Channing Magazine

CHANNING MAGAZINE 2021-22

Contents

Welcome

Introduction 3

Founders Day Address 4

Senior School

Art 12 Classics 18 Computing 20 Drama & LAMDA 23 Economics 30 English 31 Geography 32 History 34 Library 35 Mathematics 36 Modern Foreign Languages 38 Music 41 Politics 47 Psychology 48 Religious Education 49 Science 50 Sport 56 Teaching & Learning 59

Senior & Sixth Form Beyond the Classroom

Sixth Form 62 Extended Project Qualification 64 Young Enterprise 66 House Activities 68

Partnerships 70 Careers 72 Duke of Edinburgh’s Award 74 Sustainability 82

Junior School

Head of Junior School report 86 Art & Design Technology 88 Computing 90 Drama 91 English 92 Humanities 93 Mathematics 94 Modern Foreign Languages 95 Music 96 Physical Education 98 Religious Education 99 Science 100

Junior School Beyond the Classroom

Charity & School Council 102 Forest School 104 Houses 106 Pastoral Care 107 PSHE 108 Sustainability 109 Trips, Workshops & Talks 110 Residential Trips 112 Wrap Around Care & Clubs 113

Introduction

BY MRS LINDSEY HUGHES

It has been a real delight to experience Channing in what has felt like a more normal year in the wake of the pandemic. The return to a full programme of extracurricular activities, trips and speakers in school means that the pages of this year’s magazine are filled with the most fantastic accounts of a school year well lived. My grateful thanks to Mrs Devine for her sterling work as editor of such an important document.

At the end of my second year as Headmistress I reflect with real pride on all that has been achieved by our brilliant pupils and committed, hardworking staff. I am struck by the creativity and innovation shown in so many aspects of the curriculum, the power and quality of the expressive

and creative arts, and the huge growth in STEM activities among others.

I notice also how much of what we do comes from our pupils: suggested by them, led by them, brought to life by them. I hope that reading these pages they will see themselves and their friends and enjoy reminiscing over their achievements this year. Congratulations – and thank you – to you all, pupils, staff and parents, for making the Channing community what it is.

warmest wishes Lindsey Hughes Headmistress

With

Founders' Day

HEADMISTRESS' ADDRESS

Good afternoon, everyone – and how very wonderful to have you all here! Last weekend I was on stage in front of an audience wearing a very different outfi t: what a difference a week makes. It is a real pleasure to welcome you to our Founders’ Day Service for 2022, marking the 137th year since the Sharpe sisters, Matilda and Emily, worked with the Reverend Robert Spears to set up a school for the daughters of Unitarian ministers, which they named after the leading proponent of Unitarianism, William Ellery Channing. Founders’ Day has traditionally been a chance for the whole community to gather together here in Highgate for a celebration of the reasons for our existence as a school. To do so last year with just six of us alone in the Sports Hall was quite a surreal experience. Not only is this my fi rst proper Founders’ Day, then, but the fi rst for all our pupils and families in Years 7, 8 and 9, and for all the staff who have joined the school since 2019, and I am delighted that we have spent the morning really making the most of it in both the Junior and Senior School.

I realised when I started thinking about what I wanted to talk about today that much of this year has been spent

discovering – or perhaps rediscovering, in the wake of the pandemic – what school is for. You have had a chance to see that today, with the displays of work around the school and for many of you, the fi rst chance to really revisit the place you chose for your child, perhaps some years ago now. So you have seen up close what we think school is for: a place where girls really do enjoy success, however they defi ne it, and without undue pressure.

Luckily, William Ellery Channing also had something to say about what school or, more widely, what education is for. In our fi rst reading we heard his view of the three objects of education: to gain useful knowledge, to give force to the intellect (I love that turn of phrase!) and to fi x our principles of duty.

Channing was clear about the types of knowledge we need: “not only such as will have a direct bearing on the business of life, but such as will be a foundation of further acquisition of knowledge, and of a wise use of leisure, in all future years”. Not just useful knowledge, then – a curriculum or body of factual knowledge – but also skills, and (although I may be reading more into it here than is

Winnie and Maisy with their Rosslyn Chapel Award

perhaps actually in the text) a love of learning that will endure throughout one’s life.

We have already made some innovations in this respect –for example by introducing Philosophy 4 Children into the Junior School curriculum this year, and by adding GCSE PE, A level Computer Science and A level Philosophy to our curriculum in the last year in the Senior School – and I am excited to say that I am now in possession of the final report of this year’s wide-ranging Curriculum Review. Five Working Parties, led by Mrs Elliot, Miss Evernden, Mrs Wootton, Ms Pavlopoulos and Mr Riggs-Long and Mr Martini-Phillips and Miss Zanardo, involved more than 30 members of the teaching staff from the Senior and Junior School in direct research and dozens more in discussions that will help us reconsider what knowledge and skills are needed for a 21st century education at Channing. I look forward to working on this with Ms Newman, our Deputy Head (Academic), and reporting more next year on its implementation from September 2023 and beyond.

As an aside, I must say that I really like the idea of knowledge as the foundation for a ‘wise use of leisure’. In fact, I love that: a wise use of leisure. NOT (as one might be forgiven for thinking, if you have teenagers in your house) leisure spent reclining on the sofa scrolling through Instagram and watching TikTok and YouTube videos –although I am sure that they will tell you very confidently that they feel this is wise – but a use of leisure which adds to the sum of one’s knowledge. Note to self – I might also need to up my game beyond the Sewing Bee, Professional Bake Off and Netflix…

Joking aside, though, I think this is another area where we are also making great strides. The number of co- and extra-curricular activities is blossoming at Channing and there is no doubt that there are some great opportunities to make a wise use of leisure, at all ages across the school. I am particularly proud of the growth in football and cricket, where we are playing an increasing number of fixtures and involved in national competitions. Indeed, the Junior School PE department was rightly rewarded this week with the Youth Sports Trust Gold School Games Mark for the vibrant programme and level of engagement in the Junior School. Well done!

In that extract Channing also suggests that the purpose of education is ‘to give force to the intellect; to give it the command of all its powers; to train it to labour, to concentration of thought, to patient and accurate investigation, to broad views of subjects, to the true methods of reasoning, and to soundness of judgement’. I wonder – could Channing have been the original Fearless Learner?! One of the most noticeable developments taking place at Channing this year has been in how we as teachers have focused very explicitly on our own classroom practice and the myriad ways in which we have helped our pupils develop their skills as learners.

Avid readers of ‘Word from the Head’ will have followed our weekly pearls of wisdom on how you, parents, can support your children in freeing themselves from the selfimposed undue pressure that can cause such anxiety and stress in learning. The most exciting thing is that we can see it working, in front of our very eyes. Teachers report

Headmistress Mrs Hughes

more engagement and more risk-taking in the classroom; pupils report that they understand how different questioning and feedback techniques are helping them become more independent and confident learners. This is especially exciting for me because of the challenge I set myself just before May half-term last year.

At that time I had a phone conversation with two Channing parents about their very serious concerns that we were having summer exams for the Year 7, 8 and 9 pupils. I listened to their worries and said, as you will undoubtedly have heard me do at various times in the past two years, that in my view these assessments are vital to help our pupils learn to take exams in their stride. I talked about the difference between learning mode and performance mode, and how all assessment – vocab tests, end-of-topic tests, end-of-year exams and mock exams – up to the point of performance in the actual GCSEs and A levels is for learning and identifying areas for improvement.

The parents made it clear that they felt that it was all very well to say these things (well, I would, wouldn’t I?) but that the reality for north London families is that academic performance anxiety (if I can call it that) is an all-pervasive fact of life; one often passed down through generations. I’m afraid to say that I took that as a direct and rather personal challenge: in the heat of the moment I said to the parents on the phone that it was my intention singlehandedly to change the mindset of every north London pupil and parent, and demonstrate that it is entirely possible to be academically successful without being a nervous wreck. Luckily, Mr Boardman was also up for the challenge and the very fact that every Year group took their exams, whether internal or public, this summer term in their stride is a cause for optimism. I am delighted that he will be speaking at the Wellington Festival of Education next week to tell the world (or at least the assembled audience of educationalists) what we have been doing at Channing to make this happen – as I have no doubt that there are plenty of other schools that would like to do what we’re doing.

So if the first reading suggests that Channing was the original Fearless Learner, our third reading confirms that he really was quite presciently in tune with the needs of 21st century girls’ education. We heard Maya read us his views on the futility of perfectionism: ‘no human being exists whose character can be proposed as a faultless model’. Not only does perfection not exist, says Channing, but we should also not try to be like others. Now we know that’s a hard lesson to learn – we spend our time constantly comparing ourselves to one another: people we know, in class and in our other other activities; and people we don’t know (and will never know) on social media and in the news.

We all know the lines in that reading: ‘Every human being is intended to have a character of their own, to be what no other is, to do what no other can do’. For me, that’s at the heart of what being a member of the Channing community means. We strive to be aware of, and proud of, our strengths; to understand, and forgive ourselves for, our weaknesses; and to make the most of the opportunities in front of us to forge the success we want in our lives. Above all, school should be the place where we find out who we are and learn to be happy to be ourselves.

In the Junior School, Miss Hamalis has led her staff team and the Junior School girls in creating a set of eight woodland animals who represent each of the characteristics we expect Channing pupils to develop. The robin represents resilience, perseverance is the red squirrel, while the rabbit and badger are empathy and responsibility. The tawny owl denotes independence, the hedgehog respectfulness and the fox, curiosity. My favourite, you won’t be surprised to hear, is the mole, who represents bravery. Together, they form a fantastic visual representation of Channing’s values, which I know our youngest pupils are excited to embrace, and they are a great way of showing how each of us has a character all our own.

I enjoyed finding that extract because, although I was well aware of those key lines of Channing’s, I didn’t know the line that follows: ‘Our common nature is to be unfolded

Ms Zanardo conducts the choir

in unbounded diversities’. It is that diversity that makes Channing so special. I reported in my Founders' Day address last year on the work of the Channing Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Steering Group, members of which are with us today and for whose thoughtful commitment I am so very grateful. We have continued to enact their recommendations this year. It was an exciting moment at the end of last term to appoint Beatrice de Leval and Aliyah Jami as our first Diversity Officers, representing the needs of a diverse school community. They have made a fantastic start in their roles, promoting a wider understanding of race in school and organising events to coincide with Pride Month. Indeed, I happen to know that there is a school outing to Pride departing straight after the end of this service and I hope that you will have a fantastic time!

On that note I’d like to return to the first reading and the third of Channing’s objects of education: to ‘fix those great principles of duty’. I take that as an encouragement to be clear about what ‘being Channing’ means, as a school, both internally and beyond our gates. We live the Channing Promise and we encourage our pupils to develop respect, tolerance and understanding of all faiths, as well as individual and social responsibility. In that respect a huge development this year has been in the establishment of our network of partnerships in the local community.

I am very grateful to Ms Kung, Director of Partnerships and HE – it is through her work with Highgate Newtown Community Partners (HNCP) that we have forged excellent relationships with Brookfield Primary School, and then more widely with other primary schools in the HNCP catchment area. Under the banner of Education Plus we are able to offer academic enrichment and cultural capital to those children who would otherwise be unable to access it, and at the same time we are giving extraordinary leadership and mentoring opportunities to our own pupils when they lead the activities. Our Summer School will run again this year, expanded to include more pupils from local primary schools, and I am very grateful to the Junior School staff who are going to teach the Maths, English and Science lessons every morning.

We are also working closely with the team at St Aloysius College, just round the corner on Hornsey Lane, to give their boys and our girls the chance to work together in meaningful academic pursuits. They’ve been involved in our Higher Education and careers activities, and the extremely popular debating clubs, and among other things our pupils have benefited from access to their Design Technology facilities. There is plenty more to come on both fronts: pupils in the Junior School and Senior School have already enjoyed taking part in joint activities with our partner schools and I am delighted that representatives from Brookfield and St Aloysius are with us today. Thank you for taking the plunge into the unknown and working with us on these new endeavours.

Indeed, I’d like to take a moment here to thank everyone here and in the wider Channing community for their generous gifts of time and expertise, as well as their financial donations, this year. There is so much in school that would not be possible without you: the Careers and Higher Education programme would be significantly reduced, for a start! However I think these gifts are valuable not just for the tangible outcomes they provide, but also for the depth they add to our community. It is through these gifts and connections that we continue to ‘fix these great principles of duty’ of which Channing spoke.

Now, I realise that I have been taking you all on a pretty comprehensive tour of the key developments in the life of Channing School this year. It’s actually quite flabbergasting to take stock of all the ways in which we have reviewed, thought, considered and then tweaked, added, innovated in order to make the school even better. It all happens because we are aware of the need to reflect constantly and reevaluate our work as a school. As Sienna told us in our second reading: ‘All history bears living witness to the ceaseless progress of the mind. Since life is continuous motion… each hour of our lives is an hour of transition, whether we realise it or not’. Institutional development, just as much as personal development, is always needed and you can see that we have really taken this to heart!

Nonetheless, our traditions are vital - indeed, we are living one right now - and traditions contain so many elements of what makes a school. In preparation for today I enjoyed reading an old school history published in 1960 to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the foundation of Channing. It was a genuinely fascinating read and I discovered that there are many traditions that girls of that era would still recognise here: the colour of the uniform (although fortunately no longer made of tweed!)

Head Girls Maya and Sienna

for one, along with our links with the Transylvanian Unitarian College, which were first made in the 1890s. I found descriptions of some of the past Founders’ Days particularly amusing, including the 25th anniversary in 1910 that included, and I quote, ‘a gymnastics display followed by the reading of a Horace Ode’: quite a contrast, I think.

Intriguingly, the history also referred to a ‘lost school hymn’ of which only one couplet remains. Today we sing the one written for us in 1961 by Edmund Blunden, the well-known World War One poet, through a family connection with former Headmistress Isabel Raphael, who was at the time a Classics teacher at Channing. It is very lovely, and has stood the test of time well. However, I was rather taken by the one remaining couplet of the old hymn:

‘We’ll fight for the right and the good and the true, As the school taught us how in life’s morning.’

Fighting for the right and the good and the true I think sums up our ethos beautifully, and it leads me nicely to a new tradition we have invented at Channing: The Rosslyn Hill Chapel Award. This award was presented last year for the first time, and is for a student or students in each of the Junior School and Senior School who have displayed Unitarian values during the year and shown care for their community, whether that be in the form of community service, charity events or sponsored activities. Special consideration is given to actions that are effective at enabling communication across divisions. As we have seen today, the Channing ethos emphasises kindness, as well as individual social responsibility, and this award reflects these important Unitarian values.

This year’s winners in the Senior School are Winnie Dingel and Maisy Mazer, who have led the school’s involvement with disability dance charity icandance. Their efforts, far more than mine, led to a real understanding of the power of dance and the importance of inclusion in the school community, as well as some very successful fundraising. I would like to ask Andrew Appleyard, Vice Chair of Governors and a Trustee of Rosslyn Hill Chapel, to present the award. Winnie and Maisy, please come up to collect your award.

Someone who exemplifies all the qualities of Channing but unfortunately does not qualify for the Rosslyn Hill Chapel Award is Channing parent Zena Watt, who is stepping down this year after a lengthy and enormously successful leadership of the Channing Association. She first joined the Channing Association in September 2010, as a Junior School parent, and has worked in a number of roles over the years and most recently, and for a considerably extended period, as Chair of the Senior School Channing Association. Zena, we are indebted to you for your hard work, selflessness and incredible ability

to get things done. The successes of the CA over the last decade are boundless and credit for them should be laid at your door – please come up to receive a small token of our appreciation.

It is now time for me to say some farewells, and I would like to start with three of our Governors. Julia Burns, Andrew Appleyard and Cindy Leslie, our Chair of Governors, will all step down before next year’s Founders’ Day. Although they do not leave until November and March, and we will say copious goodbyes and thank yous at that point, it is only right and fitting that I should say something about each of them today. All three of these Governors have been instrumental in supporting the development of the school since 2012 and made the sometimes difficult decisions involved in developing the Junior and Senior school sites into what you see today. They have all also been fantastic guardians of the school’s ethos, ensuring that we remain true to our Unitarian foundation.

Julia is a long-serving Governor, having joined the Board in 2013, and most recently has been Chair of the Education Committee. She is a highly respected former GSA Headmistress and I have valued her wise counsel and thoughtful approach to all things education in school –thank you.

Andrew joined the Board in 2011 and has been Vice Chair of the Governors since June 2014. Most recently he has also Chaired the Estates Committee – a very significant role. Thank you.

And Cindy – it’s hard to know where to begin! Cindy joined the Board in 2009 and has been Chair of Governors since June 2012. I am eternally grateful to the Board for agreeing to vary the terms of office to enable her to serve an additional two years in that role, to see me join the school and establish myself in my first two years in role. Cindy’s lawyer’s insight and perception have been invaluable to me – alongside her dry wit and genuine care for the wellbeing of every member of the school community. I shall miss her personally, and the Board and wider school will do so too – for now, my thanks, and very best wishes to you, and to Julia and Andrew.

We have also said goodbye during the course of the year, or will say goodbye at the end of next week, to a number of our staff.

Three have retired, after extraordinary careers at Channing and beyond. Miss Marisa Pepper, Head of Junior School Music, retired in December after 24 years in the school. Not to be left behind, Mrs Mandy Phipps retired in April after 29 years teaching in the Junior School – and is embarking on a new career as a herbalist! Next week we will bid farewell to Ms Karin Hurst, first Head of Drama and then part-time Drama teacher at Channing

for the past seven years. We wish her very well for a long and happy retirement with her husband and family.

A number of people have reconsidered some of their life choices post-pandemic and are leaving Channing for new adventures or a life beyond teaching. One such is Rachel Chapman, Visiting Teacher of Music, who leaped at the chance to spend two terms on secondment as a member of the Chorus at the Royal Opera House. She will be back in January, but making more permanent changes are:

Ms Lisa Wilkinson, teacher of Drama, who is heading into the world of publishing, and Mrs Sarah Walsh, Head of Psychology, who returns briefly next week from her maternity leave before leaving to pursue a new career as a psychotherapist. We are delighted that Ms Rehmat is staying with us as Head of Psychology.

Ms Zara Hursay, Head of History, is leaving us to join the Metropolitan Police fast-track detective scheme. I confidently anticipate seeing her appointed as Chief Constable in a few years’ time. Miss Cathy Arnold, Science teacher and Duke of Edinburgh Award Coordinator, is taking a year to travel and see the world, while Miss Anne-Marie Conway, our Junior School Drama specialist, is pursuing her new adventures closer to home.

The same is true for Mrs Danielle Galli, who has been a Teaching Assistant in the Junior School – and a committed Channing parent – for eight years, while Auriel Bull, our Careers Assistant and also a former Channing parent, left in December to move to Norfolk and, among other things, write a book.

Mr Drew Underwood, our Deputy Head of 11 years, also left us in December for his new adventures, many of which appear so far to have included chilled drinks in various parts of the globe - entirely well deserved! Following in his footsteps for her new adventures (I am under very strict instructions to be clear that, as with Mr Underwood, this is NOT retirement) is Dr Nicky Devlin, stupendous teacher of Classics and Greek at Channing for the past 19 years, and who will be very much missed.

Some staff are leaving for relocations, including Miss Cassie Evans, PE Teacher, who left in December to follow her partner to his new job in Devon. Likewise, Ms Jess Bramhall of the Geography department, who has spent the full 16 years of her teaching career at Channing, is off to Dorset for a new life in the country. Some are going even further afield: Mrs Caroline Marley, Junior School Music teacher to Dulwich College Singapore, Ms Ally Cann of the English department to the Colegio Anglo Colombiano in Bogotá, Colombia and Mrs Sheila Mahmood, Science teacher, finally returning home to Canada with her family after accidentally spending 20 years in London, 16 of which have been at Channing.

A number of our colleagues are heading to new schools: Mr Martin Smith, part-time Economics teacher, left in December, and Junior School Teaching Assistants Jarmillia Paterson and Lavina Nelson will do the same at the end of next week. We also bid farewell to Dr Anna Kennedy, after 10 years’ sterling work in our Science department.

Particularly exciting are those leaving us for promotions in other schools, possibly the highest compliment we can be paid. We send off with our love and very best wishes: Ms Emily Moor to become Deputy Head of Geography at Queen’s Gate School; Mrs Kate Kavanagh to become Second in English, in charge of Sixth Form English, at City of London Academy Highgate Hill; and Ms Polly Evernden, after 11 years as Head of English, to become Director of Studies at Walthamstow Hall School in Kent. Sometimes I wish you’d all stop being 10% braver! Nonetheless, you will be missed and we thank you for your hard work in the service of the school – thank you, and good luck.

Now, while we have a number of staff leaving, we have also welcomed a huge number of babies into the Channing staff rooms this year! There have been 11 maternity leaves this academic year, and three more are on their way before Christmas… More news of those in due course.

Finally, in talking about our staff, we were very sad to have to mark the passing of Maria Alves, Catering Assistant, who passed away on 18 May 2022 after a short battle with illness. She was a tiny powerhouse of a woman, much loved among our staff and always full of smiles for the pupils at break and lunchtime. Our thoughts are with her friends and family, and of course she will always remain part of the Channing community.

To round off today, I’d like to return to the very last part of our first reading. Channing wrote, ‘To educate a child perfectly requires profounder thought, greater wisdom, than to govern a state’ - of course, I couldn’t possibly comment…but I’m fairly certain that the combined might of the Channing team could make a pretty good fist of it!

Thank you all, wonderful parents, for your support of us this year. Thank you to the extraordinary, tirelessly committed staff, teaching and support staff, Junior School and Senior School, for your hard work in all areas of school life. My particular thanks to the fantastic Senior Leadership Team, without whom I could not do my job at all!

But perhaps most importantly my thanks and congratulations to you, fabulous Channing pupils, on everything you have accomplished this year, whether large or small, publicly recognised or a hidden personal victory. You have my utmost respect, and I hope you will continue to live our Channing values with pride. Thank you all.

Senior SCHOOL

ART GCSE AND A LEVEL EXHIBITIONS.

The first end-of-year exhibitions for both GCSE and A level students for three years were again (at last!) a highlight of the school year. Creative, ambitious, challenging, diverse and idiosyncratic work demonstrated their individuality and artistic maturity, each demonstrating individual and original responses. These exhibitions are a pivotal moment in the school year and we have continually attempted to create professional-looking exhibitions to showcase the students’ talents. Both evenings were especially well attended, and enthused and enthralled reactions attested to the outstanding and compelling nature of the students’ visual achievements.

ART TRIPS

YEAR 13

In November, Year 13 Art students visited the Barbican Centre and the Whitechapel Gallery. At the Barbican they were able to learn about the sculptural installations of Japanese-American artist Isamu Noguchi, who incorporates both Japanese and Western visual elements in his work. Students also experienced the sound installation of Shilpa Gupta, a Mumbai-based artist whose work raises urgent questions around censorship and resistance. At the Whitechapel Gallery, students were treated to an array of contemporary ceramics, including the large-scale ceramic installations of Theaster Gates and Simone Fattal. Yoko Ono’s Mend Piece was a highlight: visitors were invited to take broken fragments of cups and saucers along with simple materials for repair - scissors, glue, twine and tape. After ‘mending’ the pieces, students’ contributions were put on display as part of a larger installation.

