Following on from another successful DEAR Event (Drop Everything And Read) on 26 January 2021, the Humanities and Social Sciences departments shared the following feedback:

‘The peace of 1945’ from the ‘Hindsight’ magazine allowed Year 10 GCSE History students to familiarise themselves with the events of the Cold War in addition to preparing for an assessment. Mr Newbold commented ‘DEAR events play a crucial role in developing students’ wider reading around the topic.’
History – Mr Newbold

‘Branding and promotion’ was the title of the article Year 10 Business Studies students read during the recent DEAR event. Linked to the Marketing Mix, students were able to consider:

1. Is it a mass market or niche market product?
2. How much is available to spend on promotion?
3. What is the best way to reach the target market?

Students were able to understand the power of promotion in persuading consumers to purchase products/services.
Business Studies – Mrs Kinghorn

“During the recent D.E.A.R. event we read an article on some interesting research about influence and choice. The researchers changed the order of drinks on touch screens in 622 McDonald’s stores over a period of 12 weeks. Coke Zero was at the top and Coca-Cola was at the bottom. Coke Zero sales increased by a whopping 21% and Coca-Cola sales fell by a less impressive 6%. The researchers calculated that the total effect was a loss of 25 million calories from customers’ diets. The psychology behind this comes from Kahneman’s idea of fast and slow thinking. Most of the time our brain is in fast-thinking mode and makes quite automatic decisions. This is quite a useful strategy because most of the time we have to make fast decisions(e.g. when driving, ordering dinner, etc.). It may be safer and more efficient to rely on automatic thinking. But these decisions can be easily nudged in a desired direction, as this research illustrates.”
Psychology – Mr Monk

The importance of DEAR events is evident in the wide ranging non-fiction articles linked to specific topics of the curriculum.