Heatherton Michaelmas Term 2022

Headteacher’s Reflection

This Michaelmas Term, we have been on a learning journey together through the changing seasons of weather and time. It has been a pleasure and privilege to witness the magnificent progress made by all our pupils academically and in their continued personal development through hard work and determination to give their best.

It has been a term packed with lessons, activities, events, visits and trips, and I am reflecting on how much has been achieved in a relatively short space of time. The Year 6 girls worked very hard on various transfer routes into their secondary school of choice, and I congratulate them on their successes. We are very proud of them all for their individual talents, passions and attitudes. In addition to classroom learning, the boys and girls have aimed high with integrity as they marked the passing of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, interacted with visiting authors, collaborated with others in teambuilding tasks, performed special assemblies and musical recitals, bought a tortoise and collaborated with The Beacon to make ceramic poppies, to name but a few. The girls have leapt at any opportunity to be creative, take an active part in events, and be resilient enough to learn from their mistakes. Heatherton has a cando attitude that is second to none and is truly full of remarkable people.

In the run-up to Christmas, the boys and girls have challenged themselves in spectacular performances of ‘The Nativity’ and ‘Woolly’. They worked hard to learn their lines, act in character and sing joyfully – it was so heartwarmingly gorgeous!

The Prep girls performed beautifully in the recent Christmas Carol Service in the Chapel, and it set the scene perfectly for the festive celebrations to begin. All have enjoyed lighting candles in the Christingle Service, sharing a delicious Christmas

lunch together, decorating their classrooms, wearing Christmas jumpers, playing in the snow and Form Class parties.

Huge thanks to our fantastic ‘Friends of Heatherton’ who have provided us with highlights of the season such as the PJ & Movie night and the incredible Christmas Fayre. For the brilliant tea towels, amazing hampers, beautiful decorations, delicious food, the visit from Father Christmas and his gifts. I was staggered and touched by the time and efforts given so generously by parents in organising, setting up, running stalls and taking part - you made this such a special time for us all, and it is greatly appreciated. Not forgetting our School value in serving others through carol singing and making Christmas cards for the elderly, bringing in food for the Harvest festival, buying poppies on Remembrance Day and raising money for charities throughout the term.

I am sure that we will continue to have a similarly successful time in the Lent Term as we embrace the themes to encourage our pupils to follow their hearts and believe they can achieve anything they are prepared to work hard towards.

I am very grateful for all the parental and staff support and loyalty to the School community, and I hope that you will all enjoy a lovely break from work and make the most of the time we have with family and friends.

I wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy new year!

Nicola Nicoll Headteacher

It’s Christmas!

In our final week of term, the Pre-Prep sang and performed their hearts out in their Nativity shows.

In front of a large crowd of parents, Nursery and Reception performed “The Nativity” while Year 1 and Year 2 performed “Woolly. Both performances were full of fun and joy, and the pupils enjoyed giving a festive encore. Thank you to everyone who came along to watch.

Christmas Carol Service

Our Prep girls had a wonderful evening at the Berkhamsted School Chapel for their Christmas Carol Service.

The service was filled with beautiful songs and readings performed by our girls in front of an appreciative audience full of Heatherton families.

A big thank you to Mrs Facer and the Prep school teachers for preparing the girls so well, and to all the families who braved the snow to come and watch our girls.

Christmas Fayre

We would like to say a huge public ‘Thank you’ to the Friends of Heatherton Team, in particular; Louise Paul Florence (the Chair), Sarah Absalom, Sarah du Casse, Claire Marsh and the entire team for preparing, organising and running the incredible Christmas Fayre. So much hard work goes on behind the scenes to organise, set up and run the event that is thoroughly enjoyed by all that attend.

Thank you to all the parents who took the time to run a stall and for all the contributions. It perfectly epitomises Heatherton School at its best when the community unites to enjoy time together at a special time of the year.

Interested in becoming part of The Friends of Heatherton? Find out more here heatherton.com

Aim high

Outstanding Performance

Heatherton girls have been aiming high in all areas over the course of this term, especially in science, maths and music.

Year 5 have achieved their Bunsen Burner Licences. In order to earn their licences, Year 5 had an engaging lesson learning how to safely set up the Bunsen Burner, light and control a flame, and then sensibly disassemble the equipment - several times! They are now eager and ready to engage in all the exciting experiments ahead!

Meanwhile, four Heatherton girls and four pupils from Berkhamsted Prep travelled together to Davenies for the annual Year 4 Maths Challenge. Twenty-one schools in total were represented and the children were split into pairs to compete. At the challenge, they were tested by a range of questions in a quiz-like format and all performed well by displaying their mathematical skills, enthusiasm and their ability to work together. They all enjoyed their first experience of competitive maths!

