Gayhurst School Stormont December 2014

December 2014

First Prize Junior School William Barker

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Technology Week’s Digital Photography Competition Theme: ‘I Love......’

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First Prize Senior School Lily Barker

A Note from the Head

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very happy New Year to you all!

The Autumn term is one of contrasts beginning as it does in the balmy days of September and ending in the short, cold days of winter. It must be the busiest term of the year too with so much happening and this term was certainly no exception. So Christmas has come and gone, hopefully it provided us all with time to pause, time to be with our families and a time to reflect.

The lead up to Christmas is always an exciting time of year at School and the many talented girls and boys that we have, treated us to a whirlwind of Nativity plays and Carol services. All were special and memorable in their own right. The Senior Carol service, which officially marked the end of the year, was most moving and I would like to thank all the children who made it such a wonderful occasion.

Busy is a good way to describe the last few months of 2014 at School both in the classrooms and out.

There were achievements and successes in a myriad of different forums and the Stormont magazine can only touch on a few. There was a lot of fun too as well as kindness. One of the most important cups that I present at our final assembly each term is the Junior School Kindness Cup and last term it was awarded to Gage Lange.

I would like to take this opportunity of thanking the GPA for all their endeavours once again which have been so much appreciated. I would also like to thank you, the parents, for your generosity in supporting our numerous charitable causes which reach out to help those less fortunate than ourselves. On a final note I would like to welcome you all back to School and wish children, parents staff and friends a very happy and enjoyable Spring Term.

Mr A J Sims Headmaster

GAYHURST SCHOOL Independent Preparatory School for Girls and Boys 3 - 11

Year 3 OPEN MORNING Thursday 5 March 2015 9.30am - 11.30am

For further details please contact visit gayhurstschool.co.uk

The Stormont Autumn 2014 Edition Many thanks to the whole Gayhurst community for their contributions to this Term’s edition of the Stormont

Art Autumn Term 2014

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Nursery & Reception Harvest Festival

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he Reverend Orr-Ewing joined Nursery once again this year to lead them in their Harvest Festival celebrations.

Along with singing their favourite Harvest Festival songs, the girls and boys enjoyed a story that Reverend Orr-Ewing had written himself about the importance of saying thank you.

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eception joined with Year 1 to celebrate Harvest Festival with their parents in attendance. They brought potted plants and gift boxes to the afternoon service held in the Gibbs Hall.

The donations were later distributed to local residents.

From the fields to make our food.

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uring the lead up to Harvest Festival, the Reception class learnt about different crops that farmers would be harvesting at this time of year. To help them understand how those crops became food on our plates, they made bread rolls from wheat flour.

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Ipads in Technology Week

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s part of the School’s special focus on technology during ‘Technology Week’ in October, the Nursery children had their first ‘school experience’ of working with iPads. The girls and boys enjoyed working on various apps in the Junior School IT suite.

Stories and More

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ayhurst School has many visiting groups who bring an exciting extra element to the curriculum. In September, Reception were visited by ‘Stories and More’ who entertained the year group with various dramatic activities.

Nativity

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very year the Nursery children get their first taste of performing, infront of an audience, during their Nativity production. The traditional tale always delights parents, friends and other family members and this year was no exception. Many of the children taking part were only three years old and all managed to cope with the demands of costume, songs and lines.

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Years 1, 2 and 3 A Taste of Home During the Autumn Term, Year 1 had the opportunity to bring a little of their home lives to the classroom. To start a discussion about ‘materials’, the girls and boys were able to bring their favourite soft toys in to School. Not only was it an opportunity for them all to give a presentation about their furry friends but it also gave their classmates a chance to find out a little more about their friends’ likes and dislikes.

Earlier in the term, during a literacy lesson, Year 1 had a chance to taste porridge that they made together in class.

Linking the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears to the art of writing instructions, Year 1 followed the steps to make perfect porridge - though some would disagree about just how ‘perfect’ porridge tastes!

Homes of a very different kind were studied when Year 1 went to visit the Chiltern Open Air Museum. The children marvelled at just how different things were for the Victorians. They also came across some very unusual domestic appliances!

Let it Rain.....

