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Charlie Kirton wins Salford Popstars
Once again the school was invited, in February, to select a number of Year 10 pupils to enter the Salford Schools’ Popstars Competition being held at the Willows on 29th May 2009. Charlie Kirton won the audition heats to be our worthy representative and she carried this on with great enthusiasm and motivation.
She attended rehearsals and coaching sessions which culminated in a flawless performance and which enraptured the whole audience with her stage presence as she performed ‘Run’ as sung by Leona Lewis.
Charlie said, “I would like to thank Mrs Welsh for nominating me for Salford Popstars. I was shocked that I won, but am very proud of my achievement. I would also like to thank everyone for their support on the night."
We are so proud of Charlie. She worked hard and was motivated to win. She will be busy this year performing again, as the deserved winner, in October and enjoying the prizes which include voice coaching and a recording session in a studio as well as other personal prizes such as an Ipod and downloads.
Headteacher, John Biddlestone said, "We’re so proud that Charlie has done so well to win in such a high quality field of performers."
Well done Charlie, you made us proud on such an enjoyable evening.
As well as Charlie winning the actual competition on the night, Asad Ijaz, who is currently studying the new Creative and Media Diploma at The Swinton High School, was chosen by the BBC 21CC to film the Salford Schools Popstars competition on Thursday 29th May 2009. This meant that he had to attend training sessions during the half term holiday, Saturdays and on the day of the performance.
Asad has learnt so much about filming which will inevitably help him as he has decided that this may be what he wants to do after leaving The Swinton High School.
Asad is enjoying the fruits of industry learning whilst studying the Diploma course and it is certain that he has gained so much experiential learning which will benefit his studies and develop expertise to assist him in the future.
We were so proud to see him take a crucial part in the evening’s proceedings, and the projection, as seen by the whole audience, was flawless and showed signs of creative ingenuity.
Well done Asad. We now have our camera man for future performances at the school!!
Drumming for Fair Trade
To celebrate World Fair Trade Day 2009, The Swinton High School’s Year 8 pupils performed a Samba drumming piece in recognition of Latin workers around the globe who enjoy better pay and working conditions as a result of the fair trade initiative.
As you can see from the video, teachers and pupils alike had a great time!
You can find out more about world fair trade by visiting the official website:
Swinton's Got Talent 2009
On Thursday 2nd April we staged our second annual Talent Show. After a long audition period with over 70 pupils performing either during the lunch time or after school, a shortlist of 14 acts was finally produced.
One or two days a week pupils came to the Globe to practise performing in the venue to give them experience of performing in the same place as the final. They attended after school often until 5.00pm.
All efforts culminated in an evening that promised to be both entertaining and exciting as it was hard for anyone involved in the show to predict the winner because all the performances were outstanding.
Hannah Halstead, our 2008 second place won the competition in this year, 2009.
Charlotte Stevenson from Year 7 came second and the Dance group Toxic Chaos came third.
Many thanks to all involved in the performance!
Pupils Visit London for Princess Diana Award
As part of the OpenSpace and Futuresearch Projects, four pupils from The Swinton High School went to a very prestigious award ceremony to pick up a Princess Diana Certificate of Excellence Award. Accompanied by Mrs Robb and Mrs Howarth, the four pupils met at Piccadilly Train Station in Manchester on a wet and windy Monday morning for a long train journey to London, where they were due at the Headquarters of Barclays Bank on Canary Wharf for the ceremony.
On arrival in London, with everyone feeling a bit peckish, the pupils were taken by Mrs Robb and Mrs Howarth to a fancy Italian restaurant for some pizza, which everyone seemed to enjoy. Then it was off to Canary Wharf itself, where they were greeted with refreshments and some short theatrical productions.
After posing for some pictures with Esther Rantzen and Robin Gibb from the Bee Gee’s, it was time for the award ceremony itself. After finally getting the award, there was just a bit more time for pictures and a chat before it was time to get back to Manchester.
All of the pupils really enjoyed themselves, Matthew Bracegirdle saying “I felt so proud and privileged to receive this prestigious award, I am really pleased for us all”.
Well done to everyone!
Vagabond visits TSHS
The Swinton High School hosted a performance by the band Vagabond, a six piece live band, who, unbeknown to us, had played at the James Morrison concert at the MEN Arena the night before.
Year Nine pupils from TSHS, as well as Creative and Media Diploma pupils from around the city, were chosen to watch the performance and they did us proud by encouraging the group and asking some mature questions during the question and answer session at the end of the concert.
The Band played five songs including their soon to be released single and the genre in which they play was also enjoyed by the members of staff who were in the audience.
