Students Page

Students' Feedback on Revision Skills Workshop

1. Boost to Revision: The workshop provided a significant boost to my revision efforts.

2. Motivation and Easy Recall: It motivated me to study, making it easy to recall information.

3. Identification of Mistakes: The workshop helped me realise what I had been doing wrong and provided insights on how to improve.

4. Benefits of Chunking Revision: I now understand the benefits of breaking down revision into smaller, manageable chunks.

5. Increased Sense of Need to Revise: The workshop instilled in me a heightened sense of the need to revise.

6. Clarity on Revision Techniques: It clarified revision techniques that were previously unknown to me.

7. Perception of Easier Revision: The workshop made me feel that revision is easier than I initially thought.

8. New Perspective on Revision: It opened my eyes to different approaches to revision.

9. Reflection on Personal Revision Methods: The workshop prompted me to think critically about the way I revise.

10. Inspiration for Immediate Revision: I am now inspired to revise tonight, showing the immediate impact of the workshop.

11. Learning Memorisation Techniques: I learnt effective ways to memorise key information.

12. Clear Guidance for Revision: The workshop gave me a clear idea of what actions I can take to enhance my revision.

13. Effective Short-Term Revision Strategies: It explained how to revise effectively in short periods of time.

14. Increased Work Ethic: The workshop influenced me to work harder during my revision sessions.

15. Enlightenment on Easier Revision Methods: It enlightened me on easier ways of revising.

16. Recognition of Revision Importance: The workshop showed me the importance of dedicated revision.

17. Demystification of Revision Difficulty: It demonstrated that revising is easy and not as hard as I previously perceived.

Connecting people with ambition to businesses with vision

NAW STUDENT ACTIVITY PACK 2024  - Click Here

The National Apprenticeship Week Student Activity Pack is now available to download here, alongside the teacher answer booklet here, so that you can begin planning for NAW 2024. The pack is designed for students in years 7–13 and contains 10 different activities from case study word-fills to crosswords. 

NEW PARENTS & CARERS PACK  - Click Here

November's Parents and Carers Pack is now available to download here. In this month's edition, you can find out more about HTQs, T Levels, the Higher and Degree Apprenticeship Vacancy listing, apprenticeships in engineering, accounting and much more! 

HIGHER AND DEGREE LISTING - Click Here

The October Higher and Degree Apprenticeship Vacancy Listing was launched last month, featuring over 250+ live vacancies from 50+ employers across England. To download the listing and share with your students, click here. 

At Mossbourne Fobbing Academy, we believe that every lesson and every experience is a chance to develop your employability skills. When you apply for a job, your future employer will be paying close attention to what evidence you can provide to show you have the employability skills they are looking for. Almost every classroom at Mossbourne Fobbing Academy has a poster displaying the top employability skills currently sought after, have you noticed?

This section of the website looks closely at these key employability skills and how you should and could be developing these skills every day, to make sure you stand out to your future employers!

Aiming High - Self Motivation

Is there a project that you'd like to do but you're putting it off? Maybe you think you don't have the time or maybe you just can't be bothered. Think of the bigger picture and how you will benefit from that project in the long run. Set your mind to it and plan. Use the strategies above and some of the links below to help you prioritise and organise your time.

You can keep track of anything you do to develop your employability skills on Unifrog.

• Time management and Productivity Training Video
• Managing your priorities
• Analyse Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats
• Setting SMART goals

Creativity - By using online courses, you can better understand employability skills and take extra steps to develop any skills you need work on. To develop your creativity, try these sessions by Barclays Life Skills (you will need to make a free account). Creativity is becoming more and more important in the workplace. Employers want to hire people who can think outside of the box and use their imagination to come up with original and innovative ideas however big or small.

• Understanding creative thinking
• How making a pizza got me a promotion
• Putting creative thinking into action

Communication - There aren't many jobs that don't require good communication skills and we have lots of opportunities to develop our communication skills at school. We may think of communication just as speaking, for example public speaking, but we can't communicate properly without writing, reading, listening and clear understanding.

• Understanding communication
• Sophie takes the communication challenge
• Communication and interpersonal skills

Independence - Employers love employees who are independent and proactive, who don't need to be told to get on with a task and who come up with potential solutions, rather than allowing problems to be an obstacle.

When have you had to work on your own to achieve something?

When have you gone the extra mile to achieve something without being asked to do so?

• Understanding Proactivity
• How being proactive got Alfred hired
• Putting proactivity into action

Leadership - Leadership is the ability to get the best out of a team of people as you collectively work to tackle a task, or reach an objective. This is essential in most jobs and especially if you'd like to manage people some day.

• Understanding Leadership
• Why young people will redefine leadership
• Putting leadership into action

Problem Solving - You use your problem solving and critical thinking in almost every lesson (not just maths!) especially in exams. Often it is your critical thinking and problem solving skills that help you to better understand the subject. These skills in particular will make you highly employable. Many graduate jobs require you to sit assessments before you're considered for the job and these will typically test your verbal and numerical reasoning - in other words, your problem solving and critical thinking.

• 10 Ways to Improve Your Problem-Solving Skills
• How to Improve Your Problem-Solving Skills

Resilience - Even when it may seem like a problem will not go away, resilience and staying positive can help you keep going, deal with your problems positively and continue on towards your goals.

• Understanding Resilience
• Putting resilience into action

Teamwork - Working well in a team means:

• Working with a group of people to achieve a shared goal or outcome in an effective way
• Listening to other members of the team
• Taking everyone’s ideas on board, not just your own
• Working for the good of the group as a whole
• Having a say and sharing responsibility

A successful team is one where everyone’s unique skills and strengths help the team achieve a shared goal in the most effective way.

If you have good people skills you’ll make a good team player, and skills like communication and having a positive attitude make a team great.

