Category: Woodbridge News

Sasha was asked to perform at the Suffolk Festival of Performing Arts Gala concert last Sunday, held at Ipswich School. She was asked to perform her poem (The Magic Box by Kit Wright) and her prose reading (extract from Fantastic Mr Fox by Roald Dahl) in front of a huge audience and was the only Abbey pupil there so it really was quite daunting and she did a fabulous job! She followed the Woodbridge Senior School choir who were Suffolk under 20s Choir Champions.

Sasha was presented with her cup for the Suffolk Festival Junior Speech Champion and prize of £60!, a cup for the highest mark in Junior Verse Speaking and also a prize for the Duologue Verse speaking, which she won with Lily. Sasha won five classes with distinction (Verse speaking, Prose speaking, Prose reading, Solo acting and Duologue Verse) which we think was quite amazing. She worked very hard and really enjoyed it!

Well done to the 55 runners who competed in the South Suffolk Cross Country championships at RHS on Thursday 12 October. With unsurprisingly warm temperatures and a slight breeze, these were some of the best conditions this race has ever seen, and ideal for those running this course for the first time.

Our team performed magnificently across all categories and against hundreds of other runners: the minors in particular had around 200 competitors (if not more) in their race. It was great to see so many participate and a special mention to the 39 athletes who made it through to the County round on Saturday 2nd December at Culford. A superb effort – well done!

Congratulations to Ruby Vinton, Charlie Turner and Nathan Goddard who gained 1st place and April Hill 2nd and Kit Evans Lombe 3rd. An astonishing nine runners gained a top 10 place, and well done to the Inter girls’ team who all came in the top 30. Overall results meant that amongst Mid-Suffolk schools we came first in Inter Boys, Junior Girls and Junior Boys, and second in Inter Girls and Minor Boys: amazing!

Thank you to all the parents for their continued support and Mark Goddard for his excellent leadership and coaching of the runners both in their preparation and on the day.

Results:

• Minor girls: Ruby Vinton 1st, Esme Ball 29th, Ada Marson 59th, Libbie Brightey 113th & Kitty Frith 114th.
• Minor boys: Edward Buckingham 10th, Moses McBride 20th, George Na Nakhorn 25th, Tommy Burrow 35th, Jonny Evans Lombe 47th, Erwan Gouedo 66th, Albie Smith 105th & Thomas Blackmore 168th.
• Junior girls: April Hill 2nd, Amy Goddard 4th, Isabelle Eaton 16th, Emily Whyte 18th, Jess Elmer 22nd, Cecily Royal-Dawson 23rd, Anna Jackson 28th, Ashleigh Wildbore 34th, Willa Cole 55th, Ella Pitt 65th, Ella Reynard 66th, Iris Morton 69th , Isabella Hyde 88th, & Charlotte Gibbon 116th.
• Junior boys: Charlie Turner 1st, Kit Evans Lombe 3rd, George Wharam 10th, Edward Rufford 20th, Mauricio Corfe 26th, Ruben Kill 38th, Tom Turner 39th, Tom Harper 49th, Archie Sjoberg 54th & Tom Martin 83rd.
• Inter girls: Sarah Barker 4th, Sophie Graham 16th, Milly Buckingham 17th, Victoria Burrows 23rd, Poppy Fletcher 27th & Grace Childs 29th.
• Inter boys: Nathan Goddard 1st, Alex Evans Lombe 4th, Daniel Davies 11th, George Rufford 17th, Nathaniel Gunn 19th, Hal Ottley 50th, Hugo Thomas 51st & Miles Fry 55th.
• Seniors: Olly Wroe 21st, Georgina Fulcher 23rd & Rachel Prowse 35th.

Mr Streat writes: I could not have been more proud of this year’s group of sixth formers who visited the North Islington based Bridge School for children with severe or profound learning difficulties. Between them, Jasmine, Daniella, Mary, Georgia, Flora, Ben, Theo, Will, Lily, Lia and Charlotte embraced the tasks and challenges, both physical and emotional, that the trip encompasses. From the first moment they built connections with the pupils they were working with, getting to know them, to know their needs, and to help build their confidence in little things over the course of the visit. Whether helping one to sing a song or recognise some words or pictures, another to cook a little food, one to be more confident in the water, or another to be able to negotiate a difficult obstacle outside, our sixth formers showed compassion, care, intuitive understanding and great warmth. The Bridge teachers and classroom assistants were, as ever, mightily impressed by the way our team made themselves useful and bonded with the children so quickly. Mrs Brown and I in our turn were overjoyed to hear the team continue to discuss what they had been doing and what they had learnt about the children over the course of each evening, making sure that any useful tips about how particular children liked to work were passed on. It seems almost implausible that such a short trip can reap such long term benefits, but Mrs Brown and I have the advantage of returning year after year – we see the Bridge children remembering previous visitors, and asking about them, and remembering the things they did together… it really does make a huge difference to their lives to meet young and genuinely enthusiastic visitors who are giving their full attention and emotion to the time they spend together; and of course we know how much it has meant to the many of our sixth formers who have made the visit themselves.

