Prep

from In Focus: Birkenhead School Annual 2019-20

Early Years

Prep - Junior Highlights

Prep Science

By Mrs Clarke, Science Subject Leader

What an exciting year we have had in Prep Science! In Prep we value the questions that children ask us. During a range of exciting scientific opportunities the children have explored and found answers together. They need time and space to explore and they have learned from their mistakes. At all times curiosity has been invited. We are very privileged that every junior class has timetabled access to the Science room.

Science Clubs have continued to run very successfully throughout the year both in the Infants (Miss Harris) and Juniors (Mrs Clarke). Chemistry, Physics and Biology programmes have been followed in a practical and explorative way.

We are thrilled to have followed and been awarded the exciting Crest Awards at Star and Superstar levels. CREST is the British Science Association's scheme for STEM project work that inspires young people to think and behave like scientists and engineers. We have close links with Seniors who also complete Crest awards at higher levels. For the older students involvement in the award scheme can lead to improved GCSE grades and an increased interest in continuing in STEM education and careers.

Throughout the year, social media has been used to demonstrate to a wider audience the vast range of practical opportunities on offer to our pupils. These pictures have included projects completed for the Crest award scheme and also practical work in Science lessons.

British Science Week

Junior Prep celebrated British Science Week in March. Year 3 made marshmallow 3D structures, Year 4 made ice cream, Year 5 explored how air pressure could be used in a magic experiment and Year 6 made a root beer ice cream float in order to explore states of matter.

All children were invited to enter a national poster competition based on Our Diverse Planet.

Digital Leaders

By Mr Pillow, ICT Subject Leader

With the Digital Leaders initiative now firmly established in Prep, seven enthusiastic candidates from Years 5 and 6 took on the role of pioneering ICT and computing across Prep for the academic year.

After passing a careful selection process which provided an opportunity for them to show off their skills, the elected students have had some exciting opportunities, most notably a trip up to Senior School to try out Virtual Reality technology with Mr Parry. With excitement levels high, this unique experience allowed the Leaders to take a tour around the human heart, climb out of a space station and even use a light sabre! It’s fair to say, they were inspired by what they saw and there was plenty of discussion amongst the group afterwards about whether all future lessons could be conducted in this way. We will see…

Reliable, knowledgeable and patient in their approach, they organised and ran their own clubs with children in Years 1 and 2, where they taught them essential coding skills each week in ‘Scratch Jnr’. Additionally, the Prep ICT teachers have been grateful for the assistance and support during lessons, where the Leaders have assisted with children logging on and any pupils who need a helping hand with their work. I would like to thank all of the Digital Leaders for their hard work and commitment to the role throughout their time in School this year.

This year’s Digital Leaders were:

Ted Golding (Y6) Prem Nagra (Y6) Daniel Moreton (Y6) Zach Ellis (Y6) Holly Mei (Y5) Charlotte Hope-Thompson (Y5) Charlie Dodd (Y5)

Lockdown Art & Design Technology

By Mr Ryan, Art Teacher

Continuity of education has presented many challenges for parents and children working at home during lockdown, not least in creative subjects like Art and Design and Technology.

Whilst every attempt has been made to plan topics and activities that are achievable at home, I have been fully aware that it has not always been possible to complete these tasks. It has made it even more overwhelming, therefore, to see the level of creativity that the children have displayed throughout this difficult period. Some of the artwork that I have received has astounded me! Despite limited resources, the children have managed to produce masterpieces. It has been quite a humbling experience to see the passion and commitment that the children have shown their work in Art and Design and Technology. They have risen to the challenge admirably and I only wish I could have been in the room with them to witness first-hand their creativity.

Below are some standout pieces produced during the Lent and Summer terms.

Chester Christmas

Tree Festival

We entered into the wonderful

Christmas Tree Festival at

Chester Cathedral once again this year.

The festival features 50 majestic

Christmas trees decorated by local schools and businesses from across

Chester and beyond. Pupils in Years 3 and 4 created decorations during their lessons with Mrs FitzHerbert and this year’s theme was the Ocean.

House Art Competitions

By Mr Ryan, Art Teacher

The summer term saw the return of the House Art Competition in Junior Prep.

Over the course of the term, three separate competitions were launched, designed to inspire and challenge the children in equal measure. I have to say, it has been an absolute pleasure organising these competitions; the children’s entries have been incredible! However, it has been quite an ordeal having to choose winners from such an outstanding collection of artwork! Unlike tasks set in art lessons, the children are given complete creative freedom to produce their pieces in any style and using any medium they choose. This makes for some truly intriguing and inspired work! I hope that the children enjoyed creating these pieces as much as I did receiving them and look forward to next year’s competitions!

'Recreate a Famous Artwork’ Winner Bethany Kennedy - Y4 'Recreate a Famous Artwork’ Winner Zaila Jackson - Y3

Bird Feeder Charlotte Jenner Y5 Picasso Self-Portrait Olanna Quinn Y5 'Recreate a Famous Artwork’ Winner Sophie Thuraisingam - Y5 ‘Rainbows’ Winner - Rufus White - Y5

Below are a selection of the winning entries.

