RHS Harlow Carr inspires budding artists
A recent trip to one of Yorkshire’s most beautiful gardens has helped inspire art students from Cundall Manor School. The year 9 pupils visited RHS Harlow Carr gardens in Harrogate as part of their study into natural forms. The youngsters took inspiration from the Royal Horticultural Society Garden and had the advantage of some late summer sunshine later in the day. Sarah Pearson, Head of Art at Cundall Manor School organised the trip. She said: “Harlow Carr has organic forms in abundance and offered great opportunities to draw a wide range of plant forms, the floral displays and vegetable garden being of particular interest. “We spent the morning sketching in the grounds and after lunch the everyone took part in printmaking workshops in the Bramall learning centre. During the workshops we looked at the work of William Morris, the famous Art and Crafts artist and designer, and then used our own sketches to produce prints inspired by his use of motifs and symmetry.” She added: “We are lucky to have such a great resource on our doorstep and my thanks go to the team at Harlow Carr for making it such an enjoyable experience.” The pupils will continue to focus on natural forms and will produce work for display across the school in the coming term. Parents are being invited to come and see some of the fantastic artwork on display at the school for themselves at our next Open Morning on Saturday 15thOctober from 10am. Call 01423 360 200 to find out more.
Team building scales new heights
Aerial Extreme at Bedale proved the perfect setting for pupils from Cundall Manor’s Upper School to get to know one another as part of their annual team building day. The teambuilding day allows new pupils to the Upper School the chance to work together with some of the older pupils as they work through problems and challenges as they complete the activity day. The pupils, all aged between 13 and 16 years old, had to work together to complete and number of tasks and competed in teams for the top prize. Sara Hall, Head of Upper School, said: “The children worked really well together. You could see their confidence growing after each task. She added: “It is really important that we have the ability to allow our pupils to develop their leadership, organisational and communication skills from an early age. Days like these are a fantastic way to consolidate their skills while having fun and making new friends.” Part of the tasks including completing a course on a Segway, a search and rescue mission for a pilot which involved working as a team to cross difficult terrain via pullies and a-frames. Team 10 proved triumphant over the course of the day with Head Boy Oliver Hartmann, Ben Hunter, Ethan Watkins, Annabel Hartley, Tom Wilson and Maddie Pick coming out on top. The school, located between Ripon and Thirsk, will be hosting an open morning showcasing all that the school has to offer on Saturday 15 October from 10am. To book your place or arrange a tour, please call 01423 360 200 or emailadmissions@cundallmanor.org.uk
Powerful Drama Wows Audience
A drama performance about cyber-bullying helped Year 11 pupils from Cundall Manor get the message out about the dangers posed to vulnerable teenagers on the web. FIVE drama pupils preformed the powerful and thought provoking play ‘Chatroom’ by Enda Walsh as part of their GCSE exams in front of a large audience of friends, family and staff from the school. Drama teacher, Elizabeth Vile said: “The piece explored the theme of cyber-bullying and the dangers it presents to vulnerable teenagers across a range of situations and backgrounds.” “The actors were highly focused throughout the piece and audience members were really struck with the students’ commitment and acting ability.” Elizabeth added: “The cast should feel incredibly proud of themselves and of the performance as a whole.” To find out more about drama at Cundall Manor School, visit our website onwww.cundallmanorschool.com
GCSE Science Assessments
Thornton goes Mad for Science Thornton students really looked the part as they made real progress in their science Controlled Assessment practical work. The students have been planning investigations to look at how the volume of reactants affects the amount of product formed in a precipitation reaction. The assessment counts towards 25% of the Additional Science and Chemistry GCSEs and is going really well so far. The students have already achieved fantastic results from their Controlled Assessment last term so they have set the bar high! Great work Thornton!
Cundall top non-selective independent school
Cundall’s GCSE results No 2 in North Yorkshire! Fantastic news – Cundall Manor School has been ranked 2nd among North Yorkshire Secondary Schools in the GCSE league tables for 2016! Cundall Manor also achieved 19th position among all Independent Schools in the UK. Over 97% of Cundall students achieved at least 5 A* to C GCSE grades, including English or Maths. Cundall’s EBACC results were the highest in the region, at 79%. Joint Head John Sample articulated his praise and thanks. “We are delighted that Cundall Manor has achieved 97% A* to C grade GCSEs and we are particularly pleased to be the highest ranking non-selective school in the region. May I say well done to our hard-working pupils and our committed and talented staff, and a big thank you to our supportive parent community. Congratulations to all on a fantastic achievement.” Sir Thomas Ingilby, Chair of Governors echoed this sentiment, “These are phenomenal results for a truly non-selective, small independent school. Congratulations go to all!”
