The Dragon Newsletter Lent 2016

Dragon The

LENT Term 2016

ELEVEN GREAT SCHOLARSHIP SUCCESSES ALREADY

AND THE ‘SEASON’ IS NOT OVER YET!

Congratulations to all our pupils who have already succeeded in winning scholarships to their chosen senior schools:

Isaac Bingley Isaac Bingley Alice Corlett Will Chesterman Rory Gibbs Harry McGinty Coco Pollard Coco Pollard Hugh Ridgway Jackson Shine Jai Thompson

MUSIC (Sherborne School) ACADEMIC (Sherborne School) ALL-ROUNDER (Kings Bruton) ALL-ROUNDER (Kings College Taunton) ACADEMIC (Kings Bruton) SPS AWARD (Sherborne School) ACADEMIC (Kings Bruton) ART (Kings Bruton) ACADEMIC (Sherborne School) DRAMA (Sherborne School) TOP SPORT AWARD (Sherborne School)

....and best of luck to those who have yet to sit their Eton and Winchester scholarship tests next term.

Maths Whizzes make it count

Four of our Year 8 Maths Scholars (Hugh, Isaac, Maddie & Georgie) joined a Year 9 team from the Boys’ School to take part in a regional Maths Competition held at Millfield. Head of Maths at Sherborne School, Mr Siew-Chiang Lim helped the team to practise every Tuesday before the event. The children enjoyed the experience of Relay Team Maths, Problem Solving, and Cross Numbers at a quite advanced level. Mr Lim was delighted with the contributions from our team, who went on to take 4th place overall.

2 Heads

better than One! Thank you to Head Boy Rory and Head Girl Georgina who carried out their duties admirably this term, culminating in two beautifully read lessons in the Easter Service. Both children agreed that there are always some excellent benefits to helping with scholarship mornings and speaking to the occasional visitor, as there is usually hot chocolate involved at some point!

Sidelines a view from the

Once again the whole school has been out on the playing fields, astros and courts, playing for their school, and all the teams have battled hard, learnt a huge amount, enjoyed some wonderful wins along the way, and discovered more about the importance of teamwork, generosity, awareness, kindness and perseverance. For the second year running the Rugby 7s squad reached the second day of Rosslyn Park, narrowly missing out on a semi-final place this year. Year 2 showed their enthusiasm and potential in a football match against Perrott Hill, winning 4-2. Football has been fun for the juniors too, especially when Chris Weale, who is the goalkeeper coach for Yeovil Town, came in to spend a day with them and share some of his coaching wisdom with the young enthusiasts.

House Cross Country We all enjoyed the House Cross Country event, and for the first time, Pre-Prep joined in, and showed their mettle when every child crossed the finish line without wanting to slow to a walk. The camaraderie, family atmosphere, and friendly rivalry between the Houses made for a truly uplifting prep afternoon.

Cross Country Our Cross Country runners have also recorded some superb competitive results this season. The children were competing in fields of up to 200 runners, so competition was stiff. However we had a great term of results,with Emily finishing 4th at Bryanston, and Gonzalo finishing 16th. Year 6 and Year 7 teams ran at Canford: Emily stormed home in 1st place, a feat she then repeated at Milton Abbey, coming in a remarkable 4 minutes ahead of

the rest of the field. Georgina also had a great race here and finished 1st too.

Congratulations to all the runners for a superb day at Clayesmore, where the Year 5 and Year 7 girls came 5th, the Year 5 boys came 6th, the Year 7 boys came 7th, the Year 6 girls came 8th, and the Year 6 boys came 9th - an impressive performance all round.

Sporting Triumphs in the National IAPS Competitions TOP SWIMMERS! Another highlight of the sporting term was the performance of our up-and-coming swimmers, both in local meets, and at the National IAPS qualifiers, where all the children swam their hearts out. Three of our pupils, Jai, Ella and Rocco, qualified for the National Finals based on their superb times in their Butterfly races.

Congratulations to all three, and a special well done to Jai, who recorded the best time across the country! We look forward to hearing how you all get on next term at the Big One!

CROSS COUNTRY NATIONAL Four of our children, Georgina, Emily, Florence, and Chris, qualified to run in the IAPS National Cross Country Championships held at Malvern College. They all ran brilliantly, finishing in the top third of the field, and Emily finished in a remarkable 3rd place despite being a year younger than most of the competitors in her race. Very well done, everybody, and special congratulations to Emily for finishing the season in such great style!

