St Marylebone School: Specialisms Newsletter - Winter 2012

The St Marylebone CE School Specialisms Newsletter Winter 2012 A Specialist School in Performing Arts, Maths, Computing, Communication & Interaction

Key Stage 3 NOMADIC THEATRE COMPANY July 2012

St MARYLEBONE SCHOOL AT THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM’ ‘

and ‘THE BOYFRIEND’

The TROJAN WOMEN On 3rd, 4th and 5th July 2012, the St Marylebone School Theatre became the stage for ‘The Trojan Women’, a Greek tragedy by Euripides, performed by the Key Stage 3 Nomadic Theatre Company.

The performances left the audiences on each night awestruck and tearful, showing that the power of Greek Tragedy is not lost on modern audiences. The strength and tenderness of the cast was astonishing, gripping the hearts of those who experienced it. Well done and congratulations to the whole cast.

EDINBURGH FESTIVAL 2012

For the second year in a row, St Marylebone travelled to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival - armed with sassy tunes from Sandy Wilson's musical comedy, "The Boy Friend", and a striking 30-minute interpretation of William Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream". By day, our cast of over a dozen Year 12s performed eye-catching choreography on the stretches of the Royal Mile; by the late afternoon they were performing both shows back-to-back at the prestigious Surgeons Hall, SpaceUK Venue.

Outside of rehearsing and performing their four-star show, St Marylebone's Drama students had the incredible opportunity to be completely immersed in one of the most vibrant and bustling performing arts festivals - some of the country's most fore running acts in comedy, dance, and drama grace the Edinburgh stage, and Marylebone's students were there to see it. Keep an eye out for news of our trip to the Fringe Festival in August 2013, and see how you can help us get there again!

Year 12 students took ‘Macbeth’ to the Unicorn Theatre for the Shakespeare Schools Festival on Wednesday 24th October 2012. The festival sees schools from all over the country performing Shakespeare plays in reduced, thirty-minute versions. Mr. Roberts directed the St Marylebone version of ‘Macbeth’, giving the piece a choral, military feel. All 24 Year 12 Drama students were involved in the play, and we also saw a new technical team finding their independence. We have received lots of praise on the professionalism of our students, who worked extremely hard to produce this amazing physical interpretation.

Controlling the lights at professional theatre, for a live show and a paying audience was one of the most exhilarating days I’ve had in a long, long time and nothing I have ever done could be compared to it. We only had one dress rehearsal in the morning to perfect the lights for the show; we had help from the Stage Manager and the Technical Manager who showed us the ropes, and how to work the lights and the effects it had. It was really enjoyable and there were a few laughs along the way. The dress rehearsal went well (apart from a few hiccups). The live show wasn’t until the evening, so the ‘Tech crew’ as we were known had the rest of the day to relax and look ahead. During the show we could really feel the pressure, although we were behind the scenes. I was told my lighting cues (when to put the lights up or down) by the Stage Manager through headsets which was extremely fun. It would have been impossible without that! We got through it perfectly and the show was a success! When the audience were clapping, the sense of relief that it was over was fantastic but the feeling of pride that I had controlled a show in a theatre without a mistake was even greater and I left the control room with a massive smile on my face.

Matthew - Lights

THEATRE TRIP REVIEWS 6 Million Stars The hour long play ‘6 Million Stars’ is an effective and dramatic re-enactment of the effects of The Holocaust. This fluid piece of physical theatre brings the stories of Holocaust victims and their loved ones to life, and has underlying symbolism. Not only was the play centred on the persecution and suffering of Jewish people, but also, for me, the main theme of the play was the effects of discrimination. The story included– a disabled woman, a Romany gypsy couple, a political prisoner and several Jewish characters. They skilfully used a variation of movement, mimes, gestures, facial expressions and voice to emphasise the importance of the play’s meaning. The play’s lack of exits symbolised the fact that the Jews were never left alone during the Holocaust, and there was no escape; they had a decided fate and they had to live it.

