Head’s Letters

Friday 9 November 2018

Dear Parents

There are some occasions as head of a Prep school where you feel even more proud of the children than normal, and this week has seen two occasions where this has most certainly been the case.

Yesterday, 5S gave a wonderful assembly reflecting on World War One and the sacrifices of so many men and women. The names of the 27 Abingdon School pupils and staff that died were read out. They then explained how the arts had been impacted by the war, looking at paintings by artists such as Nash, Butler and Orpen, as well as the poetry of Sassoon, Binyon and Blunden. A selection of Year 8 boys then read out poems that they had written about the trench warfare that cost the lives of so many. They were incredibly moving and really reflected an understanding of the hardships and camaraderie of the troops involved. Our two minute silence today was immaculately observed and our Year 8 trumpeter played the Last Post quite beautifully. These commemorations put so many of our own worries into perspective.

Sadly, I was unable to witness first hand our senior choir’s incredible performance at the Royal Albert Hall on Wednesday, but I am so proud of them for simply being involved. Our boys returned absolutely buzzing from the experience and by all accounts the concert was quite simply stunning and what an incredible opportunity for our boys to support pupils with special needs and sing as a massed choir at such a venue. Huge thanks to Debbie and her team for orchestrating this wonderful event for our boys.

Continuing the musical theme, our second concert platform of the term took place last Friday and as always we had a fabulous range of musicians perform, with percussion taking a lead role this time around. Potential music scholars performed alongside those just starting out on their musical journeys and the audience was certainly appreciative of their efforts.

Our Year 8s were away on Monday and Tuesday on their Geography Field Trip to Swanage to study the Jurassic coastline, with the stunning views of Durdle Door and Lulworth Cove. They came back tired after the long walks but full of geographical knowledge and having produced some stunning sketches too.

The art workshop last Saturday saw our boys etching designs from the natural world into glass before adding colour and printing onto a range of mediums. They were stunning and even baby Quinn, who came along with me to see them in action, seemed to be very impressed!

Rugby matches this week saw us take on a range of schools with a number of mixed teams out to match the strength of our opponents from Bruern Abbey and Christ Church Cathedral School. Our U10, U11, U12 and U13 teams achieved a raft of very positive victories, with our U10s performing really well, continuing their strong performances after their efforts at the MCS festival earlier in the week. Yesterday, our U8s and U9s competed in the Abingdon Prep rugby festival with lots of quick-fire fixtures and some great rugby played by all the schools which attended. For those boys not involved, there was an inter school tag tournament which was just as fiercely contested!

Next week is our Anti Bullying week and there are a number of activities planned for all of the different age groups. The theme for the week is RESPECT. It is so important that our boys appreciate the impact that their words and actions can have on others, both positively and negatively, and that showing respect towards everyone is a key part of any community.

Despite the very ordinary weather forecast for this evening, we are all looking forward to Firestorm and the lightsabers and hog roast that come before. Fingers crossed the high winds stay away tonight and I look forward to seeing many of you at the event. Huge thanks to the JPA and all other volunteers for helping to put this together for our boys.

I also wanted to mention that I will be having a Coffee and Catch up morning on Friday 23 November. This will be in the Drama Studio between 8.15-9am. It would be lovely to chat to anyone who is free and fancies an early coffee and even a pastry of some description. An additional reminder will go out in the weekly mailing, next week.

I hope you all have a lovely, restful weekend after such a busy week for the boys, and fingers crossed for good weather this evening.

Best wishes

Craig

A Year 8 poem from yesterday’s assembly, which I wanted to share with you all:

The Poppy Field

As the sun comes up
They head down
To the trenches far below
Then they sit and wait
For hours on end
Hoping they won’t have to go.

But the time does come
When they have to climb
Out of their little safe place
And avoid being killed
By the bloodthirsty shots
That pepper the unknown space.

And when they hear
The whistle blow
And run into no-man’s land
They have to face
The bombs and gas
With only a gun in hand.

