Focus on S2: Learning and teaching: Over this week senior staff have been popping into S2 classes to look at the quality of the learning and teaching. We have been very impressed by both the quality of the teaching we have seen and the attitude shown by pupils towards the work. As well as visiting […]
Category Archives: Parents
19th-23rd November 2018 – Opportunities
On any given week there is a fair bit going on in Harlaw Academy. The blog this week lists 10 of the varied activities taking place over the last 5 days in the school: a group of our pupils went to Bridge of don Academy as part of a young inspector project most of our […]
5th-11th November 2018: Respect Community
During this week we had a number of things to mark 100 years since the signing of the armistice which led to the end of World War 1. Our Art department worked on a display and towards the end of the week the library showed a film ‘They Shall Not Grow Old” which has recently […]
29th October – 2nd November 2018: The start of a very important term
As the holidays came to an end I was more than a little concerned. A lot of our old windows had been removed and new frames were going in bu there was no sign of any glass and there was a fair bit of mess to get tidy for Monday. Somehow over the final weekend […]
24th to 28th September 2018: Progress and Improvement
Each year I am required to prepare a number of reports. two of the more important ones are the; Standards and Quality report which summarises what we did last sessio harlawacademy.aberdeen.sch.uk/…/Harlaw-Academy-Standards-and-Quality-Report-session-2017-to-2018.docx School Improvement Plan which sets out our priorities this session harlawacademy.aberdeen.sch.uk/…/Harlaw-Academy-School-Improvement-Plan-session-2018-to-2019-.docx I am pleased to attach both for your reference. If you have any comments on […]
17th-21st September 2018: Wider opportunities
In a recent blog I mentioned the extra curricular open session we had ran for pupils to help raise awareness of all the opportunities which existed in the school. The subject came up at the recent parent council where we were asked if we could make the list available to parents. It gives me great […]
10th – 14th September: Informing and involving our pupils and parents
This week we had out first Pupil Council and the first Parent Council meeting of the session. I see both groups as being extremely important in school improvement and in this blog wish to say a little about each group and the difference they can make. 10 things to know about our Pupil Council: each […]
20th August – 7th September: Welcome back
The first 3 weeks of the new term have flown past and I shall this first blog of the session to summarise the highlights Staff Changes: In April I was appointed to the role of Convener of General Teaching Council Scotland (GTCS) and chair the council of the regulatory body who oversee the 75,000 registered […]
5th March – 18th March: Gaining our Gold Award
Apologies for combining two weekly blogs into one. Apologies too for this being a relatively short blog but one with a fairly significant attachment which I hope you will take time to read through. We have had confirmation from UNICEF UK that we have gained the Gold Rights Respecting Schools Award. Indeed we are only the second […]
26th February -3rd March 2018: Pride and shame
Pride: On Monday night I attended an Aberdeen City Council event to recognise the achievements of pupils from the City who take part in the Duke of Edinburgh Awards Scheme. If Harlaw Academy had only one one pupil taking part I would have been proud of their achievement. But the fact is that Harlaw Academy […]