Siah, Year 11

Dead On Her Feet The play ‘Dead on Her Feet’ was an interesting play set in the 1930s which explored the themes of depression and the struggle for the American society. It also explored the ideas of the American Dream and how everybody wanted just that little something. In addition it related to the current times as we are now in a recession so the feelings that were once felt by the American people can be related to how many people are feeling right now.

It showed there to be an X-Factor culture as people tried to make their way to the top and defeat their ‘opponents’ through sob stories and other means.

It showed the lives of the American people as if they were a game show, and the hierarchy were in control of their lives and almost scripted everything they had to do.

Olivia, Year 11

On 19th October we held the annual Year 7 Scholars’ Concert. This year the Music and Choral Scholars were joined by those from Dance and Drama to perform to their year group. The standard this year was extremely high, and their variety was testament to the diverse talents of the new scholars this year. From the brilliantly acted excerpt from Roald Dahl’s ‘The Witches’, to the Choral Scholars’ sensitive rendition of Bring Me Little Water, Sylvie, to the virtuosic violin performances from Tamla and Alana, and the flawless flute playing from Petra, and to the Dance Scholars’ electric routine it was a concert to remember! Well done to all involved, and to everyone else look out for more performances from our talented scholars as the year goes on!

Miss Shakespear

This year’s Drama Scholars, Daisy, Ella, and Amber performed in the Year 7 Scholars’ Concert.

Ella writes how she found it: ‘I was really nervous about performing as the Grand High Witch in front of the whole of Year 7. I enjoyed it a lot! I loved putting on the accent and getting dressed up. It was great being a witch for the day!’

Daisy said 'When I first found out that Ella, Amber and I were asked to perform this exciting and very funny scene, I was very excited. Rehearsing was great fun! When it came to the real thing, I was quite nervous at the start and had to go over my lines in my head, just in case I would forget them. Luckily, once I started cheering Ella and Amber on, I was fine. It was great fun as well!'.

The annual Dance Company Tour commenced on Sunday 24th June and lasted nine days. This was the most extensive tour to date, with students performing in a range of venues including a primary school, a secondary school and outside Westfield Shopping Centre, amongst other places. There were also two performances in the St Marylebone Theatre: one for invited guests from local primary schools and the other for family and friends. The performances featured guest appearances by Westminster Junior Dance Company and Dance Scholars, and included works choreographed by teachers, students and a professional choreographer.

The Engineering Education Scheme Our Engineering journey began when Miss Li-In-Oy came in to our A-Level Maths classes to tell us about the Engineering Education Scheme. She told us that it would involve working side by side with engineers to build a real life product and have the opportunity to gain a Gold Crest Award – the equivalent of an A grade at AS level! She also warned us that if we were accepted we would work for a total of 100 hours and would go on a three day residential on which we would be working for twelve hours a day, but hey – no pain, no gain! This was certainly an opportunity not to be missed! When I heard that last year’s team had designed a dam, I knew I had to be part of this.

So I filled in my application form, got an interview, and was eventually selected to be part of the team – it felt like I had just received my GCSE results again! The team, consisting of myself, Anna, Kamil and Andrew, then attended our first trip to Halcrow Offices, where we were given more information about the scheme and had to participate in a team building challenge against the other schools that were there.

The challenge was to create a tower out of a limited supply of dry spaghetti and jelly babies that would support a golf ball at the top. The team with the tallest tower would win.

With typical Marylebone spirit we were determined to win and although we unfortunately did not, I feel we worked as an excellent team and that we had THE GREATEST design by far (as you can probably see in the photo).

This year we are very lucky to be working with Atkins Global, and our project will involve designing a new oil rig in the North Sea. I can’t wait to start and look forward to working with the rest of the team on this.

Nora - Year 12

STUDENT investor challenge The IFS Student Investor Challenge, a nationwide competition in which students have the opportunity to create and manage their own stock portfolios, launched on November 5th with a number of Year 9 teams registered to take part.

Pupils carefully analysed FTSE 100 companies to decide which offered the best investment opportunities, and have since been assiduously monitoring the capricious rises and falls of the stock market and the impact on their own investments.