YEAR 12

In February, Year 12 Art students were treated to a day of London gallery visits. Ms Mackie and Ms Hume led the group to the Victoria Miro gallery, the Camden Arts Centre and No. 20 Arts in Islington. A special point of interest was that Ms Hume was herself exhibiting work in the No. 20 show, 'Threads of Time,' and we were lucky enough to have not only a talk from the gallery educator, but one of the exhibiting artists there to answer questions about her processes.

YEAR 10

On a beautifully bright day in May, our Year 10 artists set off on a trip to the Barbican Art Galleries to create preliminary studies for their GCSE coursework final pieces. As well as visiting two exhibitions at the centre, students were encouraged to take photographs and sketch the striking architecture of the City of London. We were very pleased to bump into one Channing parent, and we suspect that there will have been many more of you nearby, wishing that you too could be out enjoying being creative in the sunshine with us.

SEEING, DRAWING,THINKING…..

Channing's Sixth Form Art students were treated to a whole afternoon's immersive life drawing experience with the artist and educator Aldous Eveleigh on Tuesday 1 March. Aldous has taught at most of the major universities and Art schools in London. Students created some ambitious and varied studies and artworks inspired by Aldous and his methodology of building experience of

YEAR 12 ROYAL ACADEMY VISIT

simple form into complex mass, aligned with measuring and estimating in space. The charcoal and ink works generated served as a positive foundation for further life studies. The experience was suitably intense, yet fun and engaging, providing the rare opportunity to work from Aldous’s inspiring schemes. We thank Aldous and his model, Aviv, for their planning and delivery of such an exciting session.

In June, Year 12 artists accompanied by Ms Lam and Mr Haworth saw The Royal Academy Summer Show and The R.A. Schools exhibition. Everyone found the displays stimulating and compelling and all discovered works relating to their individual interests, despite the neon colour of some of the walls! The Schools exhibition was more of an acquired taste, with a more minimal and cerebral take on exhibiting the MA students’ work.

Classics

This year’s highlights for the Classics Department have included the return of our Mediterranean travels, the first Classics Symposium for three years and vibrant Mythologers, Classics Society and Ellery programmes.

Classicists in Years 9 to 11 headed off to Sicily at the start of the Easter holidays. We successfully negotiated Covid restrictions and busy airports to arrive in Catania and enjoy our fi rst taste of Sicilian food at the Hotel Pomara. The next day we had our fi rst archaeological visit, enjoying the spectacular temples in Agrigento. We took a group photo at the Temple of Concordia, one of the best-preserved Greek temples in Europe. Traditionally, couples visit this temple on their wedding day to ask for a harmonious

marriage. The afternoon was spent enjoying the amazing mosaics at the Villa Romana Del Casale at Piazza Armerina; the bikini girls and great hunt mosaics are always favourites and we had what is usually a busy site to ourselves! Day 3 of our trip was spent in Taormina, in what Lawrence Durrell terms ‘the most beautiful theatre in the world’, with a view over the sea and to ‘mamma’ Etna. We enjoyed some gelato, pasta and pizza in the town before heading to Catania to see the famous lava rock elephant statue. The fi nal sightseeing day saw us head to Siracusa to look at the skeletons of dwarf elephants, which may have inspired the Cyclops myth, and the exquisite statue of Venus. We enjoyed a boat trip around Siracusa harbour before heading into the town to look at the cathedral and enjoy a bit of souvenir shopping. The fi nal night was quiz night with rounds based on Sicily ancient and

modern, teacher biographies, Italian that we had picked up from our superb guide, Mario, and a picture round of celebrities disguised as the emperor Hadrian. The trip was a great success and the students were wonderful company.

Year 8 visited the Roman town of Verulamium (St Albans) in September and enjoyed a fun day of artefact handling, performing a Latin play in the Roman theatre, learning about mosaics and hypocausts and exploring the wonderful objects in the Verulamium museum’s collection. They produced an illustrated journal from the perspective of a Briton living in Verulamium, inspired by the beautiful statuette of Venus, the strigil we held in the handling session and the famous shell mosaic. Many thanks to Ms Melvin for organising the trip.

Ms McNamara and Mrs Elliot took the Year 12 and 13 Classical Civilisation

students to Warwick University for their Ancient Drama Festival. We all enjoyed lectures about the historical and social context to Euripides’ Bacchae, the iconography of Dionysos and mystery religions. We were then treated to a performance of Euripides’ Bacchae by Warwick students, featuring a female Dionysos, pop-singing Bacchae and a red bootwearing Pentheus. Thank you to Ms McNamara for organising the day.

In March, Classicists in Years 10-13 enjoyed our sixth annual Classics symposium, welcoming students and staff from Fortismere, West London Free School and Henrietta Barnett. Cristiana Lucidi from King’s College London spoke to us on Greek Tragedy and the position of women in fifth century Athens before introducing us to Euripides’ Medea and the portrayal of Medea and Jason. Dr Christopher Burden-Strevens from the University of Kent then showed us a new side to Cicero in explaining why Cicero couldn’t save the Roman Republic. We then rounded off the evening with a delicious Italian meal – many thanks to the superb Catering Department for the wonderful pasta!

Classics Society have explored a multitude of texts, topics and themes this year. In the autumn term we heard from Emmy Charalambous and Noli Tebe about their experiences attending classical summer schools, and from Freya Randall on her thoughts on Natalie Haynes’ ‘Pandora’s Jar’. Anika Agarwal and Anna Saacke shared their love of Catullus in taking us through some of his poems, while Mrs Elliot explored Euripides’ Hippolytus. In the Summer Term, Katie Shields, PhD student at UCL, introduced us to a number of ancient languages and we wrote in

cuneiform on clay tables, while Dr Devlin asked ‘what do Homer, the tragedians, Vergil and Cicero all have in common?’ Our final session saw Year 10 take the floor to explore why Hercules/Herakles was worshipped as a hero in both Rome and Greece.

It has been another mythology-packed year for our Junior Classics Club, Mythologers. In the autumn term, Ms McNamara introduced students to Virgil’s Aeneid, leading sessions on the fall of Troy, Aeneas’ escape, his doomed love with Dido and the battle against the Latins in Italy. They read extracts from the text, as well as producing dramatic performances for their peers. In the spring term, Ms Melvin, inspired by her recent holiday to Norway, taught sessions about Norse mythology, and its strong connection with nature and animals. Students completed a quiz to find their Nordic spirit animal – there were a lot of ravens – and learned how to write their name in runes. Finally, this summer we have been running a book club, reading two chapters each week from Leila Rasheed’s ‘A Roman Story’. This is a fascinating story about a young girl from Syria who is forced to move to Britannia and has a lot of adventures on the way.

In May we took Tabitha, one of our Year 8 Ellery Archaeology graduates to the Junior School, to run an Archaeology session with the Year 6 students. We carried out a sandpit archaeological dig, finding Greek vases, a Cycladic figurine and a Bronze Pegasus, before splitting into Roman and Celtic teams to explore what we can learn from their art and artefacts.

In July we said a very fond farewell to Dr Nicola Devlin at the end of her 19 years at Channing. She has

been an outstanding Classics teacher and much-valued member of the Department and we will miss her greatly. She has turned her hand to all manner of texts and initiatives, from running the school’s superb EPQ programme to teaching many GCSE and Sixth Form classes of Hellenists and Latinists everything from Greek temples to Latin subjunctives. This year saw her rise admirably to the challenge of taking on Mr Underwood’s Year 7 Latin class, which she did in style. She has also run Classics Society and coached many students through the Latin and Greek Reading Competitions, not to mention taking on late-night duties and medical supplies on trips abroad. We have been so lucky to have her scholarship and university-level teaching inspire so many students to pursue Classics for undergraduate and postgraduate study and look forward to inviting her back whenever we can!

It has been a busy and fun-filled year for the Classics Department and we look forward to next year with a trip to Rome, the return of the Classics Schools Challenge and the Year 9 trip to the British Museum.

Mrs S Elliot, Head of Classics

Computing

Channing’s Computing curriculum encourages learners to be confident, interested in learning about Computer Science and using technical language to communicate their knowledge and understanding. They learn from their experiences when creating programs and understanding how technology impacts society. They are given the opportunity to solve unfamiliar problems and design computer programs creatively and independently.

There have been plenty of activities that have taken place both inside and outside of the confines of the syllabus. Last year, pupils from Year 9 participated in the Bebras UK Challenge and scored well above the national average. This year, pupils from Years 7, 8 and 9 participated in the Challenge with equally impressive results.

Year 7 participated in the Junior Challenge, with 87,115 students taking it nationwide with an average score of 84 points. Congratulations to all Channing pupils who averaged 105 points. Twenty-nine students were awarded certifi cates of Merit and 31 were awarded certifi cates of Distinction. Special congratulations goes to Ella Cheung in Year 7, who achieved an impressive score of 178, which was best in school.

Years 8 and 9 pupils participated in the Intermediate Challenge with some 155,818 students taking it nationwide with an average score of 75 points. Congratulations to all Channing pupils who averaged 95

A LEVEL COMPUTER SCIENCE

This year marked yet another milestone in Channing’s Computing history by introducing A level Computer Science.

The approach in Cambridge International AS & A Level

Computer Science encourages learners to be confident in using a range of technology and programming paradigms and to use technology ethically. Students will be reflective as programmers, improving their own programming solution and being innovative, creating efficient solutions to problems.

The student’s view

One of the many reasons I chose Computer Science A Level is because the skills we develop in this subject will be benefi cial in a range of fi elds, opening up an increasing number of opportunities in the future.

In Computer Science, we study the practical side of computing which includes programming. Programming allows for creative problem solving. We mainly use Python or write pseudocode, where we learn how to, for example,

points. Fifty-four students were awarded certificates of Merit and 50 were awarded certificates of Distinction. Special congratulations goes to Daisy Apfel in Year 8, who achieved an incredible score of 173, which was best in school. There were 40 students who attained Gold and Distinction awards, which automatically qualified them for the Oxford University Computing Challenge which is an invitation challenge for talented UK students to produce programmed solutions to computational thinking problems. Special congratulations goes to Year 9’s Alethea Foster and Natasha Hough, who were awarded certificates of Merit in the OUCC challenge.

With two A level computer scientists (Savannah Joubert and Matilda Okhomina), I ran an exciting robotics and coding club where students built and programmed the VEX IQ robots to make the robots carry bricks through an assault course. This year students in the club created mobile device apps using App Lab. The app development software helped students develop their design skills as well as the programming skills to make the app interactive. Pupils downloaded their apps to their iPads and mobile devices so that they could play them at their leisure. Isabella Moren in Year 7 created a Spanish quiz; above is a sample screen together with the javascript code.

find items in arrays, write data into files and manipulate strings. Alongside Python we learn SQL; a database language which is used to manage relational databases and assembly language which is used to communicate directly with a computer’s hardware. You can see examples of A Level programming later in the article.

In addition to our practical work, we have also studied the theory side of Computer Science. One of the topics is communication where we learn about networks and how devices interact when they’re interlinked. We also look at the components of hardware and peripheral devices, such as inkjet printers and speakers, how they work and their use.

Computer Science also helps develop and improve our logical and computational thinking skills. Computational thinking helps break down and resolve problems by using four techniques: decomposition, pattern recognition, abstraction and algorithms. These techniques helped us become more innovative when creating solutions to problems.

Savannah Joubert and Matilda Okhomina, Year 12

GCSE COMPUTER SCIENCE – A STUDENT

My choice to take Computer science for GCSE due to my interest in technology was one of the best decisions I have ever made. Although coding and learning about the theory behind technology may be daunting, it opens up your mind to so many fascinating concepts such as how Computers function and how codes and algorithms can be used to communicate with technology. As you may be aware, the GCSE specification my year received is different from past years as the depth explored in different topics is much greater; for example when learning about binary we learnt a larger range of calculations that can take place and how to explain what they do. My favourite part of this subject, and the main reason I chose to take this course, is that we have the opportunity of learning Python, a high-level programming language. Not only is coding rewarding but also fascinating as you have to use skills from other subjects such as maths, physics and even in my opinion french/ spanish as you are learning a new language. Although at points Computing can seem impossible and frustrating I think that it is a subject that involves lots of problem solving and every lesson you are learning something new and developing your understanding of our increasingly technology-based world. Alice Cochrane, Year 10

Having completed the fi rst year of my Computer Science iGCSE course I can already see the real-world benefi ts of this subject with the knowledge I have acquired. Living in a world where it is impossible to go from day-to-day without some infl uence or interaction with technology this subject is becoming increasingly necessary and relevant. For example, in one of our theory lessons, we recently studied the different types of transmission (parallel, serial, full-duplex, simplex) and the IT/socioeconomic benefi ts and drawbacks of each. In contrast, the practical (by which I mean programming) side to the subject is equally as fascinating as it allows

HENNEY COMPETITION 2022

VIEW

the user to have some insight as to why famous apps and websites have been so successful with their algorithms and, perhaps, how you could also fi nd success in a similar way. Although Computer Science is quite a contained subject it also explicitly links to the expected subjects like Mathematics however also, perhaps less blatantly, has a positive effect on all my subjects as I do not lose my ‘Computer Science mindset’ when approaching essays and languages as I am very thorough in checking my work and being accurate in my facts (thanks to Python coding. I have learnt so much this year and am really excited to come back in September and continue the course! Tabitha Jackson, Year 10

I find Computer Science a useful subject for the future and have found this first year in the Cambridge iGCSE course challenging in some aspects but also fun in which to learn and make progress. As the course has recently changed we have had access to learn about further information about Computer Science, for example, two’s complement. I enjoy looking further into the theory and reason for designing a program because I think it is extremely interesting to look into the reasoning as computer science is the backbone to many jobs and practices in life. I have always been interested in computer science and coding and this course has explained in more detail to me the possibilities that can happen in computer science which I find very fascinating. Within this course we have learnt about boolean logic and the true and false mechanism, the process of sensors and how to apply the different sensors to a system using logical thinking. We have also learnt about the Von Neumann Architecture, which is the basis of computers and how data is stored, Binary, Denary and hexadecimal conversion and uses, Primary and secondary storage and data transmission; each of these topics have improved my logical thinking and skills to attempt in problem solving. Sylvie Leong, Year 10

The Henney Prize for computer graphics is an award open to all girls in Year 7, who produce a piece of computer art using a graphics drawing application. There were some impressive entries demonstrating creativity and the ability to use the graphics tools effectively, with Avishag Tietjen and Ellie Shenker highly commended. The overall winner was Olivia Watson; her winning entry is shown below.

NATIONAL MUSEUM OF COMPUTING AT BLETCHLEY PARK

When we arrived at the National Museum of Computing, the fi rst thing that was demonstrated was a Lego Mindstorm robot that was programmed to solve a Rubik’s cube. It took 90 seconds! We then took a tour of the museum and were able to see the Lorenz Machine and learn how it works. The Lorenz Machine was used by the Nazis to transmit important messages. It would therefore have been a great help to the Allies if they could break the encrypted messages, and so they built Colossus. At fi rst Colossus could only decode messages in three to fi ve days, as well as having other flaws in the machine, leading to the need for an updated model. The new updated model, the fi rst time it was turned on, was able to solve the code in 45 minutes.

After learning about this we were able to do some coding on 80’s computers – let me tell you, you needed a lot of patience! The computers also made a highpitched sound that was really annoying. We learnt about Moore’s Law, which is based on the principle that the speed and capability of computers can be expected to double every two years as a result of increases in the number of transistors a microchip can contain.

This couldn’t be better shown with the calculator: the WITCH machine was essentially an early calculator yet it was enormous and took up a whole side of the room, and now a calculator can fi t in your pocket. Lastly, we investigated Alan Turing’s quote: “A computer would deserve to be called intelligent if it could deceive a human into believing that it was human.” We had to try to figure out if we were talking to a human or a computer, which might sound easy but it was really hard. Then we had a chance to program a bot to imitate a human and it was a lot of fun.

Anouska Sitkey, Year 9

I really enjoyed the trip, learning about the advancements in technology and seeing all the old computers. I thought it was really interesting seeing how much smaller the computers have become; they went from massive machines to tiny chips that could easily get lost on the floor. My favourite machine was the WITCH. It was a large calculator that was capable of doing very long equations. It also looked and sounded very interesting with lots of flashing lights from the transistors and there were a lot of clicking noises. We also coded a snake game on an old BBC Master computer. I really enjoyed this as we got a feel of how it used to be before all of our modern technology. One of my favourite parts was playing old retro arcade games on old computers, including Pac-Man and Space Invaders and we even had a go on an old pinball machine! Finally, we tested our intelligence. We were matched up with either another member of the class or a bot and had to have a conversation then guess which we were talking to, as well as coding our own AI.

What a great trip! Thanks to all the teachers for arranging it for us.

ROBOTICS CLUB – A STUDENT VIEW

We joined the Robotics and Coding club with Mr Holmes in September and ever since then we have had lots of fun with coding apps and building and coding our own robots as well! We built our robot, Yoshi, in eight weeks. We really enjoyed this time and had lots of fun, though we had some struggles, it was worth it. When we were building our dinosaur we ran into lots of problems from inserting pieces into the wrong place and having to rebuild to struggling with the one motor because sometimes it would fall over. The final problem we ran into was probably the hardest because the dinosaur only had one motor, which meant that there were stability problems when it was walking.

Ailsa Hall and Charlotte Fleming, Year 7

I joined Robotics Club in the autumn term. There, I made a robot called Ike with my friend, Sophie. I picked this robot because it looked very fun with its little arms and head. We fi nished building our robot second and had very few problems, mostly because we checked each step carefully. We enjoyed raising money for Waterlow’s House charity week by charging pupils 20p a time to make the robots pick up as many bricks as they could and

move them from the start line to the fi nishing line. Ella Cheung and Sophie Butler, Year 7

We joined the Robotics Club at the start of the year. One of our main achievements so far is our robots. We made a claw bot that was able to pick up blocks with its claw and throw them. We were the fi rst group to fi nish our robot, but it was a lot of hard work. Sometimes our wheels didn’t work and our motors were linked to the wrong wire but even through those challenges it was fun. After we had built our robot and there were no more problems, we were able to tether it to a remote control. Then after that we also coded it on the VEX app on our iPads. Finn Collie-Binnee and Isabella Moren, Year 7

Drama & THEATRE STUDIES

There have been a number of ‘magic moments’ this academic year in Drama and Theatre Studies at Channing. Perhaps they have been made all the more magical by the pace with which they seem to have landed. To me, everything this academic year has felt like it was on fast forward; from the exceptional level of quality displayed in our first Performance Examination evening with Year 10 students in October, to the way three hours flew by when immersed in Punchdrunk’s ‘Burnt City’ on the KS5 Theatre Trip to Woolwich Arsenal. Everything seems to have flashed before our eyes!

Year 11 students provided us with plenty of food for thought in both their devised and duologue performances. Both assessments showcased the breadth and scope of skills the students develop during the course and also both surprising and original outcomes. Each year the exam board provides an image, a quotation, a phrase and song and groups choose one stimulus to spark a response. The creativity, comedy and intensity of their work came through controversial contemporary topics such as; gun control and gambling, political scandal and the dangers of online ‘incel’ culture.

Year 11 Devised work inspired by Brechtian ‘Epic Theatre’ approach:

Year 13 examination: Extracts taken from ‘Bronte’ by Polly Teale

Y13 devised piece, ‘Kore’

Year 13 Drama and Theatre Studies students staged extracts from ‘Brontë’ by Polly Teale, using theatre company Shared Experience’s unique blend of naturalism and expressionism to present their scenes. The Component 3 examination showcased their physical theatre skills, characterisation and sought to explain the three Brontë sisters’ lives, which were often misunderstood. The audience were invited into their struggles to make their mark on the literary world as women (they wrote under the nom de plumes of Currer, Ellis & Acton Bell) and the impact of their father and brother on the choices. The piece flits between the fantasy world of the sisters’ novels and their lived experience - period costume and striking design choices made this a memorable interpretation and a visual treat for the spectators.

Their devised piece ‘Kore’ was created as a response to the ‘Apple of Discord’ taken from Greek mythology. It examined classical and contemporary expectations of women, desire, and beauty standards. The students were inspired by the use of playful and ever changing perspective, by applying live camera feeds on stage, and distorting recorded sound and projection. Their chosen practitioner Katie Mitchell is well known for creating ‘live cinema’ in her controversial interpretations of classical texts and operas. The students created both jarring and darkly comical moments in their performance.

I was proud to direct my first musical at Channing and ‘The Sound of Music’ marked a galvanising moment of the school community coming together. Mr Boxall (Musical Director), Mr Maliphant-Gray and I were joined by a professional sound technician, set and costume designer and musicians to support the production. We wanted to give audiences the ‘wow’ factor and that is what they got! The response from students, parents, past and present teachers, alumnae and even the Mayor of Haringey was testament to the gallant efforts of the cast and crew. It was a joy to see the talents of the school culminate in such a wonderful crescendo. Led by Harriet Sumners as Maria, Celine Obadiah as Captain Von Trapp and Anna Milsom as Mother Abbess, the production will live on in our memories with as much staying power as its iconic score!

Year 12 students showed they have acutely observed the microcosm of Sixth Form life as their portrayal of four girls at a boarding school showed. ‘Numbers’ charts a kind of ‘Mean Girls meets Mallory Towers’ and provided some darkly comic character studies of rather unpleasant teenage behaviour! Their set designer, Eliana Samonas, even captured the smells of a common room (buttered toast, if you were wondering) in her hyper-realistic set.

We rounded off the year with Year 10 students performing extracts from ‘DNA’ by Dennis Kelly for their Component 2 examination. Their nuanced interpretation of teenagers with a secret to hide was beautifully staged

Y12 Extract examination performance: ‘Numbers’ by Kieron Barry

by set designer Sylvie Yeong’s creation of a field, a wood and a street. The students shared their words thoughtfully, creating the appropriate dark tension fitting for this unsettling story.

There are two members of the Drama department leaving Channing this year; Ms Hurst and Ms Wilkinson. This marks somewhat of an end of an era and we are extremely grateful for the productions, including their joint collaboration on the marvellous Key Stage 3 production of Pygmalion. There were some wonderfully comedic performances by the young cast and they thrived in period costume and an intricately designed naturalistic set. Ms Hurst and Ms Wilkinson have provided memorable experiences for students during their time here, from the clubs they have led, shows they have directed and the lessons they have taught. I would like to thank them for their tireless hard work and dedication and wish them all the best for the future.

Ms J Hill, Head of Drama & Theatre Studies

Y10 Component 2 ‘DNA’ by Dennis Kelly

Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (KS3 Production)

THE SOUND OF MUSIC

‘The Sound of Music’ is widely regarded as one of the classic ‘feel-good’ musicals, often evoking a strong sense of nostalgia for those that hear the iconic songs; so catchy you cannot help but sing along. The challenge, however, when tackling a production that holds such a dear place in people’s hearts, was trying to create a version which does not attempt to rival their own specific, often warm and fuzzy, childhood memories of watching the film. Perhaps the audience has previously performed the piece themselves or visited Nonnberg Abbey whilst on holiday in Austria. It seems everyone has a story, opinion or reaction to ‘The Sound of Music’ and I enjoyed hearing about the personal connection many staff and students have to the musical.

