One World Show!

This lunchtime we had an amazing One World Show in the assembly hall. Over 180 pupils and staff came to watch. There was an exhibition of art work from all years S1 to S6. 

S3 mirror and clock designs made out of recycled materials

Senior fashion designs inspired by the natural world

S4 corsets inspired by nature and made using recycled materials

S4-S6 eco architecture. Sustainability focussed and nature-inspired....

John and Jenna were our comperes for the event

Two S1 classes had African dance lessons in PE today, alongside live drumming, and some brave volunteers gave a public performance of the Kpanlogo dance from Ghana that they'd learnt

Elaine O'Donnell read her powerful poem 'What is?' that she submitted for the John Byrne Award competition

The Junior Drama club did short sketches they'd developed on the theme 'Its Not Fair!'

More from the Junior Drama club

The Fair Trade group did a presentation on why Fair Trade matters

Pupils modelled some amazing fashion designs inspired by our world and nature, created for Higher and Advanced Higher. 

Many thanks to everyone involved in making it a fantastic event!

Earth Hour 2015 at CCHS

This year the Eco-committee wanted to mark Earth Hour in a special way. WWF came up with an idea to create bunting to help us remember the things we appreciate most about our natural world. The brief asked us to use the phrase ‘For the love of…’ and complete the sentence about your favourite place, animal and anything that is special to you in our precious planet. WWF encouraged over 4500 schools across the UK to make the bunting in an attempt break a world record. 

Currie High School approached this challenge and the Eco-committee meetings were spent cutting out bunting out of recycled fabric to be transformed into wonderful bunting. Pupils in Art and SDE classes helped to create the design on the bunting. We are displaying our part of the bunting in school before the end of term and then it will be shipped to London to be put together with the bunting from other schools in a huge display.  We also plan to have all lights off in school P1 on Friday 27 March, before the global Earth Hour on Saturday 28 March.

By taking part in this challenge we are hoping to raise awareness of climate change and other environmental issues in our school; as well as to help support WWF raise awareness of climate change globally. We also celebrated all things eco at the One World Show on 26 March which showcased eco art, drama, music, poetry, dance and design.

By Sophie McVinnie and Abigail Odetayo, Eco Committee

The Eco Committee ripping up our donated old bedsheets

and cutting up the flags

to be decorated beautifully!

Our foyer looks great!

The BFG takes over CCHS

All our S3 pupils had three days off timetable at the end of last term to take part in a cross-curricular learning project.  They went to see the show of Roald Dahl's classic novel the BFG at the Lyceum Theatre and then came up with their own creative responses based on three themes; That's not Fair, Visions and Values, and Taking on Giants.  Each group had to generate their own ideas and then work together to see the project to fruition, often with limited resources. Groups performed their presentations to parents and other guests at the end of the third day.

One group created an art installation in the corridor outside Art & Design, inspired in part by Martin Luther King's speech ' I have a dream'. Half of the corridor was poorly lit, with art work and slogans respresenting the nightmarish reality some people face in their daily lives. The other half was brightly lit and highlighted the group's wishes and dreams for an ideal world of equality and justice for all.

Another group used a news report format to look at the lives of asylum seekers coming to the UK to seek safety, and highlighted the inequality between food and water resources of people living in different countries around the world.

Another group tackled giant multi-national food companies, often encouraging us to buy food that is bad for us.  The group showed the difference between this type of food and drink and healthy alternatives made with local or ethically traded produce. Everyone was given a taste of the dishes they'd been creating over the 3 days, and was encouraged to think about their own shopping and eating habits.

One group chose to tell the story of Malala Yousafzai, the girl from Pakistan who was shot by the Taliban for campaiging for the right to education and who recently was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Whilst the pupils were working on their installation, Taliban fighters killed 141 children and teachers in a school in Pakistan, showing the vital and urgent need to protect everyone's right to an education.

One group chose to tackle the 'That's not fair' theme by creating a Wheel of (Mis)/Fortune game show to illustrate the inequalities between rich and poor in this country.  The wheel could land on education, health care, Christmas or life expectancy, and in each case the likely scenario was acted out for both a rich, fortunate contestant and a poor, unfortunate contestant.

It was a very thought-provoking event, and so inspiring to see what the pupils had come up with in only 3 days. Well done to all our S3s!

John Muir Book and Film

Last term a group of Currie pupils met the illustrator of a graphic novel about the life of John Muir, the great conservationist. We looked through drafts of his drawings on two occasions and gave him our suggestions and ideas. The book has now been published and a class set has been sent to every single High School in Scotland!  The names of all the pupils are in the back of the book and we have our own class set to use in school.

The John Muir Trust have just made a beautiful 5 minute film about how young people feel about the legacy of John Muir featuring some of the CCHS pupils involved in the project. Do have a look by clicking on the link below, its a great film!

