Heartlines issue 18, Summer 2015

Newsletter Newsletter of Heartlands Academy

Issue 18 Summer Term 2015

Literature Winners!

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eartlands Academy had a fantastic result in the Asia House* Bagri Foundation Literature Festival 2015, with three of our Year 12 students achieving first and second places.

Using the stimulus, ‘Women hold up half the sky’, students were asked to create a piece of fiction or non-fiction, exploring this chosen theme. During spring Creative Curriculum Week, students in Year 9 and Year 12 worked with author, Bobby Nayyar, to create their responses. All their work can be viewed on the Young Reporters’ page on the Academy website.

Amna won first prize (664 entries), in a non-fiction category with “Media Representation of Women”, while Hibaq achieved second place with “Faces of Me”. In the fiction category, (872 entries), Afsarah was awarded second place with her piece “Every Asian Woman’s Nightmare”.

This is a phenomenal achievement for our Year 12 students who not only demonstrated great maturity and flair with their writing, but also enabled Heartlands Academy to dominate a national writing competition.

Miss Hamman, English *For more information please visit: www.asiahouse.org

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his year’s summer fête was a great success and raised a grand total of £1,100! The event was organised by the Year 10 Enrichment Group of Enterprise Ambassadors as part of their business challenge set by Enabling Enterprise and sponsored

by PwC. Unsettled weather didn’t deter the many visitors who enjoyed a variety of activities, whether it was bagging a bargain on the bric a brac table, feasting on the lovely ice-cream,

changing character with face-painting or burning up all that energy on the bouncy castle!

We would like to say a big thank you to all our sponsors without whom the event couldn’t have taken place: Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Enabling Enterprise, Chartwells, Latifs, Games 4 All, and parents and students for volunteering their time.

Mrs Buckingham, Business Manager

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Mrs Jones’ Diary 2015

r .As the end of another academic yea ber approaches, we say goodbye to a num Mr of staff. Leaving us this summer are: Mr e, espi Gill Ms , Tenn, Miss Ramzan red Fletcher and Mr Bard. All have secu try. new teaching posts across the coun but Mr Akbar is going to teach in Turkey r yea two his g win will be returning follo go to ing sabbatical. Mr Rumsey is leav f, Ms travelling and from the support staf red Habib and Mr Salter have both secu ols scho new r thei to e promotions and mov in September.

I wish to thank them all for their ng contributions in supporting our you

and For so many of our children, staff the at e plac ing tak be families, Eid will all send to like end of this term. I would r thei out of them my best wishes through celebrations.

sletter As you read the articles in this new I am sure you will join with me in they thanking the staff for the support of the ide outs ents have given to our stud classroom. ents Finally, I wish you all, staff, stud mer sum and their families, an enjoyable nts/ break. As ever, I thank you, as pare . port sup ed tinu carers, for your con Mrs G Jones, Principal

people.

Heartlands’ Staff:

We’re still learning!

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veryone at the Academy is learning and that includes the staff. Here are some examples of the qualifications staff have been working on this year.

Congratulations to Ms Mfundisi who was awarded a Doctorate in Practical Theology, an outstanding achievement. Following in her footsteps are Mrs KE Smith and Ms Joonum, who have both been accepted onto doctoral courses in education.

Ms Gillespie, Mr Lee and Mr Henshaw have all been working hard towards their Masters qualifications, with Mr Henshaw also developing his skills through LAMDA training.

Next year, a group of staff will be studying for their Masters degree with academics from Birmingham City University running seminars for them here at Heartlands.

We’ve also been heavily involved in leadership training this year. Mrs Salter passed her Teaching Leaders course with flying colours, as well as completing a coaching qualification.

Mr Levy, Ms Brown, Mr Farooq and Mr Ruwaid joined leaders from other E-ACT academies to participate in the NPQML qualification. Mrs Walters has also been hard at work on her ILM award in leadership and management.