It has been a decade since Channing students produced a whole-school musical and it seems fitting that after the uncertainty of the past two years, that we chose a wellloved, family favourite. Despite the historical context of ‘The Sound of Music’ being fraught with the tensions of Austria’s resistance (or lack thereof) to the imminent

Anschluss by the Nazis, there is also a central story of a young woman finding her way in the world. Wrestling with questions about her purpose, faith and understanding how her personality is fine just the way it is. That her love of singing is not something to be stamped out, but rather celebrated as an integral aspect of what makes her unique. The moral of the story, in spite of its twee and arguably saccharine moments, is simple; essential to the happiness of an individual, is their ability to live life and stay true to their own values. Maria reminds us integrity and honesty,

alongside the joy of musical and creative expression, is what we need to be our authentic selves.

It was an absolute treat to have such a mixture of students; stagehands, performers and musicians together in the Arundel Centre. The cast and crew truly appreciate the chance to learn from one another, often celebrating each others’ moments of greatness in a rehearsal with impromptu applause. One of my favourite parts of the process is watching the growing admiration and respect the cast have for one another. Watching their peers they are often genuinely surprised and thrilled by the progress which is made, week on week. Most importantly, I would argue, we have also had some brilliant laughs! There are

a few key lines that always managed to raise a smile from the cast and these young people deserve to enjoy more carefree moments of fun, after such a prolonged period of ‘Weltschmerz’ during the pandemic.

Finally, I must mention our lead, Harriet Sumners, whose talent and unassuming nature has been the most wonderful revelation. It is a rarity to find a performer with such a fantastic work ethic, intelligence and quiet determination, who is also lacking in ego! She led the cast with true Maria-esque qualities of patience, decency and a true love for performing.

Ms J Hill, Director, The Sound of Music

This year, 68 students in Years 8 and Year 9 studied for the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) Grade 4 and Grade 5 examinations. Lessons and examinations were in the wonderful new Founders’ Hall Studios. The two evening Showcases, though, were in the Arundel Centre, where there was a special excitement at the return of live audiences. From their first sessions in September to their final course evaluations, this cohort worked with great imagination, resilience and supportive collaboration. Here is a representative selection of their comments:

FAVOURITE ELEMENTS:

• T he whole creation of our pieces all the way up to the showcase… I loved being able to work with my LAMDA group as a team, we got to know each other so well. The practical work allowed me to be creative in deciding how I wanted to shape my character, which was really awesome.

• E xperiencing and learning about new characters and plays, plus developing the contrast between my monologue and duologue. I found lessons really fun and enjoyed seeing everyone else’s pieces.

• Working with and getting to know people that I wouldn’t have otherwise.

• I e njoyed the showcase, which was amazing. I loved being on stage and performing a piece I knew so well.

• T he interaction between other students and the ideas they gave me.

• My favourite thing was the freedom of choosing my pieces and then building both scenes, choosing how to construct the characters and scene. I had a lot of fun experimenting with my lines.

ASPECTS THEY FOUND USEFUL:

• T he confidence I gained from LAMDA has been huge. It has allowed me to be more calm, especially going into language oral exams, but also in public speaking, talking in big groups of people and giving presentations in class. I also value the creativity I have developed, for subjects such as English, where I need to analyse characters more deeply, but also for Art, where I have to ‘think outside of the box’.

• T he aspect I found most useful was the analytical side to LAMDA. I really enjoyed learning how to break down the piece into sections and apply techniques to particular parts. The guidance the lessons gave and the homework sheets were very helpful. Another aspect was how close I got to my scene partner. We became really good friends.

• I t hink the most valuable thing I have learned is to believe in myself.

• G etting so much feedback and working on the theory helps you analyse what you are saying.

• I s peak very quickly, and LAMDA has helped me to regulate my speed and improve my diction.

• Learning good ways to memorise things, I feel I can bring those tactics into other aspects of life.

• D efinitely the confidence it gave me - it is liberating being able to perform in front of people. I also thought the flexibility of the course was very helpful.

• T he team work aspect and being able to listen to my peers’ ideas and applying them to my pieces.

• Learning the different emotions of different types of people and how to convey different feelings. I think I have become better at expressing my own feelings.

Photographs and recordings of the Showcase performances are accessible through the Channing website under Senior Drama. In addition, some of the students contributed to a Chatting with Channing episode on LAMDA.

Ms V Penglase, LAMDA Coordinator

Economics

This year marked the end of an era. Since 2005, Ms Newman and I have been a two-person department. At the start of the year we became three with the appointment of Mr Smith. Unfortunately, Mr Smith who was semi-retired, found that he was working longer and harder with all his other commitments compared to when he was working full time as Head of Economics at Harrow Boys’ School and he left at the end of the autumn term. My huge appreciation and thanks to Ms Newman who took his lessons.

In the autumn Term, our economists attended the Economics in Action A Level Conference. The planned tube strike meant that we had to watch the lectures online. The event was hosted by Bobby Seagull and there were fi ve highly educational sessions on: Economic indicators, Government policy, The labour markets, Behavioural insights and Financial markets. The inspirational lectures were delivered by industry leaders, academics and public servants.

In the summer term, public examinations returned. Our Year 13 economists rose to the challenge of completing these examinations. The Department was impressed with their fortitude, tenacity and measured approach given that they did not sit their I/GCSEs in Year 11. The macroeconomic paper tested the Phillips curve for the fi rst time. The other essay questions focused on protectionism and sustainable development. The data response examined measuring inequality and infl ation rate targeting which is pertinent given the current rising infl ation and accelerating cost of living. The themes paper also focused on regional inequality and wage differentials. It was a challenging paper.

A number of our Year 12 economists attended public lecture at LSE “Why does racial inequality persist?”. The speaker was Professor Glenn Loury. He explored the importance of social networks in infl uencing education decisions and how a lack of access to networks can act as a barrier to educational attainment. In addition, he explored the politics of racial inequalities, with a particular focus on the US context. They also attended an event hosted by The Economic Research Council, entitled The Future of Work, with Jon Cruddas, MP for Dagenham and Rainham and author of The Dignity of Labour, as well as Richard Burge, CEO of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Unfortunately the recent tube strike delayed our Year 12 trip to the Bank of England and the walking tour of the fi nancial district and we will be going at the end of this academic year. The museum has an intriguing exhibition on Slavery and the Bank which examines the history of transatlantic slavery through its connections with the Bank of England.

With school events returning in person, Ms Newman and I were delighted to catch up with our alumnae. We welcomed back our Class of 2021 and we had the opportunity to congratulate them on their A level results. We were so happy to see a number of our class of 2012 economists at their Reunion Event. It was enjoyable to hear how many of them have put their economics studies to full use and have become industry experts. We are delighted that they are keen to come in and talk to our current students. We also received exciting news that our ex-student Natasha Burns just graduated from Barnard College of Columbia University and she got the U.K. equivalent of a double fi rst and department honours for Economics. She is about to start full time at JP Morgan in New York. She said: “I defi nitely wouldn’t be here without your encouragement to study Economics.’ We are extremely proud of her and we encourage all our ex-students to continue to share their news with us.

Finally, congratulations to this year’s winner of the Fraser & Russell Prize for Economics, Constantina Papadopolous. She has been a real asset to our subject along with our other departing economists. Ms Newman and I wish our Year 13 the very best for the future. They have been an absolute joy to teach and we are certain that they will make a real positive change in the world. We will miss them!

Mrs G Bhamra-Burgess, Head of Economics

The Wind in the Willows opens with Mole emerging from his burrow for the first time ‘and ‘after the seclusion of the cellarage he had lived in so long, the carol of happy birds fell on his dulled hearing almost like a shout'. We have felt some of this Mole-like joy this year, as activities have taken off fully again in the English Department.

Year 13 ‘Paradise Lost’ students enjoyed a spring trip to the glittering heart of Chalfont St Giles, where they visited John Milton’s cottage. A scholarly tour round his pamphlets and political essays was followed by a memorable performance of the temptation and fall of humanity in the cottage’s ornamental garden, with students sharing the roles of Adam, Eve, Satan, and the apple.

It has been a particularly busy and productive year for the Channing debaters. We started the year by preparing our Senior team of Maria Kirpichnikova, Imani MokalRussell and Catrin Cox for the English Speaking Union mace competition. The students debated the motion, ‘This house believes that artists have a moral duty to be political in their work’. The debate was spirited and the team were runners-up in their heat. The Channing Debating Club has been enlivened by our partnerships with St Aloysius College, Yerbury and Brookfi eld Primary Schools. The Senior debaters wrangled with the issue of compulsory paternity leave, whilst the Juniors have argued over whether homework should be banned and whether flights should be limited to one per person per year. The Year 5 and 6 students have become skilful debaters under the tutelage of our Year 7 team, Leila Al Hassan, Harriet Hills, Isabella Norman and Yeva Mnatsakanyan.

Linguistics Society has had a very good inaugural year. Students from Year 11 and 13 have spent Wednesday lunchtimes puzzling out grammar, alphabets and vocabulary from languages both real and imagined. One particularly gnarly puzzle involved navigating a Georgianalphabet tube map, but being given the name of only

one stop. Students all acquitted themselves honourably in the sixth form level Linguistics Olympiad, with Emilia Charalambous attaining a Silver medal.

The Literary Society has enjoyed plenty of discussions about all things bookish. We have enjoyed visitors like Dr Katie Donington who talked about the darker history of the English country house and Lewis Buxton who led the students in poetry writing, using their names as inspiration. Students have presented on a variety of fascinating topics including the origins of the Gothic, the trip to Geneva that sparked Frankenstein’ and Rushdie’s controversial Satanic Verses. Our reading has taken us through Hemingway, Woolf, Steinbeck, Wharton and Sally Rooney.

Our Year 8 and 9 readers have been busy too. We launched Book Club this year with Michelle Obama’s inspiring memoir ‘Becoming’ adapted for younger readers. It prompted discussions about education, race, the role of women, motherhood and careers. We enjoyed the explosively popular graphic novel ‘Heartstopper’, a novel that explores the blossoming relationship between two teenage boys, and ‘When the Stars are Scattered’, the story of asylum seekers and the ordeals they face. One of the common themes that has occurred repeatedly throughout all of these texts is the importance of education and the power it has to change lives. Particular mention must go to Siana Chamalidis, whose enthusiasm and book recommendations were inspiring.

We have also been busy developing the writers of the future. Participants in Year 7 and 8 writing club experimented with different forms – from short stories to poetry, memoir to fi ction - and found inspiration in a variety of sources, including nineteenth century news clippings, family history and current affairs. Planning and producing short bursts of creative writing is an excellent way to improve confidence and develop as an assured writer - all our young writers have felt the benefi ts of this weekly practice. Two wonderful poets came into school to lead workshops with students from across the school. Lewis Buxton and Cecilia Knapp both showed us how to capture our unique perspective on the world.

The English department is changing as Ms Kavanagh, Miss Cann and I all move on to new schools. Teaching English to Channing students has been a delight, so thank you all for making our time here so happy.

Ms P Evernden, Head of English

World Book Day workshop with Lewis Buxton

Poetry Workshop with Cecilia Knapp

Geography

It has been an exciting year in the Geography Department. We have been fortunate with this year being more normal that it has meant we have been able to run our full array of field trips and societies.

A highlight of the academic year was welcoming back Professor Danny Dorling, the Halford Mackinder Professor of Geography, at the University of Oxford. Professor Dorling’s lecture was entitled, “Inequality in the UK and the search for seven typical children.” He explored inequality in the UK over time and compared the UK to other nations.

To mark COP26, Senior Geography Society live streamed into the Royal Geographical Society to hear an expert panel discussion. We were fortunate that the panel answered lots of our questions. The key message from the discussion was to keep the conversation on climate change going.

I am hugely grateful to the fantastic team of Channing Geography teachers, Mr Boardman, Ms Bramhall, Ms Moor and Mrs Walker. This year we are sad to say farewell to two wonderful members of the Geography Department, Ms Bramhall and Ms Moor. Ms Bramhall has taught at Channing for 16 years and in that time has been both Head of Year 8 and Head of Geography. She has contributed so much to Channing over the years. Ms Moor has also co-led the Duke of Edinburgh Silver Award Scheme.

Mrs S Blake, Head of Geography

YEAR 11 FLATFORD MILL

A highlight of Channing’s GCSE Geography course is the annual fi eld trip to the Flatford Mill Field Studies Centre in picturesque Constable Country. The aim of our Year 11 class was to investigate downstream changes on the River Brett. At school, we had studied the various fl uvial processes visible at Flatford Mill, and on arrival we collected data from three sites (Bildeston, Semer and Hadleigh). In particular, we examined elements of the Bradshaw model, such as the channel depth, average velocity and load quantity of the river as it progressed. Back at school, our class analysed the data gathered and concluded that our hypothesis was correct overall. A few anomalous results allowed the group to evaluate the methods used and how those could be improved to obtain more accurate results on future expeditions.

Sophia Sutliff, Year 11

GLOBETROTTERS

Globetrotters is a lunchtime club for Years 7 and 8. In the past we’ve made clay models of environmental features, done capital city quizzes, and played guess the flag games. Recently we have been working on raising awareness and coming up with ideas to make our school more sustainable. We’ve also created posters and lids for recycling bins to show other students what can and can’t be recycled. As well as this, we’ve looked at how we impact the environment by calculating the carbon emissions of past flights we’ve taken, and learnt interesting facts, like that there is a huge increase in carbon emissions produced if you fly business or first class rather than economy. In addition to this, lately, we have been making quizzes for Earth Day to share with the rest of the school and play in class.

Siana Chamalidis, Year 8

SENIOR GEOGRAPHY SOCIETY

Every Tuesday a group of enthusiastic geographers meet to participate in the Senior Geography Society. Over the year we have listened to presentations from peers, notably a geopolitical discussion about the Arctic Tundra from Y13s, and have been given the chance to present ourselves, for example, Sienna and I gave a presentation on ‘The Response to the Tonga Crisis’. Through this, we are both educated and able to have open discussions with others who are equally as passionate about the subject. Later on, in the year, we began reading ‘39 ways to save the planet’ by Tom Heap and discussed the ways in which we are able to get out of the ‘mess’ we humans have created.

Lucy Selfe, Year

12

YEAR 9 KING’S CROSS REGENERATION TRIP

Year 9 spent the day exploring different zones of the recently redeveloped areas around King’s Cross. To answer the question ‘Has the redevelopment of King’s Cross been successful’, not only did we have our own surveys to fill, but we approached members of the public and asked them to answer a few questions as well. During the day we learnt about sampling and a variety of different methods of data collection.

Thea Foster, Year 9

YEAR 10 OLYMPIC PARK TRIP

In December, we visited the areas in, and surrounding the Olympic Park to help us answer the question ‘What impact has an urban regeneration project had on Quality of Life?’ The primary objective of an Urban Regeneration is to improve both the economic and social aspects of a city. We were informed that the site had previously been a vast area of dereliction and we evaluated the extent to which Quality Of Life and Standard of Living have been altered in Stratford New Town, The East Village, Copper Box and Hackney Wick.

Whilst the trip was educational and acted as the basis for our GCSE fieldwork, I found it provided an intriguing insight into how the adaptation and development of a substantial area of London can completely alter one neighbourhood for the better but have little to no positive impact on a neighbouring space; emphasising the extent to which economic factors play such pivotal roles in the way people experience life in a city.

Elsie Isaacs,

Year 10

YEAR 12 BLENCATHRA

In June the Year 12 geographers embarked on a field trip to Blencathra in the Lake District. It consisted of three days of action-packed investigating, data collection (scenic landscapes) and enhancing our research skills for our own personal investigations. This is the coursework section of the Geography A level known as the NEA (Non-Examined Assessment). Each day was devoted to a different topic that we have studied so far this year: Earth Life Support Systems, Glaciated Landscapes and Changing Spaces Making Places.

YEAR 12 BRICK LANE

On 15 October, all Year 12 Geographers visited Brick Lane to discover more about its place identity to use for a case study. We spent the morning wandering the streets of Whitechapel; learning about the past connections of Brick Lane from the movement of people such as the Huguenots in the 17th Century and the adaptation of a mosque which was once a synagogue and church. Lunch was spent in Spitalfields market and we were faced with the extremely hard task of choosing what to eat from a variety of amazing cuisines. We collected data on Brick Lane through ArcGIS, interviews and photographs to build a portfolio of Brick Lane’s diverse identity.

Sienna

Ransford,

Year 12

The first day revolved around Earth’s Life Support Systems, in which we investigated the Carbon and Water cycle in different environments around the field centre. We carried out practical investigations such as measuring infiltration, interception and carbon storage in trees. Seeing the carbon and water cycle in action helped us to gain a deeper understanding into what we have been studying so far this year. On the second day, we set out on a hike up Easedale Valley, a previously glaciated valley: the aim was to investigate the many spectacular glacial landforms that still remain here thousands of years on. We really put our geography knowledge to the test and were able to spot landforms left, right and centre. The view at the top of the valley was very rewarding: a spectacular lake named Easedale Tarn has formed as a result of erosion. For the final day, we ventured into the nearby town of Keswick, one of the largest towns in Cumbria and a hub for tourism, so it was a perfect location for us to carry out some investigations for the Changing Spaces Making Places topic, which is all about place perception, society and culture, rebranding and representation. We investigated these themes as we walked through Keswick using methods such as rephotography, mapping land use and public questionnaires.

We had evening lessons in which we learnt about methods such as qualitative analysis, inferential statistics and using ArcGIS to present data. These methods facilitated the presentation of our findings in a clear and defined approach.

Alice Metcalf, Year 12

History

2021-22 has been an exciting year for the History department, with new trips and staffing changes, as well as our new Key Stage 3 curriculum. With so many to remember, I have instead highlighted our top five events from this academic year.

ENGAGING HISTORY TRIPS

We have been so excited this year to restart some of our History trips. In May, we took our GCSE Year 11 students on a tour of Whitechapel to hear more about the horrifying Jack the Ripper murders of 1888. Students had the chance to hear more about the victims’ lives, as well as their shocking deaths. This was an excellent opportunity for students to ask any questions they had about the Ripper case, and even put their own ideas forward.

We have also taken students on new trips this year. During Enrichment Week, our Year 12 students toured Deptford to learn more about the history of slavery in London. Led by Judith Hibbert, a founding member of the Museum of Slavery and Freedom (and Channing School’s Catering Manager), this was an valuable experience for our A level historians. The Year 12 students also visited the West End during Enrichment Week to watch Six, the musical about the wives of Henry VIII.

BRILLIANT HISTORY PROJECTS

This year, we have challenged our students to create thoughtful and creative projects to accompany their learning in lessons. We started in September with our Year 9 HERstory projects. Students looked at the life of a woman from History who we feel has not been given the full recognition she deserves, and created something to honour her life and achievement. We had a fantastic array of art, posters, poetry and writings, as well as murder mystery boards and games.

Our Year 7s and Year 8s have also had the opportunity to be creative in their project work. As part of their ‘Medieval England’ module, Year 7 worked in groups to produce presentations about famous Medieval women. Looking at powerful women such as Eleanor of Aquitaine and Margaret Beaufort, students created drama sketches and even wrote songs to accompany their research. Year 8 students have also had the chance to produce projects on a range of subjects, including the British Empire and the sinking of the Titanic. They have shown off their research and presentation skills throughout the academic year.

OUR NEW KEY STAGE 3 CURRICULUM

Although we started last year, this year we have had the chance to teach our new and revamped Key Stage 3 curriculum from September. Our new curriculum features a bigger range of historical events and individuals, and refl ects a more diverse History for our students. Our Year 7 students studied not only Medieval England, but also the Medieval Ottoman Empire, and have been able to compare the different experiences and cultures people had in the 13th-16th Centuries. Our Year 8 students have also been able to explore a greater range of History, looking at experiences of people across the British Empire in the autumn term, as well as the treatment and experiences of enslaved people in the 17th-19th Centuries. In the spring term, Year 8 studied the Industrial Revolution and the increasing diversity of London in the 1800s, as well as the Suffrage movement.

HISTORY SOCIETY

We could not share the achievements of the History Department without celebrating our brilliant History Society. Run this year by two Year 12 students, Gabby Douglas-Kitsis and Anika Agarwal, the History Society has held weekly lectures from both staff and students during Tuesday lunchtimes on a huge range of topics. Particular highlights include talks on the Salem witch trials, women and piracy, and historical accuracy in the media. History Society has also had talks from members of the History department such as my talk on the history of gay marriage for LGBT History Month.

INSIGHTFUL HISTORY TALKS

In May, students attended a talk by Hella Pick, a journalist who reported for The Guardian as the UN and EastWest correspondent. Our Year 9 students attended a talk by Hephzibah Rudofsky, who spoke about her mother’s experiences as a Holocaust survivor. The Year 9 students were engaged and asked a range of thoughtful questions.

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to say goodbye, as I am leaving this year to pursue a career outside of teaching. I have immensely enjoyed my four years at Channing School, as both a teacher and this year as the Head of History.

Ms Z Hursay, Head of History

Library

In September we were delighted to reopen the Library fully to pupils and staff after a year of restricted access due to Covid. Pupils’ excitement to browse the shelves, relax with a book and make use of the study spaces was palpable. The Library has hosted clubs, workshops and author visits throughout the year. A fantastic team of 29 pupil librarians and Duke of Edinburgh volunteers in Years 7-9 have helped with everything from shelving to auditing the diversity of the Library collection.

In November, Ms Levontine joined the Library as part-time Library Assistant. She previously worked in the library at JCoSS and is an avid reader and theatre goer.

AUTHOR VISITS

Pupils have had virtual visits from a range of exciting authors and speakers. In October the poet Cecilia Knapp ran workshops for Years 7-11 for National Poetry Day. Pupils played haiku bingo and used a free-writing exercise to get inspiration for their poems.

For World Book Day in March, the author Sita Brahmachari spoke to Year 7 and the author Lisa Williamson spoke to Years 8 and 9. Both described their journeys to becoming writers and the inspiration for their books. They highlighted the power of books to bring about change – in Sita’s case, through stories of young people taking positive action to tackle climate change and racism, and in Lisa’s case, through her book ‘The Art of Being Normal’ giving positive representation to transgender teenagers. The poet Lewis Buxton also gave a reading-themed assembly for Years 7-9 and ran poetry workshops for Years 7 and 10.

BOOK CLUBS AND READING CHALLENGES

From November to February, pupils in Years 7 to 9 were challenged to read as many as possible of the 12 books on the shortlist for the Trinity Schools Book Award, earning a House point for each book they read and reviewed. They were also able to virtually meet the author Eric Lindstrom whose book ‘Not If I See You First’ was on the shortlist. In the spring term, Year 7 Book Club took part in the Alexandra Palace Children’s Book Award, reading a shortlist of six books chosen by local school librarians and voting for their favourite. They also attended the award

As part of Jewish Book Week’s schools programme, we were delighted to welcome the author and journalist Hella Pick to talk to us about her memoir, ‘Invisible Walls’. Maria and Rosie in Year 11 interviewed Ms Pick, expertly asking questions about her nearly 40-year career as foreign correspondent for The Guardian and inviting the audience to ask questions at the end. We were delighted to be joined by pupils from Parliament Hill School.

ceremony at Alexandra Palace on 25 March, including a workshop with author Polly Ho-Yen and a Q&A with four of the shortlisted authors.

PUPIL LIBRARIANS

The pupil librarians as ever have been a fantastic support. This year they helped create displays, publicise Library initiatives, choose books for the Library, review books and decorate the library for Christmas and World Book Day.

