July Newsletter

Box Hill School

July 2021

Latest News

Summer Term Highlights The Summer term is always a busy one as the academic year comes to an end. We have celebrated the end of exams for our Year 11 and Year 13 cohort and are looking forward to results days. They have all worked so hard through such a difficult couple of years and we wish them the very best of luck for the next chapter in their lives.

We’ve held a physical sports day and had our summer drama production, and seen the normal bustle of school life continue with Spanish lessons, careers workshops, sports fixtures and coaching and of course, the week that our pupils most look forward to… Expeditions Week where they take part in activities such as water sports, assault course, their Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, or even a week away to Wales.

Year 10 – Futures Workshop Back towards the end of May, Year 10 pupils attended a presentation by Mrs Carroll, Box Hill School’s Careers Adviser. The focus of the presentation was to emphasise the importance of GCSE grades and the impact these have on choices at the end of Year 11. The presentation explained how GCSE results are not only needed for progression at the end of Year 11 but will be taken into consideration by universities at the end of Year 13 and by employers in the future.

Developing lifelong learners who are committed to their own learning and are increasingly independent is our aim. As Mrs Carroll pointed out, it’s a competitive market and students listened to how they can put themselves ahead of the crowd by developing personal skills that are in high demand such as organisation, flexibility and problem solving. We look forward to continuing our careers programme as students move into Year 11.

Spanish Competition

Y13 Leavers

The Spanish department organised a piñata competition for a Round Square challenge. Students spent a couple of lessons learning about the piñata tradition and at the end they created their own piñata using cereal boxes. A piñata is a container, often made of papier-mâché, pottery, or cloth, that is decorated, filled with candy, and then broken as part of a celebration.

Piñatas are commonly associated with Mexico.

Students really enjoyed this time of creativity and socialisation. The best works have been entered into the international Round Square competition.

rounders match. IB tutor Miss Rose kindly umpired; as she ducked

The Year 13 leavers’ events commenced with a highly competitive on a few occasions when the ball whistled very close to her head, we will never know which team actually won. But, as with everything, it isn’t the winning but the taking part that counts and everyone who took part did so with great enthusiasm and lots of encouraging cheers for our staff participants, Mr Bainbridge, Ms van Staden and Ms Bryson.

The Year 13s had a leavers’ assembly in which prizes were awarded for academic achievement, as well as LAMDA and other extracurricular contributions. Several students went home with a teetering pile of certificates, trophies, and Amazon vouchers.

To finish off the day, Year 13 enjoyed a delicious barbecue in the sunshine and raised a glass of champagne to toast a very special year group whose presence in the school will be sorely missed. We wish them every success and happiness in the years to come and look forward to them returning to visit us in the future.

The Year 13 A Level and IB leavers then went to Thorpe Park on their last day of term, this gave the two cohorts a final opportunity to be together after an unusual two years in the Sixth Form. This group have always been close knit, even during lockdowns, so it was a pleasure to give them a final opportunity to socialise together.

I am sure that the Year 13 leavers will stay in touch, remembering that Box Hill will always be close to their hearts. This year group were a pleasure to teach, and support, and they will be missed. We wish them luck for their results in August and all best wishes for the future.

Chess Activity Chess has proven popular this year, with the room packed with players of all ability levels. New players

Year 11 Celebrations During their final week, Year 11 pupils enjoyed an array of activities together, as a celebration of their time at Box Hill School. The year group had a jam-packed week of celebrations; a walk up to the top of Box Hill (where the sun finally came out and they enjoyed drinks and muffins whilst relaxing with friends and looking at the beautiful view), some fun on the field with Bubble Football, Nerf Wars, and a rounders tournament and finally their long-awaited prom. All dressed up; they enjoyed a silent disco followed by formal presentations, prizes, and musical performances and then a very teary goodbye.

have discovered hidden talents, and even veterans have learned new things. Not even lockdown slowed down the pace of competition, with matches moving to online platforms and games shared over Zoom. Chess helps students develop their problem-solving skills, thinking, perspective, focus and tactics whilst also encouraging teamwork. It is rewarding to see the more advanced students helping to mentor the younger ones.

