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Christmas is Coming!

As the end of term draws nigh, we have been busy with our Christmas activities. The Foundation Stage nativity play was an absolute delight with beautiful singing, marvellous acting and gorgeous costumes and a baby born in the manger before the inn keeper agreed to their stay! All the parents and grandparents who attended agreed that this is definitely where their Christmas starts. Not a dry eye in the house!

The Years 1 – 4 nativity followed and again was a wonderful event. The girls are such accomplished, confident performers and we heard every word to every song. The girls even sung two carols in French complete with dancing stars. Well done to everyone who took part!

The Christmas Fayre was a tremendous success! Santa was kept very busy in his grotto and his elves did a grand job of keeping the excited queue in order. The stalls did very well and the atmosphere was very festive! The cutest pet photo competition was very difficult to judge but the pig with the reindeer ears was amazing!

The Modern Foreign Languages Department had a busy week organising lots of activities including a treasure hunt and a quiz. The girls made boots to leave out on St. Nicholas’ Night – for those who had been good he gave sweets and to those who had not, twigs! We learnt lots about how Christmas is celebrated in other countries.

We are looking forward to the Junior and Senior Carol Services and of course the Christmas lunch as we write!

Leading Sailor, Ian Walker Visits the School

Double Olympic Silver medalist and skipper of Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, IanWalker, visited School, ahead of the Volvo Ocean Race, to speak to the whole School about his two decade career in sailing, his experiences and what it takes to become a leading sportsman. Mr Walker is a parent at Wykeham House with two girls in the Junior School.

Ian explained how he started sailing from the age of eight on a lake near his home in London. From this time on Ian had two goals, to sail in the Olympics and to sail around the World. Ian qualified for the Olympics in 1996 where he won his first silver medal in Atlanta, America. In 2000 Ian won his second silver in Sydney missing out on the Gold by one point. Ian was also Olympic Coach to Shirley Robertson’s Gold medal winning team in Athens 2004.

Encouraging the girls to work hard to achieve their goals and explaining the level of commitment it takes to become a top sportsman Ian said, ‘I am living my childhood dream, I have worked very hard for a long time to achieve it.’

Ian explained to the girls about life on board the boat during the Volvo Ocean Race, which takes competitors around the world and is seen as the toughest challenge in sailing. The boats are made from Carbon fibre and the masts are 30 metres tall, 11 people live on board, 10 of these sail and the other records the journey for the media and the website through a series of pictures, film and interviews.Showing the girls the route of the round the world race, Ian explained that it is 26000 miles around the world but the race itself is 39 000 miles as a longer route is taken to take advantage of the wind. The race starts in Spain and ends on 3rd July in Gallway, Ireland. Describing how tough conditions can be during the race, Ian explained that the crew take it turns to sleep and this can often only be in one or two hour blocks and that they need to eat a lot of food as the work is so physical, and the crew can only take one change of clothes for each week.

Ian told the girls a little about the wildlife and the weather conditions they see during the race, including whales, dolphins, turtles and the albatross. They also encounter waves up to 14 metres in height and ice bergs the size of half a football pitch.

Following this assembly we will be following his progress throughout the race and may even be able to email him some questions about sailing conditions, his position within the race and the wildlife they are observing.

Busy Start to New Term!

It was good to see the girls returning after the long summer break filled with enthusiasm and all looking so well. We have welcomed many new girls and they are settling into their new classes well. The extensive extra curricular activities have started with many new members, which is very pleasing. St John Ambulance, which meets on Mondays, is the biggest it has ever been and Mrs Jones (5LJ’s teacher) has joined Mrs Favill, Mrs Burley and Mrs Jackson as part of the team. For our younger girls, Ms Pendry has started a Rainbows group and their red uniform has brightened up Wednesdays from 4 – 5 pm. There are so many things for our girls to join in with from Meditation to Multi-Sports to Music to Maths! We also have a new After School Care team – Mrs Batchelor and Miss Marriner have organised some fun and creative activities including cooking which the girls really enjoy. Some of the Year 10 girls have completed their Duke of Edinburgh assessed expedition last weekend. A Wykeham House girl is never bored and we are all looking forward to a busy and productive Autumn Term!

