Riding into finals, Silver DofE, Pudding Club & zebra crossing...
Riding into the national finals
Well done to Dolce Zulhayir, in Year 10, who has secured one of the final tickets to the National school Equestrian Championships in Berkshire.
She came second today in a class of over 50 riders. This means automatic qualification to the finals. Congratulations, Dolce!
Pudding Club
I love popping in to see the Pudding Club after school on a Friday (even though the students don’t share food!). It is so nice to see how much fun our girls and boys have at the end of a busy week.
DofE Silver Practice Expedition: TA Year 11 students show their resilience!
Last weekend twelve Year 11 students completed their DofE Silver Practice Expedition. Leaving straight after school on the Friday the students got their kit together and were bused out to the expedition start point at Starcross. With light fading fast the students had a short walk from Starcross to their campsite at Cofton. However, the route into camp was going to be a test of their navigation skills.
Having risen to the navigation challenge successfully both teams walked into camp before darkness fell. Getting tents set up quickly and food on the gas stoves the students settled down for the evening. Using the light of an exceptionally bright moon the students played football and rugby away from the tents then settled down for the night.
That bright moon proved to be less of a blessing for the staff as the students woke up at 5.30! The early start didn’t result in the teams setting off super early. Nonetheless the first team was ready by 8.00am. They set off confidently, with the second team not far behind leaving at 8.30am. It soon became apparent to staff from looking at the trackers that the first team that set off took a wrong turn just after the campsite. This meant the second team got ahead of them and were making good progress taking the lanes and bridleways of the route over Haldon towards Teignmouth Golf Course. The going was steep over Haldon yet both teams were in good spirits. The first team quickly saw that they had gone wrong with their navigation and got themselves back on track. All part of the DofE adventure – getting lost and finding yourself again!
The hike on Saturday was the best part of 20km, including a steep, continuous climb over Haldon. And it was apparent that the students were feeling that as they walked into Twelveoaks Campsite at Teigngrace! Despite their tiredness they had done exceptionally well with their navigation and with their timing. At Silver the students should be on expedition for 7 hours each day, and both teams were at the campsite on or around that timing.
The evening brought some Devon drizzle or mizzle over the campsite. The students were safely tucked up in their tents when the night’s excitement occurred. Mr Adams and Miss Cape had been chatting after ensuring the students were settling when the noise of stampeding hoofbeats rang across the campsite! Looking up, three large horses were spotted galloping down the slope adjacent to the terraces in the field where the camping pitches were. Luckily the horses turned onto the terrace two above the one where the tents were set up. Concerned that the horses may gallop through and over our tents the staff quickly briefed the students to be ready to get out. Luckily the campsite and farm owners promptly arrived to round up the three horses!
After the dramatic events of the previous evening the students woke around 7.00am and made their breakfasts and got ready for the day. All feeling a bit weary, and one student suffering with bad blisters, the two teams got packed up and prepared to leave. After a short briefing from Mr Brett and Mr Adams the first team set off at 9.00am with the second team leaving at 9.30am. The students were happy to hear that their route was a lot shorter today – about 10km. The route took the students through Stover Country Park, on a public footpath across Stover Golf Course, along lanes to Liverton and then through the Great Plantation woodland with the end point at the Bovey Straights Service Station near Heathfield. With competent navigation skills shown the students were elated when they reached the expedition end-point. And all made it successfully with determination and resilience demonstrated by all. Next challenge the Qualifying Expedition between 13th and 15th October – bring it on!
Thanks to Miss Cape, Mr Brett and Mr Adams supporting this expedition and congratulations to the following students: Jasmine Evans, Mia Weston, Beatrice Corline, James Lovell, Sam Stimpson, Oliver Huxtable, Elliott Lawton, Aspen Keenan, Megan Sellick, Faith Benney, Daisy Gibbings, Nina Hocking.
Kole Gjikolaj rubs shoulders with the elite
Kole, in Year 12, visited the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester this week. Many famous politicians took the opportunity to have their photograph taken with Kole!
Cadets
The Torquay Academy RAF and Army Cadets program has always been a hub of learning, discipline, and adventure. This week, cadets engaged in a diverse range of activities, honing their skills in map reading, drill, radio communication, kayaking, practice range card, and air rifle training.
Cadets learned the invaluable skill of basic map reading. This skill is not only essential for military operations but also a life skill that can be used in various outdoor adventures.
Discipline and teamwork are the cornerstones of any successful cadet force. The cadets sharpened their drill skills, ensuring they can perform with precision and unity.
