Since the start of 2022, R.E.A.L. set a goal to encourage learners to read more and to help improve the provision for reading across R.E.A.L.
Michelle Farr and Chris Newman, Joint Heads of Quality of Education, as well as the rest of the leadership team would like to thank all staff for their amazing commitment to doing this.
Michelle said: “We would like to thank our staff for allowing us into sessions and encouraging learners to talk to us about their experience of reading at R.E.A.L, this is incredibly powerful!”
“It’s really encouraging that all staff recognise the important role that reading plays in accessing other areas of the curriculum and how important it is that our learners leave R.E.A.L. being able to read well. We appreciate all of the fantastic work that has been going on at all sites and within sessions to develop the love of reading.”
“Staff have been going to great lengths to find books that match their learners’ interests and have been planning set-times for reading in every session. As a result, learners have become more confident in reading aloud and talking about the books that they have enjoyed”.
Deputy Heads and Learning Managers have been reading Harry Potter books daily online for learners and this means that all of our learners are being read to daily. It has also been really positive to see staff delivering the Phonics International Programme for those learners who require it. As a result, one year 10 learner, who has been accessing a 20 minute daily phonics intervention for four weeks, has incredibly made the equivalent of nine months progress during that time.
Michelle said: “Reading will continue to remain a school improvement priority next academic year and we will work hard to embed all that we have started this year.”
On the 25th May, a group of learners from our Creative Arts Provision performed alongside contemporaries from Dawn House school to a live audience of over fifty people in the theatre at the Old Library in Mansfield.
For some of the learners, it was the first time they have performed in public to an audience, which required overcoming some significant personal barriers to achieve this fantastic feat that has the capacity to build confidence and self-belief for the future.
Learners, parents, carers, siblings and other family members came to watch the performances, which included accomplished singing and piano solos by our learners. We were also fortunate to collaborate with R.E.A.L. Creative Digital staff and learners who filmed the whole show, as well as R.E.A.L. Catering who prepared, cooked and served delicious food and refreshments for all in attendance.
James Mills, Music Provision Manager said: “It was particularly lovely to see parents and carers come along and see their children thrive and watch them share such a joyful moment. This was the first of many more annual showcases we will be running as we build upon this exciting first success.”
We would like to thank all parents and carers for their support and encouragement in attending the showcase, and staff for creating a brilliant and motivating curriculum that makes learners want to come to school and engage.
The students who performed in the showcase are currently working towards an NCFE Level 2 in Music Technology. From September this year, R.E.A.L. Creative Arts will also be offering qualifications in drama and art and design, alongside music. For more information about R.E.A.L. Creative Arts, visit our website.
Over the last few weeks the HR and Finance Teams at R.E.A.L. have been visiting various R.E.A.L. sites to help put some faces to names and answer any staff questions.
Lucy Holley, Finance Officer said: “All of this has been put together by Finance and HR. The aim is to bring all the R.E.A.L. departments together as a team, regardless of whether we see or interact with each other every day.”
Some of the sites visited included Ilkeston, City Hub, Woodhouse Road, Blidworth, Nanpantan and Hinckley.
Lucy said: “The feedback so far has been very positive and it’s been great to get out of Head Office and meet some of our staff and learners.”
Harry Webber, HR Advisor said: “These visits are always an enjoyable experience as it provides me with the opportunity to witness first hand the hard work our staff do on the day to day at R.E.A.L.
“I also love being able to meet our learners and see how the work I do plays a part in their journey with us at R.E.A.L. and beyond.”
Lucy added: “We will be organising further dates to visit before the summer and hope after these events the staff will feel more confident and comfortable coming to us for any help.”
Providing support to our team is an important role; making sure everyone feels supported and valued at work is a key principle at R.E.A.L. Education.
For more information about new opportunities to join our team, please click here: https://real-education.org/vacancies/
A R.E.A.L. learner has created a thoughtful piece of word art encapsulating peer pressure, as a way to recap all they’ve learnt in PSHE classes this term.
A learner has been having 1-1 PSHE lessons with Specialist Teaching Assistant, Fiona Ryan. Fiona said: “My learner has engaged beautifully with the subject.”
The classes have involved discussions on the importance of consent, having your own mind and learning about self-confidence and what the right thing to do in certain situations would be.
Fiona and her learner looked up words that could be used to define peer pressure and wrote definitions for all the words from an online dictionary.
Fiona said: “We chose the words together, some of which the learner had not heard before, so it also helped extend their vocabulary.”
R.E.A.L. staff and learners got the amazing opportunity to go to the Nottingham Open and watch two of the women’s quarter final matches.
Matt Waring, Sports Lead, organised the trip for the sports vocational group in Pleasley, as well as other one to one learners from across R.E.A.L. joining too. Matt said: “I wanted to give an opportunity for the learners to experience an elite tennis competition, with access to watching some of the world’s best tennis players live.”
Tennis fans from around the UK and beyond attended the event held at Nottingham Tennis Centre. There were stalls, coaching activities on the practice courts as well as the main events of the tournament matches.
Matt said: “All the learners enjoyed watching the speed, power and technical mastery of the players. We watched two matches, one of which included the eventual Women’s Singles Champion and the Doubles Champion Beatriz Haddad Maia.
“I hope the visit will be an inspiration to some of our learners, watching a sport that is maybe not usually played by them outside of opportunities they may get in school. As well as being able to watch some very strong female role models in the matches we observed. We hope to run a similar event next year!”