Staff have also qualified to train up and coming school leaders. Mrs M Smith is now an official senior leader trainer, with Mrs KE Smith and Ms Clegg being official middle leader trainers. Well done to Dr McQuillan, who is now a National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics Professional Development Lead.

Mrs Buckingham is another great example of a lifelong learner and she’s passed her Level 4 Diploma in Business Management this year.

Another success story is Ms Thomas, who’s achieved Level 3 in her Autism Diploma. Then there’s Mr Forrester with his English Cricket Board Community Coaching qualification.

Mr Farooq’s been celebrating the success of staff who’ve undertaken Microsoft Office training this year.

He’s particularly proud of Ms De-Zeeuw and Ms Song who are Microsoft Masters and he’s sure that Mrs Buckingham’s and Ms Wallace’s hard work will soon see them rewarded with the same qualification.

So, that’s just a sample of our staff who have been working towards qualifications this year and just keep on loving learning!

Mrs K E Smith, Assistant Vice Principal

DISCOVERY CENTRE Mathematics, Science, Health & Social Care, PE. STEM Course May 2015 (over three days)

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TEM courses deliver information on science, technology, engineering and mathematics providing opportunities for young people to better their technical, personal and employability skills. They also offer specialised courses and industrial placements.

The first two days were spent at Solihull College and Birmingham City

Cricket @ Edgbaston England v New Zealand

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t has been another great year for international cricket at Edgbaston and on 9th June, the Academy took a group of students to see England vs New Zealand - and it was a day-night affair! A number of international stars were on parade from both teams.

Topping the bill from England were wicket keeper Josh Butler, batsmen

University. We were able to explore the facilities, see new equipment and even take part in practical activities such as creating a mechanical device and assembling a robot!

On day 3 we visited a company called Amey where we met with graduates and watched a presentation about the different teams working at Amey. We also did various activities such as bridge building and railway designs. For our bridge building exercise we had to create a firm

bridge with only paper and tape as our materials. Our bridge had to hold a 75ml water bottle. Luckily, our team succeeded and was able to balance the bottle until it was on the brink of collapsing. The railway was made using sponges as land and straws for the lines. We then listened to a presentation on travel opportunities as well as apprenticeships. This was the day I enjoyed the most as it has helped take control of my own career.

Aisha Shima Udin, 10SLD

Joe Root and Eoin Morgan, plus an array of other England stars. New Zealand paraded Brendon McCullum, Kane Williamson, Martin Guptill and left arm bowler Trent Boult. It was a lovely day out for our students, most of whom are part of our Heartlands Academy cricket team. They enjoyed the game immensely and witnessed England making a record score of 408 and also watched as Joe Root and Josh Butler both scored centuries. This paved the way for England to score a convincing win over the visitors.

Miss Massey & Mr Forrester, PE

Cricket Year 7 v Broadway Academy

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he Year 7 boys played their first cricket match on 4th June against Broadway Academy.

The game was held at Halford Drive Sports Complex in Perry Barr.

Broadway batted first and scored 115 in 15 overs. In reply, Heartlands got to 115 in exactly 15 overs also.

Unfortunately, Heartlands lost the game by the flip of a coin at the cricket head-quarters in Edgbaston.

Special mention should be made of Mohsin Farooq who batted really well making 55 runs and finished the game not out. Ibrar Mohammed gave good support to Mohsin and he completed 23 runs. For our team, Heartlands, Zayn Tufail, Mohammed Ul Haq and Owais Khan bowled well. Overall, all the other boys did exceptionally well.

Mr Forrester, PE

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exploration CENTRE History, Geography, Religious Education, Sociology and Psychology

Olympic Park Visit

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fter an early wake up, we lethargically assembled at the Academy and by 06:40 we had departed. The weather was glorious and it promised to be a good day.