Effective communication is key to any military endeavor. Cadets practiced radio communication, enhancing their ability to convey vital information accurately and efficiently.
The break in the weather allowed some of our cadets to take part in Kayaking. This not only builds physical strength and endurance but also fosters a sense of adventure and camaraderie among the participants.
Back at school we continued in marksmanship fundamental for cadets. The practice range card training ensures they can record and communicate target information accurately and consistently.
The cadets also delved into air rifle training, refining their marksmanship skills with a focus on safety and precision.
As we celebrate the achievements of our cadets, we’re also excited to share a glimpse of the upcoming events that will further challenge and inspire them:
RAF Griffin Camp. This camp offers an immersive experience in the RAF cadets where cadets will gain insights into aviation, teamwork, and leadership. It’s a fantastic opportunity for our RAF cadets.
Ten Tors is a renowned endurance challenge that pushes cadets to their limits. The rigorous training will prepare them for this ultimate test of physical and mental stamina. More details and timings will follow soon.
Army Battle Camp, will allow our Cadets to dive into realistic battle simulations, practicing their tactical skills and decision-making abilities in a controlled environment. It’s a thrilling experience that prepares them for real-world challenges.
We are also for the first time running a Potential NCO Course in November for those cadets aspiring to leadership roles, the PNCO course is an essential step. It provides training in leadership, management, and organizational skills, equipping cadets to take on greater responsibilities.
The Torquay Academy RAF and Army Cadets program continues to provide an enriching and dynamic environment for personal growth and skill development. This week’s training has equipped cadets with valuable skills, and the upcoming events promise even more excitement and opportunities for growth. As we look forward to these challenges, we are confident that the cadets will rise to the occasion, showcasing their dedication and commitment to their training and the values of the program.
Lexonik Returns
Although only halfway through our first half-term, intervention across all year groups is well underway in the English Department. One of these interventions is Lexonik and this year we can target and support so many more students as two more teachers, Mr Crow and Mr Dickin, have completed their Lexonik training and are now fully qualified to deliver this effective intervention.
For those who have never heard of Lexonik, it is an intervention that is designed to help students reach their potential in all subjects – not just English. It is a training programme that coaches students to process sounds at speed and develop their vocabulary – which as result improves their reading speeds and understanding.
Lexonik teaches students how to accurately and rapidly process sound chunks and once they acquire this skill, their reading and spelling dramatically improve and is actually most successful with students of average and above average ability. By taking part in these sessions, students boost their literacy skills and are better equipped to achieve better grades.
We also practice ‘suffixes and prefixes at speed’ as well as explore a range of vocabulary from a full range of subjects. With this we discuss root words and their forms. This helps provide students with ways they can access and decode unfamiliar language which is so important in an exam environment.
The beauty of this intervention is in its speed: 1 hour per week over a 6-week period.
As a school intervention, Lexonik is not new. We have been using this intervention since 2018 but as you can imagine COVID has had an impact. It is very difficult to run 6 back to back weekly sessions for the same group of four students when you are coming up against, lock-downs, isolations and illness.
This intervention is suitable for all year groups, and now we have enough fully trained experts we are able to have Lexonik groups this year in every year group for the first time! My first target group are students in year 11. Current exam data suggests that students need a minimum reading age of 15 years to achieve a Grade 4, the minimum pass grade at GCSE, in such subjects as Mathematics, Science and History. Reading is not just an English thing: every exam paper, in every subject needs a student to be able to read at speed, at a high level. We cannot escape the fact that our current Year 11s have had their education seriously impacted by COVID but will be the second cohort in recent years to sit the full exams as they used to be with higher grade boundaries. This will mean much more reading!
Lexonik promise that a 6-week course, delivered effectively, can improve a student’s reading age by an average of 24 months. The important bit here is the ‘6’ bit. It is really important that students attend all timetabled sessions to maximise the benefits. Our data for the sessions that we have run over the past few years have, on average, improved individual reading ages by 37 months. But that is the average overall.
Last year 43 students completed the full 6 week course. 1914 months were added to their reading ages. The average for last year’s cohort was 44.5 months for each student which equals 3.7 years added on average to each of their reading ages! So many students added 60+ months with a couple of students adding 80 to 90 months to their reading age. We are looking forward to our next cohorts of Lexoniks. It is always fun – even for those older ‘doubters’! May the reading fun begin!
Zebra Crossing Update
Next week should see the opening of the Zebra crossing. As the end of the 4th week comes to a close, all of the tarmac has now been laid. We are waiting for the line painting around the site and for the new crossing.
