Our fundraising for this year’s Good Shepherd Appeal on behalf of the Catholic Chidlren’s Society reached its climax on the last Friday of term. At lunchtime, the prep school joined the senior school for a simple, frugal lunch of bread, cheese and fruit. Later on in the day, the Welsford Hall was transformed as the Upper Prep set out the stalls for their businesses, which had been in preparation throughout Lent. Staff, parents and younger pupils were hugely impressed by the variety of business ideas that the children had come up with, with sweetie kebabs, cakes baked to order and chocolate fountains attracting particular interest.

52 pupils from Year 5 and Year 6 took part in this year’s Primary Maths Challenge back in late November. Nearly 70% of our entrants won bronze, silver or gold certificates in this national competition of mathematical knowledge and problem solving. The questions are a bit more challenging, and a bit more fun, than a normal maths test, for example: “Erica bought a pencil, a rubber and a ruler for £1. Fritz bought three pens for 75p. Geraldine bought two rubbers and a pen for 45p. Horace bought a pencil, a ruler and a pen.

On 22nd May Joel, Jim, Joe and Alex went to Wellington College for a maths challenge with Mr Berry. As soon as we got there we admired the grandeur of the school. We were split up into two teams, Joel and Jim , and Joe and Alex. We were told to go round 10 tables in turn where we were set five challenges in a time limit. There were various kinds of challenges including mazes, dominoes and shopping lists. I thought the mazes were best. Once we had all finished we were told to choose five lucky numbers. From first to last they asked each team what number they chose from 1-100 and saw if they got one of the lucky numbers. Unfortunately none of us got any of the lucky numbers. We now know that Joel and Jim were 9th out of 60, but Joe and Alex didn't do quite so well. All in all I think it was a great day out.

On Thursday, 3rd May, IInd form Alton Convent girls visited the largest maze in Europe and the longest hedge maze - Longleat Hedge Maze. Made up of more than 16,000 English Yews, Longleat's spectacular hedge maze made everyone very confused and very lost. The Hedge Maze covers an area of around 1.48 acres (0.6 hectares) with a total pathway length of 1.69 miles (2.72 kilometres). Basically it's huge!

There are a few bridges that can help but can also make it more confusing (!) and in the middle there is a huge tower from which you can see the whole maze and try to work out how to get out! As everyone tried to escape some people who were clever enough to get out tried to help everyone else stuck in it. It was incredibly long and even the teachers couldn't figure it out!

I knew we had neared Intech when I saw the impressive dome shaped building in the distance. On Tuesday 6th February, Year 7 visited Intech Sciece Centre. When we arrived, we split into two groups. One group did the maths puzzles and the other a Pythagoras trail first. Our groups did the Pythagoras trail. We had a sheet with questions on and we had to wander around the centre to try and find the answers to them.

On Friday 9th February, Year 6 had an extremely fun maths lesson. We worked with multi-coloured soft play balls. Using our names and binary numbers (1s and 0s) we created a long string of balls. First we chose two colours and counted up all the 1s and os that made our name, for example E=00100, R=10001, I=01000, N=01101. Then using twisted bits of metal we threaded string though the balls. The end result was amazing, and each one was unique, just like us.

As well as creating some wonderful mathematical patterns with lines and shapes thanks to Mrs Wilson's inspiration, Year 5 also learnt to fold paper very carefully in Mrs Bank's origami lesson, when they made tiny replicas of Samurai warrior hats and weapons.

All of Year 5 and 6 took part in this year’s Primary Maths Challenge, organized by the Mathematical Association. This is more a test of problem solving and lateral thinking than mathematical knowledge, and our pupils certainly seemed to rise to the challenge of the puzzles, such as:

“A family of three people each wears a pair of clean socks every day. The washing for several days is put on the washing line. No socks are missing. Which of these numbers could be the number of socks on the line? 3, 15, 30, 40, 45”

How many times have been we called upon to use our knowledge and understanding of maths to solve everyday problems? Year 6 pupils began to realise just how important maths is when they were asked to think about how the subject links to the everyday world.They researched this idea over half-term and worked collaboratively on providing evidence for presentation in poster form. These will be displayed on the Y6 noticeboard –do come and have alook. The children noticed that percentage reduction appeared in many advertisements. I’m sure they will very well aware of how to save money by buying wisely over the Christmas period!

As an independent school, Alton Convent Prep does not participate in the 'SATs'. Instead children are prepared for a range of entrance exams to our own senior school and to a variety of boys' senior schools in the January of Year 6. A broad curriculum can then be pursued over the remaining two terms of Year 6, including opportunities such as a creative arts week, English Speaking Board exams and a residential visit to France. Children take nationally standardized 11+ papers in May, without additional preparation, to facilitate progress tracking and benchmarking.

2006