Curriculum Highlights
December 2025
Music
Students at our MISST Academy have been rehearsing regularly with focus and enthusiasm in preparation for their upcoming MISST Playday. Through these rehearsals, they have developed ensemble skills, accuracy, and musical expression, while demonstrating dedication, commitment, and teamwork. Their growing confidence is setting them up for a successful performance.
In year 9 music lessons, students have been exploring hooks and riffs using Bandlab, learning how short musical ideas are used across different popular music styles. Through practical composition and recording, they have strengthened their creativity, musical understanding, and technical skills, using music technology effectively to produce polished and engaging musical outcomes.
Year 7: Collaboration with The Comino Project
The Hathershaw College is proud to be working in collaboration with the Comino Project this year. This partnership has allowed Mrs. Akhtar’s Year 7 class to work directly with Poet in Residence, Nuha Chowdhury.
In recent sessions, students have been investigating the theme "The Space Between," experimenting with unique methods to create poetry. Following these workshops, the cohort will proceed to an educational visit designed to broaden their cultural horizons. The goal of this project is to inspire a deeper creativity and foster a lifelong love of literature in our students.
Year 8: Mastering Suspense and Fear
It has been a chilling half-term for year 8 in their English lessons. Students have immersed themselves in the Gothic genre, uncovering the techniques writers use to build tension and atmosphere. By deconstructing H.G. Wells' classic ghost story, The Red Room, students have explored exactly how language is used to evoke fear. They are now putting this knowledge into practice, producing high-quality analytical writing that explores the secrets of 19th-century literature.
Year 9: Much Ado About Improvement!
This half-term, our Year 9 students have been immersing themselves in the wit and drama of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. The class has focused specifically on the characterisation of Benedick and his famous verbal sparring with Beatrice.
We are particularly proud of the resilience shown in recent lessons. As seen in the attached photos, students have been working hard to refine their analysis, making detailed improvements to their 'Check Your Understanding' tasks to ensure they are mastering the text.
Year 9
Year 9 students have been looking at different transferable skills developed through language learning, helping them understand and recognise the value of studying a language, even if they do not continue it at GCSE.
How many of these transferable skills did you know were learnt within each French lesson?
1. Presentation Skills
You practise speaking in front of others when giving short talks about topics like your hobbies or future plans.
You learn to plan and structure what you say clearly and confidently - just like in any subject or job interview.
2. Reading & Writing Skills
You learn to understand key information and read for meaning in texts about French culture, school life, or technology.
Writing tasks (like emails, diary entries or opinion paragraphs) help you organise your thoughts and communicate clearly.
3. Self-Confidence
Speaking in another language can be challenging - but each time you try, you build confidence to speak up and make mistakes without fear.
Performing role plays or class discussions boosts your belief in your ability to express yourself.
4. Problem-Solving
You often have to work out the meaning of new words using context or logic - like cracking a code.
Grammar tasks and sentence building help you think critically and find creative ways to express ideas.
5. Listening Skills
You train your brain to focus carefully by understanding different accents and speeds of speech in French audio clips or videos.
This sharpens your ability to pick out key information - useful in any subject, future job or meeting.
6. Teamwork & Communication Skills
Pair and group work, like dialogues or projects, teach you to collaborate, share ideas and support others’ learning.
You practise giving and receiving feedback in a constructive way.
7. Organisational Skills
You need to keep vocabulary, notes, and homework organised to build on previous knowledge.
Planning revision for speaking or writing assessments helps you manage time effectively.
8. Understanding Other Cultures
You explore French-speaking countries, festivals, food and traditions, which helps you appreciate diversity and global perspectives.
You learn empathy and respect for different ways of life.
9. Memory Skills
You constantly train your memory to recall vocabulary, grammar rules and phrases - improving your ability to retain information in any subject.
Using recall games, songs and repetition helps strengthen long-term memory
History KS3
Year 7 have begun the term with a unit on Medieval conquests by looking at Islamic civilisations to begin answering their new enquiry question ‘Why was there so much conflict in later medieval England’. They have first focussed on getting an understanding of what Bagdad was like in 800 AD, when it was the capital of the Islamic world. Students have come into these lessons with good subject knowledge as it is building on work that a lot of students completed at primary school.
By the end of this unit, students will be able to understand why Christian European Countries considered the Islamic Empire a threat and how this culminated in the crusades and the subsequent impact this had on English rulers.
Year 8 have begun the term by continuing to look at the Mughal Empire, but instead focussing on the empire's decline. They have been looking at key figures in the British colonisation of India and the decline of the Mughal Empire. They have also been looking at key events such as the Battle of Plassey, the Indian Mutiny and the British Raj. This links directly to their first unit which focussed on the British empire and develops their subject knowledge about how the British empire expanded into an ‘empire on which the sun never set’.
This unit also gives students an idea of the impact of British rule on their colonies and will allow them to be able to evaluate whether the British Empire had a positive or negative impact on the world.
Year 9 have begun the term by developing their knowledge of Nazi rule in Germany by looking specifically at the Holocaust. Students began the year by looking at the rise of the Nazi’s and how they were able to create a totalitarian state in Germany. This led students to focus on events such as the Reichstag fire, the Night of the Long Knives, as well as Nazi methods of control such as propaganda and censorship. This has a direct link to the KS4 syllabus where students again look at Weimar Germany and the rise of the Nazi’s for their GSCE content.
At the beginning of the spring term, students have now begun to focus on the Holocaust, first learning about Jewish life in Europe before beginning to explore the ‘Final Solution’ and Jewish resistance.
Year 10 and 11 have shown fantastic dedication to their GCSE studies, with some impressive revision completed over the Christmas period. Year 10 rose to the challenge by planning and tackling exam-style questions on Crime and Punishment, while Year 11 focused on consolidating key knowledge and sharpening their exam technique, ensuring they are well prepared and confident heading into their mock exam.
Year 10 Citizenship
Year 10 have been busy building some really important life skills during their home period sessions! They’ve been learning all about managing money; from understanding the difference between wants and needs, to what actually happens when we borrow money. Alongside this, students have explored where to find support and how to ask for help. They’ve also had open and thoughtful discussions about healthy relationships, spotting the signs of coercive control, and ways to cope with a break-up. It’s been great to see students engaging so positively with these real-life topics and developing skills that will support them now and in the future.
