Christmas Cake Competition 2012!

 Year 10 Catering Students have once again been baking and decorating to take part in the annual Christmas cake competition.

The students chose the size of the cake they wanted to make using Mrs O'Brien's special recipe. After baking, the cakes were covered in marzipan and icing and then the students were encouraged to use their imagination and skills to produce their own individual designs.

Mrs O'Brien, Subject Leader for Catering, said "The students have worked so well and with great enthusiasm, diligence and focus to produce their cakes and have all shown a high level of creativity in designing and creating the decorations".

The finished cakes were then judged by Ben Piette, owner and Head Chef of The London House Restaurant and Mr Smith, Headteacher, with special attention being paid to the cakes where the students had made their own decorations.

The winners were:

1^st place - Sophie Gooch

2^nd place - Gavin Thomas

3^rd place - Josie Schifano

Highly commended - Erin Cullen

 

 

 

Proposed Changes to Admissions Criteria 2014 - 2015

Please follow the link to view the draft admissions criteria for 2014 - 2015. Please make any responses to Mrs Wendy Arthur (w.arthur@wcsc.org.uk) by 1st March 2013.

 

Admissions_Criteria_Ad_1214.pdf

Winston Music Captain Releases First Tracks!

Our Music Captain, Sarah-Jayne Riedel, is an amazing singer songwriter (recently winning the inaugural 'Best Singer Songwriter' category at the Performing Arts Awards Evening).  She is managed by Rick Buckler (famous as being the drummer from The Jam).  Sarah-Jayne has just released three of her own songs, which are all available on iTunes for just 79p each!

Please support her amazing talent - follow this link to go straight to her iTunes page:
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/sarah-jayne-single/id584916720
We all wish her the best of luck on her first steps to stardom!

Annual Awards Ceremony

On Thursday 15th November, The Winston Churchill School held its annual Awards Ceremony and was delighted to welcome back past Year 11 students for the presentation of their examination certificates for the school’s best ever set of results. 

 

Rebecca Jenkins and Charlotte Walker were the outstanding students of the year with 14 A* grades, 11 students achieved A and B grades in AS philosophy and ethics, usually taken in Year 12.  Other outstanding achievements included success in subjects taken after school, Latin, astronomy and fast tract PE

The certificates were presented by the Mayor of Woking - Councillor Michael Smith and the special guest for the evening was Mr Paul Harrison, who retired from the PE Department last summer.   Paul presented the Special Subject Awards and those nominated by the Year Leader, he also delivered an inspiring and motivational speech.

The vote of thanks was provided by our current Head Girl and Head Boy, Gabby Home and Phil Razey, who thanked all those who had organised the very successful evening.

Award_Winners_2012.doc

Theo Fennell makes Technology sparkle for the day at Winston Churchill School

On the 16^th October Winston Churchill School Technology Department hosted our first master class in design inviting the world class jewellery designer Theo Fennell in to speak to students.  Theo’s style of jewellery is very different to the average jewellery piece sourcing precious gem stones from around the world combining with beautifully engraved and enamelled metals to design masterworks inspired by history, nature, buildings and symbolism.  Theo’s designs are highly sort after appealing to stars such as Elton John, Lewis Hamilton, the Beckham’s and many more.

Our aim of the day was to inspire the students to see where their GCSE’s in creative subjects in technology and art could take them in the future.  Theo first gave a talk to 125 of our year 9, 10 and 11 technology, art and media students, he gave insight to the students about how his career has grown from the age of the students to now, how he got into jewellery and the challenges of starting his own business and how it had grown to be worldwide.  At the end the students got to see some of his pieces for real to see the detail that goes into each part of the work. 

Then 22 competition winners who gained their place by designing a piece of jewellery inspired by Theo’s work came to the technology block for a drawing workshop.  Where first Theo showed the class his sketchbooks and portfolio of work seeing where his designs start off as a spark of inspiration to a completed masterpiece.  Then it was the students turn to get to work developing their designs that got them the place in the workshop with Theo offering each of them guidance and advice on how to improve the work and their drawing skills.

This day has now inspired students work across the year groups, some considering talking up jewellery and design courses once they leave Winston Churchill School.

Miss Blackman, Technology Department: Resistant Materials

 Let’s see what they have to say…  

‘I enjoyed the brainstorming of ideas with Theo cutting between us giving advice on how to get as many ideas from the inspiration around us. Seeing his inspiration books that he carries around really showed me how anything can become inspiration for a piece of artwork/jewellery.’

Adam Gardiner Year 10 Resistant Materials Student

 ‘The day was brilliant; it showed me what I can do if I put my mind to it. Theo Fennel is a genius; he is unique, and definitely very talented! He has inspired me to think up my own jewellery designs, so I am very grateful as I know are the rest of the people who took part.’

Robyn Hartwell Year 9 Technology Student

 I enjoyed getting helped by Theo during the drawing part. I was inspired by a lot of his work with the attention to detail. I learnt about how he gets ideas for his work. Over all a very inspiring day.

