Poole Grammar School

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History Department

Poole Grammar School is proud to be involved with the Prince’s Teaching Institute (PTI) and staff and students alike have already benefited from the range of initiatives that have been introduced over the past year. Numerous members of staff have attended subject-specific PTI courses . This has enabled staff to access the latest research and debates within their subjects and present these to our students, while challenging them to consider their stance on the key issues.

At  Poole Grammar School we have sought not only to challenge our students intellectually, but to bring subjects to life for them and instil a life-long love of the subject. Sharing podcasts and other resources with schools within the PTI programme has proven a real support in presenting content in new and entertaining ways. We have also continued to develop and enhance our extra-curricular activities, a highlight being the History and Archaeological Society making use of the resources at Bovington Tank Museum and Poole Museum, in order to provide students with the challenge of undertaking their own independent research projects. Furthermore, the choice of subjects for our sixth form students has been increased with the introduction of new subjects including AS Ancient History and AS Archaeology.

We look forward to continuing to share ideas and resources with like-minded schools, in order to ensure that we provide our students with the best learning experience we can.

English Department

We are delighted to have been accepted as members of the Prince’s Teaching Institute, as our aims of stretch and breadth with a focus on literary texts closely match those of the Institute. The podcasts and schemes of work on the site have provided both classroom materials and extension exercises for all key stages. In addition, with the support of the PTI we have instituted a number of enrichment activities.

The Department has developed its reading programme with specific library reading schemes, supported by a thriving book club and visits from authors or both fiction and non-fiction books. We play an active part in the Shadowing the Carnegie programme and run regular theatre visits. At A Level we are extending the scope of students with extension activities ranging from lunchtime literary group meetings to the use of Villiers Park online materials.

To extend creativity we have a thriving creative writing group, while we have just launched a Year 8 Animation Club. This is a cross-curricular project in association with the Art Department. Using laptops, cameras and basic backdrop materials students are learning to create their own short films using plasticine and lego, and it is planned that they will aim to produce cross-curricular materials (for example, illustrations of chemistry experiments) with a kinaesthetic focus.

With the freedom provided with the demise of Key Stage 3 tests we now offer schemes of work to Years 8 and 9 with a literary focus. In Year 8 students can study complete texts such as Animal Farm and the genre of satire, The Canterbury Tales, Victorian poetry and the polar diaries of Captain Scott; in Year 9 the texts are as diverse as His Dark Materials, Dracula and the gothic genre, the sonnet and Stone Cold.

In an all-boys’ school literacy and reading will always be key areas of focus; we hope that with a rich and extensive range of teaching topics and extension activities that students here will go on to be enthusiastic readers and writers.

Poole Grammar School is a boys' grammar school, based in Poole, Dorset.