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Year 2 traditionally try to forget about the English weather during the Autumn term and focus on habitats, climates and the way of life for people in other countries and environments. The children combined individual project work with classroom sessions to bring

life in the Rainforest to Gayhurst School. Looking at what people living in the Rainforest would wear brought an opportunity to dress in animal skins and feathers. Animal skins and feathers were the theme of the afternoon when Year 2 had a visit from AmeyZoo.

Romans, Orbits and Radio Stars Year 3 have had an incredibly busy term that ended with a live performance on the radio!

Gayhurst supported the charity Radio Christmas this year and along with donations from our ‘Wear your Christmas Jumper to School Day’, Year 3 took to the airwaves on the Station with a fantastic live performance of Jack and the Beanstalk.

Maths lessons were rather tasty using M&Ms to add and subtract; Science lessons saw the children acting as planets and orbiting each other in the playground whilst learning about how light reaches the earth and all the children enjoyed the touch typing lessons.

The History man visited Year 3 to bring the experience of Roman soldiers to life and the girls and boys also enjoyed discovering more about the Roman way of life on their trip to Verulanium in St Albans.

The visit created quite a stir and a fabulous chance for the children to get up close and in some cases touch animals such as tree frogs, lizards and spiders.

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Senior School

The Senior School always hit the ground running in September when they return from their summer holidays. Of course, many of our Year 6 pupils have the serious business of the 11+ to contend with and both inside and outside the classroom the children have packed timetables.

In September Year 6 visited the Victoria and Albert Museum as part of their Art curriculum.

The visit focused on the study of pattern and they learnt alot about shapes, tessalation, rotation and duplication. The girls and boys took what they had learnt back to the Gayhurst classroom to begin their project on printing.

The Victoria and Albert Museum

Google Cardboard

Academic Challenge

Also in September some of the children in Year 6 took part in the St. Edwards Academic Challenge.

This is the first time that Gayhurst has taken part and the girls and boys managed to take 3rd place amongst 20 schools.

In October, as part of Technology Week, Year 7 got to sample the thrills of Thorpe Park, where, as Girls’ Spelling Bee Winners well as testing out the rides they used the park to study forces. Also as part of Technology Week, Mr Garner came in to Year 4 to demonstrate Google Cardboard and the advances being made in the world of virtual reality. The whole of the Senior School took part in the Lego Robotic workshop when members of the Lego Team showed the girls and boys how to build and programme robotic models.

Some of our Senior Girls had amazing success both in History and Literacy during November. Five Year 5 girls took part in the Historian of the Year competition at Wycombe Abbey with Lily Barker returning in first place! Gayhurst also took first place at Queen Anne’s School in their Junior Event Spelling Bee.

Thorpe Park

The much anticipated Year 4 trip to see the musical Shrek took place in November. The group also managed to fit in some of the sights of Oxford at the same time.

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Year 4 and 5 both got creative in their RS lessons enhancing their learning by constructing moses baskets and sukkot’s to add a creative edge to their academic studies.

Lego Workshop

During December, amongst the Year 4 Production and the Christmas preparation Year 7 paused to think about people who inspire them while Year 8 visited the House of Commons to learn about the people who sit at the heart of the UK’s political decision making.

Year 4 had a fascinating trip to Hazard Alley in Milton Keynes where their eyes were opened to potentially life saving tips and information.

In History Year 4 looked at how Victorian children spent time in the classroom and Year 5 were shocked to see what effects rationing had on the British dinner plate during WWII.

Inspirational People

Amongst the Christmas festivity preparation, American Thanksgiving wasn’t forgotten when one of our Year 6 pupils brought cakes in to celebrate and Year 4 got ‘cracking’ on making hand made crackers for their Christmas dinner tables.

Year 4 Victorian Classroom

Year 8 Westminster Trip

Crackers

Year 4 Theatre Visit to see Shrek

Thanksgiving

Moses baskets

Creating Sukkots

Hazard Alley Girls’ History Competition

Year 5 Rationing

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SENIOR SCHOOL WINNER! Lily Barker

Elisabeth Carradine

JUNIOR SCHOOL WINNER! William Barker

Jamie Berry

Ethan Chalfont Tommy Nicholls

Zak Martin

Digital Photography Competition

Marcus Beavington Ivo Richardson

George Beddoe

Leon Rudak

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Luca Dhugga

Amber Kearns

Robin Hood 2014

SENIOR SCHOOL WINNER!

