S howing prospective parents around the Dixie is one of...

News @ The Dixie February 2018

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Contents

1 Parents’ Survey link

2 Pippins

3 Reception

4 Year One & Two

5 Year 2 & Pippins

6 Year Three

7 Years Four & Five

8 Peer Group & Young

Enterprise

9 Swimming

10 Sporting Success

11 Sport/Charity/Physics

12 STEM/Bottles/

Twycross Zoo Club

13 Year 7 & Cross

Country

14 Humanities Day

Operation Live!

Water Bottles

15 Term Dates

Dixie Does the 80s!

16 Key Dates

From the

Headmaster

The Dixie Grammar School

Nursery Junior Senior

S howing prospective parents around the Dixie is one of the highlights of my working

week, and there have been a great number so far in 2018. Acting as a tour guide

allows me to get a overview of the work being completed at one time by the school, and

with many prospective parents now wanting to see both the Junior and Senior Schools in

action, the snapshot I get is one from 3—18. I always return from these tours impressed by

the range and quality of work in progress and of course, by the pupils. The vast majority of

visitors are struck by and comment on how happy the students appear in school, but also

the warmth of the community: ‘it feels like a family’ is a regular observation.

As I say in my welcome on the website, academic excellence is at the heart of what we

offer, but we want our students to become well-rounded people as well as achieving highly

in academic studies. Happy students learn most effectively – and we strive for all students

at the Dixie to be happy.

The opportunity to see lessons in the Junior School has been a real treat for me in Mrs Bil-

lington’s absence, and I have been greatly impressed by the range and quality of activity,

the small group sizes and the enthusiasm for learning that our pupils display. The Junior

school pupils have been outstanding hosts to me at lunchtime—a treat I will continue to

enjoy even once Mrs Billington is back!

At the Senior School, we regularly survey those new to the school to help us understand

those all important first impressions. The forty-six students new to the Dixie this year have

sent a very clear message—they enjoy school very much indeed.

All students were asked what the three best and three worst things are about the Dixie. The

best things were reported by our new students to be 1. sports/clubs 2. family/friendly

3. teachers and staff 4. lessons. The worst aspects 1.toilets 2. homework 3.restrictions on

phones 4. bag racks.

As you will appreciate, not all items on the ‘worst’ list will be altered, but I am happy to re-

port that Mr Smith and his facilities team have installing additional weatherproofing to our

external bag racks over the half term break—a modification we have wanted for some time.

With reference to mobile phone restrictions, Years 6 and 9 have taken part in the Leicester-

shire teenage internet usage survey and we look forward to seeing the anonymised results!

Other highlights from the survey are:

1. Adults in the school treat pupils fairly (96% agree)

2. I am respected by other pupils in the school (100% agree)

3. I am expected to give my best (100% agree)

4. My school work is usually interesting (98% agree)

5. When I need help from a teacher I get it (92% agree)

6. Homework is regularly set (98% agree)

7. Reports and gradings are a true reflection of me ((92% agree)

8. I enjoy being a member of my form group (92% agree)

9. The Dixie is a good school (98% agree)

10. I enjoy being at school (96% agree)

11. I understand the reasons behind the rules I am expected to follow (94% agree)

Our introspection continues, and in particular, you as parents are invited to give your views

on the various aspects of school life—the Dixie Parents’ Survey 2017/18. As an additional

incentive, all those submitting responses will be entered into a draw to win a bottle of

champagne. The survey closes at the end of February and hard copies are available from

both school offices.

http://www.dixie.org.uk/

http://www.dixie.org.uk/Message-from-the-Headmaster

http://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/RX3K7/


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www.dixie.org.uk

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Pippins

The children have enjoyed

wrapping up in their winter

clothes and playing in the

igloo. They have had fun

too getting their hands wet

playing in the cold water

and ice with the artic ani-

mals.

Pancake Day came early to Pippins. The children have had a great time making and tossing

their own pancakes. They even had time to sample a few!! Yum yum!

New instruments are beginning to arrive at school—

clarinets, flutes, trumpets and trombones are all part of the

school’s investment in our new Music Room, which will be

open after the Easter break. The strings scheme will be aug-

mented to include other instruments—ensuring the Dixie’s

outstanding reputation for music continues for many years

to come.

http://www.dixie.org.uk



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'Bosworth, boats, buildings and a battle!'

As part of our topic we have been travelling

around the local area in the minibuses visiting lots

of local places. We started with a trip into Market

Bosworth on a very cold winter’s day. We walked

around the town, spoke to some of the shopkeep-

ers and made a tally chart of all the local business-

es and buildings that we saw in the town centre.