And once they’ve shot
And killed a few
They run back to their side
And keep on doing this
Again and again
Until everyone has died.

And then one day
The fighting stopped
And the soldiers returned to their wives
And no-man’s land
Became a field
Where poppies were the only lives.

Friday 2 November 2018

Dear Parents

I hope that everyone had a very enjoyable half term break and it was lovely to see the boys bouncing back into school refreshed from their holidays. The weather has certainly turned colder this week and the darker nights are most definitely upon us.

On Tuesday, the Junior section had a fascinating assembly given to them by Suzanne about the origins of Halloween. The boys and I certainly learnt much about the Celts and Druids and the evolution of Halloween, Turnip Carving and Soul Cakes.

On Wednesday, our wonderful grounds team, led by Richard, travelled to Birmingham for an awards ceremony celebrating the best kept school grounds in England. Abingdon Foundation came second which is a fantastic and well-earned recognition. We really are fortunate to have such amazing sports pitches and superbly kept grounds across both school sites and I would like to thank the team for all of their hard work keeping our school looking superb and our pitches in such immaculate condition.

Yesterday our boys in Year 5-8 were given an excellent interactive talk from Alicia Drummond about a vital aspect of life – Resilience. Alicia gave the boys some great advice and our boys really enjoyed the interactive nature of her talk and the important message that she put across. Trying to eat an apple without removing your mouth from it was certainly a challenge! Do ask the boys about the acronym GRIT and what each letter stands for. Resilience is something that all our children will need to really make the most of their abilities. The bouncebackability of the minion balloon was also a winner.

Today saw Dragon House celebrate their victory in the house merit cup with a home clothes day and our Reception boys had a talk from a dentist first thing, so I am sure their teeth brushing tonight should be much improved!

Midweek matches this week saw our Middle and Senior section boys take on Oratory Prep in some very hard fought matches against strong opposition. There were some super performances which saw close matches being shaded by Oratory but our U12 As won a very high quality game 20-15. Our U9s took on St Hugh’s with all of the boys involved again and some more very close matches ensued with APS winning 1, losing 1 and drawing 1.

I wanted to take this opportunity to publicly thank all our fabulous volunteer parents who come into school to help with all manner of events, especially at this time of year with preparations for Firestorm, the Christmas Bazaar and Gifts for Grown-ups which all take a huge amount of time and effort to organise. Our JPA committee and form reps are all busying themselves to put everything in place for the boys for these exciting events in the upcoming weeks. I would also like to mention all of our wonderful library volunteers who help to ensure our boys continue to love their books. As with all staffing appointments, we always undertake the necessary checks and processes to ensure that our boys and indeed the volunteers themselves are always kept safe.

Richard joined us this week as our Abingdon Prep Porter so you may well see him out in the car park of a morning in a high vis jacket and working around the school. Please do say hello and welcome him into our community.

Next week is one of the busiest of the term with the Year 8 Geography residential trip to Swanage, our choir singing in the combined schools buddy choir concert at The Royal Albert Hall on Wednesday and Firestorm and our own Remembrance Service on Friday.

Tomorrow we have our second Saturday Sculpture Workshop of the term for Year 7 and 8 pupils, and I am looking forward to popping in and seeing what the boys are producing.

Have a good weekend.

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 12 October 2018

Dear Parents

The warm weather made a welcome return this week with some beautifully autumnal misty mornings greeting us on the way into school.

On Monday our Reception boys visited Cogges Farm where they were fully involved in bread making, goat feeding and finding out all about the food that ends up on our dinner plates. This was a lovely follow up from the Harvest Festival last week. They absolutely loved their day out and I really enjoyed hearing all about it from the boys.

Our Year 5s visited the Black Country museum yesterday and experienced first-hand life in Victorian England and the industries that dominated the towns and cities. It is a wonderful open air museum with reconstructed buildings from a bygone era with a rather narrow tunnel to walk down to experience life as a coal miner! The boys certainly enjoyed it and their creative writing about Victorian England will be so much more vivid as a result. There was some level of horror when they discovered that Victorian sweets often contained arsenic and mercury. I think they will be sticking to Haribo!