While many of you were taking part in street parties, eating scones and drinking tea across the Platinum Jubilee Bank Holiday, some members of R.E.A.L. staff were pushed to their absolute limits cycling from Cumbria to Tynemouth.
This epic journey saw Martin Thorne, Maria Wills, Steve Quinn and others cycle 150 miles over three demanding days, all in aid of raising money for the R.E.A.L. Foundation Trust.
Tutor, Martin Thorne said: “I knew at the age of 66 that I would be the oldest rider of our group, and I knew it would be a challenge, but nothing prepared me for how hard the second day was.”
The C2C is a hilly ride that takes riders through the Lake District, Northern Pennines and County Durham, before the finishing point at Tynemouth Castle and Priory.
Martin said: “Getting to Hartside summit, a climb of 4.5 miles that rises 1,903 feet was really hard going, but I had a good wingman as I was joined by my eldest son, Matthew for the challenge. Although it was his Mum’s instructions to look after me!”
Going uphill only means one thing, you have to come back down and the route comes with some very fast downhill stretches, but not before climbing back up again. Martin said: “I was given the task of writing a book about all the different types of tarmac I had been looking at all day on the climbs. I have three chapters already!”
Stunning scenery, pizza stops and coffee breaks may have helped them along the way but Martin says the thought of raising money for R.E.A.L. Foundation Trust was a major motivation as they rode the final stretch towards Tynemouth. Martin said: “This money will seriously help to impact the young people we work with.
“I could not have wished for a better team. We all got on so well, we never fell out. We helped and supported each other the whole way, even after Maria got a puncture within half a mile of the finish line.
“Am I glad to have done this? Most definitely ‘YES!’ and I can tick this off my bucket list, but would I do it again? Probably not, but I would certainly be part of the support team if R.E.A.L. chose to set the challenge up again.”
If you’d like to donate to this wheelie-good cause you can do so here.
It’s no secret that Her Majesty the Queen marked a marvellous 70 years on the throne in June, and all R.E.A.L. sites joined in the platinum jubilee celebrations.
Learners and staff across R.E.A.L. sat down for an afternoon tea, with Sandhills being treated to live music and homemade sausage rolls cooked by the learners. Woodhouse Road had been busy handmaking a copious amount of bunting while Hinckley made some picture perfect jubilee cupcakes.
The RIS Ilkeston carefully used their finest bone china tea cups at their afternoon tea while those at the Concorde House hub had stuck mini Union Jack flags in most items on their tables full of food.
All sites were wonderfully decorated in red, white and blue, with flags, bunting, napkins, hats, photographs, drawings and themed clothing throughout the celebrations.
Imagine being able to build your own dog? Well, STEM learners at R.E.A.L. got as close as possible to this by building and programming a robot dog out of LEGO.
LEGO has been used as a way of learning for a while at R.E.A.L. due to their various fun, educational resources.
Learners have been taught how to code through LEGO and with this latest creation ‘Kiki the dog,’ their knowledge of coding has advanced further.
Duncan Allen, STEM Teacher said: “This really is a break-out technology, it’s where coding and computers enter the real world using sensors and motors and other sensory outputs such as light and sound.”
The kit uses real world colours, has a sophisticated colour sensor and some funny programming ideas, resulting in ‘Kiki’ being able to tell a story using sound effects.
At R.E.A.L. we imaginatively engage young people in learning using new creative resources and ideas.
You can learn more about our approach and who we are here: https://real-education.org/about-us/
Can you remember what you were doing this time five years ago? Well fear not, we’ve delved back into the R.E.A.L. archives to see what was happening during May over the last five years.
Going back to 2017 and Learning Manager, Andy Richmond, raised a phenomenal £5,000 for charity by running the London Marathon in an impressive time of 3 hours, 56 minutes and 2 seconds!
2018 saw R.E.A.L. Education win Business of the Year at Mansfield and Ashfield Business Awards as well as the grand opening of R.E.A.L’s Headquarters at Kingsmill House, Mansfield.
In 2019 Nottinghamshire County Council donated a bus which was transformed into a mobile classroom full of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mechanics) resources. The first destination for the bus was Caythorpe in Lincolnshire.
May 2020 had seen many changes to R.E.A.L’s way of teaching and learning as the pandemic had not long began, however the fantastic renovation of the Gallows Hub, Ilkeston was complete and transformed into a brand new working space.
2021 doesn’t feel that long ago, but in May of last year Nikki Purchell, Head of Schools, was celebrating over 10 and a half years at R.E.A.L. after joining as a teacher in 2010.
What will the next five years worth of memories bring?
R.E.A.L. has successfully been shortlisted for Independent Senior School of the Year at the TES awards 2022.
Nikki Purcell, Head of Schools at R.E.A.L. said: “This award, whilst accredited to the work of one school, represents and acknowledges the work across all schools and areas of the company.”
Schools across the whole nation bid for their hopeful chance to be shortlisted for an award. R.E.A.L’s bid presented to TES included 11 case studies of learners who feel their time here has made a massive impact on their lives, as well as showcasing the vast, high quality curriculum on offer.
Nikki said: “I’m so proud to be representing R.E.A.L. at the ceremony. R.E.A.L. Education and its schools really make a difference to the lives of our learners and their families and being shortlisted for this award acknowledges this.
Our staff work so hard to support learner progress and move them on to positive destinations. R.E.A.L. is a phenomenal place to work and the outcomes our learners achieve are inspiring.”
The winner will be announced at an awards ceremony in London on 17th June.