EURO TOOLBOX

Together with the Junior School Library, we hosted a collection of books in six European languages (French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and Polish). These showcased the best new fi ction for young readers, including picture books, middle grade and young adult fi ction. The collection was used in library lessons and for pupils to browse in the Library.

Ms I Ramsden, Senior School Librarian

Mathematics

The Maths Department welcomed a return to relative normality with teaching last September with the removal of bubbles and being able to do group work more easily. Mr Brand joined our happy team of: Ms Cooper, Mr Daurat, Mr Riggs-Long, Ms Yun and the confusing trio of Mr Williamson, Mrs Williams and Miss Williams (nobody is married to each other)!

Maths Week 2022 started with an assembly about March 14, as it was 3.14! Mars Day was about celebrating the sixth anniversary of the launch of the fi rst Exo-Mars expedition and just over a year since NASA’s Perseverance Rover arrived on Mars. Year 10 recited pi to 100 decimals places; Year 8 made a model of the solar system using different size balls from the PE department; and Year 12 told Maths jokes. Everybody was taken to Mars, where they watched the rovers on the planet. Ms Yun and Mr Daurat took Year 9 to Bletchley Park to learn about coding during the war. Channing pupils were the fi rst students to touch the enigma machine since covid. There were the usual daily jokes for all form groups and a group form puzzle competition.

The Maths Department showed ‘Hidden Figures’ which is a film about Katherine Johnson who

Touching the Enigma Machine, Bletchley Park Trip

was a key mathematician in space travel to the moon. This connected to International Women’s Day which was the previous week. We also had an author visit from Rob Eastaway, who wrote many books including ‘Maths on the Back of an Envelope’ and ‘How many socks make a pair?’ He delivered a fascinating talk about the maths of winning games and Year 10 played ‘Play your cards Right’ and found out about the probability in Monopoly. Year 12 found out about probability in Poker and learnt some Maths tricks. Mr Riggs-Long and Ms Williams took their Year 7 to teach Year 6 classes at Fairseat, see the photos below for the Level 4 Fractal Sierpinski’s Triangle they made. Maths competitions returned this year. The Hans Woyda competitions were masterfully run by Mrs Williams online with some very close matches, including a win against Westminster City School. Mathletics club started up again, after being run online last year. The UKMT Maths Challenges were still run online and we got a record number of students getting through to the follow-on rounds, showing our students ‘enjoying success.’ A special mention to the following students: Serrana Bliss (Best in Year 7); Cristina Carraro (Best in Year 8); Megan Koopman (Best in Year 9); Scarlett Durling (Best in Year

10); Ariella Garth (Best in Year 11, Intermediate Maths Challenge); Grace Nash (Best in Year 11, Senior Maths Challenge); Anna Saacke (Best in Year 12 and school); and Stella Hastings (Best in Year 13).

Puzzle of the Week continues and is very popular with Key Stage 3. Mrs Williams’ class in Year 9 are the winners this year. Ms Cooper’s class are runners up. Individual winners across the year have been: Pia Messina, Hannah Robinson, Parisa Gillardian, Evangelina Urumova. There have been many enrichment opportunities throughout the year in Maths. Mrs Wootton ran ‘Alien Invasion’ with Year 7 in the Ellery Programme. Ms Cooper has run many exciting STEM events such as ‘City of Tomorrow’ with Year 8 and ‘Design a rollercoaster’ in Year 7. There have been different form STEM activities including one about Ada Lovelace and her contributions to coding and Mathematics. Year 12 Further Mathematicians went to Oxford University to a Maths Conference ‘It All Adds Up’ at the Mathematical Institute and had a tour of the university. Year 12 also visited KPMG at Canary Wharf to see how Maths is used in the world of global fi nance. Karim Haji is a Partner at KPMG and Head of Financial Services and is a parent at Channing, who made this possible for us. We had a fascinating tour of the very impressive Head Offi ce at Canary Wharf and met a range of people at different stages in their careers ranging from tax consultancy to ESG consultants.

The Hans Woyda team

After a hiatus of two years, Year 10 returned to the ‘Maths in Action’ conference in the Emmanuel Centre in central London in March. Here is a report of the day from our students:

The top two sets of Year 10 Maths visited the Emmanuel Centre to listen to a series of talks by experienced mathematicians, explaining the different career paths derived from maths, and how they are useful in everyday life. We first had a talk from James Grime, who taught us about the mathematical side to how photos and messages are transmitted on the internet, and how wifi and frequency works. Ava T had a go at blocking wifi systems, demonstrating how Maths is associated with technology. Mr Grive also introduced us to the Lorenz code, which was even harder to crack than the Enigma code! Next we had a talk from Katie Steckles, who explained how fractals are formed and dynamical systems (we were amazed by her level 3 Sierpiński triangle made from business cards). Alex Bellos was the next speaker, who gave us a series of mathematical puzzles which involved problem solving and logical thinking associated with

patterns, enabling us to look at problems from a different perspective. Then, for lunch, all of the Channing students flooded Itsu, and enjoyed their oriental lunch. We were then given a talk from the infamous Dr Jamie Frost, who founded Dr Frost Maths, and gave us exam tips for success. He signed many of our calculators and took many photos with us students – Mrs Wootton was very jealous! Next was Emily Grossman, who shared her own embarrassing stories of maths in the media, and spoke about probability and how media portrayal is selective. Finally, Tom Crawford explained how maths is used in sports, especially how best to score a penalty in football. Tabi Jackson was nominated to take a penalty in front of the audience, scoring higher than all the other sixth form boys she was up against - go Tabi! We all really enjoyed our trip, and got some really helpful insights on how maths is used in different careers.

Ayushi Kekulthotuwa, Rose Ledlin, Simran Tulsiani, Year 10

Our Year 12 mathematicians have been so helpful this year. Amy Warren and Anna Saacke sometimes take

Mathletics club on a Wednesday if they are not being put through their paces by Mrs Williams. Year 12 Further Mathematicians have been helping run the Weekly Workshop for Key Stage 3 students with Mr Daurat. The Key Stage 3 students are very lucky to have their help and support. Many Year 12s have been running the partnerships work with Junior School students from Brookfield School with Mr Riggs-Long, where they have been doing problem solving games. Thank you Year 12. Amy Warren has been involved with all three of these – we are very grateful!

We have been proud of all our students’ achievements this year, especially our Year 13 students who have faced the first A Level exams for two years after not sitting their GCSEs due to covid. They have certainly shown themselves to be more than ‘10% braver’ and we wish them every success and happiness in the future.

Mrs Wootton, Head of Maths

Year 10 enjoying Rob Eastaway, Maths WeekYear 12 on KPMG Maths Careers trip

Maths in Action trip

Year 12 Further Maths Oxford University Maths Trip

Modern Foreign LANGUAGES

It has been another wonderful year in the Modern Foreign Languages department. A clear highlight was most definitely the plethora of activities on offer during Languages Week in November.

In assembly, we heard from Dr Charlotte Ryland of The Queen’s College, Oxford, founding Director of The Queen’s College Translation Exchange and Director of the Stephen Spender Trust. She spoke compellingly about the value of languages and the skills linguists use daily as a matter of course. In essence, languages are lots of subjects in one, covering literature, politics and current affairs, film studies and more.

SPANISH

LANGUAGES WEEK IN SPANISH

Students heard about potential career paths and this reinforced the idea that languages can sit alongside all kinds of subjects, being both useful and enjoyable.

The Stephen Spender Prize is a competition for poetry in translation that our students enter each year and Lilia Foster, Year 13 Hispanist, was chosen as one of three highly commended entries in the 18-and-under category for her translation “Underdevelopment problems” by Nicolás Guillén. We attended a virtual awards ceremony and it was wonderful to see so many young people throughout the country so passionately engaged in the skill of translation. ¡Felicidades, Lilia!

YEAR 9, 12 & 13 – FLAMENCO

Students learnt about the history of the flamenco tradition and then some basic moves. ¡Olé!

YEAR 7 – WORLD TRADE GAME

In this cultural event, pupils were in groups and assigned a Latin American country and given a fact file about the types of materials that they export. They had varying budgets, according to the wealth of their countries, and had to buy materials from the teacher to create a prototype of a product that they would sell. They then decided in their teams who would be the buyers and sellers. The creativity was amazing!

YEAR 8 – SPREAD THE WORD

Our keynote speaker, Alison Prunier, spoke to pupils about the role of languages within the World Health Organisation. Pupils were then tasked with creating a character for the WHO, writing a tweet and creating a preventative poster on one of the following topics:

• Dog with rabies

• Safe drinking water

• The importance of vaccinations

• Road safety

YEAR 10 – SWEET MARKETING

Our keynote speaker, Sally Fagan, spoke about the role of languages in the world of marketing, especially in the transcreation of a product. Pupils had to rebrand ‘Jelly Babies’ with a Spanish name, slogan and advert.

YEAR 11 – SPACE HOTEL

Jack Lidgley is a software engineer and research scientist who spoke about how he has used his Spanish language skills throughout his career. Students learnt about some of the obstacles to space travel and ways to overcome them. They had to design their own space hotel and perform a promotional advertisement in Spanish.

YEAR 12 – TRANSLATION WORKSHOP

Gitanjali Patel from Shadow Heroes dissected the translation of gender with our Linguists, which was an invaluable experience for them.

FRENCH

ENRICHMENT – FRENCH FICTION CLUB

In the spring term, the French department ran a sixweek French fiction club "Meurtre et Mystère", in which pupils in Years 10 and 11 read and translated a chapter per week of a short novel in French. The story followed the protagonist, Morgane, on a mission to find out the truth behind the disappearance of her best friend Sophie. Through the club, the pupils developed their translation skills, their ability to read aloud in French and to recognise different tenses in writing. The pupils enjoyed the atmosphere of the club, which was more relaxed than that of a lesson and was made even better by the provision of Madeleines. All those who took part were 10% braver and had the satisfaction of completing a short novel in French.

FRENCH LANGUAGES WEEK

ACTIVITIES

In November, the French department celebrated Languages Week with a range of enriching activities to suit each Year group.

In Year 8, pupils completed a cultural project focusing on an aspect of French/Francophone culture, researching the history, evolution and influences of their chosen subject. They produced posters, presentations and even short films about a multitude of topics from Jeanne d’Arc to Tintin, Coco Chanel to Stromae, different pâtisseries and countries.

In Year 9, the pupils did an online workshop with the BFI, watching two short films, ‘Les Crayons’ and ‘Le Baiser’ and exploring the importance of the soundtrack, camera shots, facial expressions and plot twists. They wrote their own dialogues and reviewed the films in French. Our Year 10 took part in the ‘Regarde!’ workshop with the Courtauld Gallery learning the meaning behind several impressionist and post-Impressionist paintings and discussing them in French. And finally, our Year 11,12 and 13 pupils worked with Clémentine Beauvais, French author and professor at the University of York, learning translation skills and interviewing her about her career as a writer.

YEAR 12 FRENCH DEBATING:

In February, we attended the regional French Debating Competition at St Paul’s Girls’ School to debate the following motions, en français bien sûr!

• Le succès planétaire de la pop coréenne fait plus de tort que de bien (The global success of Korean pop does more harm than good).

• U ne république avec un président élu est préférable à une monarchie parlementaire (A republic with an elected president is preferable to a parliamentary monarchy).

• N ous avons l’obligation morale de renoncer à tous les produits alimentaires contribuant au réchauffement climatique (We have a moral obligation to renounce all food products which contribute towards global warming).

It was a very exhilarating and enriching experience, as well as a good opportunity to practise our French and improve our public speaking and debating skills, gaining a lot of confidence in ourselves, as well as in our individual debating styles. A fairly successful day, we won two debates against Ibstock Place and St Olave’s and narrowly, by two points, lost one against Winchester. We greatly profited from this experience and had lots of fun!

Ruby Awenat, Year 12 and Maria Kirpichnikova, Year 11

ONATTI THEATRE VISIT “MON PERE NE ME COMPREND PAS!”

In February, our Year 9 pupils enjoyed watching a short play in French by the Onatti Theatre Company. The show was perfectly pitched, with a storyline about a teenager, Hélène, who didn’t get what she wanted for her birthday but who soon realises that her life is better than she had imagined. Both the Channing students and our visitors from Hornsey School for Girls were engrossed from start to finish. The actors were engaging and skillfully wove audience participation into the action, much to the delight of the students!

GERMAN

A DAY AT THE BRITISH FILM INSTITUTE

On Tuesday 10 May, my German class and I went to the British Film Institute on the South Bank for a day of German film, history, culture and language. After arriving there at about 10:20, we were led to an impressive screen with about 15 other schools. In the morning, we had a presentation from Miss V. Papen who has taught in both Germany and the UK, on family, identity and culture in German cinema. We watched a few trailers for German movies ( ‘Der ganz große Traum’, ‘Almanya - Willkommen in Deutschland’ , and ‘Honig im Kopf’) and observed the opinions on learning English in 1874 Germany, the use of cliché in German film and a little boy whose grandparents immigrated from Turkey to Germany as Gastarbeiter discovering who he is. We had a very special birthday lunch for Katya, Rory, Natasha and Frau

Stöckmann, featuring excessive amounts of Kuchen and a very tuneful rendition of Happy Birthday in German (Zum Geburtstag viel Glück). After an impromptu fire alarm evacuation, we returned to the screen to watch Berlin ’36, a German film based on a true story about the Berlin Olympics in 1936. It follows a talented young Jewish high-jumper named Gretel Bergmann and the adversity she faces whilst training for the Games. It explores themes of perseverance and resilience, abuse of authority, respect and identity. A poignant film that I would highly recommend! Thank you very much to Frau Pavlopoulos and Frau Stöckmann for a wonderful day out that we all thoroughly enjoyed!

Eve Cronkshaw,Year 9

A DAY AT THE GOETHE INSTITUT

I found the Goethe Institut really interesting and entertaining! It was so nice to be able to interact with Isabel, a Young Goethe Ambassador who has recently done their GCSEs, who could share their tips and tricks for German revision, which made it really helpful and something that I will definitely take away with me. Furthermore, the quiz was so much fun and learning a bit about German culture and all the benefits of learning German really made me think about what I want to do when I am older. I liked how everyone was able to answer questions and win prizes, the Gummibärchen were especially good! Personally, the movie, Pünktchen und Anton, was my favourite part about the trip. Not only was it funny and quite sweet, it really helped with my vocabulary and shared an important message about Freundlichkeit (kindness). Erich Kästner (author of the novel, Pünktchen und Anton) also published The Parent Trap, Das Doppelte Lottchen, which was later adapted into a hit film by Walt Disney. Pünktchen und Anton was published in 1931.

Carlotta Bruno Pensabene, Year 8

PÜNKTCHEN UND ANTON

‘Pünktchen und Anton’ is about a young girl and a young boy from very different backgrounds being friends. Pünktchen’s parents are very rich and are constantly working, and Anton’s mother is ill with bronchitis and he has to work at the ice cream parlour to keep her job for her. Together the two friends try to raise money for Anton’s mother to get better. Their economic differences do not stop them from being the best of friends. I really enjoyed the film, it was extremely sweet and had some good morals behind it. Despite it being in German, it was not hard to understand what was going on. It was well made and I would recommend it to anyone! Before watching the film we attended a talk by an A Level student who has taken German since Year 7. She took both French and German at GCSE, receiving a grade 9 in both. She explained to us her different revision techniques for learning languages, which I found very helpful, as I also wish to take two MFL languages at GCSE.

Nina Fourie,Year 8

Music

After a miserable year for music it was heartening to see all our mixed Year group ensembles bounce back into existence. Almost all of our concerts were recorded and can be found in ‘Channing Soundcloud’.

Our fi rst event of the year was the Year 11 concert in October. As part of their fi nal examination they record a performance but this concert was more in the way of a celebratory showcase.

With some clever programming we were able to run the full gauntlet of musical history and genres; from Handel – thank you Salma Ansari for your gorgeous singing of ‘Dove sei, amato bene?’ - to Mozart and Katherine Safarty’s well-paced Piano Sonata in A minor and Ella Roses’ ‘L’ho perduta, me meschina’. On to

Gluck, and Isabella Boardman (Violin) performed the famous Melody from ‘Orphée et Eurydice’. Faure got a look in, courtesy of Eliza Weston and the Sicilienne from ‘Pelléas et Mélisande’ on the Flute.

Staying with the Romantics, Ottilie Whiteman delivered a sublime reading of the second movement from Bruch’s Violin Concerto. Eva Charlton (Violoncello) certainly gave Saint-Saëns ‘Allegro appassionato’ the intensity this piece demands. Amelie Roy (Piano) calmed us down with ‘Trois Gymnopédies’ by Satie.

We revisited Mozart with Emily Brown (Flute) giving an exquisite performance of the slow movement from his Flute Quartet.

Musical Theatre was represented with some perennial favourites ‘I Dreamed

a Dream’ performed by Maja Chowrimootoo, and we were left wondering at what might have been by Arissa Raja-Hussain’s melancholic ‘Empty Chairs at Empty Tables’. Further exploration had Kimi Coetzee (Flute) ‘serenading’ us and Yanna Hill (Piano) ‘Jingoing’ with a Rock Prelude.

Chloe Marriott (Voice) left us in no doubt whatsoever about the value of a Channing education. Her ‘I Have Confidence’ said it all! ‘All I Ask’ is that you do listen again to Aoife Willis (Voice) and Zalie Wise’s powerful ‘Million Years Ago’ performances. This fabulous feast of music ended with ‘Maybe This Time’ Ruby Davis (Voice). If anything was needed to sum up the joy of music making and live performance that this group feel, the marvellous Year 11 Medley, arranged by Katherine Sarfaty, was proof!

NOVEMBER - CROATIA CONCERT, ARUNDEL CENTRE

After half-term, we were treated to the highlights of the Croatia Music tour.

Many favourites, reworked specifically for the tour, by Mr Boxall and Miss Zanardo, delighted the appreciative audience. The Croatia Ensemble and Chorus performed 'Now thank we all our God' - Geoffrey Beaumont (Arr. Peter Boxall), ‘The Lord bless you and keep you’ – John Rutter (Arr. Leisha Zanardo) and 'Cantique de Jean Racine' - Gabriel Fauré (Arr. Peter Boxall). Nun komm’, der heiden Heiland BWV661 – J.S Bach (Arr Leisha Zanardo).

Anna Whelan and Darcy Hastings get a special mention for their technical prowess and reading of 'Arrival of the Queen of Sheba' - Handel. It was time for the acapella Croatia choir to show their wares and, goodness ‘Royals’ - E Yelich-O’Connor, J Little and ‘Ave generosa’ – Ola Gjeilo did not disappoint. Reuniting the Choir and ensemble for the fi nal three items 'May it be’ – Bhraonáin/

Ryan/Ryan (Arr. Leisha Zanardo) ‘Leaving on a jet plane’ – John Denver (Arr. Michael Neaum/Peter Boxall) ‘History repeating’ and ‘Rolling in the deep’ A Gifford, A Adkins, P Epworth (Arr L Zanardo) summed up what the tour had been about.

The autumn concert in St Joseph’s Church in November was a triumph. The audience was treated to the Concert Orchestra, which opened with highlights from ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’. The debut performance of the Year 7 Chorus were the aptly chosen ‘No Matter What’ and ‘Any Dream Will Do’. The Cremona Strings delighted with ‘Humoresque’ by Dvoȓák.

It was particularly pleasing to see so many new recruits in this ensemble. ‘Hushabye Mountain’ was given a gorgeous and magically calm performance by the Conabor Choir. The Senior Strings, with soloists Elizabeth Shepherd, Kimi Coetzee and Emily Brown positively fi zzed and sparkled with the fi rst movement of

Brandenburg Concerto No.4. Brunner Show Choir dazzled as ever with Adele: Songs from the Album ‘21’. ‘Run’ showed off the qualities of the Cantemus Chorus to perfection.

A ‘Croatia Corner’ provided a tempting snapshot of what was achieved during the recent tour to Croatia. The Symphony Orchestra, with the immensely enjoyable and approachable, English Folk Song Suite by Vaughan Williams, left all in no doubt that we are back in business.

It was also wonderful to return to St Michael’s for our annual Carol Concert in December. This was a very special occasion with many carol favourites for the congregation, with the Year 7 soloist, Rebecca Ruttenberg Acosta, wonderful singing from our fabulous Chamber Choir, this year the Show Choir performed as did Conabor Choir, Cantemus Chorus and of course the whole of Year 7!

FEBRUARY – YEAR 10 CONCERT

Just before half-term we were treated to performances from the Year 10 GCSE music group. For some of these musicians this was their first solo performance on the Arundel Centre stage! Ayushi Kekulthotuwa was the first of seven pianists, playing the gorgeous and dreamy ‘Rêverie’ by Debussy followed by Eliza C’s rendition of Paradis’ ‘Sicilienne’ – staying in the more romantic style. Hannah Dickman then played the well known ‘Solfeggio’ by the son of JS; CPE Bach. Natalia Boardman on Violin and then Annabel Brod on piano treated us to two great pieces by the master; JS Bach. Elsie Isaac impressed us with her sparkling ‘Introduction and Polonaise’ by Bohm, played from memory. Galya Hynes gave an assured performance of Prokofiev’s Waltz from ‘Music for children’. Emily Ang’s tricky unaccompanied clarinet piece by Sands, seemed far from ‘Easy come, easy go’! Our following two jazz style pieces, ‘Film Noir’ by

Cornick and ‘Opening Night Jazz’ by Mier were played with a real sense of style by Maddie Swayne and Maya Chitre, respectively. Two vocalists gave very different performances from the ones they had the previous week (as Sister Berthe and Sister Sophia in ‘The Sound of Music’) with Sophie Dain singing ‘Song to the Siren’ by Buckley and Evie Morris, ‘Life is sweet’ by Merchant. We were then treated to two duets from Georgie Grossman and Scarlett Durling, who are preparing for their Music Theatre examination. They performed ‘The Stepsisters’ lament from ‘Cinderella’ and ‘Apex Predator’ from ‘Mean Girls’– great staging! Finally we welcomed Zoe Quarty, who enthralled the audience with her technical mastery of the 3rd movement from Beethoven’s ‘Moonlight’ Sonata. Our 15 performers returned to the stage at the end to rapturous applause!

MARCH – CHANNING AT ST JOSEPH’S

The Channing spring concert took place in St Joseph’s and was filled with a vast array of musical talent, from the Symphony Orchestra’s thrilling performance of ‘Polovtsian Dances’ from ‘Prince Igor’ by Alexander Borodin to Miss Zanardo’s ‘Cornish Summers’ mash-up, including ‘Let it Go’ from ‘Frozen’ and ‘Skyfall’ by Adele.

The amount of preparation for this concert, especially with the logistics of getting together all the choirs and orchestra certainly paid off, and it would not have been possible without the brilliant Mr Boxall, Miss Zanardo, Miss Bacon, Miss Daniels, Mrs Dodds, Mrs Marley and Mr Brown.

The evening started off with Haydn’s ‘The Creation’, featuring Chamber Choir, Cantemus Chorus and Conabor Choir, accompanied by the brilliant Symphony Orchestra. It was dramatically started off by the ‘Representation of Chaos’ played by the Symphony Orchestra, and then followed by the recit: ‘In the beginning’, sung by Yasmin B, and then ‘The Spirit of God’ sung by the Chamber Choir. Anna M then gorgeously sung the virtuosic aria ‘Now vanish Before the Holy Beams’, which was followed by both

Chamber Choir and Cantemus Chorus uplifting the audience with: ‘A New Created World.’

