21 March 2025
Mrs Gail Haythorne, Assistant Head Empowered Learning
Woldingham’s Connections Week, which ran from 6-12 March, focused everyone’s minds on kindness and community. All of us connect in many different ways and the more confidence we develop to do this, the better.
Highlights included a fabulous video from the Ribbons on how to be kind, polite and inclusive around school (and how not to!); sending thank you cards to people who had helped us, from our close friends to members of our catering team; and the ever-popular Woldingham Walkies, where we were joined by some very enthusiastic dogs, Harry, Lexi, Paddy and Rolo, (and their staff member owners) on a lunchtime stroll. Students also received stickers for kindnesses shown and could nominate one another for being supportive.
Connections Week concluded with a lunchtime team challenge, where the significance of the sparkly Connections badges everyone received at the start of the week became clear. Students were asked to gather in groups according to their badge colour and venture out of their comfort zone by talking to new people. A ‘chat challenge’ on each table gave students the confidence to get conversations going and include everyone. Each table also came up with a pose for a group photo which represented the inclusivity and kindness we aimed to strengthen through Connections Week.
Following Connections Week, tutors busily counted the stickers students had been awarded to discover which year group had received the highest average number. Our Lower Sixth came out top, for which they were awarded some treats, though they were only just ahead of Year 8 and Year 11. Of course, we all win when there is more kindness.
We hope everyone had a very happy Connections Week!