Lemn Sissay
Lemn struck so many chords (not least in one marvellous poem on the difficulties of dating) with his audience – empathy being at the heart of his message. Empathy… and dysfunction rather surprisingly by contrast. There was poetry too, of course, woven effortlessly but so dynamically into a fabric of story and a stream of consciousness that was both joyful, difficult, and breathtakingly incomplete at times – no sentence quite finished before the next exploded from him. He spoke in the first moments of poetry being an expression of the thoughts in the back of his head, and the thoughts behind them, and them… He performed a perfect cameo of how they can crowd each other out, fighting for attention as they roll into and over each other. But his poems, and his reflections on his early life in particular, had a metre to them which arrested the scattergun in him (despite their own intrinsic energy and the energy he brought to them in performance) and offered a clarity that demanded our reaction. This wasn’t polite verse, but raw, or funny, or chilling, and very provocative. Forgiveness, and his own inspiration found in the depths of the unforgivable, were things he could talk about with a degree of experience that would have broken many of us. That poetry had offered him a place to live, and, in part, replace the family he was denied (with a cruelty that beggars our belief, or rather reaffirms our guilty knowledge of it and of a past now viewed as simultaneously ‘acknowledged’ and ‘rejected’ despite it being played out again and again in the present, dressed differently, but there nonetheless) is our good fortune. His honesty was overwhelming, but then that is how he sees poetry as well, given it is the thoughts at the back of one’s head. There is nothing more honest that one’s inner world. What should budding poets do? Never throw anything away. How should one seek to perform one’s own poetry? By reinhabiting one’s place and mind at its conception. Old poetry is the best memory of the way we were – better than a diary. But it is also the person unmasked. So poetry is not for the timid?… No.. that’s utterly wrong and I am sure Lemn would be infuriated if that was my conclusion. Poetry is for each of us, and importantly so: the better to understand ourselves and others, interaction and reaction. It may just be that not everyone will want to share.

Thank you, Lemn Sissay. This was an evening of genius.

And then we were back for a second evening; one of contrast – both in itself and with its predecessor. Three poets – our host Amy Soapbox delighted us with, just in case we weren’t sure, an explanation of poetry. She offered a canvas as gloriously wide and high as one could conceive on which to paint in poetry the ideas that it might take a thousand words of prose to achieve. She set the stage for Rebecca Goss (Rachel to those who know her less well…) who described herself as a frustrated short story writer, but who offered us poems that told stories with such sparse honesty and compelling intensity that she seems to have achieved both: poet and prosaist in one. She talked of inspiration – the moment of knowing – but of the hard work and careful editing, increasingly so with experience, which follows. Don’t expect the words to pour unfettered and perfect, even if the idea itself comes free of difficulty. She talked of the risks and rewards of autobiography; her own life as backdrop or centre stage. The depth of emotion her poems developed as a result was astonishing, especially given their brevity in many cases. To be accelerated into her thoughts, her delights and her anguish with such immediacy was startling. Rebecca also talked of the pleasure of friendship, and female friendship in particular, the focus of workshops she had run that afternoon with our Sixth Formers; how conversation and sharing offers so much. And how friendship helps when things could not be harder to bear. Hers was a wonderful, warm, and almost private performance with her family at its heart. If every there was a demonstration of intimate honesty in art this was it.

Amy Soapbox’s introduction for the second half, a breathless tour de force of a paper world seen through the eyes of fellow poet Harry Baker, paved the way for Vanessa Kisuule, familiar to many from her performance at last year’s festival and this year’s Speech Day. Familiar, but as fresh as ever – right down to a poem just for us, written on the train today, and in defiance of Insta (and all its kind…). In defiance of competition, too – between girls, against difference, against parents and their always being right in the end (because they are) (even if it comes with the agony of train track plaits every Sunday). One poem was more familiar, however, but bears its repetition lightly: her rules for living. Not, she was keen to point out, her advice, though. Although there was a contradiction in an unwillingness to advise beyond telling us to do what we want, because we will anyway. She is a poet because that is what she is at the moment; she sees no constraints either in her writing or in her life. Whatever is right. Her advice? Just write… if you do it enough you’ll get better, and if you do it enough some of it will be good. I hope everyone was listening, because the need for immersion in poetry – or anything – seems central to its improvement and its value. I wonder how many of us will leave it till tomorrow to make a start. Vanessa didn’t, and her audience was grateful for that, as they were to all the performers, and particularly to Mrs Kneebone for the brilliant organisation and advertising to encourage so many of us to come in the first place and Mrs Davis whose gloriously innocent delight in her introduction of Lemn Sissay on the first evening, and her passion for poetry which has driven the festival, the workshops, and inspired so many in our community already, has captured our hearts. Thank you all.