Rainbows

Under the careful guidance of Ms Pendry and with help from ex pupil Sarah Forfar, Wykeham House has started a Rainbow group. Rainbows are the youngest of the 'Brownies and Guides' and it is wonderful to have girls from Reception to Year 3 staying on after School from 4 - 5 pm every Wednesday to join in the activities. If you would like your daughter to be involved, more information is available either from Ms Pendry or the School office.

The Wimbledon Championships 2011

On Tuesday 28th June, some of Wykeham House girls attended this prestigious tournament. Despite the thunder storm, the girls were lucky enough to watch the Bryan brothers play a doubles match and it was great to learn that they become this years Mens Doubles Wimbledon Champions. Please click here to view photographs taken at the tournament.

Aegon International Tennis Tournament at Eastbourne

On the 16th June the Senior girls attended this prestigious pre – Wimbledon tennis tournament and they had a wonderful day. The girls watched some excellent tennis matches including; Venus Williams v Daniela Hantuchova, Vera Zvonareva v Samantha Stosur and Janko Tipsarevic v Grigor Dimitov.

Many of the girls bought a large tennis ball and they collected autographs from several of the top players, including Serena Williams, who was watching her sister’s match Venus that day. To complete this exciting day, the girls were thrilled to spot the actress Patsy Palmer and were delighted to add her autograph to their collection too!

Trip to the Costa Brava

Some of our Senior girls enjoyed a School multi sports activity holiday during the May half term. Miss Wilson led the trip to Costa Brava where the girls were able to try their hand at sailing, windsurfing, kayaking, snorkelling and mountain bike riding. They also visited Port Aventura to ride the many roller coasters and Activ-Natura to climb through the trees. A great time was had by all.

Osmington Bay PGL Trip

Our Year 6 had a fabulous time during their week’s residential trip at Osmington Bay. In glorious sunshine and stunning scenery they participated in a number adventurous and fun activities.



The girls rose to new heights and challenges in activities that fostered great teamwork and leadership skills. Well done girls!

Success for Wykeham House School at the Royal Windsor Horse Show Schools’ Day Competition.

On Friday 13th May, Year 7 was invited to the Royal Windsor Horse Show to take part in a Schools’ Day organised by the British Horse Society. The day commenced with a seminar where the girls learnt about many aspects of horse welfare and safety as a rider.
The girls then had the opportunity to wander the grounds and watch the horses and ponies taking part in jumping, showing and carriage driving classes. Some of the girls were lucky enough to see and photograph the Queen! The girls also enjoyed the fair and the many physical challenges and exhibits provided by the Army and Navy.

In the afternoon, the girls then took part in the Schools’ Day team challenges. One team had to complete challenges relating to the topics that they had learnt in the seminar. One of the challenges was to dress up a teacher as a horse! Mrs Kennard was volunteered and the girls were timed for completing this transformation; much to their amusement.

A second team had to jump over a miniature Top Score Jumping Competition course, to accumulate as many points as possible. The girls were very agile and were able to see the actual event on the horses take place in the Frogmore Arena later.

After all the schools had competed, the results were announced and we were very pleased to hear that we were the overall winners. The girls were presented with medals, a goody bag and we received voucher tokens totalling £300 to use towards riding lessons for the girls from the sponsor, The Worshipful Company of Loriners.

Fareham Music Festival

Our Junior and Senior Choirs both sang beautifully in their respective classes at the Fareham Music Festival and were deserved winners of their groups.

The Bishop of Portsmouth’s Visit

We were honoured to welcome Bishop Christopher, the Bishop of Portsmouth to Wykeham House recently and show him around the School. Year 5 girls were thrilled to show him their work and discuss their recent Residential Visit to Hooke Court where they learnt more about Victorian England. Our youngest girls enjoyed sharing their play area with him!

The Royal Wedding

The Summer Term began in true celebration with a lovely ‘Royal Wedding Street Party’. Bunting was put up, posters were designed by the Juniors and copious numbers of sandwiches and fine food consumed and enjoyed by all. Our Foundation Stage girls stole the show in a wonderful array of ‘Bridesmaids and Princess’ dresses. We all left School at the end of the day looking forward to the events due to take place in Westminster Abbey on Friday 29th April.