A kind of Soul/Blues flavour to their music coupled with the fantastic voice of the lead singer meant that not only did they look good they sounded good also.
National No Smoking - Dragon's Den Competition
By Isabelle - Dalton-Bunker, Year 7
I entered the competition through school. We filled out the entry form on PSVE and then we had to take it home for our parents to sign. Those who returned the form on time had them sent off to be entered into the national competition. To enter the competition we had to think of an idea to spend £2111 pound to benefit the family. This amount represented how much money a person would save if they gave up smoking for a year, should they smoke 20 cigarettes a day.
If we were one of the three finalists then we would get to go to London for free to meet Duncan Bannatyne and present our ideas and then it would be up to him to decide which idea was the best. If we were a runner up we would get £100 of vouchers for the whole family and the winner would get £200 of vouchers and their school would be given £2111.
I was very excited when my dad got the phone call to say that I had been lucky enough to be chosen as one of the three finalists out of thousand of entries nationwide. When I got the text message from my dad saying I was one of the finalists I went to find my PSVE teacher, Miss Patel, who began to bounce up and down when I told her. I saw Mr Biddlestone in the yard and told him my good news and he asked me to write down a diary of my day with Duncan Bannatyne.
The next stage of the competition meant that I had to develop my idea and give a presentation of how I could encouraged a family member to give up smoking. I used my ICT skills and produced a PowerPoint presentation, a t-shirt and reward charts. I also borrowed some props from Salford Primary Care Trust which showed how much phlegm a smoker would cough up in two weeks, how much tar was in a smoker’s lungs after a year of smoking 20 cigarettes a year and a large display showing the harmful chemicals contained in cigarettes.
I carefully packed them all into my mum’s trolley bag and the night before the competition I went to bed very early. To get to London we had to wake up at 6 o’clock just to get on the train and we had to be out of the house pretty quickly. We couldn’t waste any time at all; if we did it would leave me and my dad in a disaster since we had bought the tickets all ready so that we knew for definite that we would get a seat.
On the train we were absolutely bored! All we had to do was to sit and look out of the window for half of the journey. Thankfully I had brought some paper and my dad brought a pen so we could get Duncan Bannatyne’s autograph so I could take it home and show it off to everyone (sadly no-one was bothered that I got through to the finals).
We were very lucky as we had no delays and we managed to get to the studio where the competition was being held with half an hour to spare. The studio itself looked a lot like the actual Dragon’s Den set but we were told that they actually filmed that series in a mock set in a large warehouse. This was much nicer. It had been used for lots of different purposes, one of the more recent ones being an episode of ‘Primeval’. The studio was very crowded and busy as there were lots of members of film crew, a director, Duncan’s personal assistants, people from the PR Company, the National No Smoking Day campaign, radio interviewers, an internet website interviewer as well as people based at the television studio itself.
The other two competitors arrived at the studio a short while after us. They were both from Wales; one was a girl who was 9 years old and the other a 13 year old boy. They were shocked to find how busy the studio was as they had never been to London before and seemed a little overawed. They both seemed quite nice and we were soon chatting away about who we were and where we were from.
I had felt rather insignificant up to this point until Duncan arrived. One of Duncan’s assistants came to tell us that he had arrived and I immediately began to feel very, very giddy and excited. He came upstairs to join us in the kitchen area. He needed no introduction as we all knew who he was. He was very relaxed and didn’t seem like a famous multi millionaire. We had a drink with him as we learned what the day would consist of and then we were taken into another room where the cameras were in order to prepare for our presentations.
I went first. I had butterflies in my stomach all the way through my presentation. At one point they even sprinted as the laptop went blank and my PowerPoint disappeared from the screen. I was glad when I had finished and felt a sigh of relief. It was worth it though when Duncan praised my efforts and I even began to think that I might be fortunate enough to win.
Year 11 Able, Gifted and Talented Reward Trip
At the end of the first spring half term, 10 of our Able, Gifted and Talented learners were rewarded for their consistent hard work and improved coursework grades over the course of year 11.
Before relaxing, however, they visited the ‘Urbis’ museum’s Emory Douglas exhibition about the history of the civil rights movement in the United States. This gave them an enhanced understanding of U.S.history for their English Literature coursework, studying the novels ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ and ‘Of Mice and Men’. Also they were greatly impressed by the ‘Reality Hack: Hidden Manchester’ photography exhibition, which presented a new perspective on some familiar Manchester landmarks.
After all this mental stimulation, the year 11s moved on to the cinema in the printworks to enjoy a relaxing comedy and some popcorn! In the run-up to the ‘final push’ in their exams, a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon was had by all, staff and pupils alike.