Amelia M then gripped the audience with the recit ‘And God Made the Firmament’ and the Chamber Choir then continued portraying the uplifting mood, singing: ‘The Marv’llous Work’ with the solo part sung by Yasmin B. The recit ‘Let the Earth Bring Forth Grass’ and the aria ‘With Verdure Clad the Fields Appear’ was then beautifully sung by Talia N, who demonstrated extremely difficult yet beautiful ornamentation.

The exciting finale to this work: ‘The Heavens are Telling’ was sung by all the choirs and orchestra, notably including percussion adding to the drama of this piece. The semichorus for this piece was sung by Flora Froment, Anna Milsom, Asya Pendlebury, Maya Kiani and Eloise Neill, and the gripping and fast paced mood ended the piece on an uplifting note. Rutter’s ‘The Lord’s My Shepherd’ from his Requiem, was performed by the Cantemus Chorus and Conabor Choir, and beautiful accompaniment was played by the Symphony Orchestra, notably featuring the gorgeous oboe melody, played by Anna Whelan.

Senior Strings was next to delight us with their performance of Benjamin Britten’s ‘Simple Symphony’. The first movement displayed excellent communication between the sections with the melody being shared seamlessly between them. This communication was equally noticeable in the second movement with it being entirely pizzicato. The ensemble of the group created a precise and exciting section of music with the Cellos and Double Bass on the bass line to tie it all together.

The slower final movement contrasted the upbeat nature of the first two and featured beautiful harmonies that brought the piece to a melodic end. ‘Cornish Summers’ was composed by Miss Zanardo, and was a joy to perform. It featured Adele’s ‘Someone Like You,’ and ‘Skyfall’, ‘Let It Go’ from Frozen, as well as The Beatles’s ‘Real Love’, sung by Cantemus Chorus, Conabor Choir, and featuring the Brunner Show Choir singing a solo part.

The exciting orchestration played by the Symphony Orchestra also made this piece so compelling to listen to, particularly the use of distinctive and powerful brass and woodwind melodies.

To round off the evening, the Symphony Orchestra performed Alexander Borodin’s ‘Polovtsian Dances’ from Prince Igor. The lyrical introduction and opening dance notably featured beautiful solos from Anna Whelan on the oboe as well as Kezia Colton on the Soprano Saxophone and Darcey Hastings on the Cor Anglais only a week after swapping it out from her usual oboe!

The next, faster paced dance provided a challenge for the whole orchestra with demanding runs and quick changing tempos but these were handled with precise musicality and ultimately ended with a bang.

Fittingly, the following dance also started with a bang with Mr Brown on the timpani to introduce the exciting composition. The percussion and brass provided a grandiose and rhythmic melody whilst the strings and wind performed the overlapping runs with impressive clarity. The fourth dance featured conversational solos between Anna Whelan and Kezia Colton on the oboe and soprano saxophone respectively, who made light work of the musically challenging section. Throughout the dance, Emily Brown’s piccolo playing shone through, adding flair to the piece.

APRIL – SIXTH FORM CONCERT

This year’s Sixth Form Concert was superb. The evening started with three of our four A level candidates giving their A level recitals. Yasmin Bing was first with a sparkling rendition of Mozart’s ‘Batti batti’ followed by a stylistic performance of Smetana’s ‘Aus der Heimat’ from Yuki Wu. Talia Nabarro’s haunting vocalisation of ‘A bit of earth’ completed our A level trio.

Constantina Papadopoulos (Bassoon) then performed with Anna Whelan (Oboe) and Grace Wu (Piano) the slow movement of Poulenc’s trio for Oboe, Bassoon and Piano. Flora Froment was stunning in her performance of ‘Slipping through my fingers’ singing and playing from the piano. Amelia Marriott’s light touch in Einaudi’s ‘Golden Butterflies’ captured the mood of this minimalist piano piece. Hattie Sumners and Grace Abrahams were fabulous and kept straight faces as they gave an excellent rendition of ‘Man or Muppet’.

We came back down to earth, or the ballet, with Molly Bloom, Madeleine Hjelt, Molly Malbon, and Hana Shimizu-French’s excellent flute ensemble playing two movements by Tchaikovsky. No concert is complete without a little Bach and Lilia F ably played the famous Bach Prelude from his unaccompanied cello suite.

Charlotte Woolley and Stella Hastings then delighted us with the 1st movement of the Bach Double Violin Concerto. We loved Anna Milsom’s ‘If I loved you’. Then it was the turn of the Saxophone Trio, with Charlotte Woolley, Alia Khalouf and Lisa Scheerlinck playing ‘Yesterday’.

Another highlight of the evening was the trio of Hattie Sumners (Voice

The following reprises were performed with high energy and the attention to detail within the musicality of the piece was certainly notable. As the dances neared the end, there was an impressive display of control as the strings and brass faced off with a difficult section of syncopation before the wind rejoined to bring together a truly show stopping end to the concert. This concert was the Year 13s last one at St Joseph’s, and although we are extremely sad to go, we are so happy that it ended on such a high note!

Charlotte Wooley and Yasmin Bing, Year 13

and Trumpet), Eliza Goldstone (Voice and Guitar) and Lilia Foster (Cello) performing the Beatles’ Golden Slumbers-Carry that Weight-Hey Jude medley. The final act of the evening was a duet by Yasmin Bing and Talia Nabarro singing, most appropriately, ‘You are the music in me’.

MAY – JAZZ EVENING

The Arundel Centre was transformed into ‘Ronnie Scotts on the Hill’ when our annual Jazz Evening returned after a two-year absence. Led, for the thirteenth time by our resident jazzer and saxophone teacher Mr Theo Travis, it was a sparkling showcase of talent from both our students and the professional quartet of Andrea Vicari (piano), Alex Keen (bass) and our very own Mr Alan Brown (drums). The quartet kicked the evening off and for me the highlights were the stunning improvisations in ‘Autumn Leaves’. Another highlight is always our solo singers singing with the

quartet and tonight saw some of the most compelling performances we have witnessed in this run of 13 events - Anna Milsom with ‘All of me’ a duet between Asya Pendlebury and Harriet Sumners with Mancini’s haunting ‘Moon River’ and in the second half Yasmin Bing really got in the Brazilian groove with ‘One Note Samba’ followed by a mesmerising performance of ‘Cry me a river’ from Evie Morris in Year 10. We really enjoyed the final set from our senior Saxophone Quartet (final because three of them are in Y13!) consisting of Charlotte Woolley, Alia Khalouf, Lisa Scheerlinck and Kezia

JUNE – SUMMER CONCERT

Colton. Charlotte and Lisa were also joined by a string quartet for their performance of ‘Black Orpheus’, which they first recorded remotely during the first lockdown; nice to finally hear it live! The quartet also started the second half with that great standard – ‘Take Five’ by Paul Desmond. The evening ended with the full jazz band and wow, what a sound! They played a fabulous set including ‘Pink Panther’, ‘Lady is a tramp’, and ‘Miller Magic’. The audience was hugely appreciative and enjoyed not only the music but also the delicious spread that Mrs Hibbert and her team provided for them!

It was a delight to be back in St Joseph’s for the Summer Concert. Miss Zanardo’s Concert Orchestra set the standard of the night with such an exciting sound with ‘Epic Gaming Themes’. The Conabor Choir gave an exciting rendition of a medley of well-known songs from Les Misérables. Cuba followed with the traditional ‘Quizas, quizas quizas’ played by the Cremona Strings with added Latin percussion from Lulu Chappell. Cantemus Chorus gave us a hint of something we will hear on Founders’ Day with ‘Seasons of Love’ from Larson’s ‘Rent’. The Senior Strings directed by Mrs Laura Dodds played the famous Bach Suite No 3 in D. We then had our two elite choirs with Miss Zanardo’s Brunner Show Choir wonderfully contrasting ‘I want it that way’ and ‘She Used to Be Mine’. Miss Bacon’s Chamber Choir followed with again, two contrasting arrangements, this time of ‘In my room’ and ‘Bring me little water, Sylvie’. The Symphony Orchestra closed the evening with a Bacharach Medley with Mathilda Okhomina on the drum kit and then Walton’s majestic and exciting ‘Crown Imperial’.

JUNE – YEAR 7

CONCERT

Six talented musicians in Year 7 performed solos and duets at this delightful event - Imogen Bovensiepen, Rebecca Ruttenberg Acosta, Susie Davies, Evangelina Urumova, Nuha Imran and Darcy Duffield. Following their performance the whole of Year 7 sang a popular medley of songs from ‘Mary Poppins’!

JUNE – ROTHENBERG CONCERT

Several of our wonderful Visiting Music Teachers –Mr Gerard Cousins, Mr Patrick Dodds, Miss Jenny Bacon, Mrs Laura Dodds, Miss Hisayo Shimizu and Miss Sophie Bircumshaw – performed to the whole school for this annual event. It is a great opportunity for our students to hear what our professionals really can do – perform!

The last musical event of the year was of course Founders’ Day in which we repeated some of the repertoire performed at the Summer Concert. Again it was wonderful to celebrate the school’s founding altogether in the New Sports Hall for the first time since 2019!

Throughout the year there has been a series of lunchtime recitals almost every Friday in the Arundel Centre and if you would like to hear some of the wonderful performances, too numerous to mention here, then do put Channing Soundcloud into your search engine and enjoy!

TRIBUTE TO MISS PEPPER

This report would not be complete without a huge tribute to Miss Pepper, who retired in December after 24 years of leading the music at the Junior School. Not only has she created an incredible department at the Junior School that reaches such high standards of music making but she has also been involved in all the musical life of the Senior School. She has been on all of our Music tours and I just do not know how we will manage the next one without her! She has always been there at Symphony Orchestra rehearsals to assist me and of course in her role of Head of Strings, she has coached the wonderful Senior Strings, Cremona Strings, and many quartets, quintets, trios – the list is endless! Many Channing students owe Miss Pepper a huge debt of gratitude, and there were many tears in December when we said goodbye. On a personal note, I also owe Miss Pepper a huge debt of gratitude, as she has been an amazing colleague, always caring, looking after us, ensuring we keep going – a fabulous constant support and we really miss her. Thank you, Marisa!

Mr P Boxall, Director of Music

CROATIA MUSIC TOUR

Channing was one of the first (if not the first) schools in the UK to take an overseas trip this academic year, thanks to the determination of the organising staff and tour company. We visited Croatia, replete with knockout scenery and the added luxury of three large rehearsal rooms. The trip was the tonic to revive music ensemble skills and, even more importantly, mixed Year social groups. You know you are on to a winner when students exclaims: ‘This is the best trip ever’ and ‘I've done 13 school trips but this is the most magical and brilliant’.

Klis Fortress (one of the locations from Game of Thrones), Skradin and the Krka National Park, an area of outstanding beauty, may make the trip sound more like a holiday but the deliberate change of format – rehearsing 9am-midday each day – ensured high-quality music, learning and experiences.

Split Concert Hall, renovated back to its former glory in 2020, was a superb space and the performers surprised themselves by what they achieved. The concert, in a newly consecrated church in Trogir, was amazing and it was broadcast on local radio. It was a joy to witness our students so committed and absorbed in their music making.

Miss M Pepper

The past year has been yet another one of turbulence and uncertainty on the world stage, with the usual drama surrounding the court of Boris Johnson. Back in north London, my wonderful colleagues helped me dissect the latest piece of news to reassure our students that their exams would not be so messed up by the inability of our government to stop partying and start taking things a bit more seriously.

Here are some highlights:

• Year 12 visited the UK Parliament and enjoyed a tour of both the House of Lords and House of Commons. They all loved hearing about the conventions of both chambers and how much of that convention is bound how laws are made, debating the introduction of one said law, under the watchful eye of ‘Speaker’ Isla Church.

• Year 13 have missed so much during the past two years and I am so proud of them and how they have soldiered on despite the obviously continuous turmoil in both UK and US politics. We were all delighted that they could fi nally put all their knowledge to the test and actually take A levels in May! Congratulations also to Grace Abrahams in Year 13, who was a deserved winner of this year’s Channing Politics Prize. I wish all those going on to take Politics and International Relations the best of luck; there will certainly be much to talk about.

• Politics Society has gone from strength to strength this year. My thanks to Alma Miller in Year 13, whose leadership of the Society meant it continued throughout the pandemic. She then handed over the reins to Year 12’s Anika Agarwal and Gabriella Douglas-Kitsis, who led a weekly debate to discuss the latest political events. Clearly, there has been much to discuss, and they have also roamed further afi eld, debating Alexey Navalny and Putin’s government, the election in the Philippines and the role of feminism. Thanks also to Irina Sofronie, also in Year 12, who has led some fascinating talks despite not taking Politics for A level.

• Another treat for Year 12 was to visit the UK Supreme Court. I always enjoy this trip, as it’s very understated, unlike the one to the Houses of Parliament. Security is just as stringent but anyone can visit the Court and see the splendid court rooms, furnished throughout with a carpet designed by artist Peter Blake. Our excellent guide really brought the cases she talked about to life (she’s a law graduate) and Year 12 were engaged and full of curiosity as they learnt more about the work of the court. One of the most interesting (and all too familiar) aspects of the tour was fi nding out how few women are senior judges. I hope this visit inspired those Year 12s studying law to follow in the footsteps of the (now retired) Supreme Court President Lady Hale.

Mrs W Devine, Head of Politics

The Year 12 Politics students outside the UK Supreme Court

Psychology

This year, I joined Channing as Head of Psychology to cover Mrs Walsh’s maternity leave. The Channing pupils and staff were warm and welcoming, especially the Year 13 students. Their enthusiasm, hard work and dedication to Psychology were so impressive. They persevered throughout the year and juggled their TAGs, UCAS applications, university interviews and other extra-curricular activities despite the uncertainty surrounding their final exams. Amidst all of this, we received the wonderful news that one of the head girl and psychology students; Anna Milsom, received an offer to read Psychological and Behavioural Sciences at Cambridge. The pupils ultimately sat the first public examination in over two years. Despite the advanced information provided by the exam boards, it was a very challenging exam series which tested their breadth of skill and synoptic knowledge within the subject.

In the autumn term, the psychologists took part in the Brain Day Workshop with Dr Guy Sutton. He is a neuroscientist and a Psychiatry Professor at the University of Nottingham Medical School. He touched upon the history and assessment of mental illnesses, differing aspects of the brain and a live brain dissection for Year 12 and 13 Psychologists. Students from a local school were also invited to take part in this wonderful opportunity as part of the school’s partnerships programme. Dr Sutton delivered an exceptional lecture in the evening entitled ‘The Present and Future of the Brain’ which explored some recent developments in neuroscience, together with emerging technologies such as the ‘cerebral organoid’ – growing human brain in a Petri dish - and the brain computer interface.

In the summer term, Year 12 Psychology students visited the Freud Museum, the fi nal home of Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, and his daughter Anna Freud, a

pioneering child psychoanalyst. Our young psychologists were transported back to Freud’s life in Vienna; learning about the context of Freud’s story and the background of psychoanalysis from an expert speaker. Most excitingly, they saw Freud’s famous psychoanalytic couch where he laid the foundation of many psychoanalytic concepts such as the infamous Freudian slips, free association and talking therapy. The students asked questions about Freud’s life and found the trip to be a valuable part to further deepen their understanding of the Psychodynamic Approach, a topic within the A level specifi cation.

Year 12 ran Psychology Club over the course of the spring term. Psychologists covered a wide range of topics; such as dream analysis, forensic aspects within Psychology and the stigma surrounding schizophrenia. The aim of Psychology Club was to give the students a chance to independently research an area of their choosing that we do not cover in the specification and share their findings with not only their fellow peers but also with the students in the younger years. Once again, the teamwork, level of commitment and the eagerness to always learn more is truly commendable amongst the Channing pupils.

Finally, I would like to wish Mrs Walsh my very best as she embarks to further her education as well as spending some quality time with baby George. The Psychology department at Channing will miss her dearly.

Ms N Rehmat, Head of Psychology

Religious Education

It has been another busy year in the RE Department! All classes in Years 7 and 8 have covered a range of engaging topics based on the major world religions, with lessons full of debates, discussion and thought-provoking stimuli from a range of sources. I am always impressed by the depth and breadth of the pupils' knowledge and their willingness to contribute and share their perspectives as well as respond thoughtfully to those of their peers. Mrs Walker has done a wonderful job of teaching the majority of Year 7, who have loved her teaching and the fun activities that she has undertaken with them. One of Mrs Walker’s major contributions to the department has been her running of the Spirited Artwork competitions in Year 7 and 8. The pupils have produced some fabulous pieces for these and have greatly enjoyed the opportunity to have fun working together whilst also developing their creative skills and levels of spiritual understanding.

Links with the Junior School remain strong and two groups of Year 7 pupils ‘Crossed the road’ during the spring term to present to Year 6 on Sikh beliefs and practices. This was a great success and will certainly be repeated in the future.

Further down the school, Year 9 have been nothing short of outstanding with their energy and enthusiasm for the Philosophical and Ethical issues that they have covered this year, whilst the take-up and progress of all of the groups at GCSE has also been wonderful.

Finally, I am delighted to announce that from this September, A Level Philosophy will be offered at Channing. This is a very exciting development that involves a rebranding of the departmental title from ‘RE’ to ‘RPE’ (Religion, Philosophy and Ethics). This expansion also means that a new member of staff (Ms Kiff) will be joining the department on a fulltime basis. There has already been signifi cant interest in the course from Year 11 pupils and I am hugely looking forward to embarking on this voyage of discovery with them.

Mr G Headey, Head of Religious Education

Science

Students study general science in Years 7 and 8 and we have been excited to be able to resume practical work again following the challenges of the pandemic. Channing students have demonstrated strong experimental skills during lessons, making bread dough, testing solvents, investigating combustion and looking at heat transfer. Outside of lesson time, there have been a number of activities, some of which are outlined below.

SCIENCE CLUB

In Science Club this year students have taken part in a vast range of activities, from making bee houses, to coating test tubes in silver, to flame tests, dissections and studies of reaction times. The Science Department would like to thank the technicians (Ms Sandra Whitehouse, Mrs Jagruti Shah and Ms Cathryn Selina) and the Sixth Form helpers for their hard work in preparing for and running these sessions.

SCIENCE WEEK

A variety of activities took place during Channing’s Science Week this year. Year 7 started off the week with a trip to London Zoo that included a talk on ecology. There was also a talk from Rebecca Ellis, principal optometrist at Moorfields Eye Hospital and ‘Advanced Practice Training Programme Director’ for Ophthalmology in the London region at Health Education England. Ms Ellis shared some useful insights about a non-medical pathway into working with patients in hospitals and told us about different treatment methods for eye disorders, such as medical contact lenses. Several competitions also launched, with a microscope images quiz for Years 7 to 9, a RSC poster competition for Years 7 and 8, the Biology Challenge for Years 9-10 and the Cambridge Chemistry Challenge (C3L6) for Year 12. Congratulations to Ella Cheung, Ella Bernstein, Anna Gonsalves, India Davis and Hannah Robinson, who all correctly identified all of the microscope images and won edible prizes! Well done also to Lili Ivin (Year 8), Harriet Hills (Year 7) and Anouschka Bapna (Year 7) for their colourful and attractive entries to the poster competition. Biology Club ran a session for Years 7 to 10 investigating wind pollinated flowers, and students from Years 7 and 8 made slime in Science Club. Later in the week,

CHEMISTRY

With many competitions and activities in Chemistry being put on hold due to the pandemic, it was fantastic for students to be able to get involved in a number of events again this year. Not quite all of the activities are back yet, and some have changed format, but Channing students have demonstrated resilience and adaptability and have risen admirably to the challenges that have been on offer.

In November, a team of four budding chemists took part in the preliminary round of the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Top of the Bench competition. This was the first year that this competition has been held virtually, with the Channing team accessing questions via a zoom link and completing their answers to a short deadline for each round. Maria Kirpichnicova (Year 11), Margo Gelfer (Year 10), Rory Dunn (Year 9) and Lucy Gold (Year 9) worked successfully as a team to solve a range of complex puzzles, and were able to recall information from a variety of topics ranging from environmental chemistry to chemical forensics. Whilst they missed out on a top three place this time around, I was

we had two visiting speakers. Professor Ewan Birney spoke to Year 12 Scientists about the human genome and potential uses for DNA as a storage medium; who would have thought that all of Shakespeare’s sonnets could be stored as DNA code? Students from Years 10 to 12 listened to Marc George, a consultant Clinical Pharmacologist explain his role and his career path, highlighting some of the rewards and challenges on his 20-year journey in medicine. Finally, Year 8 students made towers out of Spaghetti and marshmallows in their Science lessons to test their engineering skills. It was fantastic to see our students engaging with and enjoying science and we look forward to watching them continue to do so in the future.

RUTHERFORD APPLETON LABORATORY SCHOOL SCIENCE ESSAY COMPETITION FOR YEAR 8 STUDENTS

After last year’s success, when one of our students got through to the final round of the ‘Why I love Science’ Essay Competition, we had high hopes for our Year 8 entrants this year. Well done to Daisy Apfel, Siena Branchmoore and Chloe Lloyd for their interesting and thought-provoking entries.

impressed with the maturity, resilience and problem-solving skills displayed by our team; well done!

Also in November, four teams of Year 10 students took part in the preliminary stage of the Chemistry Challenge, a competition run by the Royal Society of Chemistry’s South East Region for schools and science clubs. "Ion the prize" (Tabi Jackson, Kitty Hannam, Bella Challis and Iona McCormack) battled it out against "Positive as a proton" (Sophia Towner, Maddie Swayne, Charlotte Conyerd and Chiara Palazzesi), "All the good names argon" (Eve Johnson, Tacita Twaddle, Jessica Ezro and Elsie Isaac) and "Barbaric borons" (Sophie Dain, Ava Teversham, Eloise Johnson and Rose Ledlin) to complete odd-oneout questions, connection-based questions, anagram puzzles and calculations. The pupils worked well within their teams to solve the puzzles and showed excellent problem-solving skills and a strong understanding of chemistry. Unfortunately, none of the teams made it through to the next round on this occasion, but the competitors were excellent company and the competition was full of good

humour (there was much laughter!) and interest in Chemistry.

Three pupils from Year 12 took part in Round One of the 54th RSC International Chemistry Olympiad back in January. The Olympiad is an opportunity for students to test their understanding of chemistry, helping them to develop their problem-solving skills and apply familiar knowledge in new and interesting contexts. The competition is aimed at Year 13, but several of our Year 12 students decided to take on the challenge. Well done to Amy Warren, Beatrice de Leval and Georgia McNeill who were all awarded certificates of participation.

Top of the Bench chemistry competition

In February, Amelia Marriott, Irina Nigam and Lidia Lonergan travelled to Cambridge University to take part in the Cambridge Chemistry Race. This was Channing’s first visit to this challenging, puzzle-based competition and the Year 13s worked successfully as a team to solve a large number of problems, competing against teams from 50 other schools. A fun competition inspired by a similar Czech competition, the Cambridge Chemistry Race was a challenging look at the concepts learnt at A level but reworked to create a series of puzzles. Although it required teamwork and logical reasoning, the race proved to be as fun as advertised with the enticing ‘Prize Buffet’ an incentive for winning. After we battled the storm, train cancellations and team members who were stuck in different counties, we competed against the likes of Henrietta Barnet School and the London Academy of Excellence. Although a fierce competition it was an excellent day out and a look at the applications of modern Chemistry.

