Education

PRIMARY SCHOOL

PLAY SCHOOL NOTRE ECOLE PLAYGROUP LITTLE HANDS MVC VILLAGE COLLEGE U3A

EDUCATION

Melbourn Playgroup

Little Hands Karen 01763 260964

Melbourn Playgroup Jane Crawford 07842 151512 Notre Ecole Janet Whitton 261231 Pippins Children’s Centre Alison Wood 223460 Primary School Headteacher Stephanie Wilcox 223457 U3A (Univ. of Third Age) Chairman George Howard 260686 Village College Principal Simon Holmes 223400 We have had some very exciting visitors this term, Pudsey bear came in to visit us and we made Pudsey bear cakes, these were very yummy! The Reception class were learning about transport and vehicles and as part of this a tractor came to visit! It stayed all day so we took a trip to the playground and we all had a sit inside. This was super exciting.

Father Christmas came to visit us on his sleigh on the afternoon of our amazing Christmas concert. The children were very excited and all received a gift. The concert was held in the school hall and was a huge success; the children sang beautifully and made everyone feel very festive. Well done to all the children involved.

As part of preparing the older children for big school we have been making regular trips to the reception class and listening to stories read by the reception teachers. We have also visited the dining hall for lunch and will continue to do these things to make the transition to big school much easier and more comfortable for the children who will be starting school in September.

Contact Jane Crawford on 01763 223459 or email office@melbournplaygroup. org.uk or even visit the website on www.melbournplaygroup.org.uk

Pippins Children’s Centre

If you are a parent or carer of a child under 5, your local Children’s Centre would love to meet you!

The Centre office is open 9.30am - 12.30pm every weekday, and groups and activities run from Monday to

Friday. Call in, telephone, email or check our website for details of our current programme, or see our notice board outside the Centre next door to the Primary School on Mortlock Street. We look forward to meeting you. 01763 223460 melbournchildrenscentre@ cambridgeshire.gov.uk The link to Pippins Melbourn’s page on that website is www.cambridgeshirechildrenscentres. org.uk/melbourn

Oscar and Pudsey Arthur on the Tractor

Melbourn Primary School Spring Fayre

This year, the Fayre will be held in the afternoon of Saturday 10th May, with fun to be had for all. Come along to bounce on the castles, enjoy our fun games, ride the steam train, hook a duck, try your luck in our grand draw and much more. For a well-earned rest, you can sample the delights of our barbecue, cake stall, refreshments and ice creams.

We’re in the early stages of planning and so if you’d like to take part in any of the following ways, please get in contact with us. We’re currently looking for people who would like to: • Bring your own stall to the Fayre • Donate a prize for our Grand Draw • Advertise in our programme • Help out on the day (run a stall, help with the BBQ, man the gate, anything!)

If you would like to help out, or bring an attraction/stall, please get in contact at PTFA@melbourn.cambs.sch.uk

Spring Fayre is Melbourn Primary School PTFA’s main fund raising event of the year and regularly contributes over £3,000, which goes directly back to the school. The money is used to add to the facilities and opportunities available to all pupils, enhancing their learning and enjoyment of school life.

Educational funding cuts from central government mean that South Cambridgeshire schools are the most poorly funded in the country. The PTFA is working closely with the school governing body to open up new fund raising channels to give our children the best possible educational opportunities. We’re taking our first tentative steps into the world of grants and lottery funding. If you have experience of fund raising and would like to become involved with your local primary school, we’d love to hear from you. Please feel free to contact Julie Norman, our Chair of Governors at chair@melbourn.cambs.sch.uk

We look forward to seeing you in May.

Melbourn Village College

Core Excellence

At the end of December the College received the annual report which compares our results with those of all other schools nationally. Once again this gave us cause for celebration. In terms of GCSE passes we were significantly above the National average but it is the progress measures that gave us the greatest satisfaction. For the fifth year in a row the progress of students at the college places us in the top 30% of schools nationally. In the core areas of English and maths the story is even more encouraging. The progress made in maths places the department in the top 10% nationally; English are in the top 5%. These are truly excellent results, which benefit all the students at the college. There is no secret to this success – it is high expectations backed up by high quality teaching. This is at the heart of all the work both of MVC and our partners in the Comberton Academy Trust – ‘Excellence for All’ is our continued aspiration.

Anglia Ruskin trip

On 13 January, all of Year 9 went on a trip to Anglia Ruskin, a local university, called Eyes on the Prize. The point of the trip was to help us make good choices in life, for example GCSE options, sixth form, A-levels and more. First there was an introductory speech, which we were slightly late to because our coach broke down before getting to MVC, so we set off a bit late. Then we went round the careers fair. There were representatives from many organisations including Long Road Sixth Form and Hills Road Sixth Form and some local universities, including Anglia Ruskin and UCS (University Campus Suffolk). I thought that the most interesting place was Hills Road sixth form who had information on what GCSEs you need to do well in to get into certain A-level courses.

Then, we listened to a speech on college life at local universities by some of the students there. It included what halls life is like and how it differs when you leave halls in your second year. They also included some information on the social side of university and what it’s like living away from home (the importance of knowing how to cook!). After that we had a tour round Anglia Ruskin campus. The showed us: some of the labs they use for forensic science; a room which they use for exhibitions (it had nine huge TVs); the display wall of the work that the people on the photography course had taken, and the gym with its neighbouring cafe. Finally we had a concluding speech and then we drove back to Melbourn. Overall it was a very informative day.

