Dear ALS Community,
As we come to the end of our last full week of this term, I’m sure you’re all looking forward to a well-deserved rest over Easter. If you’ve missed it - I have to confess I’d forgotten - we finish term next Thursday 1st April ahead of the Easter weekend. The school will be closed on Friday 2nd April so I’d hate to see Pink and Navy blazers making their way to school only to find out the holidays had started!
This week, we marked the anniversary of the announcement of the first lockdown. The past year sits as something of a dichotomy, I think; on the one hand, so much has happened and, yet, it feels like so much has stood still. As we haven’t had the usual birthdays, anniversaries, annual school Prize Giving or big family Christmas with a Christmas Service in the Church to mark the passing of time, it would be easy to forget just how much time has passed for all of us. At the same time, we’ve had such change with some challenging moments (and, I’m sure, some wonderful moments) that we all feel the weight of the lockdown on our shoulders.
If you can, take some time this weekend to reflect on the past year as a family. Keep hold of the good and try, if you can, to laugh away some of the things you’d rather forget. Remember those we’ve lost and give a cheers to those who’ve worked tirelessly to keep us all safe and well. Call the new friends you’ve made and reach out to those you’ve not seen in a while. We’ll soon begin emerging from the lockdown as the restrictions begin to ease and as we venture back to some kind of normal, I hope we can keep some of the lessons we’ve learned over the past year.
Over the past few years, we’ve been really proud to have introduced Politics to our Key Stage 3 curriculum with Years 7-9 studying it as a standalone subject. As a result, ALS was put forward for the UK Parliament Week Activity of the Year 2021 category in October and today we received the results. Of nearly 200 nominations we received ‘Highly Commended’ by the Judges. Many congratulations to all those involved! Below is Mr Colledge with our pupils and their certificates. Mr Colledge should be ‘highly commended’ for the passion he instils for politics and how much his pupils have come to enjoy studying the subject.
For next week, our mantra is from Dedicas: Inspire others by aspiring to be your best. As a school community we strive to do this in all that we do; the pupils with their learning, staff with their teaching and with everything that this last year has thrown at us all, I think we have all aspired to do the best that we can for those around us and the pupils in our care here at school. Sometimes the weekly mantra can be used to reinforce a message or to encourage reflection - I think for this week I can simply say “yep, at ALS we’ve got that covered”.
On Wednesday 31st March at 5:15pm we will be hosting our third live ‘Cook-a-long with Lodge’ to make a true family favourite, Lasagne. This gives students the opportunity to demonstrate their practical cooking skills and produce a simple evening meal for the family to enjoy. To join the session please email Mrs O’Sullivan on [email protected] by 5:00pm on Tuesday 30th March. The last couple of sessions have been a wonderful success and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.
Mr Gear has now released the next Senior Phase ExEn projects to start the week commencing Monday 29th March. We look forward to watching the educational videos that you have created and seeing the self-portraits. If you have any questions about the projects, please speak to Mr Gear on [email protected].
As a reminder, Stagecoach will be hosting Easter workshops from the 6th – 9th April here at school for ages 4 – 16yrs. More information can be found on the flyer here. Current pupils will receive a 20% discount, if you’re interested in your child attending a session please contact www.stagecoach.co.uk/leamingtonspa
All that remains for me to say is to have a wonderful weekend and hopefully this sunshine is with us to stay for a while!
Best wishes,
David Preston | Headteacher
March 26th 2021