Book Week

This year’s annual Book Week for our Juniors was once again packed full of exciting events and competitions. Local author Sandra Horn inspired the girls with her lovely books and stories. Our very own Rolf Harris, Mr Robertson (Head of Art), created two giant book illustrations for the girls. The week ended with the ever popular dressing up day and the Book Characters’ Parade.
Picture courtesy of The News, Portsmouth.

Year 7 and 8 Inter-House Netball

1st Hamble House
2nd Itchen House
3rd Beaulieu House
4th Test House

Sophy Ansell wins National Cadet of the Year Competition

Many congratulations to Sophy Ansell who won the National Cadet of the Year Competition at the weekend with St John Ambulance.


Sophy with her Mum.
Sophy with her Trophy

Jack and the Beanstalk Joint Production between Wykeham House School and Uplands Junior School

Wykeham House and Uplands School are one again very pleased to be working together, this time on a joint production of Roald Dahl’s popular and entertaining ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’.

The two schools have worked together over the last three years on joint activities; Uplands pupils have used the facilities available at Wykeham House in previous art and textiles collaborations, science and maths challenges using the laboratories and now the Director of Music is leading the rehearsals with drama teachers from both Schools. Wykeham House pupils are due to visit Uplands very shortly for a morning of challenges.

Ten pupils from Uplands were selected for their musical and dramatic skills to work with eleven Year 6 pupils at Wykeham House School. The pupils have had just 1½ days to rehearse the production for a performance on Friday 11th February at 2pm to parents and other pupils. Everyone worked very hard for the day long rehearsals on Wednesday and left School tired but excited.

Lynn Clarke
Headmistress

Pictures courtesy of The News, Portsmouth.

Rotary Music Competition

Wykeham House was delighted to host the local round of the first ever Rotary Music Competition. Those who attended were treated to a fabulous evening with some very talented musicians. The playing and singing held us spellbound. Clearly the discussion was very difficult as the three adjudicators took nearly an hour to make their selection. First place was awarded to James who played a Nocturne by Chopin. Wykeham House was pleased to celebrate with Penny Bielckus who was awarded Second place for her beautiful singing and Caroline Wiltshire who was Highly Commended for her flute playing. We all hope this will be the first of many such evenings and our thanks go to the Rotary Club for organising the event.
Wykeham House was pleased to celebrate with Penny Bielckus who was awarded Second place for her beautiful singing
Caroline Wiltshire was Highly Commended for her flute playing.

Senior Rotary "Youth Speaks" Competition

Many Congratulations. Winners once again of the Senior Rotary "Youth Speaks" Competition.

1st - Sophie Lever, Kitty Drew, Charlotte Lawrence
2nd - Caroline Herszenhorn, Megan Greenfield, Beth Sadler

Habits of Mind – ‘Questioning and Posing Problems’

Our Habit of Mind for the first half of the Spring Term 2011 is ‘Questioning and Posing Problems’. You will find a presentation about Habits of Mind on our website in the Parents’ Section - Presentations for Parents, which will give you more details of this Thinking Skills Programme. Throughout the School we have been targeting one Habit per half term over the last two years.

The important thing is to not stop questioning. - Albert Einstein

Each House Group in the Senior School was recently given one word and then had to formulate the very best questions which would have this word as the answer, e.g. Mercury, French, 15, Kate Middleton. Below you will see some of the displays produced by the House Group in response to this challenge.

The older girls are also learning about ‘Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning’ a well-respected structure detailing the progressively more difficult style of questioning, e.g. knowledge, analysis, evaluation. Understanding what a question is asking helps them respond correctly to the differing styles of examination questions.

Congratulations to Mrs and Mr Jones

The following email was sent to us by Mr Jones.

Dylan was born at Q.A. hospital at 12.56 p.m. Christmas day, weighing in at 7 lbs 7oz. After a rather slow start, Dylan, like his father, has found eating to be quite a pleasurable activity and now weighs a whopping 34 stone 10lbs! The last part may be just a slight exaggeration!