Despite a rather wet start to Saturday, our Open Morning was a very busy affair and as always, our boys were the star attraction. The Year 7 tour guides did a brilliant job and appeared to really enjoy sharing their thoughts and experiences of life at Abingdon Prep with our guests. I had a lot of positive comments about how well the boys were working in the classrooms, especially given it was a Saturday morning!

Yesterday’s assembly saw the award of the House Merit Cup for this half of term with Dragon being victorious. Congratulations to all of the boys for earning so many merits in the first six weeks of the year. The results are as follows:

1st – Dragon 1666
2nd – Phoenix 1598
3rd – Griffin 1569
4th – Unicorn 1549

Rugby this week pitted the U10s, U11s, U12s and U13s against Beachborough and the boys acquitted themselves very well with some great results for our B and C teams with high scoring games taking place across the board. Our U8s and U9s also enjoyed some high scoring matches against Oratory Prep with a highlight being a resounding win for the U9As. Our U11s are competing in a festival on Saturday, despite it being half term and I hope they have a great day out and I wish our biathletes all the best for Abingdon Vale competition on Sunday. Our U13s football squad came so close to qualifying for the IAPS national finals last Saturday, losing a penalty shootout for the final spot. This was a great effort in such trying conditions. It has certainly been a busy week on the games field.

I wanted to take this chance to remind you all of our upcoming Fireworks event and the Christmas Bazaar which both occur in November. They are great events, so do get the dates in your diaries and sign up for your fireworks tickets.

I read that there were only 11 Fridays until Christmas this week. Now there’s a scary thought! I hope you all have a great half term break, whether you are enjoying a holiday abroad or a quiet time at home. I am looking forward to spending some time with my wife, Quinn and Dizzy on long autumnal walks in the beautiful Oxfordshire countryside.

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 5 October 2018

Dear Parents

As the calendar flicked over to October this week, my wife made me turn the heating on at home despite my protestations, and we had to switch it on at school too after such a chilly start to the week. I have though, enjoyed standing at the front gate in the autumn sunshine welcoming the boys into school.

Yesterday our Years 4-6 enjoyed meeting author Nicki Thornton who gave a fantastic talk about writing and inspiration and I know the boys’ creative writing will have benefitted hugely from her passion and advice. Many of the boys bought a signed copy and I am certain they will enjoy reading her novel, ‘The Last Chance Hotel’.

Our Year 8s visited the Natural History Museum in Oxford this week for a combined Art and Science trip and judging by the photographs, they had a great time learning about scientific discoveries and drawing many of the display items they saw. Trips are such an important part of learning and create memories that last far beyond school. Our Year 7s were also out today visiting the Roman Baths in Bath. Having been there on numerous occasions myself, I know what an incredible place it is first hand and I look forward to chatting to the boys about it on their return.

A small group of Year 5 and 6 boys are also competing in the MCS quiz this afternoon and I know they will have acquitted themselves very well with their all-round knowledge of the wider world and current affairs.

Sport this week saw our senior teams take on some very strong Cheltenham College sides. Matches here finished honours even with 2 wins and 2 losses which was a super effort. Our middle section saw 8 teams playing in some incredibly close matches against Chandlings which ended in 4 wins, 3 losses and 1 draw. It is great to see so many boys involved in matches and enjoying being part of a team. I would also like to wish our U13 boy’s football team the best of luck as they compete in the regional IAPS qualifiers this Saturday.

Our Pre-Prep celebrated the Harvest Festival today with a beautiful service. For our reception boys this was their first chance to perform to an audience and they really seemed to take it in their stride. Our Year 1s and 2s seemed like seasoned pros as they presented to their families in the audience. Their confidence and clarity of expression always impresses me, especially considering how young they still are. I would like to extend a huge thank you to all of our parents for their incredibly generous donations of food which will be taken to The Gatehouse, a homeless charity in Oxford. I know how immensely grateful they are and it is so important to support our local community.

