The Social Subjects Faculty has once again organised a trip to London in June. The trip will depart from the school early on Monday 20th June 2016 and return late on Wednesday 22nd June. The full itinerary for the trip can be downloaded by clicking the link below:
SOCIAL SUBJECTS LONDON TRIP 2016 Info and Itinerary
There will be a meeting for all pupils involved in room 180 (Ms. Stoutjesdyk’s room) on Monday 13th June at lunchtime.
Message from Mrs. Brown on behalf of Mr. Phairs:
All students studying Physics who will sit SQA Physics exams on Tuesday 24th May are invited to attend Past Paper Practice Days with the following arrangements:
National 5 Practice Day – Thursday 19th May, all day.
Higher Grade Practice Day – Monday 23rd May, all day
All Physics students are welcome to attend for final revision on the relevant date.
Thursday 5th May is the fifth in-service day of this session. It is a pupil holiday except for SQA exam candidates. Staff will attend school as normal on what is also the Feast of the Ascension, a Holy Day of Obligation. Mass will be celebrated by Fr. Martin Delaney, our school Chaplain.
School will re-open as normal at 8.50am on Friday 6th May.
Our Sixth Year students had their final official day at Taylor recently before returning to sit their exams. School Chaplain Fr. Martin Delaney celebrated Mass with students and staff on Thursday 28th April, marking the end of their six years of study. We are sure our young people take with them fond memories of Taylor High School. All Sixth Year students were presented with a number of mementos to commemorate their time at Taylor. This included ‘leavers hoodies’ which our Sixth Year House Captains organised for their fellow students. They also enjoyed a trip down memory lane with an excellent video presentation of their six years at Taylor which was put together by Mr. Robert Stewart, Senior Technician with his usual eye for creativity! Our Sixth Year Cohort also enjoyed a day out at Soar, Braehead organised by our Home School Partnership Officer Ian MacFarlane, and accompanied by Stage Head Ms. Jan McCrone and Principal Teacher of Pupil Support Mr. Andy Williams. Our young people enjoyed a last day out as a group, braving the aerial assault course, battling it out at Laser Quest and bowling up a storm. Now the hard work and preparation continues for students throughout the exam diet that is underway for both Fifth and Sixth Year students.
Click this link to login and download the video and/or Year Group picture entitled Class of 2016:
https://glowscotland.sharepoint.com/sites/8519137/pupilarea/SitePages/Home.aspx
The Second Year Parents’ Meeting will take place on Tuesday 26th April 2016 from 4.00 – 6.30pm. All parents and carers are invited to attend this important meeting next Tuesday to meet with their child’s teachers and obtain up-to-date information about their progress. Subject choices have now been made by all pupils for entering Third Year in June and this move from a common course to a group of 9 academic subjects encompassing all 8 curricular areas is an important transition point in the education of the young people concerned.
We encourage all parents and carers to attend this meeting if at all possible.
The Taylor High Easter School will run once again from Monday 4th April until Wednesday 6th April. The programme begins each day at 9.15am and ends at 3.30pm.
All students in S4, S5 and S6 are welcome to attend and many have already signed up for this year’s event.
The event helps cement a very strong sense of purpose among all our students in S4 – S6 as they make preparations for the SQA exams which begin on Wednesday 4th May this year.
In order to maximise attendance at our Easter School, a bus will pick up students at two stops in Cleland each day during the Easter School. These are:
8.30am Betsy’s Shop
8.35am Cleland Club
SEE TIMETABLES BELOW
Our First Year PSHE classes took part in a ‘Book Token Competition’ as part of the library’s annual celebrations for World Book Day 2016. The whole of our S1 cohort got the chance to design colourful and creative book tokens, many of which were inspired by a variety of books, such as ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’, ‘The Hunger Games’, ‘Stormbreaker’ and ‘Skullduggery Pleasant’. Many others were inspired by reading these books the library itself! (What a huge compliment!) Thanks to our librarians for organising such a fun event and a huge well done to all our S1 pupils who took part. The finalists will now be entered into the national World Book Day Competition. Good luck everyone!