Year 11 Pantomime Challenge

Our Year 11 girls have been given the task of putting on a school pantomime. They were given the script on Monday 13th December and quickly decided the parts. The Head Girl is performing and directing the production. The staff have been supportive and supplied items to help them create their set and costumes but all of the decisions are taken by the girls. The girls will perform their pantomime to the whole school at 11am on Thursday 14th December and again in the evening for their parents.

Break a leg!


The Dress Rehearsal
Waiting for her big entrance!

Year 7 - 9 Inter-House Football 2010

After all teams had played each other, two teams were tied in first place and the other two teams in joint third place. A play-off took place to decide the final positions. Itchen beat Beaulieu, by a considerable margin, 4-0 to secure first place. Test beat Hamble 1-0, to gain third place overall.

Overall Results
1st Itchen
2nd Beaulieu
3rd Test
4th Hamble

Fun in the Snow

Proof, if any were needed, that we can have fun in the snow at School! Staff battled their way through snow laden streets to make sure we were open for the girls that could get to School safely and once they were there, we wanted to make sure that they did not miss out on creating snow angels, snowball fights and of course, building snowmen. However, as you can see from lack of corn cob pipes and button noses in the photos, the snow was so powdery that we could not get it to oblige! Just as well then that Mrs Clarke and the other teachers did not mind the odd snowball heading their way! We even had hot chocolate to warm us up afterwards.

Mini Great South Run

Congratulations to Eleanor McHugh and Kara Burgess in 4PK who competed in the Mini Great South Run in Southsea on Saturday 23rd October. Congratulations also to Eleanor Purdue 5LJ who participated in the Junior Great South Run on the same day.

St John’s Cadet of the Year for Hampshire

Many Congratulations to Sophy Ansell, Year 11, who won the County competition on Sunday to become St John’s Cadet of the Year for Hampshire.

Sophy went to the St John ’s HQ in Filton, Southampton for the day on Sunday and was assessed whilst undertaking a range of different tasks including:

  • Team building to determine how you would treat a casualty with different injuries
  • An individual presentation on how to improve communication from Leaders to cadets
  • A panel interview
  • Designing and teaching a lesson plan for CPR
  • Mentoring of a badger for the day (youngest members of St John’s )

    • Sophy said “It was a complete surprise to me to win Hampshire Cadet of the Year, as all of the cadets who took part in the competition knew so much about first aid and treating casualties. I am really pleased but now quite nervous about competing in the National competition in February where the standard will be even higher.”

    The National competition takes place over the weekend of 11-13 February in Swindon.

    The people either side of Sophy in the photograph are; to the left – Lady Portsmouth, St John’s County President, and to her right, Pat Bethel, St John’s County Commissioner for Youth.

    Ballroom Dancing

    I have been doing Ballroom Dancing for 22 months. My partner William Bannister and I have been dancing together for 3 months.

    This is my second competition with A&L Academy. The Open Ballroom Competition was held on Sunday 12th September.

    We did eight disciplines the first four were Ballroom dances: Waltz, Quick-step, Foxtrot and Tango and the next four Latin dances: Cha-Cha, Jive, Samba and Rumba.

    I wore a royal blue dress for the Ballroom then a black dress for the Latin. We did very well in the competition. We got eight 1st places and won two cups. We also won a big trophy for being the only couple to get First place in all disciplines in the whole competition.

    I love Ballroom and Latin dancing and one day I hope to be a champion. I am trained by World Latin Champions Lisa and Alex.

    DeMani Romasz (Hamble AT Yr 7H)

    St. John Ambulance

    'Our St John Ambulance division has made an excellent start this term and it was pleasing to welcome quite a few new members. As you can see from the photos, the Cadets have been learning about baby resuscitation whilst the Badgers have started their Safety Badger badge. It has been a pleasure to welcome Mrs Jackson who has come along to help us on Monday evenings. '

    A busy start to the Autumn Term

    We have now been back for one month and a review of our activities in that short time shows a huge variety of events. We have had trips to London, Pagham Harbour, West Wittering, Queen Elizabeth Country Park and several ‘on foot’ trips into Fareham.