Tomorrow sees our Open Morning take place and I am looking forward to showing our fabulous school to prospective parents. Our Year 7s will be touring them around and I know our visitors will enjoy seeing the boys in action and chatting to them about our school. We have much to be proud of and our boys are by far the best way for us to show others what it means to be part of the Abingdon Prep community.

I hope you all have a great weekend.

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 28 September 2018

Dear Parents

Apologies for not being able to greet many of you at the front gate this week but I have been away for the last three days at the IAPS Heads Conference in Wales which has involved a fascinating series of talks and seminars with the theme of ‘Tomorrow’s World; Global Citizens’. Apologies, therefore, for the shorter letter that I have put together today.

On Saturday last week we played Cokethorpe on the rugby pitch and managed to secure a clean sweep of wins for our four teams involved. It was lovely to watch all the boys playing for each other and embodying the team spirit that is so important to any community. On Wednesday our U13A and B teams took on Abingdon School and two high quality matches ensued, with the As putting in an impressive win and the Bs just narrowly missing out on a victory, though it was close match.

On Thursday our U8s and U9s played CCCS and produced some lovely rugby with strong performances. All of our teams performed well, with the U8s having a draw and a loss, and the U9s As and Cs claiming fantastic wins, and the Bs only just losing out. These performances came on the back of a very successful cross country meet run by Abingdon School last week where APS were again victorious in a field of six other schools including Abingdon School, Caldicott, Magdalen and Cokethorpe. Cross Country continues to go from strength to strength.

Representing the Abingdon Foundation our U10 and U12 Swimmers, along with boys from Abingdon School competed in the annual Griffin Gala against the Abingdon Vale Swimming Club. All of our swimmers enjoyed a full programme of swimming and gained a great deal experience from the event.

The junior section assembly this week discussed new beginnings and making the most of opportunities available to us. It was enlightening to hear from the teachers what their new beginnings and goals were for this academic year and the boys responded well in thinking about theirs. Many boys are taking the opportunity to perform at the concert platform tonight, and I wish them luck and look forward to hearing about it upon my return.

I hope you all have a very enjoyable weekend. 

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 21 September 2018

Dear Parents

This week has been our Safety Week at school with the boys learning about different aspects of how to keep themselves safe, both in and out of school. There have been some very interesting discussions about the internet and social media with many of the older boys, whilst some of the younger boys have been eagerly discussing playground and road safety. As with so many areas of life, common sense is so often the answer. Our Pre-Prep were treated to a visit from the fire service today which was a definite highlight for them.

Our Year 4s have undertaken their first ever residential trip this week. They have been walking along the Ridgeway with an overnight stay at a Youth Hostel. I was lucky enough to join them for the evening and hear about the excitement of the days walk and the very blustery wind. Luckily it appears to have been blowing them towards their destination for most of the day! The rain dissipated for Thursday afternoon and the sun was shining today for them. It is a great way to start the year and sets them up nicely for future school residentials.

Rugby this week saw us playing Pinewood with all boys in Years 5 and 6 representing the school. For a first match of the season the standard from both teams was incredibly high and our U11 teams were victorious whilst our U10 teams lost some matches which were very close. Much was learned from this as it should be the case with all matches. Our U13 As were unbeaten at the Pinewood festival, continuing their strong start to the season, whilst our U13 Bs and U12 As both enjoyed good wins. Our U12 Bs lost by a single try in a super game between two evenly matched sides. Our Year 3s also made their rugby debuts this week playing in mixed teams against The Manor. The boys all seemed to really enjoy their first taste of matches, and indeed their first taste of match teas!

