The Aldenhamian
Aldenham School Elstree Herts WD6 3AJ
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TheAldenhamian 2010
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Houses
The Arts
Sport
Activities
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Houses The House system is central to Aldenham School. House spirit, fierce loyalty and friendly rivalry are the common themes of these tales of achievement.
TheAldenhamian 2010
Martineau’s 06 Beevor’s 08 Kennedy’s 10 Leeman’s 12 McGill’s 14 Paull’s 16 Riding’s 18
The Arts Aldenham thrives on the expression of talent, and the best showcase for that talent is our programme of dance, drama and music shows, and our steady stream of exciting art production. Art Dance Drama Music
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Sport Sport at Aldenham has had another excellent year, thanks to the expertise and dedication of the PE department and the enthusiastic participation of the students. The Aldenham spirit shines through these accounts of sporting achievement. Cricket 36 Cricket: Special Event 37 Cross Country 38 Eros Run 39 Football 40 Hockey 41 Sailing 42 Eton Fives 43
Activities Activities at Aldenham play an important part in the timetable. Horizons are broadened, new skills are explored, and new talents come to light, both inside and outside the classroom. CCF: Army CCF: RAF Duke of Edinburgh Business Society Les Philosophes
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Features
Prep School News
Trips
School News
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Prep School News 2009–10 saw another fantastic year for the Prep School. Read about achievement, fun and Aldenham spirit! Foundation News Prep School News
IGCSE 49 Languages 50 Being a Foreign Student 53 Media Studies 54 Did You Know? 55 Malawi 56 Stanley Owen Buckmaster 58 Stanley Spencer 60 Alfred Gilbert 61
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Trips A great deal of work goes into organising School trips and expeditions each year. The reports in this section represent just some of the exotic – and not so exotic – destinations that pupils at Aldenham School have enjoyed. The educational and personal rewards of these school trips make it all worthwhile.
School News We lament the departure of last year’s Upper Sixth, but we also celebrate the Visitation Day prizewinners, another good year in Chapel, and some happy news from the Common Room. Sixth Form 72 Common Room 73 Visitation Day: Winners 74 Development at Aldenham 76 Chapel Report 78
Brazil 64 History: Prague 66 France & Belgium 67 Physics: CERN 68 Geography: Y10 Walton 69 New York 70 Bank of England 71
TheAldenhamian 2010
Features Ripple Africa – Malawi revisited; Languages year report; a foreign student’s impressions of Aldenham – just a few of the feature articles in this section, which also celebrates some of the history and life of the School.
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Dance One of the biggest nights of the year in School, Aldenham Dance Show draws a large crowd and is full of exuberant talent. Louise Gall gives us an overview.
Dance
26 The Dance Show was as popular as ever with completely full audiences each night. The dances ranged from Contemporary to Hip Hop with a very large number of girls and boys from Year 7 – 13 performing. This year’s show was the last for a few dancers who have been in every show since it started in 2005. Jonathan Oommen, India Loddy and Benji Rom have been very committed to Aldenham’s dance programme. Their hard work has been much appreciated and they will be greatly missed. It was also a last for Mrs Layton as she moved on to teach at another school at the end of the year. Her tireless effort and hard work to put the productions together each year were certainly very much appreciated by those closely involved. A big thank you to Mrs Layton and good wishes for her new job. Louise Gall
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The Arts
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1 Jonathan Oommen choreographs Fire
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2 Alicia Dudack, Annabel Mizel, and Jessica Dudack in New York
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The Arts
Dance
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3 India Loddy in Hero 4 Prabhleen Oberoi in Year 7 and 8 production of Cats 5 I sabella Crack leads the opening moves of Sing, Sing, Sing! 6 Year 9 and 10 Fame
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7 Benjamin Rom in Ego
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Drama
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8 7 Anthony Coote, Toby Varian and Alexander Jones in The Pardoner’s Tale
TheAldenhamian 2010
The Arts
8 Elan Solomon, Hendrik Van Vuuren and John Cattle in Waiting for Godot 9 Pool (No Water) featuring Rupert Van Alexander, Tom Wainwright, Margaux Stones and David Cotter
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the performers. Special congratulations to Jodie Chun; Anthony Coote; Danny du Plooy; Alice Erman; Bobby Gordon; Louis Hallett; Chris Hudson; Holly Kingdon; Charlotte McPhee; Annabel Mizel; Mark Rodger; Joshua Rosenfeld; Joe Stephenson (winner of the GCSE Drama Prize); Hendrik van Vuuren and Toby Varian for achieving ‘A’s and ‘A*’s in GCSE Drama. The AS show in April Pool (No Water), directed by Julie Bannister, was outstanding: stunning and bold in execution, with David Cotter (winner of the Randall Prize for Senior Acting), Margaux Stones, Rupert Vann Alexander and Tom Wainwright (winner of the Year 12 Theatre Studies Prize) each performing to maximum effect: all received high marks from the external examiner, but a special congratulations to Tom for achieving full marks, and to Dave for his winning audition into the National Youth Theatre. For six consecutive years now, students from Aldenham School have successfully competed against thousands of applicants to gain national recognition: Ricky Flax; Ben Tovey; Andrew Nartey; Joe Bannister; Charlie MacGinty, and now David Cotter have done us proud.
