Easter Concert
On the evening of 26th March (the last Thursday of term) we held our Easter Concert in the gym. It was a wonderful evening, with so much talent on display. The Chamber Choir opened the concert with an extremely competent and sensitive performance of ‘Scarborough Fair’. The two parts were beautifully held and the tone was pure and strong. They then sang one of their favourite songs ‘My Heart Will Go On’ from The Titanic. Again, this was sung with great feeling and sensitivity. Brass Group then gave a sound performance of ‘Au Clair De La Lune’, followed by a very lively ‘Gospel Rock’ with each member demonstrating their improvisational skills! It was great fun and it was good to hear how our brass players are progressing so well. The Junior Choir were tremendous. They sang Cesar Franck’s ‘Panis Angelicus’ which is demanding for children of such a young age. They then had a lot of fun with their rendition of the traditional song ‘The Mermaid’. Our soloists for the evening provided us with a great variety and range of music, from the Chinese guzheng, which Gabriella plays so magically, through to piano, cornet, clarinet, guitar and singing. We had a few guitar/vocal ensembles and the Boys’ Choir brought the evening to a rousing finish! It was an evening which showcased some of our greatest musical talent and there certainly was plenty on display, from Form 1 all the way through to Thornton. It is so exciting to witness our children’s musical progress and the great maturity with which some of them perform, especially some of our singers – Alannah Creed, Sarah Sullivan, Hollie Potter and, of course, Francesca Banks. A special mention must also go to Olivia Turner who was extremely brave and gave a very accomplished performance, accompanying herself on guitar in ‘Someone Like You’ (Adele). A further highlight of the evening was Charlotte Hoggan’s rendition of FourFiveSeconds and also Sophie Helferrich singing Black Velvet. These two girls have performed in many concerts throughout their school life at Cundall and their confidence and competence was a pleasure to witness. Many congratulations to all who took part and for making this such a memorable evening.
Trebuchet Challenge
With so many budding engineers (and equally enthusiastic and practically minded dads) in our midst, the Easter trebuchet Challenge promised to be quite a spectacle. As trucks and trailers started to convene in the main school car park on the last day of term, it became quite apparent that the assembled crowds of spectators from Pre-Prep up to Thornton, would not be disappointed. (Virtually) all homemade and (virtually) all adhering to the underlying counterweight dynamic, the apparatus ranged in size from tiny (fitting into the palm of a Pre-Prep hand) to enormous (based on a full size pallet), and in material from Lego to bamboo! As the competition unfolded, it became apparent that size does not necessarily matter as some of the largest contraptions failed to reach the distances recorded by some of the more diminutive devices, the unpredictability adding to the excitement and suspense of the spectacle. Although not technically a trebuchet, full credit must be given to the enormous entry designed and built by our most senior physicists, Thornton pupils Antony, Ben and Grayson. Such was the force with which their catapult expelled its cargo that the humble egg disintegrated in flight! (Further attempts with an orange, whilst not permitted within the rules of the challenge, did demonstrate the catapult’s impressive trajectory.) Thank you to everyone whose sterling efforts made for such an entertaining morning and congratulations to our winners – the Throup siblings and Wilkinson brothers.
Egg and Spoon Race
There was much scrambling of eggs around the grounds of school as pupils from Pre-Prep all the way through to Thornton took part in a succession of egg and spoon races. Staggered by age groups, the races saw pupils hurtling around the main school buildings and the lawns whist simultaneously trying to keep their crème eggs from falling out of their spoons (for which various methods, of varying degrees of legitimacy, were employed). Most eggs and runners made it to the finishing line, some rather worse for wear by that point than others!
Red Nose Day
Pre-Prep got into the Comic Relief spirit by coming to school wearing their red noses. The children paid £1 to make a funny face on a paper plate. There were some hilarious designs which are now being displayed in the brick building. They also danced along with Dermot and listened to the Comic Relief Song. The children found out that if they raised £60 this would pay for an orphaned child in Africa to go to school for a year and the government would then double this amount, enabling a second child to attend school too. Pre-Prep, Main School and Upper School raised a combined total of over £260. What a fantastic fund raising effort everyone!