Upon arrival, we were greeted by the FCS staff who organised us into our groups and led us through Westfield Shopping Centre (the biggest in Europe!). We were then informed

Year 10 participated in a workshop to help with their GCSE studies on the Arab Israeli Conflict in the Middle East. Visitors from the charity, One Voice, came into the Academy for the whole morning to discuss solutions to the conflict. Students were shown a slideshow giving them a brief history of the conflict, including all of the key wars that have happened. After this,

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of how the day was going to run and taken to the East Village Olympic Park for the first time. We sat in Victory Park collecting primary data for our controlled assessment while enjoying the beautiful environment around us.

We walked around the East Village assessing the environmental quality of each zone, taking photographs and making field sketches. After eating lunch in the Olympic Park overlooking the Velodrome, we continued to move through the East Village collecting data

for our controlled assessment until we arrived back at Westfield Shopping Centre.

It was a busy but beneficial day and I felt upon leaving, fully prepared for the write up of my controlled assessment. The day had opened my eyes as to how an area that was so deprived before the Olympics, has been transformed into a thriving community.

Gabriel Stevens, 10AHG

students had the opportunity to speak via Skype, with a Palestinian and an Israeli representative of the Charity, in the Middle East. Both had conflicting

stories about events, as well as problems with the continued fighting.

Both wanted peace for the people in the region. Afterwards, students were able to ask them dozens of questions via the live Skype feed. Students then reviewed possible solutions and their own ideas. Students reasoned out why ideas would or would not work.

It was a valuable workshop that gave students a more personal viewpoint of the conflict.

Shyann Phillips

expression CENTRE

English and Modern Foreign Languages, Young Writers

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ver wondered just what it’s like to be Barack Obama, Simon Cowell or Kate Middleton?

The Mini Monologues competition, run by Young Writers, invited students to delve into the world of someone else, whether real or from fiction, and bring their thoughts to life. A monologue is a piece of speech or writing which is from one person’s viewpoint and gives a glimpse into what it is like to be them, whether they are on the verge of a lifechanging moment, or simply detailing an everyday occurrence.

Fantastically, Mahima Begum, Jasmin Ara, Abdallah Omer, and Maryam Khan reached the finals and had their work published in the ‘West Midlands Words’.

Congratulations to all those who entered, and special congratulations to our four finalists.

Book Share

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A number of Year 7 students entered this competition at the start of the year.

ver the course of the year, students in Year 7 have been stretching their reading abilities through exposure to a wide range of genres. Thanks to Mrs Flynn’s effort and fantastic networking, Smurfit Kappa, a local paper factory in Nechells, kindly agreed to sponsor a Book Share project. The money that was raised enabled the Academy to purchase two hundred new books.

The books were then divided between seven boxes, each one containing a different genre. By reading books from each box, students are gradually introduced to genres that they might not normally read.

Mr Ruwaid, Learning Manager

Lexia Learners

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exia is a reading intervention programme that has been taking place throughout the year. The students work through the programme independently and complete it at their own pace. It aims to help them develop a range of reading strategies by working on different word and comprehension activities. This year’s analysis has shown, that through their morning work, students have managed to complete an extra sixteen hours of additional study in support of their reading!

The Inclusion Team would like to offer huge congratulations to the following students for their commitment and hard work: Khadija Mohammed, Adam Osman, Leo Short, Qadeer Ahmed, Abdullahi Mohammed, Mustafa Ali, Sean Barron, Kiran Kaur, Noor Bola and Xuanying Liu - keep up the hard work next year!

Ms Townsend, Inclusion

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Inspirational Art Exam Pieces

A Level

GCSE

As a result of external moderators who came to assess the GCSE and A level work this half term, there has been two displays in the department for students and staff to come and view. Those in lower years found the work very inspiring and have used it to give them ideas for their own projects. There was also a huge amount of positive feedback from staff, with some even arguing about who would get to take the pieces home! Some of the highlights included Muhammed Ahmed’s expressive cityscapes, Sheryal Shahzad’s ‘daydreaming portrait’ and Javid Zahidi’s large piece that comments on today’s ‘selfie’ culture.