By using online resources you can look further into how to develop your teamwork and read about other successful teams and get advice on what to do when things don't go to plan.

• Building your teamwork skills
• 13 Tips to Help Build Your Teamwork Skills
• Teamwork Skills: Being an effective team member

Students in Yr 9 are now entering a vital phase of their education when they will be making choices about what to study for the next two years. The choices they make will be amongst the most important decisions in their school career and will have an impact on the rest of their life. Subjects they choose to study may well lead to an A Level, university degree, career or lifelong passion.

There are some subjects that students must continue to study but there is not enough time to continue with all the subjects from Key Stage 3 to Key Stage 4.  Therefore, they will have to make some decisions about what they continue studying.

When making these decisions they need to find a balance between which subjects they enjoy, will allow them to achieve highly in, and will make them best suited to progress towards both further study and career aspirations.

It’s important that students do not make the mistake of choosing a subject because their friends are choosing it or just because they like a specific teacher. They should use the results of their Unifrog careers questionnaires and the Options booklet to make an informed decision that is best for them so that they can be the best they can be.

Please click HERE link to access the Options Information Webpage.

What is the process for picking options?

Students have already begun this process by showing perfect effort in all of their lessons, which has given them an idea of which subjects they enjoy and will excel at. Their report data and feedback from teachers at parents evening will also help with this. However, there are some specific things that students need to do in the next few weeks to ensure they pick the correct options.

STEP 1: Unifrog: Complete the Unifrog questionnaires. This has generated an independent profile report, which highlights different areas of interest to them, such as caring for others, working in a scientific or mathematical environment, and jobs which require physical activity. All year 9 students are able to access their results via Unifrog. If there are any questions, then contact Mrs Mountney who will be able to provide support.

STEP 2: Attend the Live Assembly: Students will have a live assembly in February  that will explain this process and provide them with advice and guidance. They must attend this assembly as it will confirm the specific dates and times for the next steps.

STEP 3: Attend a taster lesson: If students are interested in studying a brand-new subject such as Business, Sociology or Health and Social Care, they have the opportunity to sign up to a taster lesson to see what it is like before making a decision. Students can sign up with their tutor or speak to Mrs Mountney. 

STEP 4: Report and Parents Evening: It is very important that students study their Unifrog report and their academic achievement report to compare their preferences, attainment and attitude to learning in different subjects. This will give them a good indication of their suitability to take the subject at GCSE level.

STEP 5: Report and Options Evening:Students and parents/carers should attend Options evening to discuss their report with subject teachers and ask them any questions regarding taking the subject at Key Stage 4.

Students may want to ask them questions such as: Am I suited to study this subject at GCSE? How is studying this course at GCSE different to studying it at KS3? What would I need to do to get a grade 7+ or Distinction in this course?

STEP 6: Choose the courses you want to study: It is then time to choose the courses they want to study:

TIPS WHEN CHOOSING THE COURSES

• Talk to their subject teachers
• Talk to their tutor
• Discuss choices with parents/carers at home
• Talk to older students about their experiences
• Talk to their careers advisor Mrs Mountney
• Think about the careers guidance and advice they have received

AND REMEMBER:

• Always choose courses that they enjoy and feel they can do well in.
• Never choose a course because their friends are doing it. This is their choice about their education for the next two years.
• Do not select or reject a course because of a particular teacher.  It will not be known who will be teaching that subject next year. 

STEP 7: Choose Preferred Courses: We will do our best to ensure that students are given their preferred courses, but this cannot always be guaranteed. We also may not be able to offer all the options if there are not enough students who choose that option.

It is therefore essential that students select four subjects in order of preference on the option form.  Remember that one choice must be History or Geography.

STEP 8: Complete the options digital form Parents/carers will be emailed the link to a Year 9 Options form. This is how students inform the school of which options they would like to take for GCSE, and other subjects that they will be more than willing to take if they do not get their first choice.

Parents/carers and students should discuss what choices are best before completing the form together.

STEP 9: Options Meeting Once students have selected their options, they will also have the opportunity to discuss their choices through an interview with a senior member of staff.

These interviews will take place during Spring 2.

Getting Starting in your Post-16 applications

Steps you need to take to decide on your options

To get started

• Have you researched all the different types of careers using our recommended resources?
• Have you attended a careers appointment?
• Have you chosen what type of study will lead you to your career goals?

Do you know the difference between the following?

• A-Levels;
• Further Educational Colleges;
• Apprenticeships;
• Traineeships;
• UTCS.

How to apply to your Post-16 pathway

When to apply - You can apply to college as soon as you start Year 11, but no later than 1st January. There’s still opportunity to apply after than, but we would highly recommend that you apply as soon as you can, so that you complete the interview process and have your course offer in the bag. This way you’ll be able to continue with your GCSEs, knowing exactly what you need to do to secure that opportunity.

How to apply

1. UCAS Progress;
2. Directly through the providers website;
3. Application form – You can pick these up from the LRC or Mrs Mountney;

There are various ways that you can apply to college, traineeships & apprenticeship, but the one we promote to pupils to use is UCAS Progress. This is because it’s instant and all your applications can be tracked throughout the process.

Before January 1st, you will all attend a UCAS Progress introduction session. You will be provided with usernames and passwords and will be given guidance to complete your UCAS Profiles. Once you’ve completed your profiles, you are ready to start applying. Use the UCAS Progress database to search through all the course available to you, then you begin to favourite all the course you are interested in. It’s just like online shopping in the way you drop things in your basket and then later go through checkout to confirm you order.

When you apply you will also be added to the providers mailing list, which means you will be kept updated of college events and receive newsletters – which is useful!

You may choose as many colleges and providers to apply for, but just be mindful that you’re going to get a lot of responses from providers asking you to attend an interview.