Students will look at different ways of keeping information secret and how this was used throughout history. They will apply their new knowledge to decrypt codes and practice writing their own encrypted messages.

Day 2: Students will compete to decrypt various codes as quickly as they can and solve a murder mystery. The day will be finished off with a film.

This day is for anyone who is interested in cryptography and likes to solve problems.

Places: 15 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mrs Gemma Custerson Cost: FREE

Stop Motion — 2 Days The focus of this activity will be to get involved in tech based activities with fun film and animation activities on iPads. You will be able to create your own animation project. You could get some inspiration from shows such as ‘Wallace and Gromit’ or ‘Shaun the Sheep’.

Over a day and a half you will be working in small groups on your project using playdough, Lego or drawings and they will be shown to the rest of the group in the afternoon of the second day. There will be prizes for the most original and funny ones.

Places: 15 Location: Cambourne VC Lead: Mr Francisco Garcia Cost: FREE

Building Bridges — 2 Days The focus of this activity will be to get involved in a STEM based activity.

You will be able to create your own bridge and test it out to see how much weight it can hold. You will be inspired by famous Cambridge based bridges during your punting trip.

Over two days you will be working in small groups on your project to build a bridge that can hold a certain amount of weight. Day one will consist of a trip to Cambridge to go punting. Whilst punting, you will look at the various famous bridges along the route, taking inspiration from their unique structures. On the second day, you will use your previous days’ experience to design and build your own bridge that can hold a surprise weight. There will be prizes for the most successful designs.

Places: 20 Locations: Cambourne VC and Cambridge Lead: Mr James Russen Cost: £1 9

Exploring Literature — 2 Days The focus of this activity will be to Improve English Literature Skills.

By attending workshops at the British Library (on day 1), students will be able view resources available at the Library and will have the opportunity to attend a workshop on Questioning Texts. Day 2 will be spent at school, taking part in group workshops building on what was learnt from the trip to the British Library.

Places: 20 Locations: Cambourne VC and British Library London Lead: Mrs Kerry Urtone Cost: ÂŁ23

Remember to submit your options and pay your £12 deposit on WisePay by 26th March.

Any queries?

Contact Mrs Noble or Miss Boyns.