Pupils have taken on the challenge with enthusiasm, recognising that it offers a fantastic opportunity to learn more about the industry that has arguably shaped the current world more than any other.

Mr. Watkins

Karen Martin Scholarship The Karen Martin Scholarship is an award of £1000 given to a current Year 12 student who demonstrates a genuine interest in pursuing a career in Engineering. Applicants had to provide a written statement as well as present their ideas about an area of Engineering of particular interest to them to an interview panel.

The standard of applications this year was very high and five particularly talented students were short-listed to face the panel. While all showed themselves to be excellent candidates, after extensive deliberation, a winner for this year’s scholarship was eventually selected.

Congratulations go to all the applicants and in particular, to the worthy winner, Anna P. Anna is hoping her Sixth Form studies in Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Chemistry will help her fulfil her ambitions to pursue further study at Oxford University where she would combine her enjoyment of Engineering with Economics and Management.

Year 9 London Eye Trip This October two groups of Year 9 Mathematicians made the journey across the city to visit the London Eye as part of the Year 9 Maths enrichment curriculum. Once there, pupils carried out a survey to estimate the passenger boarding rate and used this data to estimate passenger numbers for the attraction. Using this information, they were able to calculate accurate estimates for the income generated by the London Eye and all involved enjoyed the opportunity to see how the mathematics of the classroom can be used to solve practical problems in the outside world.

As an added bonus, students enjoyed the ‘4D experience’, a 3-dimensional film that follows a seagull swooping over many of London’s most well-known sights. This offered a different perspective on the city the pupils call home – quite literally a bird’s-eye view. Wind, bubbles and mist added an extra dimension, and made this a truly immersive experience they won’t soon forget!

The students thoroughly enjoyed themselves and worked hard to come up with some impressive conclusions. Thanks to their enthusiasm, the trips were a great success, and the pupils should be proud of themselves for being outstanding ambassadors for the school.

NATIONAL CIPHER CHALLENGE For the first time Marylebone has had four separate teams competing in the National Cipher Challenge. Each week two teams from Year 10, one from the Sixth Form and one from Year 8 have been pitting their wits against the cryptic messages posted on the Cipher Challenge website. Starting with simple Caesar Shift codes, all of the teams have been learning how to attack the more challenging problems involving several parallel alphabets (polyalphabetic ciphers). Along the way they have also been finding out a bit more about the history of code-making and breaking from the days of Julius Caesar to World War II and beyond. One of their recent puzzles required them to implement the discoveries of Charles Babbage - often considered to be the father of modern computing – as they attacked the fiendish Vignere Cipher. At the time of writing, several of our pupils remain at the very top of the national leader board. Well done girls!

Year 8 were set a challenge to create a music video as part of their ICT curriculum work. The song selected was "We got the beat". The year group had to learn the song, and plan and film a music video over two days. Each group successfully filmed enough footage to produce a fantastic music video. On the second day a small group of students edited the video, which was pressured but a rewarding exercise.

The completed videos were premiered at the Year 8 assembly on the last day of the summer term in July 2012. Prizes were awarded to one form of the best story and the camerawork and editing.

Women in IT Event Year 10 ICT students attended the 'Women in Technology' afternoon at Capgemini. The afternoon was very interesting. Many different IT related careers were showcased, students were given information about possible apprenticeships and internships at Capgemini. Finally the CV surgery and interview preparation workshop was particularly useful.

Gamesvision Talk On the 13th November a Year 10 ICT class was visited by Philip Barton from the company Gamevision. He visited to help students with their ICT coursework. Students were given information about trends in gaming across Europe, and the facts and figures involved.

Students found this information very useful as it will help with their coursework which will be based on sources and valid information. Students are currently investigating many different questions, some of which will require facts and figures to allow them to make a valid hypothesis.

Many students could relate to the data, and could explore how we are seen through the eyes of researchers who know nothing about our personalities but only about our age, gender, and gaming patterns.