Last week, we were on the bus again off to the

Water Park. We walked around the reservoir,

drew a map, got extremely muddy, fed the very

hungry ducks and then had a snack outside the

cafe and shop where Ben came and talked to us

for 5 minutes all about the reservoir.

We learnt lots of new facts:

1. Ben's Dad dug out the reservoir himself

with three JCBs.

2. It has a tap and a plug just like a bath tub.

3. They dye the water blue to keep the plants

and water healthy.

4. It holds 15 millions litres of water.

5. Some of the ducks have bouffant feathers

on the their head and they are called Elvis

ducks!

We have a trip to the Battlefield and to Bosworth

Park booked for after half term which we are

really looking forward to.

Reception




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This half-term Year 1 have been learning

all about the weather and seasons. In Art

the children created a season tree using a

range of media to show the seasonal

changes. In Maths, children learnt how to

use a Venn diagram to sort 3 dimensional

shapes by their properties. Through litera-

cy work, the children have developed their

non-fiction writing by creating a fact file

about an Arctic animal.

Year 2 have had a super term

learning about sound and music.

They were visited by members of

the Dixie Senior School who

brought along some fantastic mu-

sical instruments. The children

learnt how the instruments made

sound; it was a fun afternoon. Year

2 have also made string tele-

phones to demonstrate how sound

travels via vibrations.

Instructions have been part of the Year 2 English lessons. This came in handy when designing

and making musical shakers!

Maddy Green shows how a bassoon makes a sound

Year

One &

Year

Two




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Year 2 &

Pippins



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In ICT, the children have been intro-

duced to computer programming

using ‘Scratch’. The children have

shown real enthusiasm for this work

and have learnt about basic comput-

er algorithms.

In the next half term, the children

will be learning about Space. This

will include an exciting visit to the

National Space Centre in Leicester.

String telephones in Year 2

Learning all about Winter

and the cold weather

We have been learning about Winter

and the cold weather. We know that

the hard ground makes it difficult for

birds to find food, so we have made

bird cakes to hang in our gardens to

see how many birds we can attract.

Each child has taken home their own

bird cake and a record sheet to count

how many birds come to their feeder.




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Year

Three

Potions!

Year 3 have started their exciting topic of 'Potions' this half term.

The children have focussed on the book George's Marvellous Medicine by Roald Dahl to in-spire them. They greatly enjoyed creating their own Marvellous Medicine to begin the topic, with many wonderful donations brought in from home.

The trip to Birmingham's Think Tank was a real highlight where the children were inspired by Chemistry during the Cauldron Chemistry show. We continued this theme during our Science lesson focusing on States of Matter, a highlight being the chocolate melting investigation, as well as looking at the pH scale after a few children became particularly interested. In Art the children have been recreating Quentin Blake’s sketches from the book, and their final home-work Art pieces were amazing!




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Year

Four &

Year

Five

Year 4 have had an exciting start to the year studying Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the

Chocolate Factory. The children have been looking at the language Roald Dahl used and

have been creating their own chocolate machines from which emerged a new chocolate

bar!

The science topic this half term has been

‘eating and digesting’. The children

have discovered that teeth help us to decide

whether animals are carnivores or herbivores.

The digestive system is quite complex and can be

different from one living creature to another. In

Art we have been experimenting with paint, mix-

ing primary and secondary colours together to

produce different hues. We have studied some of

the paintings by Joseph Turner and have attempt-

ed to replicate them in a similar style using the

‘wet on wet’ technique.

On the 17th January, Year 5 went to the Lyceum Theatre to

see The Lion King production. On the way to the theatre,

our coach driver, who was called Gary, gave us a tour of

London, where we saw places such as Marble Arch. When

we went inside the theatre and saw the amazing musical in

all its glory, we were amazed at the standard of the produc-

tion. The most exciting part was when the animals came

running down the aisles, making Miss Mee jump! We can’t

wait until our own production of Roar after half term, to

bring all these characters we saw to life!

Felicity Dracup and Lily Fleming-Smith Year 5

We thoroughly enjoyed our trip to London. The Lion King

was performed amazingly well. We especially enjoyed the

part where Simba was in the elephant graveyard due to all

the special effects and dancing - we have a lot to live up to

in our Year 5 performance!

Louis Wright and Owen Smith Year 5




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Peer Mentor Group Graduates! The

penultimate week of half term saw

the culmination of an eight week

course for 11 Lower Sixth students to

prepare them to work as mentors

with younger students in school

was . The course was led by Psycholo-

gist Alex Buttery and involved studying topics such as empathy, body language, boundaries

and child protection. We are really excited to see where their new found skills & training

lead our Sixth Formers in their quest to support younger students - they will be working

closely with Mrs Banton and Ms Young to add to another layer of our student care.

