Welcome to the SHIELD website!

 

What do you do in SHIELD?

In SHIELD we talk about events that are going to happen in school, volunteer to trips, relax, have fun and eat sweets which were kindly bought by Miss Baker the awesome.

How can I join SHIELD?

To join SHIELD, all you have to do is either go to A11 at lunch on Tuesday Week 2 or talk to Miss Baker in B7. And also, you wont believe this but, you don’t have to pay to join such an awesome club! You even get a cool badge!

So why not come down to A11 at lunch on Tuesday week 2 and help others in need! The club is run by Miss Baker, we are thinking about starting a YouTube channel and we have 2 new editors called Dominykas And Jorris.

Hope to see you soon, 

SHIELD.

 

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SHIELD will visit UEA to discuss what student teachers can do to make everyone included.

Coming soon, 6 students in SHIELD including The Great Miss Baker will visit UEA to tell student teachers what they could do to make everyone feel included. Pictures will be coming soon.

 

On Tuesday 29th of January 2019 our SHIELD students will go to yet another UEA trip. The point of the trip is to go and speak to a group of trainee English teachers to suggest how they could be more inclusive regarding our (the student’s) lessons. 

Several subjects that will be covered this year: 

• Including Islamic literature in lessons

• Reading books about young people from the traveller community

• Supporting students with chronic illnesses in the classroom

• Representation of LGBTQ characters in young adult fiction

• Inclusive books about gender identity, transgender and non binary people

• The struggles of Bilingual people

• Autism

Equality and fair representation is topical because in our Year 9 English lessons we’ve been studying George Orwell’s “Animal Farm”.  In order to understand why Orwell wrote a criticism of Communism and why he makes the pigs such horrible characters, we first had to be aware of the background (context) of the real life people he was describing.  Just like George Orwell, we want people to be aware of who we are and where we’re from before they study us!

Our trip to UEA might be a big success and we might gain lots of experience of public speaking, as well as express our ideas about some very current topics.

“Going to the UEA should be very fun,” says Dominykas, one of the SHIELD speakers;  “especially because not only have I and some other members of SHIELD never been to UEA but also we get to be a teacher and the teachers get to be the students for once!“

Last year at UEA:

Dr. John Gordon, Senior Lecturer in Education at the UEA personally wrote a letter to each of the speakers, praising the pupil presentations. He said,

“The students presentations were superb with a really impressive quality of information, and also a very good compliment to the PGCE group considered in the morning…The students were a real credit to themselves, and the school. The session had a powerful impact on the UEA students. I’m really glad we were able to organize the session – thank you!” 

We only hope that this year we will be as good (or even better) as last year. 

Rainbow Cards Project! 🌈

 

Not long ago, The Awesome Miss Baker found out about a Rainbow cards charity where people sent cards to a lady and the lady sent cards to people who are LGBTQ but their family/friends disown them for being LGBTQ to put it roughly. For more info, visit https://www.therainbowcardsproject.org/.

What is the Rainbow cards charity in full detail?

A charity in its early stages, The Rainbow Cards Project is a non-profit organisation aiming to combat the prejudice and discrimination that LGBTQ+ people face with kindness and human connection. We believe that some of the simplest acts make the biggest differences, and that inspired us to start sending birthday & holiday cards to those with discriminatory families in the hope that we can remind everyone that they are always loved and never alone.

How do I join the Rainbow Cards Project? 

To send a card, all you have to do is either go to the SHIELD meeting on Tuesday Week 2 or send a letter to the lady who created the Rainbow cards charity. Her post code is on the website so you can send her the letter.

What should I add on the letter/card?

On the Rainbow cards charity website, there are names of people you can send cards to and what they like, their favourite colour and when their birthdays are.

What should I not add?

Don’t add your full name onto the card, don’t add your address on the card and don’t mention anything about LGBTQ if it says not to mention it next to their name on the list in the website.

The link to the website’s list of names: https://www.therainbowcardsproject.org/send-a-card.

(The list of names is near the bottom of the page)

What do teachers think about this charity?

Mr Lewis: “Its brilliant, its a worthy cause and there should be more like it.”

Miss Baker: “Its a simple painless way to make someone else feel valued.”

Mr Cutter: “Its a beautiful thing which the recipients will feel happy about.”

Mrs Berry (A librarian): “Its really nice.”

Miss Perry-Warnes: “I think its very nice of the charity to send comforting letters to those who need them and it would be a better thing if the whole school joined in which, not only will put a smile on someone’s face, but will also give Hellesdon High School a better reputation.”  

Miss Tompkinson: “I think it is a very nice thing.”

SHIELD promote “Reading in the Community”.

 

Do you have elderly relatives? Maybe you have a neighbour who can’t move around easily or a family friend who is disabled.  For older people and people with disabilities, Christmas can be a very difficult time.

The SHIELD team answered a request on social media for visitors and entertainers to come to Oakwood House, a residential care Home in Norwich.  We decided that as we couldn’t all sing (!) we’d bring them the joy of literature instead.

So, armed with several David Walliams books, some Roald Dahl stories and a sprinkling of Lewis Carroll, we headed off to Oakwood in the minibus to spread some seasonal cheer.

Our visits were not easy: many of the people we read to were hard of hearing. Some were very poorly and a few could not speak for health reasons. However, we smiled, laughed, chatted and read and the two visits we made passed by in a flash.

Oakwood House were very grateful and made us feel very welcomed with biscuits and squash. Our link, Emily said:

”Our manager Pete was thrilled with how it all went and said he hoped it would be a regular thing. Musicians would be great too. It is really hard with our residents who are unable to verbalise but they really do benefit from such interactions.” 

We hope the visits will improve our own reading and social skills, whilst bringing comfort and fun to others.

Do you know someone who would benefit from being read or chatted to, like this?