Does your secondary have a space/hall big enough for the whole school at once?

[Erebus]

Curious- and wondering whether it'd considered a good idea for 'school unity' or cohesion if schools DID have such a space these days?

DS1 secondary (Y7-11) has a hall but it's a proper, professional theatre with fixed, raked seating which will sit 450, but the school's 1450 strong- each year group is 280, so no chance!

Another local secondary here has House assembly so can get a third of the school in at once which I guess is a good compromise.

My school had a typical 'assembly hall' into which all 1100 (Y7-13) of us could fit but usually every day, one year group of 120 had their assembly in the old small school hall (and thh Sixth form could choose whether to go to assembly at all) BUT it was possible to get the whole school into the big hall.

I would have thought most don't now. When I was at secondary school in the 1980,s, my school had over 2000 pupils - no way they were all going to fit in one room. We had year group assemblies and it was fine - all the announcements and everything were relevant to us. The school only had 2 halls as well, so each year group could only have assembly twice a week (which was great as I always found them a bit dull!).

It's weird that some halls can't even take e.g. lower school (500) at one time. I mean how do they get round their duty to provide daily worship? Is the hall constantly in a state of prayer for each year group all day?

Theoretically maybe, but they normally have assemblies as year groups, or key stages (yrs 7-9, yrs 10 & 11, sixth form) or as houses. They have two halls, and a couple of gyms, and a huge sports hall which could probably fit the whole school but isn't used as far as I know for that.
Worship can theoretically happen in class on a class basis, but in reality is a rare occurance in a forma way. However they do have voluntary things, such as a prayer space in school for a week, CU etc.

Yes, our secondary makes a deal about 'The Tutor Group' being the central support thing and 'point of reference' for the DCs. The group remains the same, theoretically with the same Tutor throughout the 5 years. I would quite like to see vertical houses, too, to give the DCs more of a sense of a school-wide, cross-age community, not just their little 'gang' of 28.

It could be done but the school is huge on its 'informal ethos' (casual uniform and all) and relative lack of structure so I can't see houses being formed! It rests on its stellar exam results but I do wonder whether my DS gets the same feeling of being a proud part of a bigger whole that I felt when at secondary in 1973!

DH goes to lots of secondary schools (between 50 and 100 in any year)
almost NEVER is there a room that can take the whole school
and in the case of my kids school, if there wasa room that could hold 1600 pupils plus 300 staff on occasion, what a COMPLETE waste of space and money the rest of the time

Well, at my school, the assembly hall was in use all the time! There was an assembly every morning, music through much of the day, lunch room, sports, Drama, PE, meetings etc etc. The school did have a dedicated gymnasium and another, smaller dining room, but the assembly hall was hardly a waste of space! But maybe back then my school would have been considered very big, at 1100 pupils whereas today 1500 is more the norm.

Erebus,
I agree about assembly halls but the size of the schools now! - DH went to the one in Peterborough with over 2000 pupils and no playground!

Blimey! Why no playground? Was it a new Academy set-up where they don't trust the DCs with their free time thus don't allow any unstructured 'time out'? I'd read somewhere that some schools have been architecturally designed to allow no hidden places where 'bad things' might happen, along with loos without full walls!

Thomas Deacon Academy.
At least it has pupils unlike the one that got built and then closed as nobody went there !

Really? Again, why? I find that sort of thing fascinating. Has a Free School nabbed the other site yet?!

Yes to my school and yes to my daughter's school

erebus
This one is coming up soon
www.christthekingcfl.knowsley.gov.uk/our_school.html
but there is a girls one that already shut - again Catholic BSF contract

The school I teach in has a Drama Hall and a Sports Hall. Goodness knows why they continue to insist on referring to it as the "Drama" Hall - as Head of Performing Arts, I'm constantly battling to get to use it, as it's used for absolutely everything, from photos to assemblies to exams. We can get about half the school in there at a push, though there were kids practically passing out from the heat when we had the whole of KS3 in there for our drama festival last summer, what with the stage lights and all. We have whole school assemblies once per term, and they happen in the sports hall. The kids hate it as they have to sit on the floor. When I was at school, we could only get the whole school together in the Sports hall too - both fairly small schools though - 750ish 11-18 yr olds.

Christ the King Learning Centre? What the f* is our government THINKING?

See, what the western world REALLY needs is education segregated along religious lines. That'll help.

erebus
And then people wonder why I have a problem with Bliar the Godfather !!!!

evil
when DH goes to schools he just LOVES the gym halls where they make all the year 9's take their shoes off !!!

Yes, my DC's school uses the sports hall once a term for a whole school assembly. The school hall is used for upper/lower school assemblies.