In matters of music, Heatherton girls have been working in collaboration with The Beacon Orchestra, with the girls and boys rehearsing together each Monday. This gives the children an opportunity to work together with people they haven’t played with before. The orchestra has come a long way since they started working together and sounded fantastic during their showcase, which took place on Tuesday 22 November. It is very exciting to be working in collaboration with The Beacon, and we look forward to future collaborations.

In addition, our Year 6 girls have enjoyed starting to learn Latin. This forms part of their new curriculum and will provide them with the building blocks to learn any Latin based language in the future, as well as helping them to understand the routes of English as a language.

Cross-country

Our girls take part in the Chiltern District Cross Country league, which takes place in various locations over the year.

The first race took place at Gayhurst School, where Holly (Y3) and Gabi (Y5) both placed in the top 10 runners in their age group.

The last race took place at Hervines Park, where our Y3 and Y5 girls both received bronze in the team medals, as well as Holly (Y3) placing top 10 in her race.

Well done to our girls for always giving their all and aiming high in everything they do.

Gymnastics in France

One of our Prep school pupils, Roma, competed in the annual Gymnastique Magique Competition in Disneyland Paris in October. She was part of a team of 28 gymnasts from EJB Gymnastics Club.

The gymnasts, aged between 7 and 15, had trained together to create two group routines; one to a medley of songs from Mamma Mia, and the other which told the story of Cinderella. Roma also competed a solo routine to Under The Sea from The Little Mermaid.

The international competition was a spectacular event with over 300 gymnasts enjoying performing gymnastics routines with Disney music, themes and costumes. During the final day all the gymnasts had fun on the rides in the Disney park and participated in the PreParade - a set choreographed routine which went right through the centre of Disneyland!

Karate Belts

The girls’ sporting achievements this term have extended through from cross-country and gymnastics to karate!

Karate is a popular sport with our girls at Heatherton with many working towards

achieving their next belt gradings in clubs outside of school.

Our girls have aimed high and achieved various belts including white, purple, orange, yellow and blue.

Be Adventurous

Outstanding Challenge

From the football pitch to the music hall, this term has seen our girls being adventurous wherever they are.

Our Year 5 and 6 girls had a great first ever football match this term. Our girls played St Mary’s School and it was a close match, with an overall score of 2-2. Huge congratulations girls, and well played!

Meanwhile, Josephine W and Sitara S took part in the Prep School Young Musician of the Year competition. The standard of playing was remarkable and created an unforgettable concert showcasing the talent of our emerging musical stars. It was a proud moment for Heatherton as our girls picked up both Adjudicators Awards that were given alongside the Cup. Well done to all those who took part. This event is now going to be an annual one for us and we look forward to even more of our girls participating next year.

Elsewhere in music, nearly 80% of children at Heatherton from Year 2 to Year 6 learn one or two instruments here at school with our team of expert practitioners. Each week during our FAB Friday assemblies, our girls get the chance to perform, giving them the opportunity to build their self-confidence and shine.

To round things off, our Year 4 girls have been working in collaboration with The Beacon on an art project for Remembrance Day. The boys and girls created their own individual poppies out of clay under the guidance of Head of Art at The Beacon and the Heatherton Art Dept. team. The finished installation honours those who have lost their lives in conflicts around the world.

Serve Others

Outstanding Giving

We celebrated the end of half term with a Harvest Festival assembly led by Berkhamsted Schools Groups Chaplain, Reverend Jane Markby. Thank you to everyone who supported the Harvest Festival by making such generous donations to the Chiltern Foodbank.

We would also like to say thank you to everyone for your donations to the Chiltern Toy Bank, and to the Friends of Heatherton for assisting us with organising collection of these.

Our Year 6 girls have written and recorded their own song to be broadcasted on Radio Christmas. Radio Christmas is the world’s number one festive charity radio station and raises money for the charity Street Kids Direct. The girls’ song will be broadcasted at 1pm on Monday 19th December UK time. You can listen here.

We are proud to have been supporting Street Kids Direct for many years and have had regular visits in our assemblies from Duncan, Charity Trustee & Director, since 1996.

Meanwhile, our Year 4, 5 and 6 girls all made Christmas cards for the elderly which was organised by the company Rotate. We have been working with Rotate for a couple of years now and always enjoy being a part of their ongoing community efforts.

This year’s Christingle services – one for the Nursery and Pre-Prep, and one for the Prep – saw the girls sing hymns and then listen to a lovely talk by our assistant chaplain, Miss Hopkins. It concluded with all the Christingles being lit by the teachers, before the girls had a few moments to look into the light created by their candles and think about something they were grateful for.