The House Drama Competitions followed the theme of Grimm Tales this year for both Martineau’s and the Senior Houses. Kennedy’s scooped all the Senior prizes with Best Show The Devil with the Golden Hair, featuring Best Performer, Ashley Stephenson as Boy, and Best Director being co-directors Toby Varian and Ashley Stephenson. Last year’s winners, Leeman’s, were runners-up with their imaginative twist on The Musicians of Bremen, and Riding’s took third place with their humorous version of The Three Brothers. Martineau’s House Drama in July involved every single boy and girl in Martineau’s, ably supported by their tutors with Mahlon Prince as MC. Once again Neale House took Best Show, this year with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (last year with A Midsummer Night’s Dream). The Best Actor award went to Mackenzie Hunt, a well-deserved win over many other strong contenders. More was seen of Martineau’s abundance of talent in the Junior Production The Pied Piper, which modernised Browning’s famous poem and featured three Pipers: the musician, Jonathan Richard (winner of the Randall Prize for Martineau’s Acting); the singer, Mackenzie Hunt; and the dancer, Christian Wells. The cast of Year 7 and 8 students performed some clever ensemble work with memorable performances from Miraj Chhipa and Sam Aron as Mayors and Rianna McQueen as the Lame Boy, with Mahlon Prince directing. The final theatre offerings of the year were from Year 10 with their devised plays Bankman and Flashback Circus. It is always a challenge to create a play from scratch but Bankman explored issues of morality inspired by a photograph of Tiannamen Square, and Flashback Circus produced a comedy-thriller from the stimulus of a clown photograph. Memorable performances included Kush Obhrai as a harassed businessman in Bankman, and the custard pie fight between Harrison Galgut, Daniel Miller and Rishi Popat in Flashback Circus. In addition to providing in-house
entertainment, there have been numerous theatre trips, including Mark Rylance in Endgame, and Nation at The National Theatre. The Upper Sixth had a day at Stratford-upon-Avon with lectures from the Royal Shakespeare Institute, a tour of Shakespeare’s birthplace and a performance of Romeo and Juliet. We also welcomed guest workshops and performances from the likes of Scene Productions with Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera and Watford Palace Touring with Dr Faustus. Visiting from further afield, we hosted the American school, Kimball Academy, with the musical Cabaret. As I write, the Aldenham School Theatre programme 2010 – 11 is under way with rehearsals for next year’s Senior Production, Macbeth, and Middle School Production, Lord of the Flies in full swing. With our professional standards and dedicated, talented staff and students, the Aldenham School Theatre is an exciting place to be.
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Julie Bannister
10 10 Joshua Rom, Dan Miller, Andreas Leonidou and Holly Hamp in Flashback Circus
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TheAldenhamian 2010
The Arts
Drama
11 S enior House Drama: Ashley Stephenson, David Cotter and Joe Jones from Kennedy’s winning play
Brazil Amazonas Expedition 2010 An exciting trip to South America, with some valuable lessons learned
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Trips
Brazil Amazonas Expedition
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1 On 13 July, 9 boys and I embarked on the expedition of a lifetime to Brazil with World Challenge. The trip involved a diverse range of exciting activities, exotic destinations and adventure. It was all about exploring Brazil, having fun, creating friendships through new challenges and learning to adapt to unfamiliar situations. The expedition began with a ferry ride across the Amazon to the project site. Here, we worked with the Arara community building fences, clearing land and planting trees. We had a chance to experience Brazilian culture and gain an insight into the lives of ordinary Brazilian people. Later, we headed off into the jungle for a three-day trek. We gained skills needed to deal with jungle and mountain terrain and
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1 Daniel Jacobs 2 The beautiful Amazon 3 Marcus Selvadurai and Miss Rance 4 Amazon fauna 6 Amazon shower 7 S aul Charalambous, William Crack and Toby Bayley 8 A well-earned rest
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6 learned about wildlife and how local people use the trees and plants in the Amazon for their healing properties. Next, we travelled to Teresopolis, the access point for a three-day trek in Serra dos Orgaos National Park. The trek was through a mixture of rainforest and open grassland. Fighting fit and ready to continue, we moved on to Itamonte for a sixday trek in the Serra da Mantiqueira range, where we enjoyed a series of plunge pools and waterfalls. Finally, we travelled to Rio de Janeiro for a few days of well-deserved rest and relaxation on Ipanema beach and we also visited the Statue of Christ the Redeemer, which provided fantastic vistas of the city and surrounding areas.
7 The team would like to thank Simon Howlett, for being a superb expedition leader. Leanne Rance, School Leader Team Daniel Jacobs, Marcus Selvadurai, William Crack, Samuel Bonnerman, Aidan Moss, Maxwell Potter, Toby Bayley, Saul Charalambous and Jamie Coote.
TheAldenhamian 2010
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Trips
Brazil Amazonas Expedition
5 Man of the Amazon