Extra Curricular

GARDENING CLUB

WORDS BY

Madame Eugenie Chaillou-Kindred

The Spring Term brought blooming news in the Prep School; our fi rst ever seedling swap event which acted as one of the fundraising events for the Harpur’s chosen charity “Men in Sheds Bedford”. Boys were given the Easter holidays to prepare seedlings of their choice and on the fi rst Thursday back, we conducted a swap event where the boys either brought a young plant to swap or £1 to purchase a plant. Madame Chaillou-Kindred prepared about 50 plants for the event and was not expecting it to be so successful! Boys brought a wide variety of plants from chillies, tomatoes to sunfl owers and even Acorn! Boys and staff took part and over £100 was raised on that day. A big thank you for everybody contributing to this fantastic event whose future looks promising.

2021 2022

GLOBAL CITIZENS BOARD GAMES CLUB

WORDS BY Mrs Alex Gordon

Is a very popular lunch break club for Y3-8 boys, particularly in the colder and wetter months! It is lovely to see all different age groups mixing and playing Chess, Monopoly, Operation, BrainBox and Top Trumps to name just a few!

BIRDWATCH CLUB

WORDS BY

Madame Eugenie Chaillou-Kindred

We conducted our annual birdwatch event in January which involved a range of keen bird watchers and nature lovers. We spent a couple of weeks prior to the date to broaden our knowledge of common garden birds and quizzed ourselves on names and how to identify a bird from its songs and appearance. On 27th January, we conducted our observations during lunchtime and ventured in the Quarry Gardens where many birds were spotted including wrens, blue tits and house sparrows. This event was followed by the national bird box week in February where we constructed bird boxes which we placed on the school premises.

Extra curricular

HUNGRY BOYS CLUB

WORDS BY Mrs Nicki Carrington

CLIMBING CLUB

WORDS BY Madame Eugenie Chaillou-Kindred

Every week on Wednesdays was synonym to climbing at the Prep School; ten to twelve boys from across the different year groups geared up during lunch time and developed climbing skills and confi dence on the different routes. Mr Roberts, Miss Kashi, Miss Hone, Mrs Russell and Mrs Chaillou-Kindred helped the boys achieve their climbing badges which consisted of achieving ten specifi c skills including fi tting a harness correctly and practising belaying. Several boys successfully reached this status and were awarded a climbing badge. Well done to all the boys who have attended this lunchtime club!

KNITTING CLUB

WORDS BY MissMolly Orme

In the Spring Term we invited the boys to come along and learn how to knit, with the end goal of being able to follow a knitting pattern. Thursday lunchtimes saw many boys enjoying learning a new skill and helping each other out. Each week the boys would come in and continue practicing both the knit stitch and the pearl stitch before advancing to rib, increasing and decreasing, casting off and more. By the end of the Summer term, boys had progressed to making different sections of cardigans which will be continued next year with the eventual objective of donating the fi nished cardigans to local maternity wards for their premature babies. O ur Hungry Boys’ Club has been busy cooking up a wide range of delicious dishes in the Dining Hall this year. Boys from Year 7 all the way down in Year 3 have taken up the challenge of joining the Prep School’s Cookery Club and having a go at creating some yummy treats.

After learning about safety and hygiene, testing their knowledge on spices, and having an exciting tour behind the scenes in the kitchens, the boys, suitably dressed for the part, set about creating some culinary masterpieces under the expert guidance of our chefs.

The boys’ fi rst dish was a chicken and club sandwich, which they followed up with a tasty tomato soup made from scratch. Their adventures in cooking continued as they created chicken stir fry and some boys even made their very fi rst pizza, mixing, kneading and spinning the dough as traditional Italian Chef’s would do.

The Hungry Boys’ Club is always hugely popular and provides the boys with some valuable and rewarding life skills, which some boys reported as even putting to good practice at home with some pleasing results and feedback.

The Hungry Boys hope to continue with our taste adventures next year, so please sign up when you see your year group’s sessions advertised in the bulletin.

Extra curricular

WORDS BY

Words by Mr Keith Roberts

CHAPEL CHOIR

As I arrived at Bedford School in September charged with getting the Chapel Choir back up and running after its 4-term COVID hiatus, as well as the excitement of a new challenge, there was a sense of the enormity of it. Boys’ voices change, and there were only 7 members of the choir still able to sing treble (4 only just), including just 2 from the Prep School (Stirling and Harry, of whom more later). Mrs Gedye and Mr Sanders had listened to all the rising year 5-7 boys sing and given me a list of names of boys whom I had never met who might be able and willing to join the choir. I wrote to their parents, inviting the boys to be probationers. Would anyone come? Would they have completely forgotten how to sing? Would we be able to work together? (they had never met me either) Would all of our existing trebles last long enough to allow any new boys to come through and not be completely bewildered? 18 boys came to our fi rst Monday session. They worked hard on singing, how to sing together, listening to themselves and each other, the basics of reading notes, how to sing psalms without sounding like daleks, forming a team spirit to take us forward, fi nding some choir in-jokes, understanding why a Magnifi cat isn’t about a magnifi cent cat*, learning how to be committed, learning that it’s OK to make a mistake. Now, looking back in July, I am proud to say that 16 of the 18 have made it to full choristership, plus Charlie who, being in year 8, started with the main choir. All 17 received their surplices (long white robes) at a moving ceremony in June, and here’s the proof.

Meanwhile the main choir trebles started with a recording of Jamie Lonsdale’s “White Doves of Peace” for Remembrance Sunday, in conjunction with an orchestra, a professional choir and some Chelsea Pensioners. This recording attracted the interest of the national news media as well as nearly 700,000 hits on YouTube. The Carol Services were a highlight as always, although quarantined bubbles made them a little less predictable than normal; somehow we managed to fi t in our choir Christmas outing, a trip bowling in Milton Keynes.

The Lent Term saw a steady stream of our squad of probationers getting experience of singing with the main choir, one service at a time and in groups. The main highlight of the start of the Summer Term, when our full squad fi nally came together, was the trip to Ely Cathedral to sing a joint evensong with the regular choir of men and boys. Here they are rehearsing with Ely’s Director of Music, Mr. Aldhouse.

As I write preparations are well underway for our performance in the Upper School Summer Concert, as well as four days at Salisbury Cathedral in August singing the services while the regular choir is on holiday. I have inherited a super bunch of boys, and the progress they have made has been extraordinary. Our veterans Stirling and Harry have been excellent leaders, willing helpers and showers of the way to our new boys. Thank you to them, and to all the new choristers for all their work and good spirit. The future looks very exciting!

GENERAL KNOWLEDGE CLUB

WORDS BY Mrs Kelly Faulkner

Tuesday lunchtimes are buzzing (literally) in the Prep School as a hoard of Y8 boys turned up every week to General Knowledge Club. We raced through different rounds such as Geography, Sport, Science and much more and it is always competitively contested. The future of pub quizzes in Bedfordshire looks bright!

3D PRINTING CLUB

School Life