John Muir Film

One of the pictures from the new book

S3 Art & Design Trip to Jupiter Artland

On the afternoon of May 12th, Ms Richardson, Mrs Steel and Miss Johnson accompanied 40 S3s to Jupiter Artland in Wilkieston. We toured the contemporary sculptures and enjoyed the beautiful surrounding landscape. All artists will be asked to write their own critique of their favourite artwork and will also be making our own school grounds "land art" in the coming weeks. Watch this space for the most outstanding work! J

 

Traidcraft Snack Attack Success!

 

For this year’s Traidcraft “Snack Attack” Challenge, all of our S2s created a healthy Fairtrade snack in Health and Food Technology. Then, in Art & Design, they designed the graphics, packaging and advertising campaign for their snack. There were some wonderful designs but we could only choose one winner! Our highly commended designers were Sarah Brown, Riya Bodas, Emma Boyle and Stella Lumsden. The design chosen to represent CCHS was by Charlotte Brock with her “Berry Burst” - a crispy, fruity, chocolaty bar. Well done to all of our chefs and designers for their excellent ideas and hard work!  

Message from Traidcraft:

'Runner-Up 2014,

 

Thank you for entering Snack Attack 2014. We were bowled over by your entries, we had more this year than we’ve ever had before! So many of them were simply amazing and showed real ingenuity, an entrepreneurial spirit, creativity and demonstrated great team work. Thank you so much for putting in all of the work you did. You all learnt about fair trade and developed other important skills at the same time.'

Eat a Rainbow!

In their Art & Design lessons, 2L1, 2L2 and 2K1 created a lovely new healthy eating message for the Dolphin Café. The message asks you to “Eat a Rainbow Every Day”. 

Basically, the more different colours of fruit and veg in your diet, the more variety of vitamins and nutrients you will benefit from. For example, orange fruit and veg contain beta-carotene, flavonoids, potassium and vitamin C. These nutrients can help reduce cholesterol and blood pressure and can help to build healthy bones. Make sure you eat your five-a-day today!  And thanks S2s for making such a beautiful display for us all to enjoy.

Mosaic panels are up!

The beautiful mosaic panels made from recycled bottle tops by pupils now in S3 for their JASS award have been installed in the LRC and look fantastic.  The rainbow, peacock butterfly and orange tip butterfly (sitting on red flower with its wings shut) have been getting lots of praise from pupils, staff and visitors alike.  Thanks to all the pupils involved last term, and the wonderful Mr Hermiston for putting them up!

For photos of them as a work in progress check out the blog posts from June 2013!

Recycling bins given a new lease of life

Noorislam Uddin in S5 has designed some fantastic new labels for our packaging recycling bins in the school.  Please remember these are for empty plastic bottles, cartons and cans only. No wrappers!  Thanks Noorislam, they're brilliant!

xl exploring the woods

The S3 xl group are continuing their work towards their John Muir Award.  They recently did a litter pick of Roleys Wood, as part of the Conserve Challenge, and have been exploring the woods around the school using their senses.

Today we were looking at leaves and making art, inspired by the work of Andy Goldsworthy and the beautiful autumn colours.

Everyone also tasted the wild wood cordials we made last week from rosehips and elderberries collected within the school grounds. Good to drink hot cordial on a wet morning!

Photography success!

Talented artist, Claire Twist, in S5, has won an award for her monochromatic photograph, ‘A Walk in the Path’, which she submitted to the national Focus Environment Photographic Competition. She will attend the awards ceremony at Dynamic Earth at the end of this month. Well done, Claire! 

 

John Muir Graphic Novel

A group of S2 and S3 pupil volunteers recently met an illustrator working on a graphic novel about the life of John Muir, the Scottish environmentalist.  They looked at a draft of the new novel and gave William Goldsmith the illustrator their ideas about his illustrations and the captions for the book. The Scottish Book Trust is going to give a class set of the novel to every secondary school in Scotland when it is published next year.  William and the author Julie Bertangna will return in October to show the pupils the next draft of the book.

The illustrator William Goldsmith showing pupils how he came up with design of John as a young boy

Focus Environment Photography Competition

Art & Design are pleased to announce the winners of our S4/5 Summer Photography Project. Themes were ‘My Environment’, ‘Wildlife& Habitats’ and ‘Nature’s Moods’. Winners were chosen by the Senior Leadership Team. Winners were :

1^st Prize: Kiera Dobbie, ‘Night Flight’

2^nd Prize: Claire Twist, ‘Path’

3^rd Prize: Jessica Sullivan, ‘Station’

Highly Commended:

Hannah McPherson, Stella Lane, Laura Butcher, Callum Wallace, Cameron Finlayson and Ronan Dance.

Well done to all exhibitors for your interesting and sophisticated work! See the lovely photographs exhibited along the corridor outside Mrs McKinnon’s office. 

Bottletop mosaics are finished!

We're hoping to have these beautiful panels up displayed in the LRC very soon.



 

The finished panels

An orangetip butterfly resting on a flower