    Above and Left: Aztec Trip Year 5
    Above and Right: West Witterings Geography Trip Year 11
    Above and Left: Science Trip to Pagham Harbour

    Year 10 girls enjoy a day in Queen Elizabeth Park

    Foundation Stage Girls at the Sensory Garden
    We have been photographed in a more modern style, had a Sixth Form Information evening, welcomed many new girls to the school and celebrated three Gold Certificate winners.

    This week we have been celebrating the European Day of Languages with competitions, themed lunches, challenges and assemblies. A few photographs of our events are shown below which give a glimpse of our stimulating learning enviroment.

    Caitlin Peters (right) is a talented cyclist and we were pleased to hear of her recent successes.

    Macmillan Coffee Morning

    Many thanks to WHISPA for organising a coffee morning on the 24th of September in aid of the Macmillan charity.

    Year 11 Leavers’ Ball

    A wonderful evening was enjoyed by over 100 girls, partners, staff, parents and Trustees at Queen’s Hotel in Southsea. The glorious weather made the celebrations truly memorable.

    Outstanding GCSE Success for Wykeham House School

    Girls at Wykeham House School have achieved outstanding results in the GCSE examinations, this year. All the girls have passed at least five examinations at grades A* to C and nearly 60% of the results were at A and A*.

    Lynn Clarke, Headmistress at Wykeham House School said ‘We are thrilled with the GCSE results, which are once again excellent. The girls and staff have worked very hard and this is reflected in their grades. At Wykeham House we work hard to help each girl achieve her full potential and we are very proud of our value added scores, which show that the majority of girls achieve at least one grade higher than they were predicted at the start of their career in the Senior School.

    We also trust that they leave the School as self confident young women ready to go on to further education and future careers. We keep them busy both inside the classroom and outside and it is this breadth of experience that enables them to develop their own skills whether they are in leadership, creativity, sportsmanship, etc. We know all of the families at the School very well and wish them all the very best for their future careers.’

    Parents and girls at Wykeham House are delighted with the results and spoke very highly of the School. Dr and Mrs Sadler, parents of Abigail a year eleven student were very pleased with her results, ‘She has worked so hard, the School has been brilliant, a supportive and fun place to be.’ said Mrs Sadler. ‘The girls all feel valued, taken care of and supported’ added Dr Sadler.

    Dr and Mrs Sadler with daughter Abigail


    Emma Turner and Katie Gwyther

    Mrs Gwyther is very happy with her daughter Katie’s results, ‘I am really proud of her’ she said ‘Katie has been here since Nursery and she has loved Wykeham House, we will really miss it’. Katie also competes very successfully in dressage and has managed to continue this alongside her studies, ‘The School has been very supportive of Katie’.

    Mrs Heaysman whose daughter Rebecca achieved 11 A and A* grades is delighted with the School. ‘They have all worked so hard’ she said ‘Rebecca has had a fantastic time, and has enjoyed every minute of it.’


    Fern Barker with Mrs Barker


    Sophie and Mrs Drew


    Wykeham House Girls Celebrate Success.

    End of Summer Term Activities

    You will see from the pictures below that we have enjoyed the excellent weather to the full this year with a range of activities throughout the School. The girls excelled at Sports Day with some very close results across the School, from Foundation Stage to Seniors. The new addition to our calendar, The Summer Fayre, was very well attended and much fun was had by all.

    Our end of term performance of ‘Alice’ in the Junior School was outstanding and very much appreciated by all who saw it. The Speech and Drama staff presented two very entertaining evenings of plays and sketches with a vast range of topics.

    Girls get behind their World Cup Teams

    Each Tutor Group in the Senior School has been given four teams to support for the World Cup. As part of their support they were invited to decorate the classroom door. Mrs Clarke and Miss Wilson judged the displays on Friday and have selected 9SC as the winning Tutor Group. The girls must now continue to follow their teams and will be awarded a prize if one of their teams makes it to the Semi-Final.

    Left, the stunning door display from 9SC who were judged to be the best by Mrs Clarke and Miss Wilson. Well done 9SC.

    Wykeham House Head Girl and her Deputies

    Congratulations to Katie Wilson who has been selected to be Wykeham House Head Girl. Katie will be supported in this role by two Deputy Head Girls, Jessica Rush and Olivia Morris-Soper.