Outreach work with Hallfields Primary School This term we have been working with Hallfields Primary School to bring ICT into the classroom. The Year 2 class learnt how to use flip cams to record their assembly on Florence Nightingale so they could evaluate their performance. They also learnt about advertising and made their own toothpaste advert.

The Year 5 class had been working on a story about a young boy and wrote their own ending to the story. They worked in groups sharing their ideas and used stop frame animation to show the ending of the story.

Megan W and Anna Maria B (Year 11) entered the annual Manchester animation competition. The competition judges included professionals working at places which include BBC, EA Games, and Google. The girls were shortlisted in this national competition.

The students should be very much congratulated as they won a prize for the amazing animation “Wings of War�. Megan designed and created the animation, Anna wrote and performed the recorded soundtrack for the piece. The day involved a trip to Manchester followed by a presentation ceremony for the prize winners, talks from a game developer for the BBC and a university lecturer. There were also hands on workshops with a flight simulator. The trip was thoroughly enjoyed by both students and their accompanying teacher, Miss W Shaikh.

We are currently running an after-school animation club and hope to have more entries for next year’s competition.

Sports Day House Banners A competition was run in the summer for all of Year 9 in curriculum time. The brief was to design a logo that could be printed on banners to represent each house at the Sports Day Event. There many very good entries but the winner was Ella W (10N).

DANCE PERFORMANCE AT WESTMINSTER ACADEMY As part of the Aspire and Challenge programme in Dance a selection of Year 8 students were chosen to perform at Westminster Academy on Friday 26th October.

Here is what Josephine in 8N thought of the experience: When we performed at Westminster Academy we did an African dance piece because the performance was to celebrate Black History Month. We saw other students perform too, including a poem reading, drumming and break dancing / acrobatics. It felt really good to perform in a place where we had never been before and join in as a community. It was really interesting to see the reactions of the audience. To prepare for this event we learnt and choreographed a routine in dance and a group from Nightingale and Wesley were chosen to merge their dances. We practised after school and at lunch times to link the two dances together and we wanted to perfect it so that when we performed in Westminster Academy we would be prepared. Everyone enjoyed the experience, including the rehearsals!

The Sixth Form Recital Evening took place at Blandford Street Hall on Wednesday 21st November 2012. The evening gave our AS and A level Music students the chance to perform solo pieces in front of family and friends. Three of St Marylebone’s choirs also performed at the event: Shout Out! sang a version of Emeli Sandé’s Read All About It, Chamber Choir performed Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound of Silence, and the Sixth Form Choir sang One Day More from ‘Les Misérables’.

Excellent solo performances were given by Sixth Form students plus a woodwind trio performance and a new Sixth Form Band performing their own version of Let’s Groove.

The evening was a fantastic showcase of the talents of our Sixth Form musicians—well done to all involved.

INNER VOICES CHOIR CAMBRIDGE TRIP Genevieve, 8D On the weekend of 9th November 2012 I went away to Cambridge with a choir I am part of outside of school. This was a great opportunity to make new friends and sing with an amazing choir in a couple of historic places.

After being stuck in traffic for nearly three hours (and fearing for the loss of our dinner), we arrived at our home-to-be for the weekend. We ate dinner, and then began the ‘Chocolympics’. These games consisted of a lot of chocolate eating and resulted in some very sick feelings!

The next day began, and rehearsing was something that everyone was anxious to get started with. We walked through the beautiful city of Cambridge to Trinity College where rehearsals began. First the warm up was taken by our amazing conductor Ralph, then we had a quick run through of our pieces. There was a hot chocolate break at 11.30am and then we went back to carry on rehearsing. This time we ran through all of the pieces with the Director of Music at the University Church, Sam Hayes. After that, everyone had lunch in the hall of Trinity College and we sat with original portraits (including one of Bloody Mary) staring at us!

The afternoon was spent shopping before rehearsing again at Jesus College. Before long we were joined by the Jesus College Choir and their choir master Mark Williams. It was a real honour to sing with such an amazing choir.

We performed Evensong with the choir and I hope it was a success. Afterwards we were treated to dinner with the choir themselves and it was a good chance to ask lots of questions about life at the university!