Prep Sport

By Mr Corran

This year really has been a case of ‘what could have been’ in the Prep sporting calendar with so many events and tournaments falling foul of Covid-19.

We managed to complete three quarters of our winter sports programme but unfortunately the summer season was lost which included the Cricket, Rounders and Outdoor Athletics seasons as well as Tennis, Kwik Cricket tournaments and various other planned sporting activities.

Prep Sports Captains

We would like to thank our Prep Sports Captains this year who offered motivation, support and leadership to their fellow Prep pupils. During the year they helped assist coaches with the smooth running of events. To be selected they must show positivity, enthusiasm and excellent organisational skills.

Athletics (Girls) – Annabelle Cooper Rounders – Cecilia Wilcocks Cross Country (Girls) – Rosa Washington Athletics (Boys) - Rory Gardner Cross Country (Boys) - Ben Dyson Cricket – Jamie Young Netball – Reefe Pankhurst Rugby – Harry Ballantyne Football – Rocco Armstrong Prep Sports Captains

Football

Football, as ever, played a key role throughout Prep with the ever popular House matches involving all pupils and inter school fixtures and tournaments for all year groups. One highlight for each year group was a tournament at Manchester City’s training ground where the children experienced top class facilities, competitive matches and some even had the opportunity to meet the players. The Year 6 football team, after a steady start to the season, began to put some good results together until the season was curtailed in March. At the time, they had secured qualification for the Liverpool Echo Shield semi final and the latter stages of the Wirral Schools Houlihan Cup.

Pupils on the London trip

Fortunately, we managed to squeeze a successful weekend football tour to London in at the beginning of March. This included victories against Bedford Prep School and Berkhamsted School as well as a trip to West Ham United.

In other year groups, the Year 5 football team enjoyed a successful season finishing joint third in the AJIS Football festival hosted by St. Bede’s and runners up in the Manchester City tournament as well as qualifying for the latter stages of the Wirral Schools Corgi Cup.

The promising Year 4 team had a good season winning the vast majority of matches including qualifying for the Merseyside Games Futsal Finals by winning the Wirral

Schools qualifying tournament held at Tranmere Rovers.

Year 4 Football Team

Cross Country

Prep have had yet another successful Cross Country season this year until the curtailment midway through the second half of the season. All junior children have run in half-termly races in school where they are able to achieve bronze, silver and gold standards. We have competed regularly, taking 40 children across three age groups, in the Wirral Schools Cross Country races against children from a number of local primary schools. These races have brought much success to both our boys’ and girls’ teams. Special mention must go to Jac Chapman who on more than one occasion has won the Year 6 boys' race.

We also entered the annual AJIS Cross Country event for Year 5 and 6 boys and girls. Much to our delight, in the Year 5 girls’ race, we returned victorious with the gold medals, winning the event by some margin after a tremendous effort from all.

Indoor Athletics

One of the highlights of the year was undoubtedly the AJIS Indoor Athletics Championship held at Robin Park, Wigan. An individual-based event saw us perform tremendously well and return to Birkenhead with several medals and a new AJIS record.

Medallists (pictured below) were: Zack Barwick who won gold in the Year 6 One Lap Sprint, gold in the Year 6 Speed Bounce and a bronze in the Year 6 Paarlauf Relay with Rory Gardner. Harry Ballantyne who won silver in the Year 6 Triple Jump. Olanna Quinn who won gold in the Year 5 One Lap Sprint with a new AJIS record time and a silver in the Year 5 Paarlauf Relay with Darcey Golborne. AJIS Indoor Athletics Championship Medallists Prep girls have played many netball matches this year from whole year group fixtures to separate team games. We have played teams and been involved in tournaments from Year 3 to Year 6 and have had great success in all areas. It has been encouraging to come away with wins from large schools such as King’s Chester, Queen’s Chester and King’s Macclesfield. Well done to all of the girls involved and to our Year 6 netball captain this year, Reefe Pankhurst who has been a superb leader both on and off the court. In March, the Year 6 girls’ netball team finished third in their group at the ‛Sisters in Sport Tournament’ held at Stockport Grammar School, having been beaten by the eventual tournament winners.

Ashleigh Neal with Year 5 pupils

In early December, we were fortunate enough to have a visit from Ashleigh Neal, a professional netball player with Manchester Thunder. Throughout the day, Ashleigh gave tutorials and held ‘Question and Answer’ sessions for girls across all age ranges. Our Year 5 girls were given the opportunity in the afternoon and thoroughly made the most of it.

In early November, the Year 3 and 4 netball teams took part in a tournament at Pownall School in Wilmslow. The Year 3 team, in their first ever netball tournament, played exceptionally well winning 6 out of 6 games. Across the tournament they scored a total of 30 goals and only conceded 1! On the following day, it was the turn of the Year 4 netball team. Despite strong opposition, they performed admirably winning two of their games comfortably and being

Netball

unlucky in their third, losing by one.