KARATE MEDALS GALORE! Damien, David, Hannah, Max and Harry represented the Prep at the national IAPS karate championships, and all five children had an amazing day, scooping, between them: 13 Gold, 1 Silver and 1 Bronze!

As a small team of just 5, they also accumulated enough points to finish 4th overall - an outstanding achievement.

Inside Out - the Classroom and Beyond

The children have had no end of fun in and around the classroom this term: Mr V put on a fab art exhibition for local primary schools; we enjoyed a visit from the Explorer Dome; we feasted for Chinese New Year; everyone revelled in the chance to “drop everything and read� on World Book Day; Year 3 re-enacted Roman battle formations with their homemade shields; Year 4 loved their art sessions; and, we hosted a small group of children and staff from Yinhai Academy China, for a two week exchange, made new friends and learnt a great deal about their culture.

The Keymaster

Travelling Through Time in the Year 3 & 4 Play

songs and bold delivery The children of Year 3 & 4 wowed the audience with their lively of a group of school in their production of The Keymaster. The show tells the story ing back in time, and children whose history teacher brings the subject alive by travell the Battle of Hastings, a then propels them into the future too. We were transported to The First World War, medieval pharmacy, Smugglers’ Cornwall, the Industrial Revolution, the future. There were evacuees and Votes for Women, and to a desolate landscape of ying message about plenty of comical moments and witty asides, but also a serious underl our own responsibility for the history of tomorrow!

All A-Board!

There is never a dull moment for the boarders at weekends, and this term’s activities included ice skating, Bristol Science Museum, Paintballing, playing on the water slides at Splashdown, The great Prep Bake Off, and a game of Hare and Hounds at Ham Hill Park.

Musical Notes The school has been resounding with music this term, with bagpipe demonstrations, House Singing with a David Bowie and Freddie Mercury flavour, (for the full story and many more pictures look on the website), lunchtime recitals, the Cheap Street Concert, and the jazz band playing at Youth makes Music.

One particularly gifted pianist, Isaac B, made the headlines when he took the top prize in the renowned Sherborne Young Musician of the Year competition, despite being up against some exceptional and much older musicians. It is probably no surprise then, that Isaac was also awarded a top music scholarship to Sherborne School. Quite superb, Isaac, well done indeed!

Pre-Prep Oh my goodness what a busy and exciting term it has been in Pre-Prep and Nursery! We all had such fun dressing up for World Book Day, and there have also been some wonderful creative arts highlights this term, such as all the music, dance and circus acts at the Performing Arts Workshop.

The children were also lucky enough to visit the Explorer Dome, where they learnt so much about food and the digestive system with some very hands-on demonstrations of mixing up food, and the length of their intestines! Nursery have delighted in dressing up (Rapunzel is popular at the moment!) and cooking, discovering the life cycle of a frog, building wonderfully on their phonics and numbers, and creating some beautiful pieces of art.

Reception have explored the world of dinosaurs and all things Italian, Year 1 have been writing story books about a naughty pigeon, and their recreations of Munch’s The Scream in art were amazing. The highlights for Year 2 include preparing for and presenting their English Speaking Board work, with huge success, and having fun in maths with frequency surveys, and winning their football match v Perrott hill 4-2.

The Performing Arts Showcase

Saturday Fun some of this term’s activities in pictures From birdwatching to baking, rifles to racing and model kits, there is something for everyone.

Electric car enthusiasts

Budding Chefs

Modellers

A Family Atmosphere

On the rifle range

There was no shortage of fun for the parents this term either, with a Burns’ Night celebration, beautifully organised by The Friends, complete with the piping in of the haggis and the traditional toasts followed by some fine reeling. It was such a fun evening that, by popular demand, the Bursar has even started up a monthly reels tea! Later in the term we were treated to a brilliantly put together Quiz Night and Fish and Chips Supper, jam packed with intriguing head-scratchers and some wonderful obscurities, such as the “Name That App” round! The parents then kindly organised an end of term disco, which the children absolutely loved, and even the Headmaster “got into the groove”! The Friends, who seem to be as energetic and enthusiastic as their children, are now busy planning for next term’s events: the Summer Fête and the Summer Ball.

Bird Watchers