We believe in ourselves and connect:
Wellbeing week: The 31st January is the second Wellbeing week in school and this time we have a focus on the importance of sleep.
The pandemic altered children’s daily routines, including sleep and wake schedules, screen time and physical activity, all of which can be harmful to their overall health and well-being. Now that most students are back in the classroom, it’s important that they establish new routines that include the proper amount of healthy sleep.
Sleep is as important to our health as eating, drinking and breathing. It allows our bodies to repair themselves and our brains to consolidate our memories and process information.
Poor sleep is linked to physical problems such as a weakened immune system and mental health problems such as anxiety and depression.
Why does sleep matter?
Getting enough sleep is critical to the health and well-being of students of all ages. Sufficient sleep helps students:
- Excel in the classroom by maximizing attention, memory and learning abilities
- Perform better in sports by being faster, stronger and more accurate
- Feel positive and have a more optimistic attitude toward life
- Look their best and maintain a healthy weight
- Have fun and enjoy life by making better decisions and staying safe.
During form period we will be discussing sleep hygiene and encouraging students to consider how to ensure that they get a good night's sleep.
Studies agree that approximately 8.5 hours of sleep is required for teenagers to perform at their optimum level. 65% of young people do not get the required amount of sleep.
The required level of sleep varies throughout your life, and it’s researchers agree that in your teenage years you need sleep more than ever.
Safeguarding our children:
Safeguarding our children remains our key priority during this difficult time. If you have any concerns about the safety of a young person in our school please email _safeguarding@wickersley.net in the usual way and our team will endeavour to support you.
Supporting our children
We are lucky to be working in partnership with ‘With me in Mind’ who are mental health practitioners. They will be in school during wellbeing week handing out free resources and on hand to chat about how to get a good night’s sleep.
Pledges update:
This term students will be completing 'We take responsibility' and 'We believe in ourselves and celebrate achievement' as part of our Pledges and their ongoing personal development. Students are encouraged to have open and honest conversations to better understand areas to improve. We promote the value of meaningful and reflective conversations to promote confidence along with specific steps to continue progressing. During this term students will be taught the value of identifying areas of which they are most proud in order to connect with their achievements. Students are given the opportunity with these Pledges to explore multiple means of self-reflection to support feeling good about who they are, what they've achieved and what's to come.
School Council news
Term 1 is over and the School Council have worked hard to find out what their peers have been suggesting and seeking to improve in and sound school. They have collected evidence from a number of ways which allows all students to ‘have their say’ in the fairest possible way. They then raised these concerns and ideas to Mr Hardcastle in a meeting just before Christmas. The main headlines are below:
We take pride in and look after our school community. The School Eco - Council
Our amazing Eco-council leaders orchestrated a hugely successful litter pick just before Christmas.
Around 50 students decided to volunteer and help make our school community that bit more cleaner to thrive in. Teams were led by the ‘Eco warriors’ and each had their own patch to work on. Some of those hard to reach areas like the bushes in front of school and around the car park were particular ‘hot spots’. One student said, “that was great and I’m off to do this again tonight in my own community , like I do every night.” Wonderful.
We are extremely proud of these students and each will receive a CFP, count it towards the Wickersley Pledges and take home with them a sense of community achievement .
We are aiming to do this monthly from January.
Student Leadership
A huge congratulations to the new Student leaders. They have successfully applied and been accepted onto the new course.
Can we thank all the candidates and students who applied, there were some real tough decisions and we wish we could have taken on more!! Please don't be disappointed if you weren't one of the selected ones. You are a HUGE credit to the school, so keep up the hard work. The new Leaders will be working closely with Mr Gill and their Heads of year throughout this calendar year working on selected projects.
Year 7
- Ethan Potts
- Claudia Brown - Vasilescu
- Ellen Henry
- Amelia Cocker
Year 8
- Isaac Blake
- Usman Ahmed
- Mabrookah Agbabiaka
- Erin Butler
Year 9
- Alexandra Griffiths
- Elena Ali
- Lexi-Mae Armitage
- Oliver Milnes
Year 10
- Thomas Erwin
- Abbi Lee
- George Mitchell
Year 11
- Sofia Verona
- Ciara Brady
- Warren Lawrence
- Molly Jarvis
PSHE update for this term:
Year 7 - Are currently looking at the physical and emotional changes that happen during puberty.
Year 8 - Are working their way through their citizenship unit where we will be exploring how democracy works in the UK, issues around discrimination and hate crime including the impact discrimination can have on the individual and how we can tackle this both on and off line.
Year 9 - Y9 students are currently completing their relationships unit of work. Including healthy and unhealthy relationships as well as exploring the law and how this protects people in society.
Year 10 - This term year 10 will be exploring issues around healthy and unhealthy relationships as well as how to look after their wellbeing.
Year 11 - In PSHE workshops Y11 have been looking at the importance of looking after their physical health.
For more information about PSHE lessons, please contact pshe@wickersley.net
Useful resources:
The following websites are really useful for supporting young people with sleep and wellbeing:
This is an excellent resource with advice for parents and teenagers on sleep hygiene and mental health. There is an ebook they you can download, a quiz you can complete about your sleep profile and some really useful videos to watch.
Some great resources for young people on how to look after their wellbeing and a chance to chat online with mental health professionals about anything that is on your mind.