The Sun Shone for our Governors Away-Day

The rabbits and squirrel who live at our school were most disgruntled this Saturday when they were disturbed by the school's governing body attending their annual away-day.  The event enabled governors to reflect on the work they have undertaken to support the school over the last year and make plans for 2017-2018. During the meeting governors agreed they would like to communicate more directly with parents so, from September, there will be a governor section in each of our letters to parents. If you would like to know more about the work of this team please contact Kate or talk to a member of staff at our next Friends of Joseph Norton event.

Together We Can Replenish the Earth

We are pleased to share details of our new partnership with the Earth Restoration Service (ERS). The ERS School Tree Nurseries Programme provides a service to both the community and the environment by helping children in schools to learn about the environment and to plant trees and create wildflower meadows in order to restore their local degraded habitats. As part of this programme, pupils at our school have planted 50 tree saplings across our school grounds.  

More information and pictures of our nursery can be found here.

Our New Community Hub

Last Friday our pupils celebrated the formation of our new Community Hub by taking part in the Great Get Together in memory of MP Jo Cox.

The event took place on the lawn of Bagden Hall where pupils from Joseph Norton Academy, Kirkburton Middle school, Emley First School, Shelley First School, Denby Dale First School, Scissett Middle School, Farnley Tyas First School and St Aidan's Academy played Get-to-know-me Bingo, completed a quiz on the local area and entered a competition to design the new hub logo.  

Joseph Norton was represented by Dillon, Lewis and Elliot who did an amazing job representing our school.  The boys loved taking part in the event and were very excited as they drove down to the school and into the grounds of Bagden Hall. Bagden Hall was built by George Norton the brother of Joseph!

Kate Gaunt, our fantastic Pastoral Manager, who also helped organise the event commented, 'It was wonderful seeing children of different ages and backgrounds working together and sharing their ideas for the local community. We thank the Great Get Together for encouraging communities to organise such events as this was a great success!'

The Great Get Together

Pupils in KS2 are looking forward to attending The Great Together on Friday 16th June. On this day, communities across the country will be coming together, inspired by MP Jo Cox, who was killed on 16th June last year.

To celebrate diversity and togetherness, we will be joining pupils from other schools in the area for a communal picnic at Bagden Hall.  

There are more than 108,000 get-togethers happening across the country — from street parties and Big Lunches to BBQs, games of football and bake offs.  

Year 11's Final Hours

In Group 8 we had a fantastic time at the Museum for Science and Industry, we looked at the exhibition on Graphene. Graphene is a unique new material that has been in the news recently, but which we had also discussed in class as part of our General Studies exam preparation.  In GCSE Biology we dissected a lamb’s heart identifying the different chambers, vessels and valves. We continue to be very proud of the support being given to some of our younger pupils by our two School Leaders.

As we near the last half term of the academic year we are making sure that our year 11’s are happy and confident about their post 16 choices. We continue to visit colleges and providers looking at what will be their new classrooms and meeting some members of staff that they will be working with.

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Empty Classroom Day

On Friday 5th May, the whole school took part in an Empty Classroom Day. After the success of our Three Peaks Challenge last year, this was an opportunity for staff and pupils to get out of the building and, in most cases, the school and enjoy and be inspired by the world around us.

Anyone who has seen the impact that learning and playing outdoors has on children and young people knows how powerful such experiences can be. Learning outdoors creates lasting memories, helps build a greater awareness of the environment, provides opportunities to think independently, and gets children feeling challenged and excited by learning. Children and young people are more active when they play and learn outdoors.  

You can see some pictures of the day below - we know some of them are blurry but the boys are just too fast and don't want to stop for us to snap them!.  We will add more pictures as soon as we are able.

Our Wooden Spoon Farm is Officially Open!

Our Wooden Spoon Farm is Officially Open!

Pupils at Joseph Norton Academy were excited to take part in the formal opening of their Wooden Spoon School Farm this week.  Chairman of Wooden Spoon Yorkshire, Stuart Watson, cut the ribbon to declare the project open, following which the farm manager and pupils gave visitors a tour of the superb new facilities.

The farm is currently home to rabbits, goats, chickens and a host of smaller animals.  Pigs and ducks will be joining the menagerie later in the year.  Guests included Wooden Spoon committee members, Cllr Janet Depledge, Trust governors and Joseph Norton families and friends – not to mention all the animals.

Pupils enjoyed hosting the event and talking about the hard work they have undertaken so far this year.  Member of the community Joy Lane commented: It has been a lovely day.  I hadn’t realised what a valuable asset the school had for their pupils and families.  I could clearly see how the children benefit from the hands-on experience of looking after the animals and growing fruit and vegetables.  There was a great turn out from the school and the local community.

The school’s Headteacher Sarah Wilson said: none of this would have been possible without the support of Wooden Spoon Yorkshire.  With their backing we have been able to transform a rundown garden into a fantastic outdoor learning area that will support the development of our pupils for many years to come.  We are all immensely grateful.

Spring Into Action !

We are all excited about the nice weather and the opportunity to get outside and be active more often. Group 4 have been very busy recently immersing ourselves in our farm topic.

We have really enjoyed learning about where our food comes from and linking farming practices to our favourite foods. We have learnt about what farmers do to produce the ingredients that go into biscuits and cookies. We then made our own biscuits and cookies using the ingredients we have learnt about. Triple chocolate cookies and flapjack biscuits were our favourites!

We have really tried to challenge ourselves in maths and have attempted some GCSE style questions to great effect. We are now all angle experts and are very confident in measuring and naming them. In English we have experienced writing for different audiences and purposes. Our extended writing is something we are proud of and our hard work in paying off.

This week we are learning about eggs and how they can be used in different ways. Blowing eggs to make them hollow so that we could measure the surface area was great fun. We have decorated the eggs in preparation for Easter and our science experiments later this week.

We are all excited about the Easter break and hope everyone in school and our learning community has a great half term and enjoys the spring sunshine.

Edible Farms

Last week Group 3 created their own edible farms.  Our task was to design, plan and cost their farms within their agreed budget.  A wide variety of edible building materials were available for differing costs.  Each farm needed to contain a vehicle, some animals and some crops. 

We loved designing and building the farms and all the farms came under the agreed budgets.  We then discussed how our farms would become profitable and the attractions and experiences that we could include on our farms to attract visitors.  Next we created posters advertising the farm, did comparisons between their farm and Cannon Hall Farm and some pupils completed some descriptive writing about their farm. 

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We finished of the week with a visit to Cannon Hall Farm where we looked at the different animals and attractions on the farm and played on the adventure playground.

Funny For Money

Yesterday we had lots of fun activities taking place around the school.   Pupils were able to participate by either paying cash or using some of their WOW points to join in with the games on offer.

We had guess the weight of Gordon the goat,  a penalty shoot out, magic tricks by our very own school magician Mr Wardle, and a treasure hunt to name but a few.

Today pupils and staff have come to work in their wellies.  The total raised so far is £62.22.  Well done everyone!