Year 6 Leavers’ Speech 2023
To start my leavers speech today I thought I'd show you some famous people on the screen. Does anybody think they know who they are?
Well just in case you're not sure that's Galileo, Marie Curie, and James Dyson.
My next question is; what do they have in common? Anybody think they know? Right well don't tell me your answer answers yet and we'll find out little bit later on in my talk why I've chosen to put those three on the screen today.
So Year Six, we finally come to the end of your time here at Crescent School. I know that brings a mixture of emotions with it, and this is an opportunity to look back on the experiences, and achievements of your time here with us, but of course, also to look forward to all of the opportunities and challenges that await you at your next school and in your futures.
We go back a long way, as you were just starting Year 1 when I came to the school and over that time I’ve got to know you all very, very well. Of course, along the way some of you have joined and others have left but you are a group for whom I’ve always had a great deal of affection. I really enjoyed teaching you and I particularly really enjoyed your input to our lessons and perhaps more than that I think you have made an excellent Year 6.
What does that mean? What does it take to be a really good Year 6 pupil? I guess we should ask an expert. Perhaps somebody who has been through it all and knows what it takes. Does anybody know anyone?
Oh yes, good point. Let’s ask the Year 6 children themselves. Before you ask, I did a little brainstorm of my own and I’ll see how close you get to mine.
Okay here’s my own top 6. A good Year 6 pupil is;
- Caring
- Patient
- Responsible
- Cheerful
- Hard-working
- Resilient – growth mindset
Well, that’s not too bad, we matched up quite well I think.
If you look at those six qualities, they don’t make up for too bad a summary of what I hope you’ve learnt from your time here at school. I said there were challenges waiting for you in Year 7, but actually if you keep to the list above, you’ll meet them head on and be amazing.
They will prepare you for everything that comes your way. Nobody can ask more from you than giving your best, striving to achieve but doing it with a smile on your face, with sympathy and empathy for those around you. I would like to say that all of you have these qualities in abundance, but a little doubt was put into my mind when I read through some of your comments on the end of year memories book.
Here's some slightly concerning recollections, and you'll hear a bit more about some of these later on by the way:
When Charlie collected raisins in his hat for weeks.
When Charlie woke up at Frank Chapman and banged his head on the top bunk.
At Frank Chapman, when we were in the woods me, Bella and Ava thought we got completely lost and then found out we were literally next to camp. (Who is their geography teacher by the way?)
When I had a pretend laser tag fight at Frank Chapman - using BANANAS!
There were a few others I could have mentioned but they all seem to involve Charlie and I didn't want to seem if I was picking on you Charlie.
Perhaps in a similar vein, I wasn’t too sure about some of your choices for future careers:
- A Walt Disney World worker in Florida.
- A Youtuber.
- roller coaster test dummy.
- One of you very sensibly said that in ten years, I would like to be… Able to get a really good career. That sounded great up to that point and then she went on to say: I would like a career as… A cat cafe worker.
To be honest that sounds quite a nice job actually.
Mind you, some of your ambitions were much more inspiring:
- A mechanical engineer
- Fashion designer
- Vet
- A game developer
- A journalist
- Flat racing jockey
- A singer
- An actor x3
- Officer in the army
- Work at Apple or Epic Games
- And of course, the ultimate career path for anybody, somebody said ‘A form teacher at Crescent School.’
Right okay let's come back to my three amazing characters that I showed you at the beginning. I asked you then who knew what they might have in common?
First, I'll tell you a little bit about each of them
So, the first one is James Dyson. He was an inventor and you might have heard of his famous vacuum cleaners.
James Dyson first started building vacuums in 1979. A few years ago he told the story in an interview:
‘I'd purchased what claimed to be the most powerful vacuum cleaner. But it was essentially useless. Rather than sucking up the dirt, it pushed it around the room. I'd seen an industrial sawmill, which uses something called a cyclonic separator to remove dust from the air. I thought the same principle of separation might work on a vacuum cleaner. I rigged up a quick prototype, and it did.’
But even after that lightbulb moment, it still took Dyson "15 years and 5,127 attempts" at making and testing prototypes before his bagless cyclonic vacuum first cracked the market.
Galileo
Does anyone know why he was so famous? There's a couple of clues on the screen. He was also an inventor of sorts and a scientist, one of the very first ones who could call themselves that. One good example is the diagram of the falling objects from the tower of Pisa you can see on the screen. Everyone had believed that the larger item would hit the ground first, but no one had ever actually tested it. Galileo actually went up to the top of the tower and dropped the two balls and found that they landed on the ground at the same time.
Perhaps even more famously, he invented the telescope which enabled him to observe the stars and the planets much more closely. He saw the moons orbiting around Jupiter and this led him to believe that in fact the earth is orbiting the sun and not the other way around as had always previously been held.
But he didn't just get there straight away. At first, I expect he couldn’t believe what he was seeing, but he kept an open mind and by trial and error he tested things, he got things wrong, learnt by his mistakes as he went along. People didn't like him for his ideas and at times he was persecuted but he was ultimately proved right in his approach to finding things out which later evolved into modern science and changed the world forever.
Marie Curie
Now Marie Curie was a Nobel Prize winner. She spent her working life investigating radioactive elements to find out more about them and how they could be used to help people in medicine. In fact, she invented the modern X-ray machine that you can see in the picture and it was used during the First World War to examine soldiers injuries and, as a result, many unnecessary surgeries were avoided. In fact, the X-ray machine now saves many lives on a daily basis. Unfortunately, this story has a sad ending because Marie Curie went on to die of cancer that had been caused by handling these radioactive materials over many years. She was a hero.
So let's go back to my list of the qualities of a good Year 6 pupil. Who thinks any of these important people can be matched up with some of these six qualities?
They were all hard working, they never gave up. When things went wrong, they didn't see that as a failure but as a route to success. They had resilience and a growth mindset.
Patience was very important. They had to keep on going even when things took a long time to get through. They were caring, an invention such as Marie Curie's X-ray machine saved countless lives, maybe one day it will save yours.
So, I hope these six qualities stay with you as you move forward Year 6. I think they will. You've shown them here in abundance throughout your time but in particular in your last year here with us. That's when everything comes together, and we see the final product of all of these years of learning and keeping to the school promise that have gone on whilst you have been here.
There will be a few rounds of applause this afternoon I'm sure but let's just start by thinking of all the wonderful work they have done in their final year here in the school, looking after the younger children, helping out with duties, in the lunchroom, in the corridors and just being a really fantastic example of what we hope and wish all Year 6 children world provide for the school. Let's give him a really big round of applause, well done.