Back in March, Year 12 and 13 Chemists attended a Chemistry in Action lecture series in Westminster. Chemistry researchers from a number of different universities across the UK described their research and explained ideas that had fascinated them. Jamie

Gallagher talked about nanotechnology and the tiny tech that is changing our phones, food, sport and health. Alex Baker explained how lateral flow tests work and how they can be used to fight health inequalities. Colourful Chemistry, with Peter Hoare, gave the students an insight into transition metal and redox chemistry. Kate Hendry took students on a tour of the oceans and gave us an introduction to trace element analysis. Finally, Andrea Sella explored the properties of ice and suggested that ice may be the canary warning us that our futures may be much less certain than we imagine.

In June, two teams of Year 12 Channing students (Beatrice de Leval, Amelia Eton, Georgia McNeill, Annabelle Lucas, Flora Pickford and Amy Warren) competed alongside two teams of students from Parliament Hill school in the Channing heat of the RSC Schools’ Analyst competition. Students were given a scenario in which they worked as analytical chemists employed to help with the transformation of a familyowned fish and chip restaurant. The owner of the fish and chip restaurant was interested in reducing their impact on climate change and wanted to change suppliers for some of their ingredients to those closer to the shop to reduce their carbon footprint, and to support local businesses recovering from losses during the pandemic. The students needed to perform analytical tests to make sure that the quality of the food does not suffer as a result of these changes; their task was to help the owners to analyse the local flour, potatoes, and vinegar for qualities associated with truly excellent fish and chips. The students had to work as a team to complete four practical-based tasks in the time allocated, working together as well as independently in order to collate the results and draw conclusions. Titration was used to

determine the concentration of the vinegar, chromatography was used to find the amino acid composition of the flour, Benedict’s reagent was used to find the starch content of the potatoes, and thermal decomposition was used to study the bicarbonate of soda. Dr Spinks was very proud of how effectively the students were able to communicate with one another, and was impressed with their strong practical skills. Well done!

We were also delighted that the Cambridge Chemistry Challenge, or C3L6, was able to take place this June. Two Year 12 students (Georgia McNeill and Amy Warren) participated in the competition, which aims to stretch and challenge students interested in chemistry, and provides an excellent experience for anyone considering taking their studies in this subject further. Set by an experienced team of teachers and university chemists, it is designed to be accessible to Year 12 students, but takes them well beyond the syllabus and encourages them to think about science in the way that they would at university. It was a tough challenge this year, and we are awaiting the results; fingers crossed!

Disappointingly, whilst the Salters’ Festivals of Chemistry for Year 8 and 9 students restarted again this year, there were limited dates available and so we were not able to secure places. Happily though, some of the festival materials are available to access online, allowing students to participate in a range of activities including chemistry careers information and the Chemistry for Good challenge. We hope that many of our students take advantage of the wealth of material available online!

We were incredibly proud of our fantastic Year 11 and Year 13

Cambridge Chemistry Race

chemists who completed their IGCSE and A level courses again in challenging circumstances. Coping with TAG assessments and uncertainty, they showed impressive maturity and resilience in adapting to the changes that were made to both their learning and assessment. We would like to take this opportunity to wish them every success for their future endeavours.

BIOLOGY

ANATOMY CLUB

Finally, it is with sadness that the Chemistry department must say goodbye to two long-standing and much-loved members of the department as they move on to pastures new. Mrs Sheila Mahmood leaves us to return to her native Canada after 16 years supporting Channing students to enjoy success in Chemistry. Mrs Anna Kennedy also leaves us after 11 years of inspiring

and motivating students in both Chemistry and Physics to take up a position at Mill Hill School. We wish them both every happiness for the future and we hope very much that they will come back to visit us often! We will also say adieu to Ms Natalie Quow as she embarks upon her maternity leave; we look forward to welcoming her back in the future.

This year, the Sixth Formers have been really excited to lead anatomy club for Years 7 and 8. We have dissected many different organs and organisms including a sheep’s eye, a frog and a rat, to name a few! The Year 7s and 8s have been learning many new and important concepts during the sessions including the different layers of the eye and their purposes, why rats have tails and looking closely at the mechanisms behind a frog’s tongue. This immersive experience has been really enjoyable for both the Sixth Formers and the younger years as we have both developed our dissection and teamwork skills. The smell of formaldehyde did not put the students off as they demonstrated their enthusiasm and engagement in the dissections and it has been a positive experience all round. We are very much looking forward to next year where we can potentially dissect more organisms!

Maya Khiani and Eloise Neil, Year 12

BIOLOGY CLUB

We have thoroughly enjoyed running Biology Club sessions for younger students. The practicals have been fun and educational, with multiple dissections such as hearts, lungs, locusts, frogs, rats and the fish respiratory system. The majority of the sessions cover topics the students have needed for their end-of-year exams or topics they will learn about to broaden their knowledge. We particularly enjoyed a session where we all learnt how to suture bananas.

Ruby Saville and Samara Jumah,

Year 12

BIOLOGY CHALLENGE

During Science Week, students were invited to participate in the Biology Challenge Competition. Testing general Biology knowledge, students took two 25-minute online papers. Year 9’s Catherine Stobart was commended and Anoushka Sitkey was highly commended for their entries.

MISAC ANNUAL COMPETITION

Microbes made my lunch

All of Year 10 entered the annual Microbiology in Schools Advisory Committee competition as part of their study of

the microorganisms in the topic on cycles and the variety of living organisms. Congratulations to Tacita Twaddle, Eve Johnstone, Amelie Singer, Lauren Smith and Maddie Pickard, who were all commended for design and creativity.

BIOLOGY FIELD COURSES

Biodiversity Fieldwork

In September, Year 12 Biology students went on a field trip to Epping Forest. We arrived at the Field Studies Centre and were greeted by our guide, Celeste, who told us about the site and the various species that live there. In the morning we focused on aquatic invertebrates. We carried out an investigation comparing the biodiversity of two ponds (Lily Pond and Frog Pond). In groups, we planned our investigation and used pond dipping as the strategy to collect different species of invertebrates, identifying them with a dichotomous key. Back in the laboratory, we compared their biodiversity using a statistical test. In the afternoon we spent time focused on terrestrial invertebrates. In our groups we collected data about how the tree species affected biodiversity. We found lots of different invertebrates and even a toad! It was a very fun and informative trip but we won’t miss the spiders!

Edie Cartmell and Sienna Ransford, Year

Fieldwork techniques

12

In June, the Year 12 Biology students travelled to Epping Forest to complete fieldwork techniques, including a required practical investigation. After preliminary work, we worked in groups to design an investigation into the effect of soil compaction on the abundance and distribution of a plant species. Back in the classroom, we completed a statistical analysis of our data to see if there was a significant correlation between our variables.

On the second day, thankfully, we were under the canopy of the Forest, avoiding the 32 degree heat in the sun! The day started by investigating the population size of woodlice, followed by collecting data using random sampling. A walk at the end of the day allowed us to see how the species of plants changed through time.

Year 12 Biologists

Intermediate Biology Olympiad

Year 12 Biology students were invited to take part in the British Intermediate Biology Olympiad. The competition is open to students in the first year of post-16 education anywhere in the world. The competition involves completing a one-hour multiple choice paper online on topics that are likely to have been covered at GCSE and in their first year of A level. Some additional ideas are introduced, requiring problem solving and application of core biological principals.

Congratulations to the following students who received an award:

Commended: Georgia McNeill

Highly commended: Eloise Neil

Bronze: Beatrice de Leval

Silver: Flora Pickford

PHYSICS

This has been a very successful year for students studying Physics at Channing, and the significant challenges that they have faced have been taken in their stride. We offer our congratulations and we await, with great optimism, the results of the Physics public examinations results.

In Year 9, students have studied aspects of electricity and, for one of the projects, each student was asked to write a letter that Volta might have written to them recounting his life and scientific work. Here is Zoe Jones’ very interesting letter.

Greetings old friend, this is Alessandro.

You may not remember me, my full name is Alessandro Volta and we were friends many years ago. I’m sure you’re

Biology Olympiad

Year 12 and 13 Biologists were invited to participate in the British Biology Olympiad. The two 45-minute papers consist of problem-solving activities testing knowledge from the whole of the two-year A level course and beyond. Congratulations to all those who took part in this challenging competition, particularly to the following students, who received an award for their entry.

Commended: Molly Bloom, Charlotte Pearce, Maya Egerton

Highly commended: Flora Pickford, Madeleine Hjelt Bronze award: Mia Hanna

wondering why I am writing to you now after all this time, the truth is I’ve been meaning to write for a long time but haven’t had the right words or the time. I’ve become very successful, you know.

In case you’ve forgotten, I’ll tell you a bit about myself. I was born in Lombardy in 1724 and my parents weren’t rich, but not poor either. Sadly, my father died when I was seven, leaving many unpaid debts. I was home-schooled by my uncle until I was 12, when I was sent to boarding school, but I left because I was being pressured into becoming a priest, which I didn’t want to be. My family wanted me to become a lawyer but I wanted to be a scientist.

When I was 20, my friend Giulio Cesare Gattoni built a physics laboratory in his basement and kindly allowed me to use it. I think that’s how my science career really started.

You may want to know how I became so successful. Before this, I was a professor of physics at the Royal School of Como. I was given the job in 1774 and only a year later I improved the electrophorus, which generates static electricity. Interestingly, people credit me with its invention, even though I only improved it. I have to keep correcting them, which is very annoying.

I also invented an improved eudiometer. An eudiometer tests how much oxygen is in the air and the reason mine is an improved version is because it uses hydrogen reacting with oxygen and is initiated by a spark. It works on the basis that the volume of hydrogen gas in the air decreases after the spark, because the hydrogen would’ve reacted with the oxygen to form water, meaning that the decrease in the hydrogen volume is proportional to the amount of oxygen in the air.

I had a friend called Luigi Galvani who was a physicist as well. He conducted an experiment where he made two different metals touch the leg muscles of a skinned frog. He said that this resulted in the generation of an electric current that caused the leg to twitch. He called this animal electricity, as he thought that it was a new form of electricity found in living tissue. He was wrong. Actually, the frog was only conducting the electricity. I called this metallic electricity. I then started experimenting with two metals and found that animal tissue is not needed. However, my findings provoked lots of controversy between the people who believed Galvani and the people who believed me. I won in the end when I invented the Voltaic Pile.

I invented the ‘Voltaic Pile’ in 1799, it produces energy! Do you know what this means? It means that the previous belief that energy was only produced by living beings is false and proves that it can be created chemically! After discovering this, I sent a letter to the President of the Royal Society. I also got invited to the Institute of France to demonstrate it, and it went amazingly. I was given the opportunity to demonstrate it in front of Napoleon I himself, who later made me a count and a senator of Lombardy, which is where I was born.

To explain more thoroughly, the Voltaic Pile is alternating disks of either silver and zinc or copper and pewter that are separated by cloth or paper that’s soaked in sodium hydroxide or salt water. After my invention, many other electrical experiments started and barely six weeks later electrolysis (which is how an electrical current leads to a chemical reaction) was discovered by Anthony Carlisle and William Nicholson when they used my invention to decompose water into hydrogen and oxygen.

I also discovered methane, a gas. You see, I was curious after reading a paper by Benjamin Franklin about flammable air. In fact, it isn’t air, it’s methane. It’s also in flatulence, especially cow flatulence. I first found it in the marshes of Angera on Lake Maggiore in 1776. I experimented with it by lighting it with a spark in an enclosed space, and it worked. I then finally managed to isolate it in 1778.

Between all of this I travelled around Switzerland and met a delightful man called Horace Bénédict de Saussure. He was a geologist as well as a meteorologist, physicist, mountaineer and Alpine explorer. He was a very busy man. He was also the first person to build a successful solar oven. The reason I’m saying ‘was’ is because, sadly, he passed away in 1799. I’m still sad, I would have liked to have seen more of him, he was such an interesting person.

It’s kind of ironic how my life turned out. I didn’t show any signs of talking until I was four. My parents thought I would be unbelievably stupid, but evidently they were wrong.

Anyway, I have talked way too much about myself, what about you? I want

to know everything! Where did you go when we parted? Have you settled or are you still figuring things out? What’s your greatest achievement? I am truly sorry for not writing sooner.

Please write back soon.

Yours sincerely, Alessandro Volta.

One of the many experiments carried out in Year 9 involves the use of a Van de Graaff generator to create an electric charge. The photograph on the left-hand page shows Hannah having a hair-raising moment!

In Year 12, one of the topics that we have been studying is optics and, in the article below, Grace Wu writes about the history of the telescope. The first telescope is said to have been developed in 1608 by Hans Lippershey, a German-born lens grinder and spectacle maker. He was the first person to gain a patent on a telescopic device. His device, called a kijker (ʻlookerʼ), consisted of a concave eyepiece that was aligned with a convex objective lens.

Lippershey’s discovery inspired Galileo Galilei, who then designed and created his own telescope just 2 years later. This device allowed Galileo to start looking at the sky, and he subsequently discovered the craters of the moon, the rings of Saturn, sunspots and four of Jupiter’s moons.

After the groundbreaking work of Hans Lippershey and Galileo Galilei, other scientists around Europe, including Johannes Kepler, began to design and build their own telescopes. Kepler made detailed studies of telescopic optics and devised his own telescope, consisting of two convex lenses, in 1611. While the design greatly improved the device’s magnification, it also rendered the observed image upside down.

In 1668, Isaac Newton built the first practical reflecting telescope. He ground a two-inch metal mirror so that it had a spherical curvature. He placed the mirror (2) at one end of a tube. Light coming in the other end (1) reflected off the mirror back towards the opening. The reflected light struck a secondary mirror (3)

that Newton had affixed inside the tube which reflected the light to a convex eyepiece lens (4) built into the side of the tube.

Both the refracting Galilean and reflecting Newtonian telescopes have undergone developments over the following centuries. Despite many changes, most of the modern optical telescopes used in the 21st century are derived from the telescopes developed by Galileo and Newton, whose discoveries relating to optics have proven invaluable to the field of astronomy.

Throughout the course, our A level students have enjoyed a combination of theoretical and practical work and, in the photograph above, they can be seen thinking very carefully about the linear air track. We have greatly enjoyed working with them for the past two years, and we wish them every success.

We would like to thank and congratulate Isabel Green, Lidia Lonergan, Jasmine Patra and Harriet Sumners, who all demonstrated 10% extra bravery when taking up the challenge of participating in this year’s Physics Olympiad.

On a personal level, I would like to thank all of the members of the Physics Department for the sterling work that they have done this year in supporting the students, and I would like to give a special mention to Miss Fung, who works tirelessly on behalf of her students to allow them to realise their potential.

Mr R Jacobs, Head of Physics

ATHLETICSCRICKET

YEAR 7 & 8 SPORTS HALL ATHLETICS

In January, selected students from Year 7 & 8 competed in the Haringey Sports Hall Athletics competition. It was a wonderful opportunity for the teams to showcase their skills that they had been working on during Friday Indoor Athletics sessions. All students performed with focus, commitment and enthusiasm in all of their events both on the track and in the fi eld. The Year 7 team placed sixth overall, which was a fantastic effort and the Year 8 team came second by the narrowest of margins. A massive congratulations to all students involved and we look forward to being part of the competition again next year.

YEAR 8 HARINGEY ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

Congratulations to the Year 8 athletics team who competed in the Haringey Athletics Championships at New River Sports Centre. The students performed exceptionally well resulting in the team gaining third place overall. Congratulations to the following students on their results and being selected to represent Haringey at the Middlesex Schools Athletics Championships:

Mia C. 2nd Place in 800m

Hermione H 3rd place High Jump

Sienna B 3rd Place 200m

Anna RB 3rd place shot put

SOUTH HAMPSTEAD

ATHLETICS FIXTURE

On 25 May 2022, selected Year 7 & 8 students travelled to South Hampstead Cricket Grounds for an athletics meet with South Hampstead High School and City of London School for Girls. It was a warm spring afternoon and the Channing students participated with determination, enthusiasm and passion. Students competed on the track in the 800m and 200m and in the fi eld in shot put, javelin and long jump. There were some excellent results across the board and we are very proud of all of the students and thank them for representing Channing at this excellent afternoon of athletics.

Throughout the summer term the Year 7, 8, 9 and 10 cricket teams played matches against City of London for Girls and South Hampstead High School.

Across all fi xtures the teams showcased some very good batting, organised and accurate fi elding and some excellent bowling resulting in many wickets being taken. All matches were really competitive and the students enjoyed putting the skills they had learnt in training into action. Congratulations to all of the students who took part and we look forward to seeing you all in action again next year.

GYMNASTICS

FOOTBALL

Channing is ambitious and has worked hard to make football accessible for all students through key delivery in the curriculum. The popularity of the extra curricular clubs which are available for all abilities means that there are more than 90 girls that attend one of the offers the school has.

Being a Barclays Pledged School, we are working hard to support the growth of the sport. A number of programmes have been started and with some tweaking we are proud to be part of the the FA Girls’ Football School Partnership.

FOOTBALL FIXTURES AND COMPETITIONS

The Y7/8 and the Y10 teams have played regular fixtures against some local schools. With the standard of play improving they have really played very well. Well done to all those students who have represented the school this academic year.

The U12 girls football team managed to get themselves to the 3rd round of the ESFA National competition. This is a massive accolade considering this is the first time the team have played together in which activities have been hugely affected under covid restrictions. They are a pleasure to coach and will continue to go from strength to strength . This success initiated an influx of new talented players, both for the football and futsal clubs. On a lovely sunny Friday before enrichment week nearly 30 girls took part in the Year 7 Inter Form Football Tournament on St Aloysius FC grass pitches. Some excellent play was noticed by all the visiting coaches and

the players should be very proud of their endeavours. A very closely fought tournament was decided by the last round of matches. Well done to all the girls involved, especially all the Football Captains, but a special mention to 7CWi who won the overall tournament. A very high standard of play indeed.

EXTRA CURRICULAR FOOTBALL AND FUTSAL

All Years have the offer of a futsal club and outside football training. It is unusual for football to still run through the summer term activities and demonstrates just how popular the sport is in the school. Year 8 are a great example of this, with a number attending technical sessions every Friday morning to enhance their football skills – they receive UEFA standard tailored coaching in order to improve their game understanding based around the FA’s 4 corner model. This has also opened possible doors for some of them to trail for the London Youth Games 2022. The FA 4 Corner Model.

TALENTED IN FOOTBALL

Two Year 10 students attended the first stage of Independent Schools FA England Trials for the first time. This was an excellent leveller to see how they cope in a more elite environment. They have also been identified by the FA and will be invited to trial under their new Talent ID system. Well done to Tabitha J and Saskia R.

Two Year 8 girls also attended the London Youth Games 2022 Trials, it is a good indicator how well these players are developing and we look forward to more players attending such events. Well done to Bella K and Natasha R.

AUSTRIAN SKI TRIP REPORT

On 1 April we arrived at Channing very early in the morning and got straight on the coach to Heathrow airport. After a two-hour flight, we arrived in Munich. We went on a coach journey full of beautiful scenery and finally arrived in Ski Amade Austria at Ennstalerhof Sports Hotel Altenmarkt. After putting our bags in our rooms, we went to get our skis, boots and poles.

Everyone got put into one of four groups depending on our ability to ski. After the first day of skiing in Flachau, where we all got used to the snow and slopes, we went back to the hotel and relaxed.

On the second evening, we went to the lucky flitzer, which was a tobogganing ride. It was dark by the time we arrived and lots of lights illuminated the track, which made it look really cool. We could go in a cart with another friend which made the experience even better. We all went so fast down the track, we had such a great time.

All our ski instructors were so welcoming and trustworthy and we all improved by the end of the week. We were basically professional!

During the trip, we also went Austrian bowling. It had wooden balls and five pins, and after a fun game, the teachers won.

The views were so pretty and the weather was perfect for skiing, even when it was sunny. On the last few days it was hotter but the skiing conditions were still great.

Towards the end of the trip we went to another part of the mountain called Zauchansee where there were jumps and obstacle courses to take part in.

There was lots to do in the evenings after dinner, the hotel had game rooms and rock climbing walls. We could also watch movies.

On our way back to Munich airport, we had time to look around Salzburg, a really pretty town. We had Austrian pretzels and there were loads of nice shops.

The ski trip was a really great experience, we all enjoyed it.

Effy: I had never been skiing before, so I was slightly nervous at first but our instructor was really nice and funny, my whole group learnt really quick and we were able to go up the mountain after 4 days, the ski lifts were so fun and one of the highlights of my trip was everyone falling of them as we got off. I loved the trip and really hope I can go again.

Amélie: I thought it was great that anyone could go, if you had skied before or never at all. I really enjoyed the lucky flitzer and the food was really good. I miss it and definitely would recommend going as there was so much to do and I had an amazing time.

Amelie Cedar and Effy Osborn

FEARLESS LEARNERS

This year in the Senior School our whole-school Teaching and Learning focus has been on developing Fearless Learners. We believe that it is possible to teach pupils to become more confident, proactive, independent learners in such a way that they become more courageous, fearless learners. To this end we have worked with both teachers and pupils to develop a range of resources that support us all to become more fearless in our learning. I am indebted to the Head

Girls, Anna Milsom and Alia Khalouf, for their hard work supporting this initiative. Through surveys, interviews and staff continuing professional development, we have produced a number of infographics that will give you a taste of what Fearless Teaching and Learning looks like at Channing.

Mr A Boardman Assistant Head (Teaching & Learning)

Sixth Form

When you consider the great double acts, Watson and Holmes, Churchill and Roosevelt and French and Saunders spring to mind (not forgetting the Chuckle Brothers). I am not comparing me and Mrs Williams to these titans of literature, history and comedy but there are two of us, so we’re halfway there. Since March, Mrs Williams and I have had the great privilege of serving as Acting Heads of Sixth Form and we have taken enormous professional pride in the achievements of the Sixth Form students and teachers over the course of an unforgettable year.

There have been so many highlights for us both and we can only capture some of the most momentous things here but I want to start with examinations. Nationally, the Year 13 class of 2022 has had one of the most disrupted educations in recent history, having had their GCSEs cancelled at late notice and then having been schooled through periods of lockdown and other Covid disruptions. And yet, despite all this adversity, they faced up to the challenge of being the first cohort to do their first formal examinations at A Level with courage, endeavour and resilience – all features of the average Channing Sixth Former. Their commitment inspired us daily and we are so proud of them all. Year 12 too have faced more than their fair share of disruption and they have also been fantastic. Starting from our superb new Officer team led by Head girls Maya Kiani and Sienna Ransford, Year 12 have risen to all the challenges thrown at them and they and their parents should be rightly proud of the adults they are becoming.

This year saw the first school musical in 10 years with the Sound of Music coming to the Arundel Centre in February

and it was superb. The cast, led by Sixth Formers Hattie Sumners, Anna Milsom, Lorna Goldman, Celine Obadiah, Georgia McNeill, Grace Abrahams, Sasha Findlay, Flora Froment, Nura Bentata and Lucie Belhomme brought the world of 1930s Austria to life and amazed us all. Throughout the year, Sixth Form students demonstrated their musical talents at various events and impressed with their dedication towards their chosen instruments. They also showed their community spirit, with Sixth Form students being involved in various outreach projects including working with Brookfield Primary, Hill House Retirement Home, Channing Junior School students, various charities and many more projects and events. Their generosity and kindness with their time is truly impressive.