Fire Drill
On Thursday morning we had our first fire drill of the year. We managed to have line up, get to registration, evacuate the building and get to the astro and back to tutor rooms all in Period 1 and then we were ready for line up and Period 2!
Year 9 GCSE Dance
Miss Feltham’s dance group continue to make great progress and they are really gelling together with their routines. They are very impressive!
Year 7 Maths with Miss Clarke
This week Miss Clarke’s class has been investigating all the different ways they can change and adapt numbers to make them easier to add! These amazing year 7 students have come up with lots of different ways of making numbers bigger and smaller to help them understand more about how they use them – including beautiful deines diagrams. They like to have lots of conversations about maths and why certain things work and don’t work – the students enthusiasm is amazing and they are always working hard and together to figure new concepts out. Well done, year 7!
Year 8 History with Mrs Addai
Year 8 have been learning about the Industrial Revolution in History with Mrs Addai. They have looked at the changes the Industrial Revolution brought to Britain and have been considering how these changes impacted the lives of ordinary people.
In this lesson, students considered the working lives of women in the 1800s, before the Industrial Revolution and in the 1900s, after the Industrial Revolution. During the lesson students were introduced to the stories of women from during the Industrial Revolution and summarised the working conditions women experienced. We looked at women working in dangerous conditions in the Bryant and May match factory and what happened when women were married and had children. Year 8 discovered that although the Industrial Revolution provided new opportunities and improved rights for women, in reality, not much changed for women.
Art with Mrs Lynch
Year 7 have made a really great start this term in their art lessons with Mrs Lynch. The students are studying ‘Bugs and Beasties’ as a theme and are enjoying drawing their interesting and complicated forms.
Here are some fantastic drawings made by the students in 7Q4.
Alexix Kovacs was totally absorbed by the drawing activity and managed to complete four excellent sketches in the 100 minute lesson! Charlie Murray, Logan Hewitt, George Moran and the rest of the class did exceptionally well too. Well done 7Q4!
Geography with Miss Fannon
Miss Fannon’s Year 9 Geography class were investigating the effects and responses of Typhoon Haiyan that occured in 2013 for part of their Weather Hazards Unit. Students had to identify the differences between primary and secondary effects as well and immediate and long term responses.
Miss Fannon’s Year 12 A Level Geography class have recently started their first human topic for Paper 2 known as Regenerating Places. Here they are working collaboratively to come up with a least of factors that make a place ‘successful’.
Miss Fannon’s 8T8 Geography class is investigating the Plate Tectonics Theory and how plates move to create earthquakes and volcanoes. The students explored the concept of ‘Pangea’ the idea that the world was once one supercontinent, as well as looking at the structure of the Earth.
A Level Biology
On Tuesday the A level Biologists went to Braunton Burrows in North Devon to carry out some ecological sampling. Braunton burrows is a site of special scientific interest (SSSI) and has a unique ecology. It’s one of the largest sand dune systems in the UK. Students were carrying out random sampling techniques to investigate succession (ecosystem change over time) as part of their A level Biology course.
Science with Miss Baker
Miss Baker’s 11Q4 class have been working hard in Chemistry, revising ionic bonding. This has included using skittles to represent electrons and model the formation of ionic compounds, a tasty Friday treat! Miss Baker has been so impressed with how they’ve started the year and is very excited to see how they do in their upcoming PPEs. Keep going, Year 11!
Principal’s Award
Congratulations to George Evans, Riain Leal and Charlotte Holmes-Vittles who achieved the prestigious Diamond award last year!
Students of the Week
Year 7 – Seren Chadwick and William Schmiedinghofer
Year 8 – Finley Dawson and Stella de Rose.
Year 9 – Leo Maasz and Emma Giles
Year 10 – Darcy Reece and Austin White
Year 11 – Finn Mallen and Lauren Catt
Sixth Form – Hannah Carr and Harvey Shaw
Keeley Little
It has been a brilliant season for Keeley, topped off by winning the South East Sapphire League for 100m and 200m. Even more impressive that she is running at U17 level. Amazing and well done Keeley!
U16 Boys Football vs St Peters
On Tuesday year 11 made it through to the second round of the national cup. It was a hard fought victory after an extremely competitive and physical game. TA did not play well however the silver lining was the return of Igor Piewiszko who performed exceptionally well and was man of the match. TA’s goalscorer was Ollie Clarke in the first half after the GK failed to deal with a Liam Cartwright free kick.