The Young Enterprise Scheme is new this year and generously supported by several of our

parents. The Young Entrepreneur businesses competed at an event called The Foxes Lair

(similar to The Dragon's Den) in the last week of half term and pitched their product ideas to

ten other schools and five judges in a large lecture theatre at De Montfort University.

‘Athena's Books’ and ‘Basic’ did a fantastic job presenting their product propositions and

impressed the judges with their confidence and ability to field five minutes of challenging

questions. They were asked about their costs, their pricing strategies, their target markets

segments and how they planned on marketing their products.

Athena's Books pitched their 3 books titles to a very high standard: School Life, Sexuality &

Gender and Growing Up books, fielding questions about how they carried out their research

and why they chose a non-digital format.

Basic were awarded second place with their customised and ethically sourced T-shirts,

Mugs, Tote bags, and hoodies.

The judges also commented on how strong the presentations were from both Dixie teams

and how enthused, articulate and well planned they were. They commented on the overall

standard of the presentations and how difficult it was to arrive at their final judgement.

This experience helps to prepare the Young Entrepreneurs for selling their products at The

Highcross shopping centre in Leices-

ter on Sunday 25th February and

then at a showcase event at Leices-

ter University in March. Many con-

gratulations to both businesses and

grateful thanks to all parents

involved who give their time so

generously.

Peer

Group &

Young

Enterprise




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Congratulations to all who represented the Dixie and

the Midlands with such distinction!

Continuing the swimming theme, the galas in both

the Junior and Senior Schools were held this last half

term—the former at Hinckley Leisure Centre, the

latter at Loughborough University.

In the Junior School Inter House Swimming Gala for

Years 2-5 there was great swimming from all 78 chil-

dren. Lancaster were the overall winners and 5M

won the prestigious Year 5 Raft race (debut win for

Miss Mee). Congratulations to all who swam, many thanks to

the parents who supported the event but also to all the staff

who made such a fantastic event possible.

The Senior School Swimming Gala was well supported by parents as ever, and much fun and

competition resulted in a memorable afternoon. Victor/Victrix Ludorum as follows: Year 6 Harry

Crane/Emily O'Higgins, Year 7 Tom Hudson/Oscar Mitchell/Rebecca Kennedy, Year 8 Daniel

Kennedy/Charlotte Chenery, Year 9 Oliver Crane/Keeley Whitehead/Rhiannon Chiles, Senior

Rhys Chiles/Ella Grainger Overall score: York 819 Lancaster 849. Congratulations to all who

competed and who contributed to such a successful gala.

Swimming




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Six Dixie Grammar swimmers headed down to London to

compete in the National ISA swimming representing the Mid-

lands team against six other regions. Eleanor Partridge was a

late addition to the Midlands team but unfortunately Rhys

Chiles had to pull out of the competition due to injury. Every

one of our swimmers came away with a medal and a smile

and participated in a total of 14 races. It was a great event

and our swimmers were fantastic in every aspect of their per-

formance.

Jack Llewellyn - Silver medal - Year 5 boys breast-stroke, Oscar Mitchell - Bronze medal - Year 7 boys

backstroke, medley relay bronze, Rebecca Kennedy - Bronze medal - Year 7 girls freestyle, freestyle

relay bronze, medley relay 5th, James Curtis - Silver medal - Year 8 boys medley relay, freestyle relay

bronze, Dan Kennedy - Gold medal - Year 8 boys backstroke (new national record), freestyle gold, med-

ley relay silver, freestyle relay bronze, Eleanor Partridge - Bronze medal - Year 9/10 girls medley relay,

freestyle relay bronze, Individual medley 4th place.

Great commitment was shown by our

Years 3-6 who came out in force, giving

up their Saturday mornings to run in the

Local X Country event. A very chilly and

muddy morning did not stop our 21 chil-

dren running. The next event will be held

in March and the top runners will qualify for the County event.