Bedtime was late again once more. We were up early for a final rehearsal in the Masters Lodgings of Queens College before returning to the coach for a trip back to London. Overall it was an amazing experience that I am thankful I had the opportunity to participate in.

Under the direction of Ralph Allwood MBE, Director of Music at Eton College for the last 26 years, the Inner Voices Choir offers a first class choral education to our students, with weekly rehearsals and regular performances. Bringing Ralph, described by The Times as ‘the finest trainer of young choirs in the country today’, into the state sector has been a real bonus for our pupils and brought to them the life-enhancing joy of singing in a truly great choir.

Inner Voices is a Registered Charity (No. 1144419).

To find out more about the choir, please go to: innervoices.co.uk

St Marylebone Drama & Theatre Studies Department Announces WAY OUT theatre and FRIDAY MASTERCLASS

WE NEED YOUR HELP As part of our endeavour to inspire and challenge our Drama students, we are running two very exciting projects.

WAY OUT theatre is a project designed to bring in fringe theatre companies to perform in front of our students. This programme provides emerging artists with a ready made audience and enables more of our students to easily access current theatre productions.

FRIDAY MASTERCLASS is an all inclusive lunchtime drop in session during which students, parents, teachers and friends of the school deliver specialist Drama classes on a range of topics from sound and costume design to specific performing skills such as acting for the camera.

HOW CAN YOU HELP? We know that we have some very talented parents at our school and we would love it if you could share your skills with our students, whether as a performance, a talk, or a practical workshop, we would really like to share professional knowledge. If you are anyone you know is interested in any of the above opportunities (and it may even be your child at school) please send an email enquiry to Miss Goodman, Director of Drama and Theatre Studies: a.goodman@stmarylebone.westminster.sch.uk.

THE ST MARYLEBONE CE BRIDGE SCHOOL St Marylebone’s successful bid in July 2012 to open a new Special Free School was a cause for enormous celebration. The St Marylebone CE Bridge School (SMBS) will be one of only five new Special Schools in the country when it opens its doors in September 2013.

The school is currently in its pre-opening phase and we are working closely with the Department for Education (DfE) and the Education Funding Agency (EFA) to establish the required policies, procedures and premises to ensure we are ready for opening on time.

Much work has been completed this term by the school’s project team: A new Governing Body has been founded, made up of governors from the main school, which has already met formally twice to shape the development of the new school. This close affiliation is important to promote the inclusion and excellence of the main school’s ethos. In time, representatives from the school’s staff and parents as well as the Head of SMBS will join the Governing Body. We are very grateful and fortunate that we have such a generous and talented group of governors who are willing to add to their busy workloads.

The premises are the project’s biggest challenge. We are currently sourcing a site for conversion but it is likely that the school will begin, like many London Free Schools, in temporary accommodation or by utilising existing specialist space at Blandford Street until the site is ready.

SMBS already has its own prospectus and this is available to download from the main school’s website. Staff, Governors, parents and carers, the School Council and pupils have all been introduced to the aims and progress of the initial stages of the project and had a chance for discussion. Reaction has been overwhelmingly positive.

Once we have agreement on the site then we will start a full-scale consultation with the local community, similar in nature to the one required for the main school’s move to Academy status.

Numbers of pupils applying to the school have already been positive. Parents of pupils with special needs have been enquiring and many have visited our current provision to talk with teachers. Watch out for regular updates and a new blog on the St Marylebone School website. If you have any questions please contact Matthew Glenn, Deputy Headteacher.

Dates for your diary Thursday 20th December 2012 Service of Lessons and Carols St Marylebone Parish Church, 7.00pm Tuesday 12th, Wednesday 13th, Thursday 14th February 2013 St Marylebone Dance Show St Marylebone School Theatre, 7.00pm

Term Dates End of Term 2: Friday 21st December, 12.30pm Term 3: Tuesday 8th January - Friday 15th February 2013 Inter-term break: Monday 18th February - Friday 22nd February 2013 Term 4: Monday 25th February - Wednesday 27th March 2013