This has been a challenging year and although we are disappointed not to be able to hold our Year 7 Carol Service as normal we are pleased to share our virtual offering today.
We hope you enjoy the music and Christmas messages and sing along (at home) to Hark! the Herald Angels Sing. Thank you to everyone involved in bringing this together including Joe Dent, Rector of the Minster Church of St Andrew.
Speech Day
Next week we will hold our annual Speech Day and prize giving in school with a special assembly for Sixth Form students and tutor groups. We will share the messages with you next Friday, including recordings by our Guest of Honour, Dr Ian Hodgins, and the Lord Mayor of Plymouth, Cllr Chris Mavin.
Celebration Assemblies
This term’s celebration assemblies were held on Wednesday when students were recognised and rewarded for their behaviour and attendance during the first half term.
Awards were made in the following categories and when more than one student was nominated a special ‘santa race’ was held to dertermine the winner. This caused a lot of fun and excitment in form rooms!
Student of the month
Student of the term
Good behaviour award
95% attendance award
100% attendance award
Mr Manley said, “ It was lovely to see so many students enjoying themselves after a challenging term”.
The assemblies concluded with commending students for their behaviour this term and asking them to stay focused, calm and purposeful until the end of term.
Here are two screenshots of one of the santa races!
Christmas Jumper Day
Students and staff donned their Christmas jumpers in a special festive mufti day yesterday with the money raised going to Bristol Children’s Hospital and St Luke’s Hospice.
Here is just a selection of our Christmas Jumper photos.
7C
7E
7S
8N
10P
10S
Advent Wellbeing Calendar
Tutor Groups have been following the advent wellbeing calendar provided by Young Minds Uk each day and Mrs Downes, Form Tutor of 9W sent me this example of an activity completed by her students.
Mrs Downes said, “I was really impressed with 9W’s thinking and care for others and I thought this was an example of good work especially in Advent”.
Christmas Wishlist
Solving climate crisis like deforestation
End world hunger and poverty
Free global distribution of vaccines
End global conflicts and have world peace
Eradication of diseases
Free education for all
Ending prejudice and discrimination- equal rights
Moderating weapons of mass destruction
Breakthrough in spacecraft technology
Treating others how you’d like to be treated
Mrs Downes
Excellent Work
Mrs Green has shared some work from her 9G Geography students who have researched and created presentations about London - the world's first National Park City.
Please click on these images to read the students’ presentations.
Devrim, Oscar and Declan
Morgan, Ewan and Harry
Nick
James and Priam
Computer Science - The Bebras Challenge 2020
Despite the pandemic halting the school-based challenge, a group of DHSB students competed from home in the international Bebras challenge, and many have been awarded certificates in recognition of their achievements, writes Mr Scott.
The Bebras Challenge introduces computational thinking to students. It is organised in over 50 countries and designed to get students all over the world excited about computer science.
The 2020 Bebras winners from DHSB are:
Juniors - Years 7 - 8
Jonah Crawford 8E - Certificate of Participation
Noah Easterbrook 7W - Certificate of Merit
Morgan Martin 8N - Certificate of Distinction
Jamie Nannelli 8C - Certificate of Participation
Ben Saberi 8S - Certificate of Distinction
Jonah Struthers 8W - Certificate of Best in School
Jonah Crawford 8E
Morgan Martin 8N
Intermediates - Years 9 - 10
Harvey Brown 10N - Certificate of Distinction
Noah Evans 10C - Certificate of Participation
Rudi Gibbs 10C - Certificate of Merit
Scott Howley 10N - Certificate of Best in School
Alan Kraszewski 10C - Certificate of Merit
Sakthivelan Pandy 10W - Certificate of Best in School
Harry Pickard 9C - Certificate of Merit
Benjamin Wagstaff 9W - Certificate of Merit
James Young 9S - Certificate of Participation
Harvey Brown 10N and Scott Howley 10N
Seniors - Years 11 - 13
Rob Derry 12W Best in School
eSafety Advice
With Christmas fast approaching, I thought it would be a good time to look at PEGI ratings and how important they are when deciding what games your children should be playing.
PEGI stands for Pan European Games Information system. It is comparable to the age-rating system for films and is used in 30 European countries.
PEGI provides visual information on the age that the player should be before playing the game, this is based on content in the game (and not how hard it is!). It is mainly derived from the levels of violence, sex, bad language, etc. PEGI will continue in this country even with our departure from the EU.
The PEGI age rating symbols. They mean 3 and above, 7 and above etc.
PEGI content descriptors. These show what the content of a video game may contain.
It is important to understand that the PEGI rating is based on the content on the game and does not include the potential harm from online interactions.
Every child is different of course and as a parent/carer we can make choices based on what we know about them, but as a rule of thumb - this is a great place to start and please do remember that 18 games are designed for an adult market.
If you want to know the rating of any game, head to https://pegi.info/page/tips-parents
If you want other parents' opinions on the game and its content head to https://www.commonsensemedia.org/game-reviews
This will also give you an idea of the potential for online harms from these games.
Ms Buckler
Collection of Exam Certificates
GCSE and A level certificates are now ready to collect from the top reception (Conference Room) between 9.15 and 3.15 daily. Please bring ID with you. Certificates will not be given to anyone other than the candidate without the candidate’s written authorisation, to the Exams Officer karen.edwards@dhsb.org.
Sports Update
It was great to see so many students back playing in the House Sport this week, all within Covid-19 safety guidelines.
Well done and thank you to staff who have enabled House Sport to re-start and to the students who participated.
The Native
And finally this week, The Native (made up of DHSB Alumni) have just released their new music video shot by Cosmo Jarvis.
Ms Davidson says the band is also on the hub sessions on Youtube tonight at 7.00pm.