The services gave the girls a chance to reflect on what they are thankful for, as well as using the symbolism of their Christingles to see how, like the light of their candles, hope can still shine in dark times.

Nursery

This term we had a busy Harvest themed Stay and Play morning. Our Nursery children had great fun interacting with current and prospective children in our specialist Early Years environment. The children got to take part in engaging activities in our outside area, ranging from painting and obstacle courses to role play in our outdoor kitchen.

During our Stay and Play morning, the children also get to take part in specialist sessions, which include singing with Mrs Facer and Modern Foreign Languages with Miss Cook.

Our Nursery girls have also been enjoying the specialist sessions as part of their curriculum. This includes their weekly ballet sessions. Every week, we explore basic movements and exercises through imagery and storytelling. Ballet is a wonderful way for young ones to experience movement to music, learn to listen to instructions, develop mobility, co-ordination and strength, work together with their peers and to be creative. But most importantly, all children take a lot of pride when mastering a movement and much joy from dancing together with their friends.

Our Nursery children have also been utilising the dedicated Food Technology room and getting into the Christmas spirit making festive jam tarts. This allows the children to become more independent and begin learning how to prepare their own food.

Trips and Visits

> Year 5 Greek Temples virtual Workshop > Author Visit – Anna James

> House Captains and Vice House Captains visit to Windsor Castle

> Pre-Prep ‘Open the Book’ visit

> Year 6 Trip to Castle Campus – Humanutopia with Sixth Form

The Christmas Fayre was the highlight of the Michaelmas Term for the FOH and one of our most important fundraisers in the school calendar. The school was buzzing with activities and the children had a great day.

Thank you for all your parental support with this event – your donations for the hampers enabled us to create 16 beautiful raffle prizes. We also appreciate your help with donations for other stalls and, of course, your attendance at the fayre with your children was much appreciated.

I would also like to thank the FOH team for all their hard work in preparing for the fayre. It takes a huge amount of effort and the team have worked tirelessly since the start of term to ensure a successful event.

We also had the pleasure of holding our popular PJ & Movie Night earlier this term. This too is a great fundraiser and always well attended and enjoyed by the girls. We look forward to organising our next PJ night for the new term.

Over the summer we helped the school purchase a number of items, including some outdoor table tennis tables, large playground games and an outdoor musical drum in the shape of a turtle! We are continuing to work with the School to purchase items and will keep you updated on future spends and ideas.

We wish you a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year and look forward to the new term in January.

FOH

Friends of Heatherton Upcomming

Louise Paul Florence

Principal’s Message

The Michaelmas Term, it has always seemed to me, is like an elite athlete’s winter training: it is the period of time in which the year’s foundations are laid for success. It provides few of the opportunities to demonstrate that success (the excellent 11+ results aside) but nearly half the year’s teaching means that patterns of progress and industry are established and turned into habits. As a result of this hard work, your girls will be tired at the end of this term, but you will also know that their abilities have taken giant strides forward and they are already assured at things which looked very difficult only a few short months ago.

Before the next steps forward of course, a holiday refreshes enthusiasm, provides opportunities for curiosity (particularly through reading) and enables families to spend extended times together. May I wish all the Heatherton community the rest, the joy of reading and curiosity, and the celebration of family reunions this holiday.

Backhouse Principal

NewsThe music department at Heatherton has welcomed three new peripatetic instrument teachers this year who are all experienced experts in their field. Our new teachers are really looking forward to meeting you all! We also welcomed a new pet to Heatherton this term...meet Jeremy the Tortoise! The Year 6 girls have enjoyed taking him to the younger girls’ classrooms to teach them about reptiles, caring for animals and the importance of conservation.

Awards

Heatherton Girl (Pre Prep)

Heatherton Girl (Prep)

Art Cup

Computing Cup

Design Technology

Drama Cup

English Cup

Geography Cup

History Cup

Maths Cup

Modern Foreign Languages Cup

Music Cup

Physical Education Cup

Religious Education Cup

Science Cup

Swimming Cup

Character Cup

Prep Music Attainment Award

Prep Music Attitude to Learning Award

Pre-Prep Ballet

Pre-Prep Gym

Prep Ballet

Prep Gym

Richard

Jemima B

Tilly G

Seren W

Alexandra F

Cup Gabi G

Seren L

Sophie K-E

Amy W

Beth M

Tabitha L

Cherrie A

Josephine W

Alannah C

Maya-Rani S

Eliana G

Sasha D C

Connie P F

Noya P

Anika S

Lyla H-C

Bonnie W

Celeste T

Emilia W