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Remembrance Day Whole School News Special Guests As usual day to day School life was often enhanced by special visitors. From the annual visit of The History Man to Rainforest creatures, these guests of Gayhurst continue to delight and educate our children.

This year we also welcomed two of the stars of the Winning England Women’s Rugby Team who not only gave the children a taste of the excitement of the world cup but also stayed to teach our sporting pupils some of their skills. The Faust Ensemble also took a break in their concert preparations to bring their own particular brand of music to the School. A whole day of workshops had the girls and boys completely emersed in the wonder of rhythm and music.

It was an extra-special Remembrance Day this year as we also commemorated the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First Wold War. To mark this event all the members of Gayhurst School were given a pocket sized copy of St Luke’s Gospel, the way these Gospels were provided to the soldiers. Year 8 pupil Ben Hunt played The Last Post, for the first time in Gayhurst history, on the saxophone.

Ben Hunt plays The Last Post Commemorative St Luke’s Gospel

The Faust Ensemble

Harvest Delivery

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England’s Rugby stars take assembly

We were delighted to support SHOC this year, with our Harvest collection. SHOC help deliver much needed support to the homeless people of Slough.

We collected food and day to day items for the many people who make use of the SHOC dropin centre. Mrs Lingley and two year 7 pupils went along to the dropin centre to deliver the boxes and packages sent in by our generous parents.

Christmas at Gayhurst

Junior School Christmas Dinner

The run up to the Christmas holidays is always a fun, exciting and packed few weeks. There is always so much going on at Gayhurst from the Christmas theme ‘sneaking’ into curriculum lessons, to exciting visits from special guests.

The music department had been leading the children in singing practise since the beginning of term and the culmination of all this hard work was heard at St James’ Church in our two carol services.

The traditional Nativities, performed

by Nursery and a joint Reception and Year 1 performance brought the usual tears and laughter!

Senior School Carol Concert

The ever-busy GPA organised a funpacked afternoon for our youngest pupils and even Father Christmas put in an appearance accompanied by his ‘familiar’ looking elves.

Our wonderful catering staff excelled themselves once again, providing us all with delicious Christmas treats durng the last week of term.

Junior School Panto and Party

Rec & Y1 Nativity

Technology Week For the second year Gayhurst ran ‘Technology Week’. Preparations for this week had begun in the summer holidays when pupils had been busy taking photographs to enter the Digital Photography Competition. Workshops, quizzes, guests and games made up a week of technical fun.

Please see page 8 for the digital photography finalists.

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Sports News

Rugby Round-Up We were very lucky last term, as far as the Autumn weather was concerned, with no matches cancelled. However, it has been a very up and down season with regards to results. We have won half and lost half of the fixtures with just a couple of draws. The B, C1 and C2 teams have been most successful and the U/9 C1 team were the only team to be unbeaten.

Tournaments.

The U/8’s were runners up in the Gayhurst tournament. The Colts A team got to the semi-final of the Rugby school sevens and runners up in the Belmont tournament and the Colts B won the triangular competition played with St Bernard’s School and St John’s Beaumont. In the National Rugby qualifiers at Warwick school, the U/8’s and U/9’s are through to the finals held at Epsom College in March, we wish them the best of luck.

Inter-House.

At the end of term we have the inter-house competition and so often we see the best rugby of the term. That was certainly the case in the U/10 final between Taylor and Stafford. It was the clash of the Titans and after much extra time they just couldn’t be separated. The results of the other matches were: Rugby Awards Yr 2 Gibbs Yr 3 Taylor Well done to all the children who have represented the school in the Yr 4 Stafford various disciplines this term and we look forward to continued success in Yr 5 Taylor and Stafford the Spring term.

Yr 6 Campbell Colours Yr 7&8 Taylor Colts Full: Milo Connolly, Ovo Atori, Pierce Dillon, Alex Lee, Hayden Waller, Aiden Meazzo, Hugo Lindsey.