There was also some very promising work from the year 11 and 12 students so I am looking forward to seeing what they produce by the time they are in year 13.

Miss Bibby, Head of Art

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Momentus Occasion for Art Students

Heartland’s Students

Exhibit at Birmingham School of Art

6th -9th July 2015

This was the first year the Sixth Form students of Heartlands Academy were able to take the next step up towards becoming professional artists. On Monday 6th July, both Year 12 and Year 13 Fine Art students were able to exhibit a selection of their own work in the gallery spaces of Birmingham’s School of Art. The exhibition of our 6th Form work was shared with another three schools from across the local area, helping to demonstrate a wide variety of artwork from many different schools and students. The week-long exhibition kicked off with a private view on the Monday, which gave the opportunity for all of the students’ parents and teachers to come along, observe and admire the very high quality work of their children and students.

Many of the students were a little apprehensive about the exhibition but upon arrival, it was easy to tell how proud they were to see their final pieces hung and displayed in this professional setting. The exhibition, at the local university art school, will certainly help to inspire some of the students to pursue further education into the arts, or even as a career.

No doubt, this exhibition will be the start of a very successful recurring arts event for many years to come. Well done Year 12 and Year 13, an amazing show.

Mr Fletcher, Art

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imagination CENTRE Art, Drama, Music

Animation Art Club

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n the Animation Art Club, this summer term, it has all been about moving the inanimate objects through various animation techniques. Our budding animators have been Jameel Mann 8GIA, Dannish Choudry 8FAS and Hamaish Hassan 8STK, all of whom have created some marvellous characters and animation sequences throughout the course of the Animation Art Club, run on Tuesday afternoons. The students have understood/ learnt how to create their own wire-framed armatures, which allows the coverage of plasticine or skin, to give the armature character.

Stop-motion animation is created via a series of photographs that the students painstakingly created over one week, sometimes several weeks.

They sequenced the images carefully

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together in iMovie on the Apple Macs. Here, the students learnt how to sequence their photographs together with many creative scene transitions, sound effects and titles.

In turn, each student transformed an already cleverly constructed sequence of animated photographs into a very professional short film. One aspect of animation all the students thoroughly enjoyed was the opportunity to use their own Lego creations to produce some terrific short animations.

Examples of these final short films may be watched and enjoyed on some of the screens around the Academy.

The students involved have worked incredibly hard and their diligent efforts will be appreciated when you stumble across their creative achievements.

Mr Fletcher, Art

Carrie’s War

uditions were held to find a cast to perform Carrie’s War, as the Drama department’s way of commemorating the 70th anniversary of the end of World War 2. The cast, who were from a mixture of Years 8, 9 and 10, have worked hard for the last four months to stage this World War 2 drama.

The play tells the story of two children evacuated from their home in the city to the Welsh countryside for their own safety. They stay with the Evans family and find out all the secrets of this small village nestled in the Welsh hills. The audience are left wondering what the curse put on this quiet village is.

The cast performed well and I personally would like to thank them for all their hard work over the last four months.

Mr Henshaw, Head of Drama

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innovation CENTRE ICT, Business Studies, Design Technology, ASDAN

Rotary Club Design Awards

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t has been a fantastic year for Design and Technology at Heartlands Academy. There have been some fantastic, innovative and creative design ideas which have been seen through to manufacture.

The GCSE groups where given the challenge of designing and manufacturing portable furniture or a pull along toy.

Each year, we enter the students in to the Rotary Club Design Awards.

This involves the pupils presenting their products to a panel of judges.

This year our GCSE students were competing against A level work. I am delighted to announce that Qadeer

Ahmed has won 1st prize for his outstanding pull along toy which would not look out of place in a shop window. Shawaib Sawar also won 3rd prize for his fantastic foldable deck chair.