The highlight of the year has been Timur K demonstrating his expertise. Whether playing against the Year 11s blindfolded or challenging and beating five Year 10 players at the same time, he has shown what dedication to mastering the game can

Summer Half Term Musical Theatre Workshop On Wednesday 2nd June, during the Summer Half Term, some of our students enjoyed a Musical Theatre workshop. Katy Stredder took the morning session and in the afternoon George Hinson, who has performed in the West End, came in to run a workshop based on choreography from the musical ‘Hairspray’. The dancers did extremely well and put on a short performance for parents at the end of the day.

View the workshop dances by clicking the ‘play’ icon.

bring and has taught many in the club how to improve their game.

Festival of School and College Arts #EduArtsFest The Festival of School and College Arts took place on 28th May 2021.

The event’s aim was to fill social media with the voices of children and young people playing music, performing drama, sharing artwork, poetry, singing, or dancing - championing the vital role of the arts in schools and colleges around the country, and the fantastic work created by children and young people.

To view this video, please go to our social media channels.

EAL Trip On Wednesday 23rd June, the EAL department took a day trip to Bushy Park and Hampton Court Palace. At over 1,000 acres, Bushy Park is the second largest of London’s eight Royal Parks. It is situated close to Hampton Court Palace and is famous for its mix of waterways, gardens, and herds of red and fallow deer. It became a royal park in 1529 when it was given to King Henry VIII by his close adviser Cardinal Wolsey, along with Wolsey’s home – Hampton Court Palace.

They started the visit with a walk through the park where the group also had a picnic lunch and students enjoyed meeting and taking pictures of some deer. They then continued to the palace for an afternoon tour exploring the different parts of the palace, learning about the different stages of royal British history, as well as taking a stroll through the historic palace gardens.

IB Results On Tuesday 6th July, students at Box Hill School celebrated after the Class of 2021 achieved a fantastic 100 per cent pass rate in the IB, against a global pass rate of 89%.

The school’s mean IB result this year has also increased by an impressive 2 points to 34, exceeding this year’s world average which is currently 33. Two of our students achieved over 40 points and 100% of all our IB students immediately secured their first-choice courses at prestigious universities both in the UK and Internationally.

Despite the global pandemic and the challenges presented by remote learning these results are a testimony to the hard work, dedication, and resilience of this year’s IB cohort and all our staff, we are extremely proud of them all.

We wish all these students the best of luck in their future studies and thank them for being fantastic Box Hill School ambassadors.

Solar Eclipse On 10th June at 10.08am, a partial eclipse of the Sun was seen from the UK! Our lucky Lower school students who had a Science class during the eclipse, made their own Eclipse observer from a shoe box and enjoyed the astronomical event outside Dalewood.

Royal Mail ‘Heroes’ Stamp Design Year 7 and 8 students have taken part in the Royal Mail ‘Heroes’ stamp design competition.

Students were asked to make a stamp design to honour the heroes of the pandemic chosen from a range of people like Captain Sir Tom Moore, NHS Staff, scientists and even David Attenborough. The prize will be for a student to have their design made into a postage

Alice in Wonderland Production Due to COVID restrictions at the end of the summer term, we couldn’t invite parents to our outdoor summer drama production of Alice in Wonderland. However, as the saying goes… ‘The show must go on!’ and that we did!

Taking place ‘in a round’ we planned for parents to watch from all areas of the stage with their own picnic blanket and snacks. We have tried to replicate this in our filmed version and hope you enjoy the production which includes acting, dancing, and musical theatre.

stamp and the Queen will also be looking at the final stamp designs.

We were very impressed with the effort students made and we hope that one of our designs will be chosen.