Colts Half: Daniel James, Jake Barton, James Steuer, Shaunak Mehta, Will Wright.

1st XV Full: William Starrs 1st XV Half: Eamon Dillon, Jonathan Battaliou, Jason Ramsay, Jensen Ellis, Marcus Beavington, Tommy Gormley.

Most Improved Players: 1sts: Eamon Dillon Colts: Paul Gormley U/10: Teddy Flemming U/9: Zack Orr-Ewing

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Yr Yr Yr Yr Yr

2 3 4 5 6

Taylor Gibbs Stafford Stafford Campbell

Inter-House Hockey Results

Girls’ Sport As well as a very successful hockey season across all ages U8-U11, girls’ sport has continued to go from strength to strength. Gayhurst Girls have enjoyed brushing up on their skills in the football activity for the first half of the autumn term and along with their male peers, lots of girls have been taking part in gymnastics activities and street dance. The Gymnastics Squad has had a great start to the year preparing for upcoming competitions.

We are delighted that Kate Webster has secured a Sports Scholarship to Claires Court and was also selected for the U11 Bucks County Cricket Squad. Verity Misselbrook will join the U11 Bucks County Development Squad and both Elisha Togher and Amber Kearns have been performing in The Youth Ballet’s Swan Lake and Cinderella respectively.

Gayhurst (mixed) swimming squad were placed in the top 3 in the recent Division 10 Gala and both Eloise Wraight and Sophie Davies were placed in the top 15 in cross-country events.

Cross-Country Gayhurst have dominated the Inter-Schools Cross-Country in the Yr 3, Yr 4 and Yr 6 age groups coming first in the opening two races. However, there have been some very good individual performances in the other age groups.

Hockey Awards U8-Player of the season: Amelia Garner U8-Most improved player: Rosie Marshall U9 & U10 Player of the season: Freya Errington U9 & U10 Most improved player: Sophie Davies U11 Player of the season: Eloise Wraight U11 Most improved player: Amber Kearns U11 Full colours: Kate Webster, Eve Rollafson, Eloise Wraight U11 Half Colours: Anand Kaur, Elisha Togher, Alice Langley, Amber Kearns

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School Council 2014/2015

Jake Bloor 3N

George Beddoe 3R

Charlie Hewson 5B

Charlie Marsh 5M

Jamie Stevenson 7B

JakeSlowikowski Leo Bloor 3N 3S

Sebastian Mansfield 5N

Ben Kingston 8K

Zach Orr-Ewing 4K

Barney Sticklen 4L

Samuel Abbott 4W

Will Wright 6K

Joseph Beddoe 6L

Ovo Atori 6S

Secretary

Chairman

Jensen Ellis 8K

Tommy Gormley 8K

Staff Spotlight Year 8 form teacher, Mrs Kunzig, has been at Gayhurst for 33 years and would like to share some of her experiences with us. She has been Head of French and the year 8 form teacher for almost all of the time at Gayhurst; with the exception of four years, when she was a year 7 form teacher.

For ten years Mrs Kunzig had a dog named Vronsky. The dog would lie under her desk and sit there during lessons. Vronsky was a Border Collie and a rescue dog. Sadly, like her previous two dogs, he died of old age. Everyday Mrs Kunzig walked her dog in the woods at lunch break.

Mrs Kunzig has three children and six grandchildren, two of whom are currently at Gayhurst School. Mrs Kunzig was born in America during the Second World War. Two years later, once the war was over, her family returned to France. In August 1971 she moved to England. In 1980 Mrs Kunzig trained as a teacher and in 1982, once she was trained, she began teaching at Gayhurst. Mrs Kunzig has had the same classroom ever since she first came to Gayhurst.

Mrs Kunzig is well known for her huge frog collection. Her collection started when one pupil gave her a small statue of a frog. It was stolen, and she told everyone that it had no value so could they please return it to her. No one did so people felt sorry for her and started giving Mrs Kunzig model frogs. Two years later the stolen frog was mysteriously returned to her desk!

What a nice surprise!

Interview and writing by Ben Hunt and Ben Kingston.