We are incredibly proud of all the pupils’ hard work this year. Well done. Both products won within the Design and Craftsmanship category. This is testament of the hard work put in to their Controlled Assessment.

Well done to our designers of the future.

Mr Vardy, DT Resistant Materials

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NEWS FROM THE SIXTH FORM Aspire and Achieve...

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n Thursday 7th April I went to Aston University to take part in a two day event called ‘Aspire and Achieve, Year 12 Business Challenge’.

The event provided a snapshot of one of the Year 2 modules called the ‘Business Game’. As a small group of four, we had to design a product (mobile phone) and present to a panel of ‘Dragons’ (University staff) for funding. The pitch consisted of: the financial details of the product such as the profit margin, where we would launch our product and to justify why we wanted to launch our product in that region, and give reasons why we had chosen certain features for our phone.

There was also a series of workshops and sessions taking place that were beneficial as they provided an insight into university life and why we should have a degree. The workshops were: • ‘How to create an effective UCAS application and details about Student Finance’ • ‘Employability Skills and what employers want from their employee’ • ‘What a degree can do for us in the future’ Over the two days, I learnt more about the options available which will help me when deciding which route to take at Post 18.

During the group activities we also

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learnt about the different Business Management styles and we chose Paternalistic (where managers make decisons in best interest of the workers following consultation). We also learnt how to prevent conflict and how to deal with it should it arise. Overall, the experience helped put my lessons into context and provided essential information to help me decide whether or not to pursue a Business degree. It was really enjoyable and I wish I could do this again and develop my skills even further.

Raqeebah Bi,12HEJ

Changemakers

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uring the autumn half-term, I spent three days training to become a Social Action Leader with UFA (University of First Age). One of the days included attending the Concrete Collective event at the Millennium Point meeting different organisations who aim to inspire young adults to make a change e.g. as Uprising, BeatFreeks, BBC Radio 1XTRA, etc.

As a trained Social Action Leader, I carried out a project with eight Changemakers from Year 7 – 11.

Our first aim for the project was to create awareness within the school and community for homelessness; this we achieved through assemblies and the after-school group sessions that took place every Thursday.

Our second aim was to help

relevant organisations, which we did by donating £281.96 to the charity Crisis. The money raised came from generous donations: non-uniform day, Year 7’s Sponsored Silence, a sale of clothes donated by Mrs. Jones and through the ‘Smoothie Bike’ that students enjoyed! The Academy, sixth form staff and students also took part in the tinned and packed food donation activity where a large amount of food (105.3kg) was collected for The Salvation Army Food Bank!

This experience with UFA has been a great way for myself, the Changemakers and also the staff and students of Heartlands Academy School and Sixth form to make a change! Thank you for the support towards our project.

A well done to the following Changemakers: Year 7: Tsnat, Suhayla, Saffie, Naqib Year 10: Naa Adei Year 11: Sonia, Intisar, Hodan Amna Hussain, 12BIK

Future Scholars

AND IN OTHER NEWS...

If students are struggling with their homework, please feel free to attend Year 7 Homework Club which is held straight after school on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays in the ICT suite.

Future Scholars

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n Monday 8th June, five of our Year 9 students were selected to attend a Future Scholars Award Event at Warwick University. Warwick University is a member of the Russell Group who support the ethos of increasing social mobility by giving young people the opportunity to experience University life.

Our students were involved in many interactive sessions which included: ‘Do you want to be a scientist?’, ‘The (dis)United Kingdom?’ and ‘Student life’. Their participation and enthusiasm was praised by the Warwick University ambassadors.

This was further reinforced in their feedback. Sania Tahsin stated, “I personally found the experience of great interest as it gave me a real insight into University life”. Sanaa Anjum said, “I really enjoyed being involved in the different sessions, especially racism and feminism”.

