Year 9 and Year 10 Induction Days

Our new intake had their first week at the academy with three induction days. The new Year 9s and Year 10s enjoyed a variety of subjects based at the academy and team building activities at Alton Castle.

Learners attend Alton Castle in their house groups where they participate in various activities. One of the favourite activities is ‘crates’, where three nominated learners wearing climbing harnesses stand on a small stack of crates with the aim of stacking them as high as possible until they collapse. The other learners are responsible for keeping the ropes tight for when the learners fall off the crates. Another favourite is ‘night-line’ where the aim is to work in pairs and make their way along a woodland, rope pathway. One learner is holding a cup of water and is blindfolded with the other learner acting as their guide. However, the blindfolded learner is the only one who can ask questions but the second learner isn’t allowed to speak and has to find a way to communicate instructions.

When the learners are at the academy they attend maths, English, business and engineering lessons. In the engineering lessons they build a marble run and make an aluminium keyring dog-tag using basic hand tools. English linked their subject with business where learners looked at persuasive advertising and how a slogan or text can influence their target audience. From there they then design an advert for an unsaleable product using creative and persuasive writing skills. In science learners looked at the reaction of metals and extracting DNA.