Spotlight On South - CHS South Issue 6

SPOTLIGHT

on south

Spring

After a COVID related hiatus, it is my pleasure to share with you our latest issue of ‘Spotlight on South’. For those of you unfamiliar with our termly publication, it serves to celebrate all of the fantastic achievements of our wonderful CHS South community!

Spring is a time filled with potential, and it has been a thrill for all of us to be able to embrace the opportunities the easing in restrictions has presented us with over the Spring Term.

Enrichment and personal development are an essential feature of our ethos and values at CHS South, providing the necessary balance to the rigour of our academic studies. Now more than ever, our young people need the chance to round out their learning by connecting with and learning about others, and through experiencing the brilliant diversity of opportunity available to us in the wider community. As you will see in this issue, the CHS South community has provided all of this and more over the past term; I look forward to celebrating even more exciting opportunities and achievements with you in our next issue!

LOOKINSIDESOUTH...

WELCOME...

Aim Sky High

Our fantastic students showcased their talent on Blue Peter on Monday 21st March, combining street dance, pure explosive athleticism and contemporary dance to create a fantastic performance in aid of Red Nose Day! Our students are part of the Aim Sky High Dance School in Sale and were especially selected to take part in the filming which took place in Media City on Friday 18th March.

Aim Sky High are a dance group based in Sale and have around 100 members. They have previously danced with Justin Bieber and Stormzy to name but a few incredible acts! They train 6 hours a week and are dedicated to improving and showcasing their skills and talent. Zanae in Year 10 said, “It was a fantastic experience that I thoroughly enjoyed and it will live long in my memory.” We hope to see the students continue to grow and share their love of dance within the school and wider community.

Life is wide, limitless. There is no border, no frontier.

This year we celebrated 25 years of World book day and we did it in style. If you thought you saw Little Red Riding Hood chatting with Dracula in the playground then your eyes probably weren’t deceiving you. Our amazing staff worked hard to bring their favourite characters to life and what a fabulous job they did!

Students spent the day participating in lots of fun activities which really highlighted the importance of reading for pleasure.

Our aim is to encourage our students to explore different genres and stories and to foster a love of reading that helps them escape to magical places.

Our character treasure hunt was a huge success and the children thoroughly enjoyed looking for clues and trying to work out the puzzle. We also had some fantastic entries to the book cover competition. Well done to all our winners and to everyone who got involved. We cannot wait to see what next year brings.

Transition from primary to secondary school can be an unusual time for all children but with COVID, online learning and missed time in school it is now more important than ever. A good transition can mean the difference between floundering and flourishing. We at CHS South are working hard to ensure a smooth transition takes place. Miss Austin has been lucky enough to go work in our feeder Primary Schools. On Tuesday 1st March she went to work in St Margaret’s Primary School and delivered a tennis session to the Year 5 students. She is now working with all 3 Year 5 classes; building a positive rapport and relationships with staff and students. The Year 5 students were outstanding and worked together to achieve their first quality of success badge Empathy. They worked in partners to help each other develop their control and coordination. Tennis is a fantastic sport to help develop student’s physical development, mental development and is social and fun!

Reflecting on Success

All students at South experienced an exciting and inspiring day as ‘BBC Teach’ delivered a session in our new purpose built theatre. They ‘shared their stories’ about personal development, empathy and what makes someone creative, happy and successful. A wonderful day where all reflected on their journey so far.

Odd Arts worked with Year 10 students to create a play about division ahead of their ‘Festival of Unity’ at Whitworth Art Gallery. The pupils really showed their passion and drive to make a change in the world.

Keepitup

‘No Woman, No cry’

This term, our lovely Year 8s have been studying the artwork titled, 'No woman, no cry,' by Chris Ofili. They have been developing an understanding of the context of the artwork. As well as developing their observational drawing skills, oil pastel application skills and mono printing skills

Our students have been busy creating copies of the artist’s work along with creating a portrait in the style of the artist of an inspiration person.

