BBC | Calderhead High School

For News Day (6th March) the Young Reporter team and BBC Scotland invited pupils from a handful of schools across Scotland to visit their iconic headquarters at Pacific Quay in Glasgow and pupils from Calderhead High School were delighted to accept the invitation.

The pupils were taught some of the skills of being a reporter and got the opportunity to put these into practice. They learned the background mechanics – Emma demonstrated that she was a natural using the autocue! The pupils got a chance to interview each other in the radio recording rooms before filming an interview with Fraser Gillan, star of the new BBC Scotland flagship programme, ‘The Nine’.

They also met the team behind ‘The Social’ and were intrigued to see the ‘post-it’ notice board with ideas for current and future features.

After lunch, the pupils were delighted to film an interview with BBC Weatherman, Christopher Blanchett, and you can see Sahand and Shakira’s interview by clicking here.

The pupils then learned more about evaluating sources and discovering ‘fake news’.

The pupils had a fantastic day and learned much about being young reporters. They are looking forward to implementing all this at Calderhead’s Young Reporters’ Club.

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Pupils from Calderhead High School, accompanied by Ms Faulds and Mrs Lumsden, had the opportunity to join the panel at the recent Authors Live event at the BBC in Glasgow.

Authors Live is a series of live webcasts filmed by BBC Scotland Learning and presented in partnership with the Scottish Book Trust. They feature some of the most prominent authors, poets and illustrators, and the webcasts can be accessed on the BBC website.

This latest Authors Live event talked about unheard voices in the writing industry and the barriers that stop diverse voices from being heard. The panellists included Alex Wheatle, author of the award-winning Crongton sequence, Scottish rapper Dave Hook from hip hop band Stanley Odd, and Anni Cameron, poet. As well as the discussion, pupils enjoyed raps from Dave Hook and Alex Wheatle reading from his latest novel ‘Straight Outta Crongton’. S4 pupil, Heather Duncanson, asked the panel whether they felt that they had to be role models for teenagers and you can see their response on the BBC site. Pupils were gifted books and were delighted to have these signed by the author and poets.

Pupils were also treated to a tour of the BBC after the event. They enjoyed lunch in the BBC canteen and had great fun spotting famous faces. They also managed to see the newsroom and the various departments, including BBC Bitesize, which will be familiar to our senior pupils preparing for prelims at the moment.

We would like to thank the Scottish Book Trust for choosing our school to attend this event and to the BBC (especially our excellent guide, Kimberley, who was a font of knowledge about the BBC).

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