Do we really have to wait another year?

On Friday, 13 October we held our Mufti Day to raise funds for the children’s charity Over The Rainbow, whose aim is to enhance the lives of children who are living with a serious or life-threatening illness, by providing financial support for specialist equipment for day to day living or to organise special days out to make their wishes come true.

Pupils wore their own clothes with a rainbow theme and all colours of the rainbow.

Year 4 hosted a cake sale in the hall at break and there was a bring and buy stall run by the librarians, a pick a stick stall and knock the mugs over. Well done to all.

Lily Constantine takes up the story: We all boarded coaches on our visit to Norfolk: our destination, The Green Britain Centre, Swaffham. This is the home of Europe’s largest wind turbine which you are allowed to climb. Wow! What an incredible feat of engineering, although we were all trembling in fear of heights! But by the time we got to the top the view was absolutely breathtakingly worth it. In total we climbed 67 meters (300 steps!); while we were climbing we found out that the person who designed it was Sir Norman Foster, who was the architect of the Gherkin and the Wembley stadium in London. After our descent we were lucky enough to view the world’s first wind powered vehicle. The whole day was a perfect mix of excitement and information, and we all learnt a lot more about how to enhance the power of wind.

Congratulations to James Phelan for winning the history society’s debate entitled, ‘The Worst Natural Disaster in History’. James fought off stiff competition from Chester Wigzell, Oliver Reid, Tom Jarvis, Joshua Cole and Eliza Kilburn with his passionate and convincing argument in favour of the events of 1816, the so-called ‘year without summer’. Thank you to Dominic Ellice-Freeman for so ably chairing the event.

A 7.30 start and miserable weather weren’t enough to dampen the spirits of the Young Enterprise team at the Framlingham Sausage Fest last Sunday; in just a few hours, nearly £350 was raised as part of the business’s first fundraising venture.

Exemplary planning and punctuality were integral to the group’s success and kept the stall and raffle running smoothly throughout the day. Joshua Bradbeer, Daniel Hempstead, Callum Sycamore and Jess Bowers were responsible for the stall’s successful setup, while later Jude Ashken and Cavan Fawcett helped to manage customers and promote the business during the day. Lily Proudfoot and Ella Holliday worked the crowds determinedly and pulled every passerby towards the stall, while Sebastian Lamb and Nathan Little worked to promote their product and provide market research for their team.

The company is now looking to start producing their products, and look forward to the quiz night fundraiser on the 8 November, Queen’s House hall from 6.30-9.30. Tickets are available from every member of the team, priced at £5 each.

Gunpowder, Treason and Plot! Year 6 Taster Afternoon – FULLY BOOKED

Saturday 4 November

from 2pm until 4.30pm

Woodbridge School

We are delighted to be hosting our first themed taster afternoon at Woodbridge Senior School on Saturday 4 November from 2pm until 4.30pm. The theme is seasonal – Gunpowder, Treason and Plot!

We have introduced the event to enable children to enjoy a classroom experience at Woodbridge Senior School alongside children of the same age who are potentially going to be joining Year 7 at Woodbridge in September 2018. The children (whether currently at The Abbey, our Prep School, or another school) will be able to make the first steps towards forging new friendships which we hope will ease their transition from Year 6 to Year 7.

The afternoon comprises exciting and stimulating sessions for the children along the Guy Fawkes theme (delivered by our academic staff) and presentations for parents (from Neil Tetley, Headmaster, and Nikola King, Deputy Head Academic).  Neil and Nikola will provide an overview of all aspects of the Senior School including an insight into Learning@Woodbridge which is our individual approach to teaching and learning that supports the achievement of excellent academic results.

The afternoon commences in the School Hall at 2pm and the full schedule is detailed below:

2.00 – 2.15pm 

Welcome in School Hall.  Children will be allocated to their groups and introduced to each other by their group leaders (Woodbridge School Sixth Formers).

2.15 – 3.55pm   

Children in activity sessions and parents in talks.

3.55 – 4.30pm   

Children and parents reunited in the School Hall for informal afternoon tea with Woodbridge academic staff.

If you would like to book a place or find out more about the event please contact Mrs Clare Kneebone by email – ckneebone@woodbridgeschool.org.uk.

We look forward to welcoming you to a taste of what makes education at Woodbridge so special through our celebration of Gunpowder, Treason and Plot!