Tutor Time Programme

This isn't as boring as it sounds - it does involve some routine reminders to help the students stay organised and aware of everything going on in school but also involves House Competitions, quizzes and BGS 100.

Students follow a prescribed programme of activities on a weekly basis during their morning tutor periods. Sessions focus on activities that are designed to provoke thought and provide students with tools that aid and support their learning, enabling them to work independently whilst helping them to support their own well-being.

Pupils also have time to learn how to develop their metacognition and study skills. One key aim is to develop pupil's ability to remember more. We cover approaches such as interleaving and spaced practice techniques such as dual coding and retrieval practice.

You can find out more about these terms here:
https://www.bostongrammarschool.co.uk/students-and-parents/how-to-study

At appropriate times pupils also create a revision timetable, where form tutors are able to help and supervise careful planning. In year 11, closer to the trial exams and real exams, pupils are given some time to practice these techniques, applying what they have learnt.

The file below is also available for students or parents who want more examples of revision techniques:

Boston Grammar School believes that students should be appropriately prepared for the choices they make during their education and the choices they make in the future. Students should have an understanding of how their education will prepare them for the world of work. The students should feel confident in making key decisions about educational and career choices and have a clear understanding of the routes to achieve their goal. This preparation should be achieved through a variety of means such as impartial and independent one to ones with a qualified Careers Advisor, careers resources purchased by the School and Taster Sessions at local colleges and Universities. Students will also have access to our careers library and access a range of online resources and programs as well as meeting a plethora of employers, further and higher education institutions and companies that offer apprenticeships.

Careers will be integrated into the students' experience for the whole curriculum and will be based on partnerships with external partners, businesses, educational institutions, apprenticeship providers, teachers, students and parents.

In form time students are able to access skills for the world of work and participate in activities that ensure they aim high, listen, problem solve etc.

Boston Grammar School is committed to raising the standards of literacy of all of its students, so that they develop the ability to use literacy skills effectively in all areas of the curriculum and use it as a platform to cope confidently with the demands of further education, employment and adult life.

The KS3 Form Time literacy focus is based on three main areas for development:

• Learning through talk
• Reading and Learning from text
• Learning through writing

Each week each year group has a year group assembly around a particular theme based around the schools CARE values, special events and British values.

The reading and debating programme at BGS takes place both within the literacy sessions (reading) and a separate fortnightly debating session. The school uses 'The Day' website to "inspire pupils to become critical thinkers and better citizens by engaging their natural curiosity in real world problems."

The selection of news articles is based on the 'Big Ideas' within our English curriculum, but topics focus on all curriculum subjects. The 'Big Ideas' at Boston Grammar School underpin all of our reading initiatives.

We strive to ensure that students, through their knowledge about reading, as well as their reading habits, are able to access/understand higher-level concepts and principles, and are able to conceptualise and articulate their understanding of those ideas.

Through careful analysis/evaluation of the new knowledge that reading affords them, students will use that knowledge to imagine/create new possibilities, new ways of thinking, and new ways of viewing the world.

Ultimately, the overarching aim of BGS' focus on ensuring students' optimum reading capabilities is to create a better, brighter future for all - including our planet.

Our students should be able to:

• Use skimming, scanning and text marking (annotation) when reading, in order to identify appropriate information from the text and to research and appraise texts.

• Learn new vocabulary, relate it explicitly to known vocabulary and understand it with the help of context, dictionaries, learning walls and knowledge organisers (where key vocabulary is displayed, for example, and how the word(s) link with the 'Big Ideas' at BGS).

• Make inferences and refer to evidence in a text, again, linking with contextual factors and conceptualising, especially in relation to the 'Big Ideas' at BGS.

• Identify the purpose, audience for and context of the writing and draw on this knowledge to support comprehension, linking with the 'Big Ideas' at BGS.

• Read fluently, accurately and with understanding, checking their understanding to make sure that what they have read makes sense.

• Become independent and critical readers who make informed and appropriate choices.

• Select information from a wide range of texts and sources including print, media and ICT, and to evaluate those sources.