This year witnessed the return of “Taylor Tycoon” to Taylor’s S1 ICT course unit on Graphics and Marketing. Pupils are each given initial capital of £1 and are asked to apply their entrepreneurial spark to make as much money as they can from a business idea they develop either as sole traders or in partnership with other pupils. Business ideas range from confectionery, cake, sweets and stationery to nail painting, customised jewellery and a magician! After creating unique business logos, business plans and marketing materials the extremely enthusiastic young entrepreneurs will launch their enterprises upon an unsuspecting campus, setting up stalls in the theatre with the assistance and support of the Department’s staff. This daily Bazaar is expected to create a real buzz and will surely be deemed a resounding success due to the efforts and creativity of all pupils involved. This year’s winners were Lucy Toolan, Mia Agnew and Rebecca White who created Doughnuts & Co. and made a whopping £96.16! The total raised across First Year was over £1000. This once again proved to be a thoroughly rewarding experience for First Year’s pupils.
49 Fifth and Sixth Year pupils studying Higher and Advanced Higher Maths set off to the Kilbowie Outdoor Centre in Oban on for the Annual Maths Camp Weekend. Students are given the opportunity to participate in an extensive study programme for the forthcoming examination. A great time was had by all with pupils also being given the chance to take part in an Outdoor activity as part of the school’s Health Promotion Programme. They took part in Coaststeering which involves rock climbing and sea swimming and the group finished off with a seven metre jump into the sea. Credit goes to the students involved as this is an activity where participants get extremely wet jumping in and out of the sea on what turned out to be a particularly cold and wintry day. All staff who participated in the weekend were impressed by the pupils’ effort and application. It is hoped that their efforts will be rewarded by excellent results in the final examination. The weekend is part funded by the Edinburgh University Mathematical Association and we thank them for their continued support. Thanks to Mr. Mark Dorris (Principal Teacher of Mathematics), Mrs. Liz Bergen and Mr. John Harty (Teachers of Mathematics) and Mrs Anna Robertson (Principal Teacher of Support for Learning).
North Lanarkshire Learning and Leisure Services are proposing to change the configuration of the school day from August 2016. This proposal applies to all secondary schools across the Council. I am conscious that a change took place in 2013 but unfortunately the decision to allow individual schools to vary structures has resulted in a significant number of different approaches being adopted which are not able to fully deliver the anticipated opportunities for young people in secondary schools.
Following a period of evaluation and research North Lanarkshire Council is now proposing to adopt a common model of 33 periods of 50 minutes in all secondary schools from August 2016. This will be accompanied by a co-ordinated approach to curriculum planning designed to ensure that the needs of all our young people are met.
The benefit of this approach is that it will allow for increased curricular opportunities for pupils in the senior school since they will be able to access a wider range of courses. The secondary Head Teachers have been working together on a uniform approach to curricular planning. This co-ordinated approach will ensure that the needs of all young people are met. The authority also propose to implement a common timetable for S5 and S6 in order to maximise choice for students. A wider range of courses will be on offer in pupils’ base schools, in neighbouring schools and from our college partners.
The details of the proposed new weekly configuration of the timetabled day are detailed below. If you have any questions about its operation, I will be happy to answer them.
| Day of Week | Start | Finish | Morning Break | Lunch Break |
| Monday, Tuesday, Thursday | 8.55am | 3.45pm | 10.35am – 10.50am | 12.30pm – 13.15pm |
| Wednesday, Friday | 8.55am | 2.55pm | 10.35am – 10.50am | 12.30pm – 13.15pm |
If you have any comments on this proposed configuration, please forward them in writing to me at the school either by letter or email. The appropriate email address to use is: enquiries@taylor.n-lanark.sch.uk. I would ask that you respond to this request no later that Wednesday 24th February 2016.