Dance at MVC

On Wednesday 18th December, 26 GCSE dance students travelled to Sadler’s Wells Theatre in Angel, London, to see the critically acclaimed Swan Lake, by Matthew Bourne. This was a fantastic opportunity to see another of his works, as the students are studying his adaptation of Nutcracker! for their exam. The performance was beautiful, danced by a stunning cast, whereby all of the swans were performed by male dancers. The students were a credit to the school, returning back to Melbourn to perform in the school’s Christmas concert! Despite it being such a long day, the girls still managed to give an excellent performance. The students were also lucky enough to speak to Matthew Bourne himself, who was sitting watching in the audience. Melbourn’s GCSE Dance group look forward to another performance soon!

Patience Wins Out …

Congratulations to Lucy Hanlon Year 11 for the exciting success of her art - today in use by the Education Department of the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge as the official logo on their face-book account.

Lucy’s logo was created when she was in Year 8 in 2011 after a visit to the Fitzwilliam Museum. Students were asked to make their own interpretation of the Museum architecture. Following a display at the museum three works were chosen as possible logos and earlier this year it was announced that Lucy’s colourful and creative art design was to be used as the website logo from October 2013.

Lucy said “The challenge was to produce a piece of artwork based upon the view of the front of the Museum and the sculpture exhibition being displayed in the grounds around the entrance. Mrs Heeks and Mr Juett subsequently arranged for the artwork to be exhibited publicly at the CAM Williams Art Gallery in Gwydir Street alongside the work of several professional artists. I visited the gallery myself and was proud to see my art on display.”

After some considerable time Lucy was contacted by the Museum who said they really liked the image as it was clear and carefully constructed and original and felt it captured the essence of the education work of the Fitzwilliam Museum.

The Museum’s facebook and twitter pages can be found at: www.facebook.com/fiteducation – https://twitter.com/ FitzMuseum/Educa

The German Exchange

A group of year 8 and 9 students from MVC took part in a joint German Exchange run by Comberton Village Collage, spending a week with a German family in Bad Hersfeld, Hessen. The students involved were Theo Windred, Alderney Smith, Matthew Taylor, Adam Grove, Amy Selby, Rebecca Bystry and Oliver Martin.

Before leaving on Thursday 5th December most students had already been in contact with their German partners via Facebook and Whatsapp, allowing them to get to know each other and to practise their German a little before living with their partners and their families in Bad Hersfeld.

After a long bus journey students were met by their German families on the Thursday evening, and were made to feel very welcome. The next day, whilst the German partners were in lessons, we were given a tour of the school and the town and were lucky enough to have some snow, making everything, including the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market), feel particularly ‘Christmassy’. The rest of Friday and the whole of Saturday were spent with host families, most of whom took our students on visits to see the local area. On the Sunday our group visited and had a tour of Wartburg, a medieval castle, which stood impressively high up on a hill with excellent views. On the Monday students were in lessons with their partners, which they found most interesting. The following morning was spent doing project work with the German teachers, involving making Weihnachtsdekorationen and Weihnachtskarten as well as Weihnachts-biscuits, which everybody seemed to enjoy eating. On Wednesday we visited Erfurt, a medieval town, where we were given a two-hour tour and time to go around the large Weihnachtsmarkt. Our final day was spent visiting the salt-mines of Merkers, not far from Bad Hersfeld, where we went 500 metres below ground-level and saw, amongst other things, a huge underground concert-hall.

Everybody seemed to thoroughly enjoy the trip and there was an impressive amount of German spoken. Our students are now looking forward to having their partners stay with them and their families in March, and will perhaps continue to stay in touch once the exchange is over. All in all students had a most positive experience and learned a great deal.

We hope to have more MVC students take part in next year’s exchange.

Expedition to Ethiopia

Mr Walker and Miss King are delighted to be leading some of our current Year 11s on an expedition to Ethiopia, with World Challenge in July 2014. This is an extremely exciting adventure for the students, who will have the amazing opportunity of gaining valuable life skills, experiencing a new culture and way of life, whilst helping to improve the lives of others. The expedition will include: Learning about the application of permaculture to rural African communities as a way to generate long-term food security and develop community empowerment.

A four day project phase, in which the students will help to build a bread oven so that the local children can supplement their diet with carbohydrates. The students will also have a chance to interact with the children by bringing with them: games, songs, lessons and a football!

A cultural activity day, in which the students will get the chance to see how beautiful Ethiopian cloth is made; visit the local Chega house to learn how the local staple is made; and practise their haggling skills, when picking up food supplies from the buzzing local market. The students will also visit the Konso museum to learn about the tribal history of the Omo Valley and see a fantastic collection of ancient Waku statues.

A three day trekking phase. The students will get the opportunity to take in the views of picturesque valleys; eat traditional injera; enjoy an evening of star-gazing; visit a local shama medicine man to learn about the traditional tribal medicines; and visit a local blacksmith’s to see how traditional clay pots are made, even having a go at making their own!

Travel back through the Rift Valley to Addis Ababa. For the last two days, the students will have the opportunity to take in the views of the landscape, made up of lakes surrounded by mountains; head to hot springs; haggle for weavings and tapestries in local villages; and finish with a celebratory meal out in the capital, before heading for home.

The students are all very excited to embark on their lifechanging adventure; they are looking forward to, ‘giving something back,’ and making a difference to the lives of the people they will meet. The students have all been working very hard to organise fund-raising events to raise the money to enable them to go. They have done their fund-raising independently and should all be very proud of themselves as we, at MVC, are!

Please do visit our website in September, to read about the students’ memorable experiences and view the wonderful pictures that they will no doubt bring back with them!

Free Weekly Advice Clinic at the Melbourn HUB

Thinking of Making a Will? Need to provide Financial Protection for Family or Business? Why not drop in at the Hub for a chat with John Gibson of Giddings Lane Will Writers, or Mark Graddage of Beacon Wealth Management Ltd. They can discuss your needs and provide you with important information to assist with your financial objectives. Every Tuesday 10am–3pm

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