A leading independent prep school in Somerset, offering excellence in education for 2-13 year olds
Year 4 are learning about Roman Britain in history with Mr Finch, and recently learnt all about Roman roads. After studying the various stages of construction, the pupils were set the task of building their own, using Digestives for the base, Maltesers for small stones, Smarties and M&Ms for sand, pebbles and gravel, custard creams for the paving and cream to hold it all together. The class were split into two groups with Praefecti Bell and Bugler leading and organising their groups to complete the various tasks and stages of the road. It was a great lesson, with lots of learning and fun had by all. And the best bit? Lower Prep got to eat the roads for pudding!
Many thanks to Old Perrott Hillian Hugo H, who gave a fascinating talk to Years 7 and 8 recently about his career in horse racing. Hugo, who works as Assistant Trainer at fellow OPH Harry Fry’s yard in Higher Crockermoor, talked about how horses are trained and raced, what their care involves, and what happens in the build up to race days! It was brilliant; thanks, Hugo. If there are any other OPHs or former parents who’d like to come and talk to Years 7 and 8 about careers, or deliver a school lecture for Years 3-8 on any topic, please do get in touch!
As part of this week’s work to celebrate and support Children’s Mental Health Week, pupils in Years 3 and 4 have been discussing how they connect to each other and the wider world. They then wrote and illustrated individual strips, before linking them together to form a paper chain. Excellent work, Lower Prep. Elsewhere, children in Years 5-8 have produced some thoughtful artwork on the topic of connecting and our Pre-Prep children have taken part in some lovely and lively discussions about working together. More on that next week!
Eight finalists took part in the hotly contested Year 7 Public Speaking Competition recently, to a packed audience of pupils, parents and our guest adjudicator (and school governor), Richard Redwood from Canford. Each pupil had to present a two-minute speech on a charity of their choice, with the top three charities being selected as our designated school charities for the forthcoming year. Very well done to all the pupils who took part, but especially to runners up George K (in support of Shelter) and Oscar W-A (in support of Dogs of Portugal), and to overall winner Arthur V, whose speech about Great Ormond Street Hospital was praised for being poised, eloquent and extremely well presented. Very well done to you all and we look forward to supporting these three charities in due course.
Year 8 pupils took part in a fiery debate last week as they contested the motion ‘This House believes that fast food does more harm than good’. Very well done to the proposing and opposing teams for delivering impressive and well-researched speeches about the pros and cons of fast food, and to the chair and timekeeper for orchestrating the proceedings. Following further questions from the floor, the motion was eventually defeated by a slim margin of just seven votes! Excellent work, Year 8.
Book Clubbers in Years 3-5 enjoyed sharing their impressions of Roald Dahl’s classic tale ‘Danny, The Champion of The World’ with Mrs Byrne at our recent gathering. The children discussed the close relationship between Danny and his father, and talked about making good choices. After half term it’s Onjali Q. Rauf ’s enthralling novel ‘The Lion Above the Door’ coming under the spotlight when Years 3-5 reconvene in March.
Thank you to Dr Leaman and the strings pupils from Blundell’s who joined us for a wonderful workshop and concert last week. From the fabulous solo performances (Jemima’s performance of The Swan was sublime) to our joint renditions of Shostakovich’s ‘Romance’ and Bizet’s ‘Habanera’, led by our Head of Strings, Ms Greenwood, our audience of parents and pupils were entranced by their beautiful sound. Encore!
We are proud to be supporting Children’s Mental Health Week with Place2Be this week, and there is lots going on in school to reinforce this year’s theme of connecting. First up, we are fortunate to have four experienced and fully trained Mental Health Champions on our staff team and one of them, Mr Sheldon, kicked things off with a brilliant assembly on Monday about the importance of being seen, heard and valued. W
Well done to our U11 boys who won the plate competition at Friday’s IAPS hockey tournament. It was fantastic event (not to mention quite unusual, in that only one goal was scored in the pool stage!), and the team were commended for their resilience and effort. A special thanks to King’s Bruton for hosting the event and for sending through some great photographs.
Our youngest boarders in Year 3 had great fun at their Loft Night last night last week! The children played crash mat rounders and other games in the Sports Hall, before heading upstairs for Harry Potter and popcorn. Many thanks to our brilliant boarding team for yet another amazing Loft Night for the junior boarders.