ISA Midlands X Country

The weather was cold with a little sleet but the sun

shone and a perfect muddy course at Bedstone Col-

lege awaited the children. This event was a qualifier

for the National event and we are pleased to say the

following children have qualified –

U10 Lewis Warren, U12 Nadia Gauhar, U14 Daniel Kennedy, U18 Jared Cutler & Mark McCall

BEP Gymnastics Level 1 Competition

Year 2-6 entered the BEP Gymnastics competition at

Hinckley & Burbage Gymnastics Club, a first for us at

the Dixie. The children worked hard learning the

three different disciplines and all did an amazing job

on the day. The Year 5 and 6 team consisting of Mia

Simmerson, Ellie Weston, Leila Spencer & Imogen

Green will now progress to the Level 2 competition. A great start to the term!



www.dixie.org.uk

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Sporting

Success




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Ted Davies, Dan Kennedy and Guy Kibble (pictured

right) represented the Dixie in a Year 8 inter-school

Physics quiz at the Abbey Pumping Station. The quiz

was organised by the Ogden trust, and 5 schools in

total were involved. The Ogden Trust was set up by

Peter Ogden in 1998 with the aim of supporting ini-

tiatives, programmes and projects to promote the

teaching and learning of physics for young people.

Ted, Dan and Guy worked really well as a team and

came away in joint 3rd position. Well done to you

all!



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A real highlight of my week is the

Tuesday presentation assembly at the

Senior School which often runs late

due to the number and variety of

awards to be made. It is always pre-

ceded by a musical performance—

many thanks and congratulations to all

who have volunteered to perform in

front of the school.

Kyla Burton was the first, then Phoebe

Harrison—Laila Gauhar was the latest

in the school to donate hair to The

Little Princess Trust. She did so in an

assembly and should be very proud of

her fundraising total of £562—many

thanks to all in the Dixie community

who contributed so generously. A

forthcoming non-uniform day will

sponsor this organisation in honour of

all three students.

Sport

Charity

Physics




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From welding with chocolate to making chocolate gird-

ers to edible putty, Dr Khan’s STEM club is certainly cap-

turing the imagination of our budding engineers.

Mr Dixon’s assemblies are always a treat, and in the penultimate week of term he ad-

dressed the senior school on the value of education. He spoke about the human quest for

knowledge and was passionate in his message that ‘It is better to be Socrates dissatisfied,

than a fool satisfied’ (John Stuart Mill). Mr Dixon was able to reinforce the message that

students at the Dixie are fortunate to attend a school where the individual talents of each

and every student are nurtured and valued and in which any criticism of students wanting

to excel will not be tolerated.

After this inspiring message Ms Young spoke to the school about a matter far more mun-

dane – water bottles! Students should not bring in plastic bottles of water as they leak easi-

ly; there have been incidents of students’ work being damaged. Students are welcome to

bring in re-useable water bottles which are designed for the purpose and significantly more

robust. Please be advised that from Monday 5 February the plastic bottles of

water will be removed from stu-

dents if seen by staff except, of

course, at lunchtime in the dining

hall.

We are currently in the process of

establishing an Environmental Group at school

and discouraging the use of disposable bottles is

a good start to becoming more environmentally

aware. To this end, one of our Young Enterprise

companies, Basic, will be selling reusable water

bottles after half term at a price of £4—they will

be available to buy on the first day back after

half term in the hall at break time.

As part of our sponsorship of the Snow Leop-

ards at Twycross Zoo, they are offering us an

exclusive Dixie Zoo Club for children ages 8-

14 running the week beginning 16-20 July

2018. Bookings are being taken by the school

offices—the cost is £180 for the week and are

allocated on a first come, first served basis.

STEM

Bottles

Zoo Club




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Charlotte, "I thought that today

was a very exciting and inter-

esting day. I really enjoyed find-

ing out about all the different

pictures in the gallery, but I also

enjoyed hearing the orchestra

play. It has definitely encour-

aged me to practise more."

Tori, "Today we had an exciting day in the museum and Symphony Hall. First we went to the

art gallery then we went to Symphony Hall and heard the orchestra play. I had lots of fun and

it was wonderful! I enjoyed it so much." Olivia, "I felt I didn't want to leave and time went by

really quickly. First we were 20 minutes in and then it was all over." Alyssa, "We had great

seats and I had a perfect view. Each piece was very different, but they were all brilliant. It was

a great trip!"



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Year 7 visited Birmingham’s

Museum & Art Gallery and

looked at the Pre-Raphaelites

collection before lunch. They

then went to Symphony Hall

for the KS3 Schools Con-

cert. Some of the children

were really excited about the

hall itself and the various ways

the acoustics could be al-

tered. They were also most

impressed by the virtuoso vio-

lin playing in Vivaldi's 'Winter'.