Maryam Mahmood agreed and added, “It was fun and engaging! I was able to freely express my views and opinions. For example in one session we had to create a song/rap about a topic we felt strongly about, and as a group we chose feminism.”

Both students and teachers collectively agreed that attending the Future Scholars Award Event has been a fantastic experience.

Miss Bhuttay, Psychology

Poetry Slam

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n Tuesday 12th May, Miss McArthur and Miss Henry hosted the summer term’s Poetry Slam in the LRC. It was a fantastic event that saw participating students enter from all year groups.

The quality of poems produced was astounding, and you could tell a large amount of thought and effort had gone in to making these poems both original and unique. The theme of this term’s Slam was ‘You Say’; this gave students the opportunity and freedom to write about whatever they wanted to.

Our three judges had a tough job in picking winners.

Our top three winning poems were on diverse topics ranging from a light-hearted poem about school to a brutally honest perception regarding the struggle of women. Our Poetry Slam offers students the chance to express their inner thoughts and allows them to build confidence as they perform in front of a crowd.

To read our most successful poems, please visit the Young Reporters page.

Ms McArthur, LRC

Wing Wah

o celebrate the Chinese New Year, students from Year 7 were asked to take part in a competition to write a piece about the oriental celebration. It was to be about 500 words and accompanied by a creative picture that they had drawn themselves. To win, students had to captivate us by being the most imaginative, not only in their depiction but also their written piece, too. Our lucky winners were: Samia Said, Panashe Hove, Tsnat Tedla, Tia Davis, Afraa Zamir, Anees Islam, Suhayla Ahmed, and Mehema Begum.

The fortunate eight were able to enjoy a free lunch at Wing Wah, Congratulations to them all.

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Calendar 2015/16 Results Days A Level GCSE

Thursday 13 August Thursday 20 August

Autumn Term Teacher Days

Thursday 3 September (closed to students)

Friday 4 September (closed to students) Term Starts for Students

Monday 7 September Open Evening

Wednesday 23 September Sixth Form Open Evening

Thursday 3rd October Half Term Monday 26 October to Friday 30 October Term Ends Friday 18 December

Spring Term Term Starts Monday 4 January Half Term Monday 15 Feb to Friday 19 February Term Ends Thursday 24 March

LITERACY CLUB

Literacy Club has got off to a great start this term!

Cross-curricular conundrums in hangman, mindboggling word snakes in Boggle and a plethora of other word puzzles and literacy games bring out the competitive sides of attendees; yes, students are never short of fun and games!

Every Tuesday 3:10 until 3:40pm in the English SLZ Attendees are enjoying themselves in a variety of games and activities all in the name of improving literacy.

Will we see you there next week?

Mr Williams

YOUNG REPORTER The Young Reporter page on our website has been extremely successful this year. It is updated on a weekly basis and covers a range of different types of writing and a variety of topics. All the work published belongs to students in the Academy – and demonstrates the outstanding nature of our students’ creativity. Some of the work has been completed in lessons, and some has been sent in by students who have written articles in their own time.

Miss Hamman

www.heartlands-Academy.org.uk/news/young-reporter

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For up to date announcements, follow us on TWITTER @Heartlands_Acad

Opening Times Mon - Fri: 8am - 4pm Late Opening for Sixth Form Students Mon - Thu: until 7pm

E Library Service

Heartlands Academy is offering all students and staff a new E Library service. No fees, automatic returns and no lost books. See the LRC for more information or simply log in to the following website and start borrowing:

http://heartlandslrc.lib.overdrive.com/

E-SAFETY

E-Safety is a priority at Heartlands Academy and we have measures in place to protect students from unsuitable on-line content while at the Academy. If you would like to find out how to keep your child safe at home, please contact a member of our E-Safety team or visit our website for further information.

Mrs Buckingham, Miss Johnson, Miss Brown and Mr Ahsan.

© July 2015 Heartlands Academy, No 10 Great Francis Street, Birmingham B7 4QR