World Book Day
On World Book Day itself the Pre-Prep pupils and staff arrived at school in some fabulous costumes from dragons to dinosaurs and princesses to pirates. Nursery described their characters to each other and Reception brought in their favourite story and read it to the class. PP1 explored the story of the Three Bears and made delicious porridge. PP2 read four books which included Tabby McTat and wrote adverts for homeless animals. PP2 also wrote their own stories this week using George’s Marvellous Medicine as inspiration. They read their versions entitled George’s Marvellous Machine to the rest of Pre-Prep in assembly. Well done to PP2 for some amazing writing. It was lovely to see so many novel and inspirational costumes throughout the whole of Main and Upper School too. The whole of Pre-Prep also had a ‘draw a book cover’ competition in which the children had to design a new cover for their favourite book and write an explanation of why they particularly liked their chosen book. Congratulations to everyone for their fabulous drawings and explanations, but particularly to our winners: Saskia Simpson-Daniel (Reception), Emilia Sample (PP1) and Gus Living (PP2):
House Times Tables Competition 2015
Just before half term, the whole school fell silent for 5 minutes for the annual House Times Tables Competition. Prizes are given for the top scores in each Year, with the maximum score being 99. There were some very commendable scores across all age groups also worth mentioning: FORM WINNER HIGHLY COMMENDED Form 1 Matthew Alton 36 Stuart Broadwith 34 Jude Collier 34 Arran Armstrong 33 Fergus Mainey 30 Form 2 Isla Wadsworth 96 India Duree 94 Josie Sample 94 Alfie Weber 94 Caspar Dallas 92 Form 3 Patrick Cunningham 97 Sam Dallas 82 Flossie Attwood 77 Beth McEvoy 77 Form 4 Matthew Mairs 91 William Cunliffe-Lister 87 Harry Nettleton 87 Emily Bulmer 86 Murron O’Neill 86 Form 5 Basil Nettleton 97 Jacob Zoing 91 Ollie Booth 90 Olivia Turner 90 James Earley 89 Rebecca Bolt 88 Form 6 Ethan Watkins 99 Sean Skahan 88 Ben Earley 87 Niamh Watkins 87 Kit Jay 87 Thomas Hall 86 Leckby Max England 99 Elise Darcy 98 Iranzu Ros-Ramirez 96 Louis Zoing 93 Eldmire Becky Thompson 99 Annabel Hill 98 Lucy Wang 97 Uxua Ros-Ramirez 97 Jenny Davidson 94 Thornton Tim Wang 99 Gabriella Lei 99 Freddie Wiles 99 Ross Sullivan 99 Helena Youmans 96 Lauren Egan 95 Laura Aspinall 94 Quentin England 93 Taking the average score across each house, the House results were incredibly close (the closest in the history of the competition) with just one mark between all four houses: 1st Normans 61.7 2nd Tudors 61.2 3rd Stuarts 61.1 4th Saxons 60.8 Well done to everyone who participated. Same time next year!
GCSE Biology under the microscope
Eldmire have recently been studying cell division in Biology and during the practical sessions they have been trying to look for dividing cells under the microscope. Mr Sigsworth has been very patiently growing garlic roots for the pupils to make root tip squashes from. It is quite a tricky process to get the cells to stain correctly but sometimes if you are very lucky you can catch some cells at various stages of mitosis when the chromosomes in the cell nucleus thicken and are then pulled to opposite ends of the cell ready for the cell to split in half. The students patience and perseverance paid off as they managed to capture (with an iphone down the eyepiece!) images of the process.
Our Open Day Scientists
Pupils from throughout the school were keen to demonstrate their scientific skills and knowledge during Saturday’s Open Morning through a series of experiments: Gabriella was extracting DNA from peas, strawberries and kiwi fruit; Lucy was testing indigestion remedies to see which was the most effective at neutralising acid; Freddie and Isobel were dissecting the heart and lungs of a sheep and Charlie had a great time observing many features of creatures under a microscope, his favourite being the fruit fly. Our younger visitors on the day were very keen to get some gloves on and get stuck into the dissection, whilst parents looked on and were fascinated by Mrs Roberts’ explanation of the anatomy. Thank you to the budding young scientists who helped demonstrate the Science labs on the day.
Silly Hat Day
Perhaps it was something to do with the weather but there was certainly an abundance of wild and wacky head gear on display last Friday as pupils and staff from throughout the school entered into the spirit of the Woolly Hat/Silly Wig Day to raise money for St Mungo’s. Some won compliments, some raised a chuckle, some – not least Mr Sample’s offering – definitely prompted a double take!
GCSE Art and Textiles trip to London
This year’s London trip was as action packed as ever! In search of inspiration for the GCSE set task Thornton’s Art and Textiles students descended on London for a whirlwind tour of the museums, galleries and sights of London. On Friday they studied natural forms and artifacts at the Natural History and V+A museums before seeing the eye-opening ‘East meets West’ exhibition at the Saatchi Gallery, which was characteristically controversial and challenging. The Cirque du Soleil at the Royal Albert Hall that evening proved to be brilliant inspiration for those who had chosen the Figures in Motion topic as performers dazzled us with incredible feats of contortion and daring. On Saturday the group’s first stop was the Tate Modern and the ‘Time, Conflict, Photography’ exhibition as well as ‘Sigmar Polke’ and the permanent exhibitions, which are always inspirational. After a boat trip and the opportunity to see many of the capital’s landmarks from the Thames the group went to the National Gallery, home to some of the most iconic works, and the National Portrait Gallery which is currently showing Grayson Perry’s ‘Who are you’ works amongst its permanent collections. Art student Pippa Cook gave her impression of the trip: “We thoroughly enjoyed the Saatchi Gallery it was culturally enriching and the modern art changed my perception of art for the better, and opened my eyes to the many forms of art. We had the pleasure of watching Cirque du Soleil, it was one of the best performances many of us had ever watched and firmly glued us to the edge of our seats. Some of the acts were gravity defying and made our hearts stop! All round the trip was most enjoyable for all of us; we managed to get a huge amount of inspiration and ideas from the trip, although our feet were quite sore by the end.” Rounded off with a little downtime in Covent Garden, the trip was a great springboard for the set task so watch out for the exhibition of the students’ work coming up in June!