Making Waves Together

I was delighted to receive the following article about an educational programme on coastal safety and surveillance at the Mount Batten Centre from Tors Froud, Project Manager of Making Waves Together.

Tori commented that “personally and professionally, your students were a pleasure to work with. They were guinea pigs for me on this programme – I normally target women only or family groups, but this was a first; being over a 4 week course and also teenagers only… and they didn’t let me down, they definitely did you proud – I really did smile at the students’ conduct throughout.”

For the last 4 weeks 18 year 8, 9 and 10s have followed an educational programme about coastal safety and surveillance at the Mount Batten Centre. They learnt stand up and paddle boarding techniques and rescues, self-recovery in a kayak and practised rescuing a casualty with a throw line.

Utilising course frameworks from the BCU, RNLI, RLSS and SLSGB, they also spent time in the classroom looking at scenarios of hazards along the coast and how to minimise the risks.

The final session took to the fields at Jennycliff and Mount Batten Beach with walking boots and hot chocolate in thermos flasks. During this practical the group discovered 2 ‘casualties’ in the distance on the rocks by Mount Batten Beach with their binoculars. It was decided they should call ‘999’ and within minutes the Coastguard Rescue Team (CRT) and Police responded.

Watching the ‘casualties’ get extracted from the rocks to the beach, they saw the techniques and casualty care given to the ‘broken leg’ and ‘dislocated shoulder’.

The incident was an exercise, planned specifically for the group to put into practice the knowledge that had been learnt; the ‘casualties’ were instructors from the Mount Batten Centre but it wasn’t until they had been rescued that the group were made aware of this.

Many thanks to the CRT, Sgt Port from Plymouth Police, Longroom Port Control, Cattewater Harbour Commissioners, Plymouth Lifeboat and Falmouth Maritime Operations Coastguard for their support in this exercise.

This is the first 4 week programme devised by geography teacher, Plymouth Lifeboat DLA & Making Waves Together Project manager, Tors Froud, of this kind. It has been established for delivery to teenagers at the Mount Batten Centre and is being supported by #CoastSafe – a Devon and Cornwall Police initiative which aims to prevent incidents through multi agency work, along the coastline in Devon and Cornwall. These 18 young people now have the opportunity to share their experience and knowledge to their families, friends and wider community.

Chris Cook from the RNLI Plymouth Lifeboat who worked with the planning and delivery of the programme said “The coastal safety and surveillance initiative has been an excellent way to enable young people to engage with their local coastal environment. Not only are they able to take part in a range of exciting and fun water based activities but they also learn how to do this safely. The participants can not only plan safe activities for themselves but spot others in danger near the coast.

The Mount Batten Centre hosted the Programme with funding from Awards For All. Tors, Chris and the staff at MBC hope to roll it out to local groups of all ages and adapt it to varying levels of water abilities, from land based dog walkers, to local primary schools and possibly develop it for Plymstock School even further.

All the students involved were awarded with their BCU Paddle Start Award as well as a Certificate of Completion supported by Devon and Cornwall Police’s #Coastsafe initiative; it is hoped that these young people can have the confidence, knowledge and ability to help support and educate their friends, family and other coast users.

What a fantastic opportunity for students in our local area and they really did Plymstock proud. Well Done

Last weekend Ian Johnson a member of our Maths Department, his grandson and some of our students took part in the Tour de Moor. Ian has written the following account for this week’s blog.

“Tour de Moor is run by St Luke’s Hospice who provide amazing end of life support whether in the home, at Derriford Hospital or at their facilities at Turnchapel.

The Tour de Moor challenge comes in three levels with the most extreme being the 52km mountain bike across some of the most challenging tracks on Dartmoor.

On the day, the weather didn’t disappoint; wet, cool and windy. That, along with the more recent weather, made for some incredibly muddy trails, where the challenge was just to stay on your bike!

Those participating came from all age groups and abilities but all had one thing in common, and that was to raise money for St Luke’s. My amazing grandson Finlay (13 years) had been so looking forward to taking part, so we did 3 weeks training – lesson learned, we need more training next time!

The main refreshment point on route was Princetown, where smiles were abounding even with the driving rain and strong winds! After a further 11 miles we made it to the finishing line with a finishing time of 4 hours and with a real sense of achievement albeit very muddy.

Upon returning to school on Monday, conversation with my tutor group turned to the Tour de Moor, and I was over the moon to hear that so many of our students also took part from across year groups. It is moments like this that make you realise that our future generations are compassionate and ready to challenge themselves for good causes and the benefit of others.”