We have also been privileged to have students share their knowledge with us through student run assemblies including on: ‘Microaggressions’, Stephen Lawrence, the Holocaust and more besides. We have also been treated to an impressive range of outside speakers such as former refugee Alex Ntung, the Rap Project, Hanna Gildam-Clark from Inner Drive, Brook, John Paul-Flintoff and Beatbox academy amongst others. This in turn has inspired this year’s fantastic range of Channing projects where Year 12 students select, research and deliver a presentation on an area of their interest. They were

staggeringly good this year with topics including: Spain under Franco, the Bhopal gas disaster, nanotechnology, Norway’s prison system and many many more. Congratulations to all the girls for their endeavours.

An enduring and endearing feature of Sixth Form life alongside the numerous academic achievements is what a fun and vibrant place it is to study. For example during Enrichment Week, Mrs Williams designed and created various Taskmaster challenges of varying degrees of difficulty in which joint Year 10/12 teams battled to complete their tasks to the best of their abilities and had lots of fun along the way. When Year 13 had their last day, we set them various Harry Potter-themed challenges including an escape room and, naturally, we set these challenges whilst dressed as Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall. Their prize for completing the challenges was a exam survival kit complete with lucky penny, marble (from when they’re losing theirs), hot chocolate and party blower to celebrate the end!

I want to finish by paying tribute to various staff members who have left the Sixth Form team. Ms Kung served as Director of Sixth Form for four years until January before becoming Channing’s Director or Partnerships and HE. We are eternally grateful for her work transforming the Sixth Form and she continues to guide them through the

various channels of UCAS and beyond. Although sadly only with us as Head of Sixth Form for a short while due to personal circumstances, good luck to Ms Gjersten and thank you for her energy and ideas. Also leaving the Sixth Form team, some to other roles at Channing and others to pastures new are: Mrs Garrill, Ms Beenstock, Ms Evernden, Ms Hurst, Ms Lisa Wilkinson, Mr Daurat, Mrs Kennedy and Dr Devlin. They will be sorely missed and we thank them all for their guidance and support of the girls over the years and wish them all the very best in their new roles and pursuits.

Mr Martini-Phillips and Mrs Williams Acting Heads of Sixth Form

EPQ EXTENDED PROJECT QUALIFICATION

Every year, some Sixth Formers choose, as their Enrichment option, to undertake an independent research project, which may produce either a 5,000-word essay or an artefact or production of some kind. This is a valuable opportunity for students to work independently, to wrestle with problems of all kinds and to learn to think for themselves.

The number of students completing EPQ this year was a little lower than usual, perhaps refl ecting the shadow of Covid. All the more power to those who stuck it out and completed their projects, which were no less diverse and interesting than in previous years.

At the end of the process the students are invited to refl ect on their experience of undertaking EPQ. Several of this year’s bunch commented on the pleasurable but somewhat unnerving freedom of investigating a topic without a set question or resource list:

‘I almost did too much research…’

‘Due to the fascinating history of Art, it was easy to get hooked on art in one period and forget about the overall goal of the project.’ (Ah, but getting you hooked was part of the goal.)

‘In the beginning, there was certainly worry as to whether I would ever manage to narrow my ideas down, let alone create a question.’ And yet: ‘ This is certainly something I would look to do again as the process of research and writing has not only taught me invaluable skills, but has opened me up to a new area of history that I now have great knowledge of and interest in.’ Hurrah!

The experience is remembered by some as pure pleasure from start to fi nish:

‘I really enjoyed the whole process of my EPQ from doing initial research to presenting the topic and research done. I loved reading all the different material and learning more about my chosen topic… I was surprised by how much I enjoyed writing [the report]…

‘Everything I have researched will be relevant to [my University course].’

‘The further I got into my research and writing, the more I was able to connect to the topic I was writing on and my passion grew, making writing for hours seem like a fun activity to share my knowledge rather than a chore to meet a deadline…

‘I have found the EPQ process a greatly enriching experience that has benefi ted me in many ways.’

These young scholars have discovered new interests that they may well return to later in their academic careers, and have gained valuable experience of the kind of intellectual independence they will be expected to make good use of in further education. Many thanks to those colleagues who supervised the students’ projects.

Long may EPQ continue at Channing and good luck to all future researchers!

EPQ titles 2021-22:

Emilia Charalambous

To what extent can the popular theories behind the Late Bronze Age Collapse be supported by Bronze Age writing?

Nancy Flintoff

Did Chernobyl hasten the fall of the Soviet Union?

Celia Gomez

What determines the value of Art: Takashi Murakami

Emily Kamata

How did Jesuit Missionaries, between c.1550 and c.1610, try to evangelise China and what was their response to Chinese society?

Molly Malbon

What does the future of brachycephalic breeding look like?

Young Enterprise

This year we were able to enter two teams into the Young Enterprise Company Programme and, after a bumpy start and a few setbacks in terms of product approval, both got up and running with marketable products. The Euronext mentors who gave up their valuable time to meet the teams weekly online were impressed by the innovation of the products, as well as the outstanding presentation skills of our students.

Team Textus came up with the idea of making dolls from recycled clothing but, when faced with the realisation of how long each one would take them to make when they already have a heavy school workload, they soon refi ned their product to a doll-making kit where all the parts were sustainably sourced, and “Sustainadoll” was born! This team won the prize for the “Best Presentation” in the Euronext competition, as well as the “Innovation Award” in the

regional Company Programme fi nalist competition run by Young Enterprise. Both teams were also presented with a Finalist Award and reminded that many teams don’t even make it to the competitions as the company report and the slides have to be submitted in our case before we had even had a chance to go to market.

Team SCANdle originally designed and tried their hand at making spherical soaps (Sphoap). They were determined to market a handmade product with fragrances linked to inspiring women. Once they realised that manufacturing cosmetics involved insurance issues, they quickly changed their name and adapted their manufacturing to produce candles in reused jars in the four fragrances – Rose (Rosa Parks); Cinnamon (Hedy Lamarr); Lavender (Ada Lovelace); and Jasmine (Jane Goodall). My offi ce has been full of lovely fragrances ever since!

Having enjoyed the challenge of the competitions and decided on products, marketing strategies and started production, the two teams

were ready for business. The fi rst punters eager to get their hands on the products were the Channing pupils, whose enthusiastic response during the Sixth Form lunchtime fair energised the teams into further production ready for the looming summer fair period.

The Highgate Fair in the Square, this year co-sponsored by Channing, provided their biggest selling opportunity and soon had the coffers fi lling up. The sun shone and the team smiled through the long day and the remaining stock was repackaged ready for the Junior School Summer Fair the very next day. Sensibly, the teams had divided themselves into sub teams for each

fair and the sun shone on Stanhope Road and both teams sold nearly all their remaining stock.

As I write this we are preparing for Founders’ Day and their last opportunity to set up a stall and talk about their experiences in the programme. Next week we have to close their accounts and wind up their companies. They have all learned so much and been a fabulous group of students to work with. There has been no falling out and arguing about who should do what and who made the most sales –nothing like ‘The Apprentice’ at all! I was expecting much more drama and stress when I took over this role in the autumn term but they have all been a credit to themselves and to the school. We have so many young people with an impressive range of skills, I am not sure they always realise how great they are!

I would like to thank the teams for their patience with me during my first year. They have been a pleasure to work with and they should be really proud of all their achievements.

The teams are:

Team Textus: Branwen Bainbridge, Gabriella Douglas-Kitsis, Meaghan Lawrence, Emily Mullen, Irina Sofronie and Amy Warren.

Team SCANdle: Isla Church, Hana Dulson, Savanna Joubert, Barbara Parente, Flora Pickford and Grace Wu.

If you are interested in mentoring or just coming in for a one-off session to speak to our future Young Enterprise teams, please do get in contact with me via the Senior School office.

Look out for news of our teams and products in Word from the Head next term. You will be able to pay by card next year!

Mrs R Williams Young Enterprise Link Teacher

House Activities

The House Singing Competition in the spring term was the most spectacular and hard-fought House event we have ever had.

All the Heads of House played a part in their House’s performances and the theme for the medleys were varied. Sharpe House was first up, singing a medley of “Diva Songs”. The words to Rihanna’s “Umbrella” song were changed to “Della” to pay homage to Miss Della-Porta. Waterlow House were next with their Abba medley, which had everyone singing and I was, of course, the “Dancing Queen”. The Spears House medley was “Love” and their performance included a magical wedding, with Mr Gittins

WATERLOW

Waterlow Charity week in March was the final of all Houses. The school was awash with golden daffodils, which students happily purchased as an early Mother’s Day present. No charity week is complete without delicious food and there was of course the Bake Sale, donut selling and Easter Egg hunt. The culmination of our Charity week was the Fashion Show held in the New Sports Hall. Each Year group was given a decade as a theme and volunteers rocked their looks up the catwalk. Special mention must go to the staff who volunteered, including Ms Hill, Ms Hursay and Ms Cooper.

Mrs N Houston, Head of Year 8 and Waterlow House

as the celebrant. Goodwin House brought out the big guns with a medley of classic rock band anthems. Who could forget their surreal performance which involved a Freddie Mercury look-a-like (Mr Murphy) singing: “We are the Champions”. Unfortunately, Goodwin were not the champions this time as the winning house was Spears. Their medley performance certainly took the audience on a journey of love, marriage and betrayal with a section sung beautifully by Sophia Sutliff in Year 11.

SPEARS

Spears Charity week this year raised more money than ever! We had a silent disco, a bake sale, dodge ball and all the usual stalls at our lunchtime fair. The biggest surprise for me though was the popularity of bubble tea. We sold out in around 15 minutes one breaktime, and with a very healthy profi t margin! Our theme for the week was love, and it was great to see so many pupils wearing pink to support the school charity for their own clothes day. The Spears Offi cers were wonderful role models throughout the week, with boundless energy and enthusiasm, they demonstrated great leadership. Thank you to everyone who contributed to an event or bought an edible treat. Sterling work Spears! PS, did I mention that we won House Singing this year.?

Mr P Gittins, Head of Year 9 and Spears House

GOODWIN

Goodwin House Charity Week was the first cab off the rank! With a Halloween-themed week what wasn’t to love about that?! The week was filled with a Halloween cake sale, scary movies, guess the ghost, Halloween dress up day and our very own in school trick or treat. Pupils went running around the school to look for the rooms with sweets for their treat bags. It was so impressive to see how many teachers dressed up as ghosts, all in the name of charity. The Halloween-themed

dress-up day was my favourite and even Mrs Hughes came to assembly wearing a scary mask. The Officers and their Deputies did a sterling job of organising and coordinating all of the events and raised a whopping £2153.28. Well done to all involved and thank you to the pupils for their support and taking part.

Ms L Zanardo Head of Year 11 and Head of Goodwin House

SHARPE

Sharpe's charity week took place in November and we had a wonderful time raising money. Highlights included a lunchtime screening of 'The greatest showman', a fantastic karaoke competition and a fair in Founders' Hall to round off the week.

Ms S Della-Porta, Head of Year 10 and Sharpe House

Partnerships

Channing students have a long tradition of helping others and playing their part in the local community – particularly through volunteering – and this year has been no different. The school is forging new partnerships, particularly with local State Primary and Secondary schools. These new collaborations and the Education + programme were born from our partnership with HNCP (Highgate Newtown Community Partners and Brookfield Primary School).

Channing colleagues have been involved in a number of activities that have helped to transform/impact the lives of many students and local residents. Debating and Minimus clubs with Ms Donington (second in charge of English Department) and Mrs Elliot (Head of Classics) respectively were offered to Yerbury, St. Joseph’s and Brookfi eld Year 5/6 students, leading to quite a lot of competition to be involved. Channing student volunteers have been instrumental in helping with these two clubs but in particular, the problem-solving and science clubs offered to Key Stage 2 students would not have been possible without the input of Year 12 volunteers

alongside Miss Quow (KS3 Science coordinator) and Mr Riggs-Long (Mathematics teacher).

The impact has been obvious, with Brookfi eld Year 6 students wanting to continue Latin at secondary level and Channing student volunteers commenting that they “really enjoy getting to know the students from Brookfi eld and I look forward to each week. Their progress and interest in science is fascinating to see. This has helped me learn new leadership skills and communication skills. I am grateful I have had this experience.”

DT CLUB

KNITTING CLUB

Helping students read has also featured in our partnership relationship this year. Year 9 volunteers attend St. Joseph’s Primary School and help with reading – sometimes even fluent readers ask to read with our students so they can engage in conversation about the content of the books. Year 12 volunteers, who attend Channing Junior School for reading too, have also travelled to Brookfield to work with Key Stage 1 students.

At Channing Junior School, Philosophy and Knitting clubs were also offered to Key Stage 2 students at Brookfield, Yerbury and St. Joseph’s Primary Schools. This has provided a wonderful opportunity for students to learn a new skill and in particular, philosophy, where they were challenged to develop their philosophical voice, learn to examine topics both from their own and others’ perspectives, and grow as independent thinkers.

The Education + programme is flourishing and we look forward to continuing a number of the activities/clubs in the new academic year. This programme has also spearheaded

the partnership relationship with St. Aloysius College as well as Parliament Hill School. Debating in Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4 are successful clubs with St. Aloysius, which will hopefully lead to involvement in external competitions whilst Parliament Hill and St. Aloysius Year 7 students have benefited from a Latin club. Most recently, a select number of Parliament Hill Chemists attended Channing to participate in a Chemistry competition and both schools have been engaged in presentations and talks offered by the Channing Careers department.

We have also been fortunate to utilise the facilities at St. Aloysius – particularly their Design and Technology specialist rooms. Channing Year 7 students have been working on building an amplifier – albeit through trial and error – but this has been an opportunity for the students to work with different equipment and focus on different skills.

Ms J Kung Director of Partnerships and Higher Education

Careers

DEVELOPING SKILLS

Two new skills-based activities added to the calendar were enthusiastically received by students. In November, the Sixth Form practised Interview Skills with 75 members of the Channing community. In June, Years 10 and 12 had their first taste of networking, discovering more about careers and how to further them. Student feedback on our inaugural events has been overwhelmingly positive. In fact, they have asked for even more parents and alumnae to participate next year! This complements our focus on ‘presenting yourself’ with Year 10 which Sarah Lockett, journalist, TV presenter and actor kindly delivered again this year, as well as our more general classroom focus on oracy.

INSPIRATIONAL SPEAKERS

OUT AND ABOUT

All Year 10 students set out on a work insight morning, visiting one of nine different workplaces: Baringa (Mr Barnett), Deutsche Bank (Ms Eusebio), Google (Mrs Brown, Mr Rosenthal, Mr Malbon), Withers (Mr Mullen). Atkins (Dr Campos), Orchard Therapeutics (Dr Kostopoulou), the Universe of Cool (Mrs Ezro), the Highgate Dental Practice (Dr Cochrane) and the Summit (Dr Caglar). They absolutely loved their visits and learned so much from the activities so generously designed for them.

Inspirational Speakers

Throughout the year, students were enriched by talks from such eminent speakers as lawyer and business leader Dame Judith Mayhew, Sir Dieter Helm, Professor of Economic Policy at Oxford University and Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, Britain’s most successful Paralympian and Chair of the Trustees of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award. Baroness Nicky Morgan marked International Women’s Day by talking about her career in an interview by Mrs Hughes, and students enjoyed themed events on Careers in Sport and Carousels offering insight into work with Music, Languages, Neuroscience, TV production, Dentistry and more.

Fifty Channing linguists, would-be politicians and future diplomats had the privilege of attending the Australian High Commission, kindly hosted by Ms Heckscher, the Deputy High Commissioner at Australia House, where they gained an inspiring insight into the work of diplomacy from seasoned diplomats and former ambassadors, as well as special guests Catherine West MP and Adam Jogee, Mayor of Haringey. KPMG and Rothschild & Co also kindly invited interested Sixth Formers to insight events at their offices.

Year 9 and Year 10 students prepared fascinating blogs about how they spent their Take your Child to Work Day in workplaces ranging from Citibank to Selfridges. They greatly appreciated getting to know more about their parents’ jobs, as Natasha B described: ‘The opportunity to educate myself on all that my father does was truly enriching, as before, I could never quite comprehend the complexity.’

Every Year 7 student participated in the National Careers Challenge to design a repurposed and marketable product

Sir Dieter Helm CBE

Professor

Baroness Grey-Thompson DBE Paralympian & Peer in the House of Lords Monday 28 February, 6pm

Baroness Nicky Morgan PC Member of the House of Lords

Hella Pick CBE Holocaust Refugee, Journalist & Author

It was a delight for us to return to in-person events this year!

Baringa

Adam Jogee, Mayor of Haringey, at the Australian High Commission

out of Air Products’ used gas cylinders. Team Blueberry Bubbles went on to represent Channing in the National Final at the ICC in Birmingham, where Zara J won the prize for the Most Enterprising Student. Meanwhile, Year 8 students were participating in the Channing Skills Challenge, developing teamwork and presentation skills in the context of designing courses and marketing strategies for their perfect university, with Team Casia winning the best pitch and product.

BACK AT THE RANCH

Channing Alumnae featured large in our Careers programme this year, illustrating the breadth of paths chosen by our students: Lucy Collins, a Naval Architect, Hannah Poole, currently completing her PhD in Oxford in Atomic and Laser Physics, Fatima Sarbuland a Computer Scientist now specialising in the property sector all spoke with excitement about their careers in STEM. On the creative side, we heard from Suzanne Zack on her art history career, most recently on the BBC’s ‘Antiques Roadshow’, Katie Bull, who, with a background in textile design turned entrepreneur, founding Clove+Clay alongside holistic coaching, sound healing and reiki, and Catherine Pring, a full-time artist. Former Head Girl Georgia Clarke, who studied Economics and Politics before going into the Prison Service on a graduate scheme, gave a truly inspiring talk on the personal rewards of a job that makes a real difference.

At our annual Careers Convention for Years 10 and 12 –largely in person for the first time in three years – students selected four talks from a choice of twenty-two exciting options, including Professor Jolene Skordis, an eminent academic specialising in Global Health Economics at UCL, Dr Teri Okoro on architecture, Charlotte Girling, on broadcast journalism and Monica Teversham on publishing.

With deep regret we said goodbye to Auriel Bull, who contributed enormously to the Careers Department in her time with us. We welcomed Adina Marcu as Careers Coordinator in March. The Careers Department is indebted to Nura Bentata and Alma Miller, who stepped in to contribute to the Chatting with Channing podcast ‘Guiding and Inspiring’ about our Careers Programme, as well as to the current Student Careers Leaders Maria Kirpichnikova, Rosie Pendlebury, Ella Skordis-Worrall, Lexi Jary and Shinju Kimura-Phalonin in Year 11 and Sophie Dain, Sophia Marshall, Ava Teversham and Sophia Towner in Year 10, who support us in developing what we offer to students and have already begun interviewing some of our most eminent speakers.

The extensive careers information and guidance which we provide at Channing would not be possible without the support of so many parents, alumnae and friends of Channing who also generously provide work experience opportunities for our students during the summer holidays. On behalf of our students, our thanks to you all.

Ms E Pavlopoulos, Careers Co-ordinator

Duke of Edinburgh

The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award is one of those times in your life that you will never forget –you either love it or hate it!

Most of Year 9 sign up for the Bronze as most others are taking part, but they’re never really sure what’s in store. We have a 1-day Practice walk in The Chilterns and then a 2-day overnight expedition in The New Forest in the summer term. Miss Cathy Arnold, Mrs Smith-Modu and Mr Daurat have been looking after this cohort this year and Miss Cassie Evans left in December 2021. Miss Arnold is about to go on her own expedition on water in the oceans, so we wish her the very best of luck on the seas.

Then in Year 10, about half the year sign up as the other half realise that roughing it is simply not for them! The 3-day Practice expedition takes place in Box Hill and the Assessed in The South Downs, also in the summer term. Mr Duane Riggs-Long and Miss Emily Moor have been looking after them and we hope to have convinced a good number to take up the Gold when in Year 12. Miss Moor is about to start a new position in a new school and I hope that she can squeeze in some DoE too!

And fi nally, the Gold Award is offered in Year 12 with the four-day Practice expedition taking place in Exmoor or Yorkshire in October and the Assessed in Brecon, Wales in July. Mr Hill and myself look after the Gold Award and love seeing the young people pushing themselves out of their comfort zones and taking responsibility for their decisions whether they be good or bad. Here we have the true leaders of the future.

None of this is possible without the work of all the staff at each level in the DoE Team who do this on top of their normal day to day duties at Channing. Thank you all for making these memories happen.

Whichever memory is yours, hopefully it is one where you still learnt something about yourself and friends as you persevered to the end.

Ms Monica Yun DoE Manager and Gold Leader

BRONZE AWARD Year 9

THE TRAINING DAY

On Saturday 26 March, the Bronze Participants met at Channing to undertake training for their expeditions which was led by the DoE staff and an excellent group of Gold students. Topics covered included suitable kit, tick and blister prevention, how to use a trangia safely and navigation practice. During the afternoon the groups planned their routes for the assessed trip. This was a jam packed and very successful day which built on the skills covered within their PE lessons.

THE PRACTICE WALK IN THE CHILTERNS

On Sunday 15 May it was time to put the navigational skills into practice in the Chess Valley. It was a very enjoyable day and teams learnt valuable lessons in preparation for the assessed trip. There were a number of challenges for individuals and groups to overcome, from carrying rucksacks, climbing hills, taking bearings, making team decisions, supporting each other and let’s not forget putting up those tents!

THE ASSESSED TRIP TO THE NEW FOREST

On Wednesday 22 June we set off for the assessed expedition in the New Forest. As teams set off into the undergrowth, the sneaky New Forest ponies tried to steal the teachers’ packed lunches. The training paid off and teams were noticeably more confident with their navigation and were able to identify and correct small errors much more effectively than during the practice.

Teams dealt well with the heat on the fi rst day and supported each other well. Tents were successfully erected and there were a number of ingenious supper menus prepared in camp during the evening. Day two was much cooler and thankfully the heavy rain forecast never made an appearance. There were some impressive examples of perseverance as individuals and teams dug deep in order to complete the assessment. Thursday ended with a very enjoyable BBQ and awards ceremony.

PE ACTIVITY DAY

After the two days of walking in the New Forest for their Bronze Duke of Edinburgh award, Year 9s took part in a number of outdoor activities as part of their PE activity day. The activities gave the Year 9s an opportunity to develop their teamwork and organisation skills and have fun on:

• High Ropes

• Low Ropes

• Pioneering activity

• Raft Building activity

It’s always good to see Channing pupils being 10% braver and our Year 9s rose to the challenge in true Channing fashion.

The DoE staff team are very proud of the year group and hope many of them decide to continue their DoE journey and sign up for the Silver award next term.

There are 94 students signed up to the Bronze Duke of Edinburgh award scheme from the current Year 9 cohort. During the year they have been working towards completing their volunteering, physical and skill sections.

