Category: Woodbridge News

On Sunday 11th October eleven of our riders competed in an inter schools style jumping competition at Newton Hall, Swilland. It was the first time representing the school for several of them and what a great success it was too.

The team of Oliver Reid, Ada Marson and Eve Marson won the 60cm, with Ella Reynard, Olivia Lubbock and Maddy Ayres coming second. The Woodbridge School teams wiped the board with their third team gaining a 3rd position – Lily Waterer, Grace Childs and Zoe Newman. With a commendation to Lily for her riding on Poppy.

In the 65cm individual class, Woodbridge school held the top 6 placings – 1st Oliver Reid, 2nd Olivia Lubbock, 3rd Grace Childs, 4th Olivia Brown, 5th Ada Marson 6th Eve Marson.

Olivia Brown won the 70cm, with Ada in 2nd and Olivia Lubbock in 3rd place. The 80cm class saw Ada come 2nd on her new pony – Rolly Rascal, a 3rd for Olivia Brown, 4th for Olivia Lubbock and 5th for Lara Bell on her young horse. Lara is our Riding Captain for this year and it was great to have her there to encourage the younger riders.

Next weekend the riders will be off again to another competition. Good luck!!

Audrey McBride reports from the Charity Club….

Charity at Woodbridge this term has begun in an exciting and energetic way and indeed, right from the outset. A spur-of-the-moment collection was held on Speech Day to raise funds for the ongoing refugee crisis and contributions allowed us to give over £170, a short five days after the Prime Minister’s pledge to receive 20,000 refugees from Syria over the next four and a half years. On Friday 25 September, the Tuckwell Room was transformed into a hall of tea and cakes as part of the annual Macmillan event; ‘The World’s Biggest Coffee Morning’. Donations of bakes and purchases were aplenty, enabling us to collect over £400 for the charity. A special mention must be given to Cilla Kindred of the catering team at Woodbridge who held a coffee morning at her home before work, and who managed to raise £180 for Macmillan, entirely under her own steam. Thank you to everybody who made the time to give something to such a worthy cause and to those of you who held their own events.

The cross country race on Tuesday 29 September also contributed strongly to the School’s fantastic fundraising efforts- with every pupil running to raise funds for the charity YoungMinds. The newly formed Charity Club at school hopes to organize something complementary to both this and to World Mental Health Day which falls this year on Saturday 10 October.

On Friday the Suffolk American Football Association descended upon Woodbridge School and spent the morning coaching our Sports Leaders a simplified version – Tag American Football.

The afternoon featured a mini tournament with 150 girls and boys in years 7 and 8 split into 16 teams, competing against each other. Sports Leaders were then spread across the teams and fields, so when combined with -five full time staff members and the SAFA staff, there was an excellent player to coach ratio.

The Leaders had only half an hour with their teams to teach them the rules, which they themselves had only learned a few hours earlier, so was vital they implemented the methods and approach learned from Matt and Alex to ensure the kids could make a fast start.

Matt said of the Sport Leaders, “I think the Sports Leaders did a brilliant job, and the tournament was a huge success. We were fortunate that we could move between the groups ensuring all 150 children were given the best introduction and explanation. Similar to the morning session, the use of a visual demonstration was widely used, walking through outcomes and game situations. Partnered with open ended questions fired back to the players, to test what they’d learned meant in half an hour they went from zero to creating their own plays between them…. I think we might have found a few budding NFL stars in the making!”

Great fun was had by all and this marks the start of a club which will begin after half term on Friday evenings.

Many congratulations to Zara Lye, caught in brilliant action here, who finished in the top half of the field in both the showjumping and cross country elements of British Eventing’s Open Novice section at the recent Moreton Morell weekend event. These excellent results bode well for her as she prepares for the National U18 Championships in May next year despite being only 14.

Friday saw the first round of the Trower Trophy (the Inter-Section competition). Two teams from the Army & RAF sections & one team from the RN section competed. This year we have introduced a new rule that each team must include two female cadets for all the rounds. Despite all the teams working well and pushing hard two Platoon from the Army came out on top. The next round is the command task on 13 Oct 15.

Our first game was against Ipswich Prep. We started well and had the ball in our attacking circle for most of the game. Unfortunately, we were not successful in finding the back of the net, however, the team should be congratulated on their continued effort, trying to score. Abigail Thomas made a great pass across the front of the goal, but unfortunately we could not convert it into a goal. Final score 0 – 0.

Our second game was against Littlegarth and this was a team we wanted to beat as they had beaten us the previous week. This game saw the ball move from one end to the other, with great attacking and defensive play from both teams. Again, we were unable to convert and the final score was 0 – 0.