    Help for Heroes

    We were delighted that Mr Rogers came to assembly to accept a cheque for £3618.21 from Jessica Rush and Penny Bielckus. Mr Rogers told all the girls where the money be spent.

    Wykeham’s Got Talent!

    Congratulations to Alice and Ella in Year 4. They won both the semi-final and the final of Wykeham’s Got Talent which was presented by the Business Studies Enterprise “7th Heaven”. They danced to their own interpretation of the hit “Everybody in Love” by JLS.
    Well done to Alice and Ella!

    Speech and Drama Festival

    The girls so enjoyed what was sadly to be the last Fareham Drama Festival after 42 years of competition. They did exceedingly well winning a total of 27 cups in a variety of disciplines from solo verse, mime, duologues and prose reading.
    The festival has provided an opportunity for the girls to perform, often as a solo entry, to an audience with helpful comments from the adjudicator at the end of each session.

    It is to be hoped an alternative can be found to keep alive the spirit of the festival.

    Barcelona Trip

    On the 7th April 38 pupils and 5 members of staff set off for five days in sunny Barcelona. The trip was packed with sightseeing, shopping, singing and a flavour of Spanish life was evident throughout our time there. This was especially true of the artistic life of Barcelona as we visited the Picasso museum and both the Sagrada Familia and Parc Guell which were designed by Gaudi.

    The choir also sang at Poble Espanyol on the second day of the trip. This is a fascinating place which is essentially a museum of Spanish architecture, style and culture of various location all in one place. The choir beautifully sang in the Central Plaza enhanced by some wonderful accoustics and were very much a credit to the school.

    For many the highlight of our five days may have been our visit to Port Aventura. This is a huge rollercoaster park approximately 60 miles south of Barcelona with some of the rides achieving speeds of over 80mph and one ride in particular, dropping 330 feet in less than 3 seconds!
    The girls had a fantastic time and arrived home happy, if a little footsore!
    Please click here to view/download a short video of the visit. The file size is 170mb and download time will depend on the speed of your internet connection.

    Help for Heroes Charity Evening

    Everyone at Wykeham House is very proud of the achievements of two of our Year 10 pupils, Penelope Bielckus and Jessica Rush. They have organised, co-ordinated and prepared a fund raising event for the ‘Help for Heroes’ Charity. Inspired by family members currently serving in Afghanistan the whole school took the event to heart and helped the girls make it a great success.

    A wonderful concert, fabulous raffle and many individual and company donations have meant that the girls initial target of £1,000 has been well and truly broken. The total raised is now more than £2,000.

    A huge thank you goes to everyone involved and to Malcolm Rogers for coming to speak about the charity during the evening.

    Careers Conference

    Wykeham House hosted our first Careers Conference on the 10th March 2010. We had a vibrant and inspiring afternoon thanks to a variety of presenters, drawn from the School community, who talked about their daily careers.

    The afternoon was launched by Mrs Heaysman, a Director from IBM, who spoke to all the girls about the huge range of opportunties now available to them. The girls then moved between presentations of their choice selected from Medical, Legal, Business, Sport and Media. It was lovely to welcome over 60 girls from Lavant House School to the event.

    I thank everyone who gave of their time to make the afternoon a success for the girls.
    Mrs L Clarke

    Art Exhibition by Mr Robertson

    Just in case you haven’t seen the posters in school I do recommend a visit to Bedales Gallery between now and 24th March to view the exhibition of Mr Robertson’s work. ‘The Net Mender’ is an exhibition of box constructions and drawings; opening times are Monday – Friday 2.00-5.00pm and Saturday 10.00am-1.00pm. I know many of you will be familiar with the nature of Mr Robertson’s work, inspired by Scotland’s landscapes, writing and history. We are very proud to have such an eminent artist working on our staff to inspire the girls in the field of creative art.

    Douglas Robertson is an artist who divides his time between living and working with us in Hampshire and collecting and researching in his native Scotland. More details will be found on his website; www.douglasrobertson.co.uk

       © 2007 Wykeham House SchoolTelephone: 01329 280178Fax: 01329 823964