We are really proud of Ian, his grandson and our students not only for their fantastic personal achievement in completing such an event but for their commitment to support such an important local charity.

Between them they have managed to raise over £1,000 for St Luke’s.

crocheted poppies for the poppy appeal

Many of you will know Jan Brown our school receptionist. Jan has been combining one of her hobbies with fund raising. Over the past four years, she has crocheted poppies for the poppy appeal. Every year she tries to vary and change the design and is attempting to beat the £140 she raised last year for the Royal British Legion appeal fund. Jan has the poppies on sale in reception and they are available to all visitors and staff. We wanted to let you know about her work and recognise the contribution she is making to such an important annual appeal. On behalf of Plymstock School, I should like to thank you Jan for all your efforts to help this worthy cause.

Plymouth Snow sports Club’s Alpine Ski Race team

Brothers Jacob Year 12 and Oliver Year 9, members of Plymouth Snow sports Club’s Alpine Ski Race team, achieved great results last weekend. Plymouth Snow sports Centre celebrated their 30th anniversary and the race team held a slalom competition, contested over 4 runs on 2 separate courses. Oliver came 3rd in the juniors’ category and Jacob came 1st in the adults’ category and was additionally awarded the title of fastest skier of 2019; his name is added to the coveted “Golden Ski” trophy on the wall at the ski centre.

The team are now training hard for the Southwest Schools Championships in Torquay in November.

Well done boys – a fantastic achievement!

Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL)

We were delighted to welcome Leeshia Walton this week, to Plymstock School. She is our new Designated Safeguarding Lead taking over the role from Mr Sprenkel. Leeshia has spent many years as a Midwifery lecturer at Plymouth University as well as working for the NHS and we are all looking forward to working with her.

Social inclusion and community cohesion

On Wednesday we were visited by a group of European teachers through Amber Initiatives (non-for-profit organisation who work on social inclusion and community cohesion). The visitors came from various countries including Italy, Portugal, Germany, Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Finland. They visited some classes and had a tour of the School as well as undertaking some Mathematics! The teachers were impressed with how well our students behaved and worked in our school.

Life Education Lesson

Year 7 Life Education students created ‘Graffiti Walls’ about Positive and Negative Relationships. This is part of our Year 7 Relationships and Wellbeing Unit. Students are asked to consider the characteristics and qualities of a ‘good friend’ and how they ‘push you forward’ in contrast to a ‘bad friend’ who ‘holds you back’.

Year 11 Next Steps Booklet

Our Next Steps Booklet was launched this week and is designed for Year 11 to support them with the post 16 options process. You can find a copy of this booklet on the Careers Section of the school website. We hope that this will be a useful document for both students and parents/carers.

Year 7 sailing trip

The sun shone brightly on four lucky Year 7 students who sailed along the Plymouth waterfront and out to the breakwater on Tuesday in ‘Pegasus’ a boat belonging to The Island Trust. Nils, Freddy, Joel and Ellis participated in a variety of sea faring activities including steering and operating the boat, trawling for plankton, examining marine life under a microscope and completing a booklet about Plymouth Sound. We should like to thank John Hepburn and the Pegasus crew for making their day so enjoyable. Summed up very well by one student who said ‘I don’t want the day to end.’

We now reach our student of the week section. Our winners include:

Year 7 – Julia who has absolutely smashed the merits for this half-term (from a variety of subject teachers) which is a fair reflection of her kind hearted nature and positive attitude! She also was one of the winners in the Bake off cake challenge for languages day and has 100% attendance with no red cards or homework detentions.

Year 8 both Skyla and Oceana have been nominated by Miss Holton and Mr Wookey for their remarkable resilience and showing the true spirit of Plymstock.

Year 9 we have three nominations and all joint winners:
Logan completed an abseil for Jeremiah’s Journey last Saturday at the Cheesewring.
Lizzie was awarded Player of the Week by her rugby club Plymstock Albion Oaks RFC. Lizzie is an active member of their Oaks Inclusive Rugby programme.

Owain and Jake stopped to help an elderly woman who had taken a fall while they were walking to school last Wednesday morning.

Rhiannon and Dedan in Year 10 are working really hard on the new D&T GCSE that they have opted for and their most recent homework task was produced to an exceptional standard.

Rose in Year 11 who is working very hard in Hospitality and Catering, even going above and beyond to help the staff clear up when others leave behind a mess in their wake!!

And finally…

I hope that all our students and families have a safe and enjoyable half-term.