Joe Cross Year 10 Resistant Materials Student

Here is an account of the day by one of our year 9 students:

My Day with Theo Fennell by Naomi Ehigie

My_Day_with_Theo_Fennell_by_Naomi_Ehigie.pdf

Annual Sports Awards Evening 2012

After supporting our students in the Super Schools event Aaron Phipps, London 2012 British Para-Olympian Wheelchair Rugby Player, returned to the school in the evening as our guest of honour at the Annual Sports Awards Evening.

The opening address was given by Mr Fricker, Subject Leader for PE, and all the Sports Mentors introduced our gifted and talented students and gave a short talk about their achievements so far and their hopes for the future.

Throughout the evening awards were presented for the following:

Performing Arts Award - Brittany Fuller

 Service to the Sports College - Harrison Hubbard

Most Dedicated to School Sport - Sam Stemp

Team of the Year - Yr 10 & 11 Girls Football

The Dean Blackmore Most Improved Performer - Robyn Hartwell

Young Sports Leader - Charlotte Walker

Performer of the Year - Louise Adams

The evening finished with Aaron Phipps giving an inspirational speech about his experiences as a competitor in the 2012 Para-Olympics and the opportunity for everybody there to ask him any questions they had.

Super Schools 2012

On Tuesday 23rd October all our students from years 7, 8 and 9 took part in the annual Super Schools event.  Before the event they were asked to find sponsors and on the day they took part in a variety of timed fitness activities supported by the Sports Prefects.  All students had their photograph taken with our guest for the day London 2012 British Para-Olympian Wheelchair Rugby Player, Aaron Phipps.

Year 10 Enterprise Day – The Bradford Business Game

Year 10’s first Enterprise Day was run by Surrey SATRO on the 18^th and 19^th of October, we played a game called The Bradford Business Game. We had to create a business which produced paper made goods; we had to appoint roles to members of our group so we all knew what each of us was supposed to do. We started off with a £10 but we had to spend £2 of that on training for the Accountants of each group, we then had the rest of the money to spend on buying supplies for our products we were to make. But before we did anything else we had to create a company name, and logo which we had to put on each product we made. When we had designed and made a prototype of our products, the sales director had to go and sell it to the buyers who gave us a contract to make more in a certain amount of time.

 After this, the sales director brought back a cheque to the Accountants who would have to put it into either the Deposit or Credit account. With this money we could buy more supplies to make more products or alternatively save it in the Deposit account which also gave us 10% interest every half an hour. The day then went on like this, repeating this procedure.

Many people enjoyed the day as it gave us an opportunity to see what business life would be like if we were setting up a real business. We also had to present our business to the rest of the year at the end of the day to show how we had got on and what we learnt from the experience.

We thought that the day was very enjoyable and taught us a lot about running a business. It provided us with valuable lessons about teamwork and how we have to compromise with the other members of our team. It gave us an idea on whether we would want to go into a business like that when we are older.

We would like to say thank you to SATRO and the business people involved in the day for providing us with such a great experience.

 

By Becca Vernon and Jack Fishwick.

Winston Churchill Students Rise to their Charity Challenge

In the final week of the Autumn half term the current Year 8 cohort of Winston Churchill students presented a cheque for £3,751.55 to Cancer Research. "I'm incredibly proud of the initiative, dedication and service to others our students have shown" commented their Year Leader, Mr Martin Byrne. 

 

During their first year at the secondary school the students, who selected the charity and coordinated the fundraising events themselves, undertook activities ranging from some highly popular bake sales to more unusual events such as dancing the macarena in their pyjamas during their lunch hour and arranging a for local barber from "Cutting Edge" barbers to shave Mr Byrne's head bald to raise awareness of the illness.

 

More ambitious fundraising activities included organising a successful year group disco and a talent show to rival X-factor. During the Summer Term the students were set the challenge of gathering sponsorship and working together to cover the 874 miles (1,407 Km) distance from Lands End to John O'Groats "under their own steam". This saw students walk, run, row & cycle 107 miles more than the 874 miles (1,407 Km)  of their target distance, with two students raising in excess of £100 on their own

 

On receipt of the cheque during an assembly at the school Miss Jeannie Pitt, Area Volunteer Manager for Cancer Research, told students "Thank you so much for all your hard work! I have visited many schools and this is the largest amount any year group has raised for us."

Year 11 Maths Enterprise Day

On Monday 8th October and Tuesday 9th October, the Year 11s took part in Maths Enterprise Day - where they experienced the development, production and investment stages of business.

They gained investment in their company by producing a catapult that could fire over 4 metres 10 times, then had to mass produce their catapults to make as much money as they could for their business. Some teams worked brillantly producing high quality catapults at a huge profit. 

In the afternoon, they invested the money they had made so far in our stock market - the excitement and buzz round the room was fantastic to see and we can congratulate several members of year 11 for becoming millionaires!

Open Evening

The open eveing for prosepective parents took place last week with Year 6 students and their parents invited to look around the school and take part in all the different activities which had been organised by the different departments.