Our third and final game was against Orwell Park. After a quick team talk before, the girls knew that they had to give 110% in order for them to be in a chance of coming 1st or 2nd. What a game this was; every single member of the team fought for every ball and tackled perfectly. Lara Hoffman Leatherdale and Isabelle Kershaw-Jervis were superb in defence, tackling hard and distributing the ball out to the wings. Chloe Morgan, Caitlin Maggs, Abigail Thomas, Sophie Fry and Lily Waterer played excellently in attack and as a result we scored 4 goals. Abigail, Lily and Chloe set up Sophie Fry’s 3 goals and Caitlin helped Chloe to find the back of the net. Final score W4 – 0. Imogen Melrose had a fab afternoon in goal as she managed to keep a clean sheet and she captained the team v Littlegarth.

2nd place overall!! A great performance by all – well done!! Thank you to the parents who were supporting from the sideline!!

In History Year 4 learned about the Romans and so early on in the Michaelmas term they enjoyed a visit to Colchester Castle. During their visit they heard the story of Colchester, learnt about some of the roman artefacts discovered, enthusiastically dressed-up and built model houses.

Jonjo Walker 4J
The Roman temple of Claudius was built around 55-60AD. The Romans made the Celts build the temple and pay high taxes to pay for it. Boudicca, head of the Celts, burnt the temple and Colchester as a revolt.

Marina Pommier 4J
In the doctor’s grave I saw an old pair of tweezers exactly like ours right now. There were objects I have never seen before. We can tell that they had doctors and what medical instruments they had in Roman times. We also saw the board game. It looked like he was in the middle of a game because the pieces were in different places than the starting places. It was so well preserved it looked like it was just made!

Isabel Deacon 4J
For the house building activity we built a Roundhouse and a Roman villa. It was fun because we had to work together and it was quite hard because some of the blocks were longer than others and we sometimes put them in the wrong places!

This annual event saw over 100 former pupils return to eat, drink and reminisce with old friends. There were OWs from the 1940s (and 1936!) through to the present day. Celebrating 40 years since they left was a group of 20 strong ‘1975’ leavers, some returning for the first time. Another large contingent was the 1990s – 25 years since departing, and still going strong by the sounds of things!

The Dinner was also the perfect chance to welcome this year’s OW President, Huw Turbervill. Read his blog on the Old Woodbridgian section on the School website to see what he has been up to since leaving the School in 1991.

Thanks to Maddyson Chan and Callum Askins for their welcome speeches and to all the OWs that attended. All pupils become Old Woodbridgians so this could be you in forty years’ time!

What a fantastic start to the season! Fast and frenetic (no, not furious!) from the start, the intense pressure Woodbridge imposed on Ipswich paid quick dividend, and it didn’t take long for James Bellhouse to power over for the first score. But Ipswich responded well and replied very quickly to score in the corner.  A moment of reflection and regrouping: normal service resumed: our boys executed some nice phases to work deep into Ipswich territory. Then James Cherryman, second row, brilliantly chipped the ball over the defence and chased down his own kick to score under the posts. Ipswich stayed in touch, though, making the most of penalties to regain ground and the initiative, and score again. But back came Woodbridge in their turn: this time it was Felix Kibble who ran a hard line to bulldoze over for a debut try at the end of a fine phase of team play.  The first half ended soon after, with Bertie Nicholson hammering home our advantage with a penalty kick.  The second half did at least afford Bertie the chance to add to our score and our lead with a final penalty to complete his tally of five successful kicks.

Score: Woodbridge 27-12 Ipswich

Grey skies and a spot of drizzle did little to dampen the enthusiasm of the Swing Band, or indeed of the audience for the Swing Band as all took their seats for this year’s ceremony.  The Headmaster spoke with passion about his extraordinarily enjoyable first year, and about the future. The school enters exciting times, and we as a community must embrace this chance to think and act differently to prepare the students and ourselves for an unpredictable future: to be comfortable in uncertainty; to think in an original and creative way; to ask questions and to listen; to develop resilience.  Then he made way, first for our prize winners and then for our guest, Derek Browne.  CEO and founder of a fantastic organisation linking entrepreneurship and education he may be; one-time work colleague of Nick Leeson he may also be … but most of all he is inspiringly enthusiastic, committed to the future, to aspiring high, to setting no limits.  He delivered the kind of aspirational message so important for the pupils to hear; what was just as exciting was his own obvious approval of the achievements and ambition shown by our own pupils, the pupils that we were there to celebrate.