The children in the preparatory school enjoyed a music workshop on Wednesday morning with our new brass teacher who joins the school in September to work with Mr Andrews to expand the brass provision.

Mrs Stephenson is an experienced performer and teacher and she demonstrated the full range of brass instruments to the children. Some of the children were able to have a try on the instruments and one or two actually produced a sound! The workshop concluded with Mrs Stephenson performing some beautiful pieces from "The Titanic" to the "Jurassic Park". Should you be interested in your child learning a brass instrument please contact the school office.

A residential school trip offers many opportunities for learning outside of the classroom. On the  Isle of Wight trip, Year 5 experiences encompassed  Art, History, Geography and Independent living skills amongst other things.

They experienced life as servants at Osborne House under the supervision of 'Mrs Pilkington' then had the opportunity to become lords and ladies at Carisbrooke Castle, (while also learning about the different arrow heads and what they were used for!). 

Year 6 enjoyed a cultural day out visiting the City Art Gallery in Southampton in the morning followed by an afternoon of music making at a school in Milford on Sea.

The children were given a conducted tour of the gallery where they viewed the Perseus series by Burne-Jones, early renaissance and romantic paintings and finally some 21^st century sculpture. In the afternoon they played the gamelan known as "The Trusty Servant." This is one large musical instrument played by many people and which has been part of Indonesian life for many hundreds of year's. Andy Channing introduced the instruments to the children and led them through several different pieces of music. Everybody took turns to play big gongs known as Suwaken, small gongs called Bonang using bronze keys such as Saron and Slentherm.

My initial analysis of the NFER assessment results from the week before half term suggests some very good progress throughout the prep school, as well as some excellent individual achievements; I’m also pleased to note the sensible, business-like way in which pupils took these tests in their stride.

My visit to Paris in the company of Year 6 and their teachers was a very enjoyable one: it was a great privilege to see the city afresh through the children’s eyes. I’ve included a selection from the children’s diaries below.

Children in Early Years have been very busy over the last few weeks. Some beautiful art work has been produced for the recent Festival of Arts and a special well done to Reception for this. All classes have been busy planting various vegetables and flowers and we are hoping for a bumper crop this year! Nursery & Pre Prep have planted tomato plants to grow on. We also have some larger plants already producing fruit much to the delight of the children and there is no shortage of little people willing to eat the very sweet little tomatoes!

History came alive for the children in Year 4 when they visited Hampton Court Palace. The building looked beautiful in the spring sunlight, but thinks took on a more serious air as we were guided through the cellars and corridors by a palace servant. We were told tales about the King, his queens and the many secrets of the palace.

As well as visiting the royal apartments, Great Hall and Chapel Royal, we had a tour of the palace kitchens. Here we learnt how to roast meat over a huge fire and saw an amazing demonstration of how the Tudors would create fire.

 Twenty nine excited Year 6 pupils all piled into the coach having had to get out of bed incredibly early! Though we had a long journey ahead of us we knew we had an exciting week to look forward to with lots of interesting places to visit.

Some of these were Notre Dame Cathedral, Sacre Cour Basilica, the Pompidou Centre and a Seine river boat trip. We also went to the Musee du L'Orangerie, Fountainbleau, a market and a French art workshop in Barbizon. However the best part was going up the Eiffel Tower, or 'Tour Eiffel' in French! When we we got up the tower I felt as though I was flying. I was stunned by the views as you could see for miles around.

This year’s Inter-House rounders competition could not have had a better afternoon. All of year 5 and 6 participated in representing their school house. Sporting my “naff” team names from the Pumpkins to the Artichokes, all 6 teams played against each other on the 3 pitches officiated by Miss Orbell, Mrs Bloem and me. In the early rounds, the Artichokes looked the strongest with India and Josh creating good strikes and Tom playing his part. They nearly came unstuck against a determined Penguins, who began to show good team work. The Pumpkins had the best bowler in the competition in Jo. The Anteaters showed their steely resolve by winning the final match against the too confident Penguins 4½ to 4 to stop the furry or feathery critters winning the championship, After Cherries humiliating defeat at the hands of the Cucumbers they bounced back with a run of victories especially gaining the scalp of the Artichokes, Harry C timing the ball with perfection in scoring 2 half rounders. However at the end of the competition the Artichokes secured 13 points, only with that defeat, whilst three other teams having 11 points.