Our School Council from last year completed their handover and gave a lovely assembly on all of the good work and projects that they have been involved with over the year. Some of these are ongoing and our new council members were announced in assembly. I know they are all excited to get started and looking forward to having a say in what is happening at school. I would also like to thank all of the boys who stood in the school council elections, whether they got voted into a position or not. It is great to have so many boys wanting to be a part of this school group.

I spent a good deal of time in CDT this week and was lucky enough to take part in Jitterbugs, jigsaws and a buzzwire game. The boys had produced some fabulous work with super use of fretsaws, and electronic components to design their creations. CDT is thriving at Abingdon Prep.

Our first Art workshop of the year took place last Saturday which was based around the theme of sculpture. It was a great success and extremely popular with the boys who were able to create some very impressive pieces. I know the upcoming workshops will be equally popular and enjoyable.

Tomorrow sees our first Saturday Rugby fixtures against Cokethorpe and I look forward to watching our boys from Year 4 to Year 8 and seeing many of you on the sidelines.

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 14 September

Dear Parents

It was lovely to welcome so many of you to the Informal Parents’ Evening on Tuesday. I hope that you found the talks with the form teachers useful and informative and that you got to meet some of our new parents too. I certainly enjoyed chatting to many of you and catching up after the summer break.

Very rarely would I wish for rain at any time of year but sadly our first rugby matches of term had to be cancelled due to the hard ground, so with any luck we might have a few heavy showers next week to help soften the ground, or at least a few more of the misty mornings that signify autumn is very much on its way. However, our U13 As did compete at the Dragon tournament against some impressive opposition. Our boys performed admirably losing to Caldicott and The Beacon but beating St Hugh’s, St John’s Leatherhead and Abingdon School. Ashley was delighted with their first run out and the boys came back injury free and looking forward to their upcoming matches.

Class pairings took place for the first time this year on Thursday and it was based around the theme of construction. It was great to see our older boys helping our younger ones as they designed and built a range of different structures, from boats and planes to houses and islands. Cross year group friendships are something that are always in evidence at Abingdon Prep and help to bind our community together.

Tomorrow we have the first of our art workshops with the theme being Sculpture. I know that it will be an inspiring course and I am looking forward to seeing the finished products.

Safety week begins on Monday and the boys will have many opportunities to learn about safety in different situations, from online safety to road safety. I know there will be a lot of interesting discussions in classes so that the boys have a better understanding of how to keep themselves and others safe. An extremely important life lesson.

I hope you all have a good weekend and as autumn starts to take hold, perhaps some conker collecting and blackberry picking is in order!

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 7 September

Dear Parents

Term has finally started and we have been welcomed back with some great weather and a school full of boys with energy and enthusiasm. It has been lovely for me to start to get to know so many of our new pupils and I hope that both they and their parents are already feeling part of our Abingdon Prep community.

As with all our terms, the Michaelmas term is a busy one with fixtures, trips, our Saturday Open Morning which all the boys attend, Firestorm, the Christmas Bazaar and lots of work both inside and outside of the classroom. I firmly believe that being busy at school is a great thing and I am looking forward to all of these events. We have wasted no time in getting started and yesterday our Year 6 boys departed for their Cornbury Bushcraft adventure. There were a lot of smiling faces and clean clothes as they got onto the minibuses. I am sure the smiling faces will still be there on their return but perhaps not the clean clothes, especially for those boys who opt to eschew the tents and sleep in the dens they have created!

My first assembly of term focused on three messages that I want all of our boys to make a key part of their lives at Abingdon Prep. These were – Work Hard, Get Involved and Be Kind. I sometimes feel that life can be over complicated with so many different instructions and rules to abide by, but if we all embrace these messages, then we will continue to build a strong and very successful community within the school.

One of my favourite things about being a Headmaster is that I get to wander around school popping in and out of different lessons. This week, I watched our Year 8s studying DNA and the role of chromosomes and I saw our Year 4s playing number games in Maths by rolling dice to create a number and then having to work out the remainder to get to 100. Our Year 3s were creating booklets about their first week at school and in French our Year 6s were writing about their hobbies whilst Year 1 were making marmalade sandwiches with exercises about Paddington Bear!