Year 3 Netball Team

Year 4 Netball team

Tri Golf

In February, two teams of five boys and girls took part in the Wirral Schools Tri-Golf tournament at The Hive in Birkenhead. After a highly entertaining afternoon’s golf with eight different activities undertaken on a rota system, Birkenhead School managed to finish second overall and, with it, qualify for the Merseyside Games Tri-Golf Festival, set for the end of June. Unfortunately, this became yet another casualty of the present situation so we will never know what might have been….

Prep - Junior Highlights continued

Boumphrey Lecture - Miss Julie Yardley

On Friday 18th October, the last Friday before half-term break, the first Boumphrey Lecture of this academic year took place. Years 5 and 6 pupils were treated to an inspiring and thought-provoking lecture from Miss Julie Yardley entitled ‘Chimps and Icebergs’. The talk was focused on how we can lead healthier, happier and more successful lives by having greater emotional intelligence.

Miss Yardley began her lecture by using the movie “Inside Out” as an example to showcase the many emotions that live inside our brains and how they influence every action that we make. She then went on to cite Professor Steve Peters' books “My Hidden Chimp” and “The Chimp Paradox”, detailing how everyone has a “chimp” in their brain which at the wrong moment can introduce doubt into a person’s mind, causing them to second guess themselves, which results in negative outcomes.

Miss Yardley explained that we must train ourselves to “cage our hidden chimp” and that we should use the logical part of our brain and not let the emotional part take over in potentially stressful situations. She concluded the lecture by explaining that our behaviour drives our outcome; we need to be self-aware.

Miss Yardley encouraged the audience to label their emotions and to explain to themselves why they might be feeling a certain way, rather than acting instantaneously on the negative emotion. She recommended reflecting on your emotions before making decisions, and to think about your words and actions and how they may affect others.

Miss Yardley stated that to become good at emotional control you need to practise and encouraged the pupils to practise controlling their emotions in their everyday lives; the more they practised, the more likely they would be to form good habits.

Chester Zoo Vist

Rangers from Chester Zoo visited Prep and put on curriculum-linked workshops that covered topics such as 'Talking Rubbish', 'Sustainable Palm Oil' and 'Animals in the Rainforest'.

Every class in Juniors were visited by rangers from Chester Zoo in November, linking in with Geography, Science and Art work. Years 3 and 4 took part in ‘Talking Rubbish’ workshops, learning all about plastic pollution and how long different materials take to break down when we’ve finished using them. Year 5 learnt about animals in the Rainforest, enhancing this term’s Geography topic and Year 6 sessions were based on Sustainable Palm Oil. The children discovered how useful and versatile palm oil is. They also discussed the importance of using a sustainable source for the benefit of the environment. All the workshops were informative, hands-on and fun and we are really grateful to Chester Zoo for the fantastic experience.

Year 3 Caribbean T-Shirts

Year 3 pupils had lots of fun designing their Caribbeanthemed t-shirt in their Design and Technology lessons during the Lent Term and they were thrilled to show them off in the sunshine.

Christmas Chapel Services

Years 3 to 6 performed songs and poems for friends and family at the Christmas services held in Chapel. Bumble the therapy dog loved learning about how Bumble helps patients' recovery.

Prep Music

By Mrs Keating, Prep Music

As the Year 6 Production of Aladdin wasn’t able to go ahead at the end of this term, I thought recording a medley of ‘Aladdin’ songs would be possible, as a small memento of Year 6’s musical life in Prep.

Will Fletcher (Aladdin), Jemima Blair (Jasmine) and Olivia Parfect (Genie) worked hard rehearsing their solos and all of Year 6 rehearsed (in their ‘bubbles’) a large part of the song ’Friend Like Me’. Photos of the Year 6 were taken and those who were willing to take part vocally, were recorded individually over a couple of days. Many thanks go to Mr Robinson who kindly put the backing track together and mixed all the vocal parts and to the Marketing Team, Mrs Alcock and Mr Mohan for taking the photographs and

In March, Bumble came to visit children in Prep. Bumble is a therapy dog at Arrowe Park Hospital and the children producing the ‘Aladdin Medley’ video.

in our series of Parent Seminars which run throughout

Bullying Workshop

We were delighted to welcome Actionwork Creative Arts to the School in February to run a series of anti-bullying and e-safety workshops. Over the course of the two days, Professor Dr Andy Hickson delivered a series of interactive sessions to students from Prep and Seniors along with an informative seminar for our parents as part of our Parent Seminar series.

Through the fun sessions, Dr Hickson explored the concept of bullying and its many levels from power to empowerment. Children in reception enjoyed a puppet workshop in which they explored what it means to be a good friend and if someone is unhappy what they could to do help. Children from Years 1 up to Year 10 enjoyed workshops where the concept of bullying was explored on its many different levels and the different forms it can take. They explored what the word bullying means to them, strategies for dealing with bullying, and building The sessions were fun and delivered the messages in a powerful way. Dr Andy Hickson is the latest speaker

confidence and assertiveness skills. the academic year. In November, we welcomed Rachel Munns to talk about how parents can support the mental health and resilience of children.