Exploring Design through Science Fiction

Our fantastic Year 9 art students have been exploring the design process and a variety of making methods to inform construction. The students have been exploring materials and techniques that are paper based, pressings, tonal drawings, biro drawings, dry brushing, drawing from observation, paper engineering, papier mâché. As well as looking at the work of H.R. Giger. They have been very busy creating a final piece, which is a Science Fiction inspired armor piece.

Natural World Inspirations

This term, Year 7 students have been looking at the artwork of the Mexican/American artist Ana Serrano. An image often used in her work is the cactus. Year 7 have completed cardboard edge paintings, 2D and 3D models of a cactus. Their work has been inspired by the colours and textures of Serrano’s models of the Favelas. A fantastic effort well done Year 7!

So Popular!

Here at CHS South the Year 7 Art club meets every Wednesday after school. We have a regular number of artists who attend each week, sometimes we run out of seats!

Painting, tie dying, friendship bracelets, clay work and scratch art have proved very popular and students have enjoyed the activities as you can see from the great outcomes.

Our First Ever Musical

This half term, we had over 80 audition for CHS South’s first musical, ‘High School Musical’. The auditions were set over two days principle auditions and ensemble auditions. The students were very successful and the rehearsals have started. Make sure you get your tickets for the shows on the 28th 30th of June! We can't wait to see you there!

Contact Manchester

Our students have been fortunate to work alongsi practitioners from Contact Manchester, who completed ‘Drama Drop’ for the Year 9 students. They looked at physic and vocal skills and how to improvise effectively.

Blood Brothers

Year 9 and 10 pupils have either performed in Blood Brothers or working towards their Blood Brothers performances in March. They have been working incredibly hard to create a professional performance which focuses on two brothers who were separated at birth.

Students had the opportunity to watch the musical at Palace Theatre in Manchester where they really enjoyed the performance and were professional at all times. We were excited to be back watching live theatre!

This year we celebrated International Women’s Day by hosting a speed dating event in our brand new theatre. We invited 14 amazing, strong, and determined women from our local community to talk and inspire our Year 7 girls. It also coincided with National Careers Week, so we made sure all women presenting had different job roles to promote diversity and raise aspirations for our students. The event was an overwhelming success. The students shone and every member of the community commented on how brilliant our students were.

International Women's Day is celebrated across the world each year. It's like a remembrance day but especially for women like Rosa Parks, Emmeline Pankhurst, Marie Curie and many others.

But why is it so special?

Miss Daswani explains that, "It allows us to celebrate women, what we've achieved and what men and women need to improve on".

Speaking of achievements, do you know what Rosa Parks did to be known as the "mother of the freedom movement?"

Rosa Parks can be classed as a hero that led up to people of colour to be treated fairly in the present day all because she held a firm ground and didn't let a white man take her seat.

We need to keep celebrating these amazing women. I'm sure you all know who Emmeline Pankhurst is, but you might not know that she came from Moss Side. Also, she has a statue dedicated to her in St. Peter's Square in Manchester.

Did you know that she was the eldest of ten siblings? She must've been one resilient big sister. The woman who protested for women's rights had quite the backstory. It is truly down to her and the Suffragettes that we can be grateful for the equality we have today.

Happy International Women's Day!

Science Fiction Inspired Photography

Year 9 have completed their recent project based on the theme of Science Fiction. Inspired by the model making of the artist Giger they have created their own Cyborgs. They used their own photographs of circuit boards, mannequin heads and skulls to create the images you can see here. Our photography students then went onto edit their photographs on Photoshop. Students are looking forward to presenting all their work in a small exhibition later in the year.

Congratulations to Amarri in Year 8 who has signed for Stoke City. Amarri has shown outstanding resilience and dedication in football. He often trains during the week and competes at high standard on the weekend; and continues to be an exemplary student at the school. This fantastic achievement will involve high level training and competition against elite clubs All the staff and students at CHS South are so proud of him. Well done!

