Year 7 Skills Day
Each year, our current Year 7 students take part in a skills day which takes part over three days and focuses on important life skills such as planning, empathising and teamwork.
The day began with students thinking about a situation in the news and imagining how it might feel to be in that position. How did they think those concerned felt? How do they get to their feelings? Why do we need to be good at empathising? All important questions to help with understanding the needs of people that you work with in order to build a successful collaboration.
Their first task of the day built on this new knowledge by demonstrating how to make an omelette as if they were on a TV cookery programme. The twist though, was that the “demonstrator” couldn’t use their own hands but had to rely on another student to be their hands; one student sits facing forward with arms linked behind the back of the chair, the other crouches behind and puts arms through to the front thus providing the arms to the others’ body. The ‘arms’ person’s head remains hidden so as not to see what is happening in front.
The task would have resulted in some questionable omelettes, but it tested their communication skills and once the roles were reversed there was a noticeable improvement in the cookery!
Asking themselves questions like “What were you worried about when you came to SCGSG?” students took time during the afternoon to reflect on their transition from primary to secondary school and create an icebreaker video that might help to dispel any anxieties that new students might have when they make the move.
From the videos submitted by the entire year group, a select few will be added to the Year 6 Transition Website for prospective students to view as well as other content curated by Head of Year 7, Mrs Mahoney.