Thirsty in Thirsk?
Does Thirsk need a Coffee Shop? That was the question posed to the Eldmire Business Studies group who visited Thirsk, on a very cold Wednesday afternoon. Their task was to assess the suitability of Thirsk for a proposed business venture. They were most grateful to Mrs Lake, of White Rose Books, who took time to speak to the students about her experiences running a successful Coffee Shop in Thirsk. They were rather surprised at the number of recent business ventures in Thirsk and they initially discounted the Public Houses as being a competitor to the proposed coffee shop. Joe Ducker commented that although Thirsk is a growing town, with parking and near to a good road network, he had counted 17 outlets that would be competitors and concluded that Thirsk was already well served. All the other students agreed. The task gave the students an insight into the initial research start-up business would need to undertake.
Drama entry – Beasts and Beauties
ISA Drama Entry begins to take shape 14 students from Leckby and Form 6 are well into rehearsals for their extract from ‘Beasts and Beauties: Eight Tales From Europe’ that they will be performing at the ISA Drama Festival on Sunday 13th March 2016 at The Hammond School, Chester. The students will be telling the stories of ‘Beauty And The Beast’, The Three Wishes’ and ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes’ in a physical and energetic interpretation. These talented students are hoping to emulate the glory of our previous entry, ‘Charlie And The Chocolate Factory’ that won prizes at last year’s festival.
Musical production is nearly “rapped” up
Cundall Manor “School of Rap” – Thursday March 3rd The pupils in Leckby have been hard at work since September writing, producing and performing their own musical theatre production, “School of Rap”, loosely based on the High School Musical story. Between them all, they have written the script and all the songs, produced the necessary backing tracks, and now they are hard at work rehearsing it for their performance on Thursday 3rd March. To write an entire musical is an amazing achievement. They have had the opportunity to develop their creativity and practise many of the skills required for both music and drama at GCSE. All are welcome to the performance.
GCSE Art students find inspiration in London
GCSE London Art Tour This year’s GCSE art trip was a very action-packed two days. On day one, the students discovered that The Natural History museum, Science Museum and V&A are treasure troves and the groups split to make the most of the time to sketch and take photographs for their sketchbooks. After a few hours of intense exploration and a spot of lunch, they explored the more contemporary works of the Saatchi museum. The current exhibition features a number of up and coming artists whose varied and experimental ways of working gave the students lots of ideas. The evening was spent singing along to Abba songs at the internationally acclaimed production of Mamma Mia at the Novello theatre. Day two started with a hearty breakfast followed by Mr Vale’s magical mystery tour of the City and its iconic buildings. The group climbed the 311 steps of Monument Tower to be met at the top by gale force winds! Next was the Tate Modern via Borough market and the Cutty Sark to see the Alexander Calder exhibition, a fantastic collection of the late Kinetic artist’s sculptures. The permanent collections gave the opportunity to see a wide variety of artists’ works. The river boat to Embankment gave students the opportunity to rest their legs and view the city from the water. After lunch, a busy afternoon was spent viewing the amazing collections at the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery in Trafalgar Square. Seeing so many famous works reaffirmed the point that there really is no substitute for seeing works of art “in the flesh”. The students returned with heads spinning full of ideas and hundreds of photos and sketches to process. The results of the students’ work will be exhibited for all to see at the annual Summer Art exhibition in June, we hope to see you there!
Children in Need
A huge thank you to everyone who remembered to bring in their donations and got dressed up for Children in Need on Friday. We saw some fabulous ‘Hero’ costumes around school, including sports personalities, policemen, firemen, armed forces members and plenty of comic book super heroes. Special mention must go to Form 3’s Oscar Fenby who emulated his cycling hero Chris Hoy by spending the day sweating it out in bubble wrap! Oscar’s inspired costume drew the attention of Sir Chris himself who retweeted the Fenby’s Tweet on the day! Thank you also to all the children in Reception who boosted the Children in Need coffers with their bun sale on Friday. The total raised by the whole school currently stands at a wonderful £456!