TA will now face the always-strong Ivybridge in round 2.
U15 Netball Academy CVL
The U15 Netball Academy took to the court at Paignton Hub again this week in their second county Central Venue Netball League. In Pool A, they won 10-3 against Teign School, drew 9-9 to Newton Abbot College, drew to Churston Grammar School 5-5 and finished on a high with a 7-5 win against Kingsbridge School. Congratulations to Seren Chadwick, Isabelle Moxham, Ema Kestell and Scarlett Connolly who were all voted as players’ of matches across the four games.
U15 Netball Academy: Isabelle Moxham (C), Brooke Tully, Ema Kestell, Eve Cameron, Jemimah Jones, Seren Chadwick and Scarlett Connolly
U12 Boys Football vs St Peters
Our new year 7s had their first taste of ESFA National cup football against St Peter’s from Exeter. It was great to see a new group of players starting their football journey as part of TeamTA. The game had everything and was end to end from the start. The first half saw St Peters lead 4-2 at the break, our players were brilliant in the second half and showed fantastic character to bring the game level at 4-4 to take the game into extra time. This was really pleasing to see and stands us in good shape for future games. Unfortunately there was some heartbreak for the team with St Peter’s scoring the winner with 2 minutes left of extra time, but we will bounce back!
Goals on the day came from Gio x2, Oliver and Freddie.
U15 Boys Football vs Launceston
Year 10 on Thursday cruised in to round three of the national cup with an emphatic 15-2 win over Launceston. The team performed incredibly well as the scoreline suggests. But it was the comments from the Launceston member of staff that pleased Mr Grinsill the most. The member of staff commented on how professional the boys were but more importantly how respectful they were. The goals came from Charlie Green x4. Finley Alnut x4. Josh Sandeman x3. Albie Baker x2. Sam Alcock and Greg Hindom.
U16 Netball @ TGGS
On Thursday our U16 netball squad played in a tournament at TGGS. The girls played some tough matches of a very high standard and produced some fantastic results. The girls transferred skills that they had been working on during training onto the court and tried out lots of positions in readiness for their upcoming National Schools competition. They adapted very well in new combinations, encouraging and supporting each other throughout all three matches.
Match 1 Vs TGGS A – 6-6 Coaches Player was awarded to Millie Sneap and Oppositions Player was awarded to Ema Kestell
Match 2 Vs TGGS B – 13-4 (win) Coaches Player was awarded to Amara Phillips and Oppositions Player was awarded to Tammy Westacott
Match 3 Vs CFGS – 4-9 (loss) Coaches Player was awarded to Maisy Green and Oppositions Player was awarded to Tammy Westacott
Well done to all of our U16 squad: Ella McLachan, Maisy Green, Summer Connolly, Tammy Westacott ©, Amara Phillips, Ema Kestell, Eve Cameron, Isabelle Moxham, Jemimah Jones and Millie Sneap
House Students of the Week
Year 7
Brunel – Rosco Biagott
Christie – Farah Davidson
Darwin – Summer Reed
Fawcett – Marcus Finlay-Peers
Harrison – Mason Maxwell
Kitson – Daisy Dorman
Nearne – Tiffany Eastly
Pengelly – Elizabeth Francis
Year 8
Brunel – Kiara Ujj
Christie – Lewis Allington
Darwin – Alesha Black-Matthews
Fawcett – Talia Street
Kitson – Tyler Evans
Nearne – Bella Kendal
Pengelly – Anastasia Tukilush
Year 9
Christie – Olivia Fordrey
Darwin – Leah McClements
Harrison – Frankie Finch
Kitson – Sam Bowden
Nearne – Analais Biggs
Pengelly – Millie-Ann Wigston
Homework Students of the Week
Year 7
Brunel – Xanthe Tyson
Christie – Bobby O’Regan
Darwin – Jelani-Ondo-Chamielec
Fawcett – Gabriela Piasta
Harrison – Bailey Taylor
Kitson – Seth McCann
Nearne – Madison Wood
Pengelly – Maisy Hart
Year 8
Brunel – Bali Mudge
Christie – Imogen Clifford
Darwin – Max Weston
Fawcett – Scarlett Connolly
Kitson – Mollie Peters
Nearne – Oscar Read
Pengelly – James Beer
Year 9
Christie – Halle Wotton
Darwin – Emilia Hunt
Fawcett – Oliver Cocker
Harrison – Brodie Reddist
Kitson – Adam Copping
Nearne – Henry Brewer
Pengelly – Julia Tatarynowicz
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