Senior School
At St Gabriel's our aim is that all children will be given every opportunity to achieve their potential in terms of academic achievement, aesthetic appreciation and spiritual awareness, within a happy learning environment.
In the Senior School staff engage fully with motivated students in workspaces that support each subject's specific needs. The curriculum is broad and, whilst all schemes of work are based upon the recommendations of the DfES, there exists the flexibility for all members of staff to explore the subject further outside the restrictions of the National Curriculum.
The extensive Senior curriculum includes the core areas of English, Mathematics, Science, PSHE, PE and Information and Communication Technology. In addition, students in Year 7 will study Geography, History, Religious Studies, Music, Art, Drama, Latin and two Modern Foreign Languages. In September of Year 7 all students experience two-week “taster” sessions in each of the following languages; French, Italian, Spanish and Mandarin Chinese. After half term they choose two of these languages to continue studying until the end of Year 9. At this point, they choose one or both languages to continue to GCSE.
As all of our students are encouraged to take all 3 separate sciences in Year 11, in Year 9 our students are sitting their first GCSE Science modules.
In Year 10, our students will have chosen their options subjects. They can choose from all the subjects they have studied in Years 7 to 9, as well as Photography, Dance, Mandarin and Greek.
English, Science and Mathematics have students in sets all the way through Senior School. Latin, Geography, History and Religious Studies are also set in Years 7 to 9. The remainder of subjects are taught in mixed ability groups. Irrespective of whether departments have girls in sets or not, staff-pupil ratios are such that each girl's needs can be monitored accurately and acted upon to ensure that full academic potential is realised by every student.