Category: Year 8

Lymm Learner programme

Natalie McGillivary

We are excited to announce an inspiring new initiative at Lymm High School: The Lymm Learner. This programme is designed to recognise and cultivate qualities that we believe are essential for students to thrive academically and personally. As part of this, our positive points system will be shifting to better reflect the qualities of a ‘Lymm Learner.’

A ‘Lymm Learner’ is a student who:

  • Takes responsibility for their own learning.
  • Is motivated by their progress and strives to improve.
  • Asks thoughtful questions and confidently challenges assumptions.
  • Thinks critically to enhance their understanding.
  • Embraces setbacks as learning opportunities and shows resilience.

Each week, students will earn Lymm Learner Hall points for demonstrating these attributes in their classes. The top three students in each year group who accumulate the most Lymm Learner Hall points will receive a special certificate, which will be sent home in recognition of their dedication and success.

Get Ready for Children in Need – Friday 15th November!

Lisa Hughes

Dear Parents / Carer,

We’re thrilled to announce that Children in Need is just around the corner, taking place on Friday 15th November! This event is always a highlight of our school year, and our Sixth Form students are preparing to go all-out once again with their incredible costumes to raise funds for this worthy cause. You can expect a fantastic display of creativity, colour, and fun as our Sixth Formers dress up as all sorts of characters and parade through school at break time to collect donations.

In addition to the costume parade, we have a special treat for students this year: the chance to throw wet sponges at some brave volunteer teachers during lunchtime! Students can pay a small donation for each throw, making this a fun and memorable way to raise even more for Children in Need.

If you’d like to support this wonderful cause, we’re making it as easy as possible to donate through the school. Donations can be made on the day in our collection buckets, through ParentPay, or even via card, with a card reader available in school.

And don’t forget to keep an eye out for all the wonderfully dressed-up characters making their way to school that day! Thank you in advance for helping us make a difference through Children in Need.

Kind regards

The Charities Team and The Sixth Form Team

 

Change to dates of summer term

Natalie McGillivary

The original calendar for this year involved an INSET day on Friday 27th June. However, for various reasons (mainly related to exams and trips to Tynny) it no longer works to hold the INSET day then. Therefore, Friday 27th June will now be a normal school day. Instead, we will finish for the summer holidays on Friday 18th July (as opposed to the original plan of Tuesday 22nd July). Apologies for any inconvenience and please do let your Head of Year know if this causes any major problems.

Attendance

Natalie McGillivary

During this final week of the half term, I would like to kindly ask you to check your child’s current attendance and punctuality via Class Charts. Our own experience at Lymm High School over the years, as well as research nationally, consistently shows that students with good attendance are much more likely to have a better experience at school and to achieve better academic results.

As a reminder, we say that children should be aiming to have attendance of at least 97%. It is also worth bearing in mind that the government state that anyone with attendance below 90% is classed as being ‘persistently absent‘ from school.

Any absence at this time of year, because we are so early in the academic year, can have a major impact on attendance figures. If your child has already had a few days off, it is even more important that they do not miss any more days; it might sometimes feel like the odd day ‘here and there’ but it can be surprising how quickly the days add up.

You may remember from the Information, Advice and Guidance evenings earlier this term that we shared with you the average grades our Year 11 cohort achieved last summer. Students with 95%+ attendance, had an average grade of a 6+, which is equivalent to getting grade 7’s in half of all subjects and grade 6’s in the other half. However, for students with below 95% attendance, this dropped to an average of grade 5 in all subjects and for those with below 85%, to a grade 4 in all subjects. This clearly demonstrates the huge impact that even relatively small drops in attendance can have on pupil progress, not to mention all the extra-curricular opportunities and pastoral support that can be missed.

As always, our general advice is that it is usually best to send your child in even if they are feeling a little under the weather on the understanding that there is support available in school and we will always contact you if it is necessary. You may also find this information from the NHS useful: Is my child too ill for school? – NHS.

I would also like to remind you of the importance of students attending school on time, every day. All students should be on site by 8:20am in preparation for registration which begins at 8:25am. Our registers close for the AM session at 8:55am, students arriving after this time are marked absent for the morning session, which has a huge impact on their overall attendance. A quick reminder of our late procedures here:

  • Students arriving after 8:25am are reminded to go straight to Form
  • Students arriving after 8:45am must sign in at Student Services

Students will be issued with a lunchtime detention if they are late to school, miss Form or are late to lessons.

If you do need to report your child absent, please do this via the ‘Report Absence’ section of Class Charts only. Please remember that we do not grant leave of absence for holidays.

If you have any questions or concerns about your child’s attendance or punctuality, please do get in touch with your child’s Pastoral Manager or Head of Year.  We are here to help!

Many thanks,
Mrs Jennings