Golden lunch, national cups progress and a sneak peek

Year 7 Gold Effort Lunch

17 of our year 7s achieved the gold standard in their effort scores for cycle 1. This was a very impressive level of effort for these students to maintain during their first term in secondary school. We rewarded them with a roast dinner to say well done! I came to see the students and add my congratulations to the students.

Joe Boyce, Hamish Herring, Grace Gibbings, Oscar Mills, Jason Mewitt, Phoebe Smith, Nya Bettrisge, Kyron Connor, Ellie Farthing, Daniel Piper, Harry Paull, Chloe German, Riley Calland, Ethan Lynch, LAex Nagy, Grace Halsey and Emilia Hunt

U13 Devon Athletics Championships

A huge congratulations to Francesca Skelly in Year 7, who competed in the U13 Devon Athletics Championships last weekend. Francesca made the school extremely proud, coming 3rd in the 400 metre race and 2nd in the 1500 metres race. Well done Francesca!

Year 8 Netball Devon Central League

Year 10 through to round 6

On Wednesday the year 10 football team booked their place in the last 32 after a victory of Richard Lander School from Cornwall. TA completely dominated the game however we made hard work of it. TA started on the front foot and eventually, after 12 minutes a strike from Reef Beer from 20 yards saw us take the lead. TA continued to create chance after chance but we were wasteful and found the opposition goalkeeper in good form. On the stroke of halftime Richard Lander equalised completely against the run of play. Half time saw a firm team talk being delivered from Mr Grinsill and with this ringing in their ears saw TA once again dominate. Once again however we failed to convert our chances. Eventually, a loose ball fell to Charlie Pope who cooly chested the ball and struck home with his left foot. Pope then found himself on the score sheet again after coolly dispatching a penalty.

We will now wait for the draw to be done to see who they face in the next round.

You can watch the goals below.

Year 8 netball

A huge congratulations to the Year 8 Netball Academy who travelled to Paignton Hub on Tuesday to play in the Devon Central League. Our two teams played extremely well, with Team A winning six of their seven games convincingly and Team B won one, drew one and lost two games.

Both teams represented the school to an extremely high standard and Miss Lewis is extremely . Congratulations to Millie Sneap who was nominated as the player of the tournament!
The squad of 14 were: Katie Rowe, Isabelle Roberts, Olivia Riches, Paige Clements, Amy Harrison, Mllie Sneap, Amber Dicken, Summer Thompson, Amara Phillips, Jemimah Jones, Eve Cameron, Brooke Tully, Ema Kestell and Lydia Bevan.

First team football

Our boys managed to keep a clean sheet and grab some great goals as they progressed into the next round of the English Schools cup after a superb performance against Lliswerry High School. Our goals were scored by Tor Swann 1, Tom Burt 2, Sean Brown and Ben Hopkins. Going into Christmas we look to continue our form from training into our games with a strong focus on our performance as individuals and as a team.

A sneak peek!

We are building something amazing… Our girls and boys are just inspiring in the wide range of sports they compete in and we are building them the most inspiring Team TA changing room. There will be nothing like it when it is completed! I can’t wait to show them the end result when they come back after the Christmas break.

House Competition TA’s Got Talent

This term’s house competition is a talent show which is to be held on the afternoon of Thursday December 9th. The event is entitled TA’s Got Talent and is open to all Year 7 students. At the time of writing, our Year 7 entrants are currently putting the final touches to their acts – deciding upon the costume and emailing Miss Risk their backing tracks. Each house must decide upon one act which can range from a solo to a whole class performance. Students have been given a list of potential acts and have responded with real gusto. Given the time of year, it is perhaps not surprising that many of the acts have a festive theme although Brunel’s act, in particular, is something I have never seen before. On the day, I will have the unenviable task of having to decide upon the winner as I am the one member of staff who is not specifically assigned to a house and will therefore be able to exercise neutrality! The winner will not be decided by the performance alone however as the level of applause will be measured by a specially designed clapometer created by Mr Foulds and Mr Hadley. As always, whole group participation and support is very much at the fore of what we value here at Torquay Academy. The whole of Year 7 will be watching and cheering on their house and are designing banners that will proudly display their allegiance.
I look forward to reporting the results next week.

Mr Bindon’s Year 11 Maths class

Responding to feedback from their paper 2 PPE Maths exam The yellow sheet is a Question Level Analysis (QLA) sheet which shows them the breakdown of marks for each question in the exam. They also have a pinpoint learning booklet which is formulated to help them to secure more marks. This also signposts them to an online learning tool called Hegarty – where students will watch clips on certain topics. This is to directly target the focus of the student’s learning in improving in areas where they have not been completely successful.

Year 13 English

Today in Mr Engineer’s classroom Year 13 were reading ‘Othello’ and began working through the notoriously meaty Act 1 Scene 3. In this famous sequence Othello is judged by the Duke for his relationship with Desdemona and it is determined that their relationship is pure. Here you can see the pupils working through and discussing their annotations and analysis of the scene in question. In the English department staff create notes and annotations for texts that all staff use to ensure all pupils receive the highest quality teaching and textual analysis in lesson. In this case, Dr Jones had provided the guiding notes.

Year 13 Biology

This week the year 13 Biology students have been reviewing their PPE papers. Each student has gone through their paper and analysed each question to produce the perfect answer to the paper. Hopefully ensuring that they not only know the knowledge but how best to apply that knowledge in the summer’s exams.

They then moved on to the next topic looking at the human nervous system. The first part was looking at how Na+ and K+ pumps set up a resting potential in our neurones.

Year 7 Star Readers

Congratulations to the following year 7 students who have achieved their bronze Star Reading certificates for tracking their reading for four weeks and completing an Accelerated Reader book quiz: Maisie Sandercock 7P, Ben Jeffs 7K, Millie Swift 7K, Darcie Mellish 7K, Ethan Lynch 7K and Oskar Demkowski 7N. The following students have achieved their silver Star Reading certificate for tracking their reading for eight weeks and completing two Accelerated Reader quizzes: Felicity Adams 7F, Ben Jeffs 7P, Evie-May Howell 7K, Nys Bettridge 7B and Mihai Marin 7B.

Year 8 Star Readers

Congratulations to the following students who have been awarded their bronze Star Reading certificate for tracking their reading for four weeks and completing an Accelerated Reader quiz: Charlie Green 8D, Emma Matthews 8D, Ema Kestall 8C, Dean Conway 8C and, Harrison Davies 8N. The following students have been awarded their silver Star Reading certificate for tracking their reading for eight weeks and completing two Accelerated Reader quizzes: Charlie Green 8D and Millie Sneap 8P. Congratulations to Ivy Hodgson-Hunt in 8P for achieving her gold Star Reading certificate!

Sunrises

There have been some amazing sunrises this week.

Haldon Night Run

Hannah finished 2nd female in the Sportiva Events latest nightrun at Grammercombe Woods, Haldon on Sunday evening. The 5k route followed an undulating trail path of mud, tree roots and puddles and earned her a fabulous engraved glass. Well done Hannah!