Our delightful new Reception class have been out in the play area on the trikes and were telling me all about the hole in the road, so the trikes had to go around it to keep safe. Our ‘Learning Lions’ seem to have been smiling all week and certainly learning much about their new school.

The ‘Other Half’ activities have started with a bang and our new prep club for the junior section has proved popular too.

I hope you all have a great weekend and that the boys are not too tired after the exertions of their first week of term. I look forward to catching up with many of you at the informal parents evening on Tuesday night.

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 31 August

Dear Parents

I hope you have all had a great Summer holiday and that your boys, and yourselves, are looking forward to getting back to a new academic year at Abingdon Prep. We will have 48 new pupils joining our community and I know that they will be welcomed as warmly as I was this time last year. The holidays have flown by with some fantastic weather to get out and about in.

It was lovely to see so many Year 5 – 8 boys at pre-season Rugby yesterday for a bit of early season practice. The weather was kind and a little bit of rain in the preceding weeks had turned the playing fields back to green after the desert like appearance through the summer! They were certainly not soft but more than playable for a game of Rugby. It was lovely to meet some of our new boys and for them to meet up with some of their contemporaries prior to the start of term. Our two new GAP students joined us and showed off their rugby knowledge. They are Ned and Nathan. Ned is with us from the USA (Minnesota) for the year and Nathan is more local from West Hanney. We are delighted to welcome Sam back as he joins us again for another year.

We have a number of other new staff joining us this term. Many of the boys will have met them at Move Up Morning but please do come and introduce yourselves to them when you have the opportunity. Natasha is our Head of English, Drama and Year 6 form teacher, Rebecca is our Head of Science, Russell our Head of French and Year 7 form teacher, and Helen our new junior Science teacher. Lucy Hamerton has also joined the administration team and you will meet her in the mornings in the school office.

I look forward to meeting all of our new parents at the informal drinks tonight and others of you at the informal parents evening on the 11 September, at the gate in the mornings or on the side of the pitches at fixtures!

Best wishes

Craig

Friday 6 July 2018

Dear Parents

It seems like only yesterday that I stood outside the front entrance welcoming the boys into school on the first day of term in September, rather conscious of the fact I did not know any boys’ names, let alone parents’ names! The year has simply flown by, and I certainly feel far more comfortable standing outside welcoming you all into school now!

I have thoroughly enjoyed my first year here at Abingdon Prep, and feel very fortunate to be part of this warm community with such delightful and talented boys. It has been a very special year for me with the birth of our first child coinciding with becoming Headmaster here. I think I can safely say that I am looking forward to a more restful first week of the holidays, if Quinn shows willing…

Yesterday evening’s Summer Concert was an enchanting way to wrap up such a busy term. It was lovely to see all of the boys involved and showcasing their musical talents. We are very fortunate to have so many outstanding musicians in school.

Our end of term Prize Giving was a splendid way to celebrate the achievements of the year and to recognise our impressive cohort of Year 8 boys, many of whom have been with us since Reception. They have distinguished themselves in so many different areas over the years and I hope they will look back in years to come with fond memories of their time here and the friendships they have made. I know they will be moving on to their new schools well prepared to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

On Tuesday this week three of our boys travelled to the Alexandra Stadium in Birmingham to compete in the National Prep Schools Athletics finals. Rather impressively, all three won medals so we now have the U11 High Jump champion, the U13 Long Jump Champion and the second fastest U13 1500m runner in our midst. I have never before worked in a school where such results have been achieved at this event. The boys should be immensely proud of their efforts.

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to wish all of those involved with our Abingdon Prep community a very enjoyable and relaxing summer holiday and I look forward to welcoming the boys back in September, hopefully knowing a lot more names this time around! I try not to tempt fate by mentioning the World Cup but we can live in hope. Too late – I have mentioned it!

Best wishes

Craig