Champions of South

Massive congratulations to Mohamed in Year 10 on becoming the KUGB National Boys Champion. From an early age, Mohamed has shown consistency and dedication in this sport. He has always been humble and always strives for success. Mo is now training for the England squad, and we wish him all the best for the future.

Be Active, Stay Healthy

Year 10 have been offsite for some of their PE lessons this half term and have been able to use the Gym at Hough end Leisure Centre. Students have been looking at different ways that they can lead a healthy active lifestyle away from the traditional activities delivered onsite at school. For some students this has been their first time using cardio and weight machines. Attitudes and levels of participation have been excellent, and they have been amazing ambassadors for the school. Well done Year 10!

Determination, Resilience and Commitment

Netball at CHS South this year has been an overwhelming success. We kicked off the year with over 60 girls at practice which meant we were able to enter the league for every single year group and have a squad much larger than usual. Netball has proved popular with our students and the standard has been exceptional. The wonderful Year 7 team started the year very strong and are currently undefeated. Fingers crossed they remain the champions throughout the year! Our fantastic Year 8s have had a tough start to the year but have showed their determination, resilience, and commitment. They have played the most games across all year groups! Well done Year 8! Our wonderful Year 9 students started the year with the largest squad, which was tremendous however, due to weather and unforeseen circumstances, have had the most matches postponed. They have remained committed to training and we hope they come back fighting next year. Despite the pressure of Year 10 our fantastic Year 10 students have organised their time and revision well to ensure they could play all their indoor tournaments. Their teamwork, umpiring and leadership has been second to none.

Well done to all the Netballers at CHS South!

Perfect Start

The girls have made the perfect start to their competitive season for the Junior NBA. In their first tournament they have topped their group after winning all their games convincingly against Flixton Girls and Didsbury high school. Well done girls and keep up the good work.

Beat The Buzzer!

The Year 7 boys at CHS South have made a great start to their Junior NBA campaign. They have won three out of their four opening matches in the tournament, including a last second buzzer beater scored by Rikairo. The Year 8 boys have also made a fantastic start to their basketball journey picking up some important wins again tough oppositions. Year 9 secured their first win of the year against Chorlton high School and the standard of competition was extremely high; with both teams showing fantastic sportsmanship. All teams have shown great resilience and skill development in their first matches and we hope that this continues in the future. Good luck boys!

Team Spirit

Girl's football has gone from strength to strength at South and our Year 7s are no different. They have formed an amazing team in a short space of time and have been putting in lots of time to train. They have made it to the quarter finals of the Manchester School PE Cup but fell short against a strong Trinity Side. However, the girls were silver medalists in Manchester Futsal Championships, an area which we continue to thrive in

Athletics Medal Haul

Congratulations to all the students who represented CHS South in the Manchester Schools Indoor athletics competitions There were an array of medals achieved for both team and individual performances. Let’s hope there is lots more to come in the summer term

Back Together

Boys' football continues to be a huge strength at the school. All years have entered the Manchester School cup, Greater Manchester Schools Cup and League formats All teams have worked hard this season and it has been great to see so many involved after the lockdown restrictions

Ambassadors of South

Huge well done to all our students who have been involved in the Manchester inclusion events this year. Students have completed in a goalball competition and Panathlon event. All students were great ambassadors for our school.

Strength

Our turn out for the Manchester Schools Cross Country event was amazing. CHS South produced some brilliant individual and team results. Running at CHS South continues to be a popular event and we look forward to see how these athletes perform

Outstanding Commitment

This year has seen lots of students taking part in various competitions for table tennis and badminton across KS3 and KS4 All students have represented South showing outstanding attitudes and commitment. A particular highlight has been the KS3 & KS4 table tennis team winning the overall friendly competition against William Hulme Grammar School and becoming KS4 Manchester Schools silver medalist.

Blossom by blossom the spring begins

Algernon Charles Swinburne

451 Mauldeth Road West, Chorlton. M21 7SX