Girls’ Cricket – Surrey CCC Workshop Amy Gordon from Surrey CCC visited school to deliver a cricket coaching session for our Year 7, Year 8, Year 9, and Year 10 girls. This was a great opportunity for the girls to learn from a high-level performer and coach and to improve their batting, bowling, and fielding skills.

Sports Day We had perfect weather for our Sports Day on June 15th.

Competition was fierce between the Thirds with pupils enjoying track and field events such as 100m, Relay, Shot Put, Javelin, Long Jump, High Jump and of course Tug of War! Unfortunately, parents could not be invited this year, however the whole school got together in year group bubbles to celebrate the day, cheer each other on and congratulate all the winners of the events.

Boys U15 Cricket vs Kingswood House We have had many sports fixtures this term and it is nice to see pupils back in action with their fixtures. One fixture was the Boys U15s at the beginning of June. Box Hill School hosted Kingswood House School, winning the game by 6 wickets. Well done to both teams.

Expeditions Week – Year 7 It was a lovely way to finish their first year at Box Hill School. Year 7 pupils went to the Brecon Beacons in South Wales for a week.

There they camped, went pony trekking and rock climbing, played volleyball at the campsite and challenged themselves with gorge walking and caving.

Expeditions Week – Year 8 Year 8 pupils had a fun filled week of water sports at Queen Mary’s reservoir learning to paddle board, sail, and wind surf. All the pupils got to try each activity and then the final day was filled with fun activities and competitions including the ‘Box Hill Wobble Board’ competition.

Expeditions Week – Year 9 Year 9s set off to begin their Bronze Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Expedition. Having worked hard honing all the skills necessary to complete the 2-day backpacking expedition, they put it into practice over two days. They have learnt about tent pitching, first aid and emergency procedures, navigation, and route planning and how to pack a large rucksack!

Expeditions Week – Year 10 Some of the Year 10s taking part in the Silver Duke of Edinburgh’s Award completed their 3-day expedition. Year 10 also took part in local activities such as rounders and dodgeball competitions, Box Hill Walk, Inter-Third Mega Quiz, Self Defence Challenge and Mountain Biking.

Expeditions Week – Year 12 Kickstarting their Monday, Year 12s enjoyed a muddy, wet but very fun assault course. As well as needing fitness and agility to work their way around the course, they all finished together by working as a team to get through the obstacles!

Later in the week they completed the Futures Week workshop and some also completed their Gold Duke of Edinburgh’s Award.

Y10 Interleaving Year 10 students trying out another effective independent learning strategy in form time, INTERLEAVING - studying multiple subjects to improve learning which is effective for long term retention of knowledge and understanding.

ISC Library Project Year 10 ISC students made a short presentation about using the school library. They discussed with Miss Rose and Miss McCarthy how they used the library and what they thought their fellow students would need to know. The presentation shows the different areas of the library and the types of books we have and how to check a book out. The students enjoyed deciding what shots were needed and what they needed to say to get their information across.

Y8 History Year 8 have been learning about the women’s campaign for the right to vote in their History lessons. They studied the Suffragette movement in Britain in the early 20th Century and the tactics they used when they were denied the vote. Students created their own posters to take on a peaceful protest march. Students used the colours on their posters that suffragettes had used to identify themselves to each other – green (give), white (women), and violet (votes).

They planned the route for the march and which slogan to shout to get people’s attention and support. Raising their posters and shouting, “What do we want? Votes for Women! When do we want it? Now!” They got quite a lot of attention.

GET IN TOUCH Please contact us via admissions@boxhillschool.com WHO TO CONTACT Claire Jordan, Registrar Emma Bushnell, Marketing Manager

Old London Road, Mickleham, Dorking, Surrey RH5 6EA Tel: 01372 373382 www.boxhillschool.com  boxhillschool  @boxhillschool

By re-enacting an historical event such as this, it promotes a greater understanding and the experience of, albeit very briefly, what it was like to be part of a campaign, a march and to protest for women’s rights.