On Thursday 16th March students and staff had the opportunity to bring their favourite characters to life by coming to school dressed as a fictional character. 

A variety of costumes were in evidence and the overall winner was Raees Tariq (9G). We raised £1,000 for the World Book Day charity – Book Aid International -through our non-uniform day and a book and cake sale hosted by 9Alfred. Every £2 we raised provides a new book for a library in Africa so that means we raised enough to buy . . . 500 books! Every year they send one million new books to libraries, schools, universities, hospitals and refugee camps. We have made a significant contribution to their annual target!

Thank you to Ms Bullock for providing the book themed cup cakes. Big thanks to 9Alfred for organising posters, book collections and donations and giving up their lunchtime to sell books for a very good cause.

Ms Brown (English Department)

Handsworth Grammar School have been entering the Young Writers Mini Saga competition for a number of years now. This year’s theme, “Wonderland”, included 40 entries ranging from speculative fiction to romanticism.

The competition organisers were impressed by the entries from Handsworth Grammar School, commenting on the way in which the writing ‘has certainly captured the young writers’ imaginations, from changing history and alien encounters to fantasy lands, we enjoyed reading every entry we received’. The English Department is delighted that 37 out of 40 entries received have been published in an anthology produced by the organisers.

We would like to congratulate and recognise the achievement of the following year 7 students:

A huge well done to all students – keep writing!

English Department

The Year 7 Football team beat St John Wall 9-0 in the Aston League last night and next play George Dixon tonight to go top of the League. Well done!

A group of 14 year 12 students visited the Tate Modern Gallery in London on Wednesday 15^th March accompanied by Mr Ali and Mr Conway.

They were able to take part in a discussion on the migrant crisis in the Greek island of Lesbos in the Mediterranean, and saw the impact that this crisis is having on the migrants and the people of the island.

Students were then able to view works by some of the most famous artists in the world including Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and Jackson Pollock.

On a beautiful London day, the students were also able to see at first hand the spectacular Millennium Bridge, designed by former Handsworth Grammar School pupil, Ken Shuttleworth.

On Wednesday 15 March 10 Year 8 students visited Cherry Orchard School once more to support learning in Science lessons.  Rishi Patel writes: “We taught two Year 5 classes about how to get tomatoes down a mountain using metre rules, weights and newton meters. We taught them what newton meters are, how to use them and what they measure. We showed them how many newtons everyday objects weighed, from pencil cases to pens – we weighed anything we could get our hands on.  We then moved onto trying to balance a metre rule with different amounts of weights on either side (it wasn’t as easy as it sounds). We then looked at pulleys and how they work, with Mr Alishah.  Both classes worked very well and listened to our and Miss Saleem’s instructions very carefully.  The trip was an amazing and enjoyable experience and I would love to have this opportunity once again.  I would like to thank Mr Jones and Miss Saleem for selecting me to go on this trip; it was a total success and I hope the Year 5 classes have learnt something new”.