ISA Midlands Cross-country

Well done to all our cross-country runners

who ran in the ISA Midlands cross-country at

Bedstone, Shropshire last Wednesday. We

took nearly 50 pupils from both the Junior

and Senior school and our efforts and deter-

mination in all the races was excellent con-

sidering they were up against a tough course

and weather conditions were far from per-

fect. The senior school results were as fol-

lows: Senior boys Jared Cutler 3rd, Mark

McCall 4th Under 16 girls: Eleanor Partridge

16th, Hettie Williams 39th Under 14 boys Dan

Kennedy 5th, Robin Thiele 15th, Grady

Stallings 25th, Corey Morris 36th, Harvey Oli-

ver 41st, Henry Young 43rd, Oscar Mitchell 59th, Tom Hudson 80th. Under 14 girls Nadia Gauhar

4th, Daisy Jackson 19th, Emily Cutler 21st, Rebecca Kennedy 47th. Under 12 boys Harry Cressy

46th, Harry Crane 60th, Elliott Middleton 86th. Under 12 girls Evie Baron 83rd. Congratulations

to all: in particular to Jared, Mark, Dan and Nadia who go on to represent the Midlands in the

National Finals.

Year 7

Cross

Country




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Earlier this half term, the whole of Year 9 were off timetable for a day devoted to Humanities. They en-joyed three sessions of different ac-tivities in RS, History and Geography.

In RS students learned about the Hol-ocaust and the power of words and linked this with Buddhism by medi-tating at the end of the session. In Geography students played World Trade Game designed to raise aware-ness of global inequality and provides a starting point for discussions about trade in the real world. In History, pupils created and played games based on the topics studied this year such as: World War I. World War II, Pirates, Circuses in the 1800s and Ex-plorers

‘I think the Geography session was really good as we were learning without realising it’

‘The best thing today was med-itating in RS as it cleared my mind and relaxed my body’

‘My favourite part was making the History game because ours was about “The Greatest Showman and that is my fa-vourite film!’

‘Loved it. So, great that the school does things like this.’

Operation Live!

On Thursday 1 March a company called ‘Operation Live!’ will turn our assembly hall into an

operating theatre for the day, giving 60 students the opportunity to carry out a realistic op-

eration/dissection using human dummies and real (animal) organs. Students will get the

chance to dissect pig brains, remove eyes, fit stents and pacemakers in hearts. They will also

fully investigate the digestive system and calculate anaesthetic dosages. With four students

applying for places on medical degrees in this year’s Upper Sixth, MedSoc, Dixie’s medical

society is certainly having an impact—we hope this day will inspire others to pursue medical

careers.

For all sorts of reasons, it will not be appropriate or possible for us to serve a hot lunch on

this day—please be advised that all students will receive a sandwich/cold lunch for them to

eat in their form rooms.

Junior School Early Morning Room

Teachers are in their classrooms at the Junior School from 8.30am—if you arrive before that time

and there are no teachers in the room, please do not leave you children unattended. Many thanks

for you cooperation in this.

Humanities

Day

Operation

Live!

JS early

mornings




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October Half Term 2018

When setting term dates I do my best to encompass all of the five local councils to ensure

that our two-week Autumn half term is a ‘catch-all’. I plan term dates a long time in advance -

at the time I originally set our 2018/19 dates, Leicestershire's dates were provisionally 22nd -

26th October. Their dates have now been published and whilst Staffordshire, Derbyshire,

Nottinghamshire and Warwickshire are all taking half term between October 29th to Novem-

ber 2nd, Leicestershire schools’ dates for half term are 15th - 19th October. As such, our pub-

lished half term dates of Monday 22 October—Friday 2 November put us out of kilter with

Leicestershire—a completely unavoidable situation. Dixie term dates for 2019/20 will be

finalised and communicated to you shortly.

Our PTA do an incredible job in

bringing parents together and rais-

ing money— following last year’s

‘Dixie Do’ I am delighted to remind

you that The Dixie Do is back...with

an 80s twist!

Open to friends, family and all-

comers (over 18!), the PTA are ad-

vertising this assault on the senses

which promises to be a night to

remember with great live music

from the '80s Revellers', drinks, food and multi-media...all from the decade taste forgot!

Fancy dress optional - sense of fun mandatory! Tickets are £20 each, food will be available

for an additional cost.

Tickets are now available online. January’s winners of the 200 club will be drawn in the first

presentation assembly after half term—details to follow.

Key Dates for the remainder of the academic year are shown overleaf, including recently

confirmed dates for the Sixth Form Ball and Year 11 Prom—both being held again this year

in our marquee, which is partly funded by the School PTA.

I was concerned that with just a four and half week half term, there may not have been

enough to fill a newsletter—I needn’t have worried! I wish you all well for what remains of

half term and following a short break, I look forward to another busy and successful half

term ahead.

With my best wishes,

Term

Dates

PTA Event



https://www.tickettailor.com/events/dixiegrammarschoolpta


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Key Dates



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