10 Dec 2021

WEEKLY MAILING

This week’s mailing is:

Letters:

Notices:

From the Headmaster to all parents:

 

End of Term Reports

These will be published to the parent portal over the weekend.  If you cannot see the report on the portal by Monday 13 December, please contact [email protected] which is also the contact if you do not currently have a log on to the portal but think that you should have one.

Holiday reading 

The Library and the English department have encouraged students to find time for reading over the holiday period. Christmas is an ideal time to rediscover the pleasure of a great story and all of the associated benefits that reading brings.

To help students select from what can be a bewildering blizzard of choice, we’ve recommended twelve books for each year group, which are on on the attached Christmas cards. Do encourage your child to take a look; we’re confident that at least one of them will appeal!

We’ve also encouraged students to enter The Christmas Three Reading Challenge (read three books over three weeks and answer three questions on each). A link to the full details and the entry form is in their school email inbox.

Last but not least, we’ve created a Christmas card with book recommendations for adults. We hope it will inspire you.

2nd Year HPV Vaccinations – Reminder

A second email has been sent to parents and carers of Second year pupils with information on how to give consent for the 1st dose of the HPV vaccination. This is currently scheduled to be given at the start of the Lent term. Please check your junk email folder if you have not received this as some parents have reported finding the previous email there.

Please contact the Health centre directly if you still cannot access this email, bearing in mind that the Health centre is closed for the school holidays. It is really important that the school have up to date contact details for sending such important information to parents so please let the school know if your email address changes so that we can update our records.

Music video of Christmas Concert:

The Christmas Concert 2021 provided a particularly special opportunity to celebrate live music making after too long a gap – and the pupils were able to share with a full audience some confident performances in their choirs, orchestra and bands. The concert was streamed to families who couldn’t attend in person and this edited video gives a good idea of the concert. We heard performances from three choral groups, the close harmony Academicals, the Gospel Choir and the entire first year of some 66 pupils. The orchestras included the Chamber Orchestra (Haydn’s C major cello concerto with soloist and Berkshire Young Musician of the year, Oliver Simpson), Second Orchestra (Verdi, Shostakovich and Horovitz’ La La Land) and First Orchestra (Rossini’s William Tell Overture). Finally our bands, Concert Band and Big Band, were in fine form with some toe-tapping numbers, including some seasonal cheer from the former with Leroy Anderson’s Christmas Festival. Our thanks to all the pupils and staff involved – and to Nick Lloyd and the Amey Theatre team, who put together this video. We hope you will enjoy it.

Abingdon Box Office:

  • ROH Live: Tosca 2021 – Wednesday 15 December at 7:15pm. Into the romantic world of an idealistic painter Cavaradossi and his lover Tosca comes the malevolence of Baron Scarpia, Chief of Police, with fatal results. Elena Stikina, Bryan Hymel and Alexey Markov bring to life one of the best loved operas in The Royal Opera repertory: Puccini’s Tosca. Love and evil come – thrillingly – face to face in Jonathan Kent’s intense production. Please note this will be screening live from the Royal Opera House.

Early bird discounts available for February half term holiday camps 

We are pleased to inform parents and pupils that we have a variety of high quality February half term camps taking place at Abingdon Senior School that we hope will be of interest to you and your friends. This includes:

  • Competition Level Tennis Academy (Ages 11-15 years)
  • World of Games – 2D and 3D Gaming (Ages 13-17 years)
  • Automatronix – Tech Camp (Ages 8-12 years)
  • Bit:bot Cars – Coding Camp (Ages 13-17 years)
  • The Land of Ozobots – Robotics Camp (Ages 8-12 years)

We are offering a 10% early bird discount offer on these courses, if booked before Tuesday 4 January 2022.

For more information and to view the full range of holiday camps available to pupils during February half term, please click here. Please note, all of these courses can be booked directly through the Leisure website.  If you require further information, please email [email protected]

From the ASPA Chair, Richard Stone:

I hope you have all had a good first term of the school year. It seems hard to believe it is already at an end. ASPA has been busy planning what we might be able to do this year in terms of getting parents together and it was a pleasure to meet some of you at the school’s new parent events earlier this term. Our main objective is to enable new parents to get together and we are very conscious that the pandemic has prevented this from happening. All being well, we are planning three year group parent events next term. Please save the following dates in your diaries! Tuesday 15 March (Third Year Parents), Thursday 17 March (Fourth Year Parents) and Monday 21 March (Lower School Parents). Please keep an eye out for further details in the New Year. We also hope to run a whole school parent event in the summer term. All of this is obviously Covid rules permitting. I hope you all have an enjoyable Christmas Break and look forward to finally having some parent events in the New year.

Next Term

Term begins on Wednesday 5 January 2022 at 8.35am with tutor time, followed by lessons from 9am.  It will be week A timetable.

News from the Week:

School Calendar

Any amendments to Lent Term 2022 events made after today will be indicated clearly on the School Calendar.  Parents may wish to consult the term dates page to remind themselves of the beginnings and ends of terms and half-terms.

Here is the link to previous weekly mailings.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year