Bronze Participants

Lauren Aserkoff

Matilda Avigdori

Ella Banks

Ariella Bentata

Natasha Birch

Alice Borysenko

Georgie Bradshaw

Liv Brown

Katya Brozel

Amelia Cable

Amelie Cedar

Saskia Chadha

Beatrice Chadwick

Liv Chowrimootoo

Amelia Cohen

Grace Coleman

Jemima Colton

Amelie Conway

Eve Cronkshaw

Elise Cunnington

Ella-Marie Davies Hana Dean

Sophie Drozdova

Aurora Dunn

Annalise Elms Masha Fedoseyeva

Aoife Feeney

Alanna Forbes

Alethea Foster

Eibhlin Frost

Cara Garth

Anna George Gabriella Georgiou

Parisa Gillardian

Lucy Gold

Teresa Gotto

Maya HamiltonBrown

Opal Harper

Imogen Hawksley

Lila Hay

Thandie Holden

Mabel Hollis Aurora Holmes

Rachel Hommel

Natasha Hough

Tate Hymanson

Lyla Jamieson Lucy Johnson Eva Jones Zoe Jones Ruby Keve Megan Koopman

Mei-Xing Le-Carson

Olivia Leslie Millie Leviton Paloma Lewis

Leonie Malone

Charlotte Menendez Pia Messina

Eliza Mistry

Lydia Mistry Ava Moaveni Isabel Monico Freya Moody

Haruka Mori

Anouska O’Neill Orla O’Neill

Effy Osborn

Maika Pastrana-Yanase

Ashani Perera

Maisie Phillips Anaaya Pujara

Hannah Robinson

Amelie Rosen Amelia Saade

Isabella Salmon

Joanna Samonas

Scarlett Santi Violet Saville

Sophia Shapiro

Tanvee Sharma Molly Shenker Elizabeth Shepherd

Lila Silverman

Anoushka Sitkey

Charlotte Skinner Eva Slessenger

Sereny Staite

Catherine Stobart

Eva Maria Tesoro Sanna Thukral Cerys Tyner

Avantika Varghese Sophie Warren

SILVER AWARD Year 10

How did you spend your Founders' Day holiday? Perhaps it started out with a sloth-like slumber to a well-deserved brunch. Or perhaps, you are the energetic sort and completed a 5k run in record speed. In either case, it was a day of relaxation, a holiday.

The DoE team along with 62 Year 10 students had what many would deem a far cry from a holiday. Trudging up a hill on day 2 of their Silver assessed expedition is not exactly in any holiday brochure. But let me assure you that it was indeed a holiday for all of us on the trip. No, I am not being fanatical, here are just a couple reasons as to why. Firstly, going on holiday is all about the people you go with, often friends and family and, despite the odd bit of bickering over where to eat, you laugh with them and (mostly) enjoy their company. DoE is no different. You spend all three days with your friends in a group, laughing and joking both up and down a steep hill in any weather conditions. Yes, there are still the debates about what to cook on the trangia first and the odd argument

over which way to turn, but the obvious enjoyment is plain to see. Secondly, holiday destinations tend to have spectacular scenery. The D of E expedition is once again no exception as routes sweep you through rolling hills and winding forests. Glorious and magical. Word limits restrict me to expound on other reasons, but DoE expeditions, no matter how tiring and gruesome, are true holidays. Although, in a very ironic fashion, I think we all needed a holiday after finishing the expedition.

Sadly, this was the last expedition that will be led by Miss Moor as she moves on to newer pastures. She has truly been an outstanding leader. Although it would be remiss of me to not point out one chink in the shiny armour. Despite claims of remarkable brilliance at the game Monopoly Deal, she only managed one victory in 10 games. She will be truly missed by the DoE team. Who am I going to beat now at Monopoly Deal on the next trip?

Mr Riggs-Long

SILVER DUKE OF EDINBURGH PRACTICE TRIP

BOX HILL NORTH DOWNS – 23 - 25 APRIL 2022

For me Silver DoE was one of the most exhausting yet exciting and rewarding experiences I’ve had at Channing. The week leading up to the expedition mainly included packing and repacking my rucksack to make sure I had everything necessary for the trip as well as shopping for all the snacks! On the morning of the expedition at 7am I arrived to see roughly 30 students all gathered in Highgate High Street wearing walking boots, waterproof trousers and giant rucksacks, (luckily for us the waterproofs weren’t necessary as the forecast rain miraculously stayed away). Once we arrived in Box Hill we all got off the coach and got into our groups. My group ‘the plodders’ left in high spirits at around 9am we then walked for an hour or so before noticing we were very lost, we walked around for quite a while until we eventually found our bearings and were soon back on track. This was repeated a few times throughout the day, preparing us for the rest of the trip as we never made the same mistakes again. Finally each checkpoint had been reached and we had arrived at the campsite all in one piece, we pitched our tents and had a well-deserved rest before starting dinner. Once we had finished our surprisingly nice dinner, we treated ourselves to a hot chocolate

with marshmallows and made our way back to the tents. The nights probably weren’t the highlight of the trip, nevertheless we tried our best to stay warm, wearing every item of clothing we had packed. The next morning we ate some pancakes, tried and failed to make porridge, packed up our tents and set off. The sun was shining, which helped us forget about our achy feet leaving us excited for the day ahead. We walked through woods filled with bluebells, across a couple farms, along some streams and finally a very big hill, chatting and laughing all the way, knowing that dinner wasn’t too far. We arrived at the campsite, quickly pitched our tents and had an early dinner, again followed by a hot chocolate and then bed. We all slept much better this time despite the numerous spiders we found in our sleeping bags. Finally we had reached the last day, we ate breakfast and had an early start knowing the end was in sight, we walked on leaving the other groups behind, determined to get home. At last we reached the top of Box Hill and then embarked on our descent to the station. We arrived at the station and made our way home!!

Lotte Crane, Year 9

Day 1

Despite not being able to have the usual Saturday morning lie-in, everyone was fully awake when we met at school at 7.30am to catch the coach. We arrived at Box Hill to a sunny sky and, surprisingly, we could actually carry our overloaded backpacks. After a few hours of walking, we stopped for lunch, and then walked again until we reached the summit of Box Hill. The sky was perfectly clear, allowing us to see the magnificent views. This motivated us to carry on walking towards the campsite.

Soon after arriving at the campsite, we pitched our tents and began making our dinner – pasta and tomato sauce. We enjoyed the beautiful scenery and tried to ignore the fact that our tent was on very uneven ground and was pitched down a hill.

Day 2

We awoke in our tent, piled on top of each other due to the downward incline. Yet we all slept well enough and managed to make our breakfast and pack up our tent in time for an 8am start.

We reached multiple checkpoints before realising we were very lost and found ourselves in someone’s garden. However, we soon managed to get back on track, and reached the viewpoint at Leith Hill Tower where

Silver Participants

Maya Anthony Maddie Barrass Natalia Boardman Gigi Baxter Echo Braden Ella Brown Arabella Challis Maya Chitre Charlotte Conyerd Catrin Cox Lotte Crane Scarlett Davis Beatrix Davis

Julia de Arruda Campos Higgs Hannah Dickman Lola Egerton Jessica Ezro Liviana Feher Zara Ferguson Margo Gelfer Emilie Goodman Kitty Hannam Eva Harris Brown Maddy Horsell Lucy Hunt

we paused for a snack and enjoyment at being in the countryside. We then set off for what we thought would be a simple walk back to the campsite for the night. Yet again we managed to miss a turnoff and took a very long route to get there.

We watched the stunning sunset and took many great photos before packing away for the night and attempting to get as much sleep as possible in preparation for a 4:45 am wake-up the next day.

Day 3

After a very cold and early start, we were eager to set off towards the station as we thought of our warm beds. The weather improved throughout the day and our spirits remained high. Eventually we reached the station, surprisingly, only 10 minutes later than planned. We were exhausted but very proud of ourselves, and we realised we had all had a great time despite the hours of walking and bag-carrying.

Aside from greatly improving my teamwork, map reading and compass skills, I also learnt an important life lessonpitching your tent on a hill is a bad idea if you want a good night’s sleep.

Aimee Rosenthal, Year 10

Elsie Isaac Tabitha Jackson Eve Johnstone Elsa Keaveny Ayushi Kekulthotuwa Isabel Koch Alisa Kondi Rose Ledlin Mia Levy Mia Lomer Sophia Marshall Iona McCormack Sophie McSpadden

Eleni Mordue Tara Moriarty Erica Mullen Camille Odile Menear Amel Ofili Chiara Palazzesi Ava Peers Maddy Pickard Isabella Preston Olivia Price Zoe Quartey Saskia Ransford Aimee Rosenthal

SILVER D o E ASSESSED TRIP 3 JULY 22 – SOUTH DOWNS

I absolutely loved the Silver DoE expedition and all it had to offer. From navigating and putting up a tent; to reaching our check-points in one piece and cooking on the trangia; every element was fun. Our experience ranged from being chased by horses, accidentally climbing up crags to relaxing at the campsite with all the other groups.

The trip began with a slightly worrying footpath closure that affected our initial route, so from the get-go we had to navigate a new course along a river. This turned out to be not too difficult and on the first day we enjoyed a tranquil trek along this river for the majority of the day. The second day was tougher but, in my opinion, more rewarding. The scenery was stunning and although there were more hills, I think that the groups all persevered and

Charlotte Sawtell Lana Seaton Carolina Shuldig Lauren Smith Scarlett Sullivan Maddie Swayne Ava Teversham Sophia Towner Tacita Twaddle Haroula Voutsa Lily Waite Poppy Waltasaari Saoirse Willis

worked together to complete the day. Finally, the last day started off with the toughest incline yet, however this brought us up to the top of the South Downs so for the rest of the day we enjoyed the 360° views of spectacular English countryside.

The expedition was a great thing to do with friends and we all motivated and helped one another throughout the trip. The views were beautiful and although we did get lost, we all improved our map-reading skills and bonded as a group! Despite the expedition being hard, it was well worth it and we all felt a real sense of achievement on completion. I’m looking forward to Gold!

Charlotte Sawtell, Year 10

GOLD AWARD Year 12

This year we had 18 students sign up in Year 12 and some groups have moved ahead and others will complete a little later as they have until aged 25.

Heaven’s 7

Lucy Selfe

Edie Cartmell

Sienna Ransford

Barbara Parente

Flora Pickford

Millie Eton Charlie Pearce

Dead on Arrival

Amy Warren Anna Saacke

Branwen Bainbridge Emily Mullen Irina Sofronie Meaghan Lawrence

GOLD PRACTICE EXPEDITION

OCTOBER 2021, EXMOOR.

All 3 groups ventured to Exmoor for their Practice Expedition during the October half term. They had no idea what was in store, but the night-walk certainly got them used to counting steps, improving their Magic Numbers and enhancing their micro-navigation! The moors were not kind to them, the clouds fell upon them and they were unable to see more than a few metres ahead at times!

Dead On Arrival trying not to forget what number they were counting towards on Winsford Hill, Exmoor

Every Duke of Edinburgh young person loves a challenge and what better way to add to the collection of Bronze and Silver DoE certificates and get one more!

Goldbusters Aliya Jami Lorna Goldman Eloise Neil Miranda Gomez Velasco Alice Metcalf

Heaven’s 6 on the last stretch into Lynmouth

Goldbusters showing us that Tarr Steps aren’t too slippery these days

GOLD ASSESSED EXPEDITION JULY 2022, BRECON

The soaring temperatures in July did not stop Channing’s Gold DoE girls from completing their assessed expedition. New departure times of 5am were negotiated with DoE staff and the Assessor so that they could finish at 1pm and sleep by 6pm each night! The chase for Channing’s DoE staff with Heaven’s 6 and Dead On Arrival was certainly on.

Both groups passed successfully with flying colours - all smelling clean on their way to our celebratory meal in Hay-on-Wye.

Mr Hill, Mr Riggs-Long and myself were very impressed with how they learnt from their mistakes in Exmoor and overcame the scorching heat waves on the Black Mountains. They are all future leaders with many talents and skills so please watch out for these young adults!

Ms Monica Yun Gold Leader and DoE Manager

Dead on Arrival at the start of Day 1

Heaven’s 6 at the bottom of Sugarloaf, Day 2

Do E AWARD COMPLETIONS 2021-2022

DoE

Awards (that include the expedition element)

Bronze

Annabelle Lucas, 12 AH Mia Levy, 10S

Arabella Challis 10Q Ella Goodman, 12 SE Eloise Johnson, 10D Aimee Rosenthal 10W Emily Ang, 10 Q Chloe Hommel, 10W Madeleine Barrass 10S Tabitha Jackson, 10 Q

Lola Egerton, 10D Natalia Boardman 10D Amel Ofili, 10S Lauren Smith, 10W Elsie Isaac 10D

Charlotte Conyerd, 10S Hannah Dickman, 10S Poppy Waltasaari 10D Simran Tulsiani, 10 S Sophia Towner, 10S Sophia Marshall 10W Charlotte (Lotte) Crane, 10W Madeleine (Maddy) Horsell, 10W Maya Anthony 10Q Sophie McSpadden, 10Q Ella Brown, 10W Zoe Quartey 10Q Isabella Preston, 10W Lucy Hunt, 10S Tacita Twaddle 10D Saskia Ransford, 10Q Scarlett Sullivan, 10S Iona McCormack 10Q Kitty Hannam, 10Q Charlotte Sawtell, 10W Tara Moriarty 10Q Chiara Palazzesi, 10S Georgia Baxter, 10Q Haroula Voutsa 10W Alisa Kondi, 10Q Lana Seaton, 10D Ava Teversham 10D Georgina Grossman, 10W Isabel Koch, 10D Elsa Keaveny 10S Maddalena Pickard, 10W Maya Chitre, 10W Olivia Price 10W Jessica Ezro, 10D Carolina Schuldig, 10D Eleni Mordue 10Q Liviana Feher, 10W Flora Froment, 13 AH Erica Mullen 10Q Ayushi Kekulthotuwa, 10S Kitty Gayer, 10Q Echo Braden 10S Catrin Cox, 10D Ava Peers 10Q Eva Harris Brown

Silver

Isabel Fetterman, 13PE Lidia Lonergan, 13 MY Tori Akinrinlola, 13 MY Molly Malbon, 13 MY Sienna Ransford, 12 PB Aliya Jami, 12KW

Flora Pickford, 12 JH Meaghan Lawrence, 12KW Lorna Goldman, 12AH Branwen Bainbridge 12PE

Gold

(very rare for someone to receive this whilst still being on roll at Channing!)

Asya Pendlebury, 13MY

DoE Certificates of Achievement (special award during COVID times that does not include an expedition.)

Bronze Silver

Grace Silverman, 11SH Meaghan Lawrence, 12KW Mia Apfel, 11SH Gilda Grimes 11W Mia Levy, 10S Maya Khiani 12CG Eve Johnstone 10D

Sustainability

CHANNING CLEAN AIR DAY

We’ve been finding out about our immediate environment at Channing. Using an air quality monitor, students measured air pollution outside the front of school at drop-off time. We compared our findings with World Health Organisation recommended levels. We focused particularly on concentrations of PM2.5, which is the most dangerous pollutant for respiratory health. The Eco Reps also conducted surveys,

investigating how students travel to school and handed out important health information to car users (see photos).

Through this we hope to raise awareness of the dangers of air pollution which, according to Imperial College London, killed 4000 people in London in 2019, as well as being a powerful driver of climate change.

GETTING RECYCLING RIGHT

We have a range of recycling facilities at Channing but these only function if used properly. Eco Reps designed posters for our recycling points which clarify the correct materials for recycling. The main message we discovered from Haringey Council was that anything which is to be recycled must be clean. This is especially important because putting the wrong things into recycling bins contaminates batches and leads to machinery breakdowns at recycling plants.

THE BIG BATTERY HUNT

As part of a nationwide initiative, Channing students in both the schools collected used batteries for recycling. At the time of writing this we have received 1796 batteries, with form 7ME collecting the most. Thanks very much to everyone who has contributed. This will be an annual event for us from now on.

GOOD NEWTS FROM THE GARDENS!

The student gardening club has been working to measure and boost the biodiversity of the school pond. In their surveys they discovered pondskaters, water boatmen, damselflies, dragonflies and smooth newts. This makes it an important island of wetland habitat in an urban area.

WORKING TOWARDS THE GREEN FLAG AWARD

We have weekly meetings organised by our Year 12 Sustainability Officers, Branwen and Charlie. These are aimed at putting Sustainability high on the agenda at Channing and achieving national accreditation. They are currently working on a week-long programme of events around World Animal Day (4 October 2022).

Mrs S Walker Sustainability Co-ordinator

Junior SCHOOL

Founders' Day AROUND THE WORLD WEEK

It was fantastic to be able to welcome parents, pupils, their siblings and the wider community to Founders’ Day this year. There was a real buzz around the school, particularly as we have not been able to open the Junior School gates for parents to join this much-loved day for the past four years due to the building project and then the pandemic. It was a pleasure to see all of the girls proudly touring their parents and family around the school for an around-the-world-trip visiting seven different Commonwealth

countries across all of the classrooms around the school.

During the two weeks prior to Founders’ Day, the teachers planned a cornucopia of activities to support the girls’ Around the World adventures. Each Year group embarked on their journey to learn about one Commonwealth country across the curriculum; we chose Commonwealth countries to link with celebrations for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee year. The girls learned about the culture, geography, language, currency, landmarks, traditional dances, art and music of a range of Commonwealth countries:

Reception Australia

Year 1 Malawi

Year 2 Bangladesh

Year 3 Malaysia

Year 4 Sri Lanka

Year 5 New Zealand

Year 6 South Africa

The Friday before Founders’ Day, we gathered for a special assembly where I explained to the girls how the history of our school, Channing, its tradition and heritage, is important and we must celebrate it. I reminded the girls that our school was founded in 1885. When I asked how long ago this was, one of the Year 6 girls impressively worked out that it was 137 years ago! Over the years, many things

Perseverance Resilience R Empathy Independence

Bravery Respectfulness Curiosity Responsibility

have changed; however, many things also remain the same. For example, there are traditions that we follow year after year. One of our school’s long-standing traditions is skipping out. I will never forget the reaction from two of my friends, who happen to be Channing alumnae (I have clearly always been drawn to the ethos of the school and this has been reflected in the friends I have chosen) when I told them that I had been offered the post as Head of the Junior School. They were delighted for me and shared lots of lovely memories of their time at school. They also told me (initially I must admit that I thought they were winding me up) that as the Head of the Junior School, at the end of every term, I would skip out of the school with all of the girls and staff following me in rejoice of a great term and in celebration of the holidays. They both then nostalgically hummed the tune of ‘Am Camin’ by Schumann –Kinderszenen Op.15, 8 with a big smile on their faces. And yes, I do skip out of the school at the end of every term.

In assembly, the girls were delighted to reflect on how every day they are making the school’s future history and that perhaps, in 137 years’ time, the Head of the Junior School will explain how we introduced our new initiative, Channing Characters, in 2022. Before the pandemic, the Senior Management Team and I started discussing how to formalise Character Education, taking into account the Channing ethos and Channing Promise that underpin everything that we do. The idea is that the girls will benefi t from visibly referring to a set of defined character traits with accompanying tangible characters across their education experience. To decide upon the final Channing Characters, some of the girls (last year’s Form Captains and the Head Girls that are now in Year 7) and all of the teachers gave their input. As a community, girls and teachers alike each suggested traits and ideas for tangible characters. It was pleasing to see there was lots of overlap and we all had similar thoughts about what

makes a Channing girl and what we want a Channing girl to be like.

After much discussion, we decided that the Channing Characters will be inspired by British woodland animals; an artist was commissioned to design them:

Resilience robin

Perseverance red squirrel Empathy rabbit Responsibility badger Bravery mole Independence tawny owl Respectfulness hedgehog Curiosity fox

This term, the Year 6 girls met the artist, Paul Solomons when he came to school to lead a workshop. He supported the girls in the completion of their projects to write an accompanying story about each of our Channing Characters. Eight of these pupil-written stories will be used as our official stories, so the Year 6 girls of 2021-2022 will leave their legacy for the Junior School to enjoy.

During the assembly on Friday, the Year 6 girls eloquently helped me to explain the character traits that each of our new Channing Characters represent:

Resilience Robin has the capacity to recover quickly from diffi culties and to spring back.

Perseverance Red Squirrel is persistent despite diffi culty or delay in achieving success.

Empathy Rabbit has the ability to understand and share the feelings of others.

Responsibility Badger has an obligation to do something. Bravery Mole is courageous.

Independence Tawny Owl thinks and acts for herself.

Respectfulness Hedgehog has due regard for the feelings, wishes, or rights of others.

Curiosity Fox has a strong desire to know or learn things.

Going forward, we will champion the girls to develop all of the Channing Characters within themselves. This will stand them in very good stead for the future and prepare them for what’s ahead.

This year, we introduced Philosophy for Children (P4C) into the curriculum, which will be marked in the school’s history. Since the spring term, the girls from Reception to Year 6 have been enjoying their sessions and developing their enquiry skills. The quote attributed to Greek philosopher, Heraclitus: ‘Character is destiny’ implies that destiny, or fate, is not a predetermined outside force, but that our future, our destiny, is determined by your own inner character. After all, one of our founders Matilda Sharpe said: ‘Never forget; life expects much of you and me’.

Miss Dina Hamalis, Head of the Junior School

Art & DT

The Junior School’s Art & DT Room has been a hive of activity this year!

In Art lessons, our busy bees have been studying a variety of new skills and techniques inspired by some of the greats, from Matisse to Mackintosh and Kusama to Kahlo. This year, the girls have utilised their sketchbooks to record their ideas and explore new media. The blank pages of their books have offered a safe space for them to investigate and develop their own interpretations to a brief. The girls have been encouraged to be brave and try out new things. Pupils in Upper Key Stage 2 have used their artistic voices to convey meaning in their work, considering a narrative or communicating a message to the viewer. Year 6’s focus on Dame Paula Rego’s work helped the girls to realise the smallest details in an artwork can mean a lot, and studying the Pop Art movement taught the pupils that they can be loud and bold.

designers and engineers, they had to research existing products and explore techniques, considering how they can bring innovation to their own designs. Pupils have particularly enjoyed the construction stage of each project, sometimes having to learn how to use a new tool. For example, pupils in Year 3 had to saw lengths of bamboo for their insect hotels. DT project briefs are often focused on benefi ting the lives of others, such as when pupils in Year 5 designed and constructed models of ‘nature hides’ to enhance our Forest School area. They had to consider its function as well as aesthetics, selecting their own camouflage exterior that would blend in with the surrounding leafy area. The pupils often express just how proud they feel about their fi nished products on their evaluation forms.

Food Technology is part of the DT curriculum, and this allows our girls to learn about methods of food production such as seasonality in UK farming and how everyday foodstuffs such as couscous is made. Pupils have loved designing their own recipes and making their dishes this year. Of course, the most popular lessons have been the taste testing! This year, pupils at the Junior School have tested fruit jelly, seasonal soups, scones and more.

If you visit the Art Room, you are likely to see the pupils practising their pencil and brush skills, making masterpieces from cutouts and sculpting clay into wonderful pieces. Year 2’s spotty pumpkins offer a charming example of our 3D work.

We had success in a variety of art competitions this year, with Channing pupils’ entries receiving commendations in several national and international contests. Two girls had work selected for the ‘Young Art 2022’ exhibition at the Royal College of Art and were invited to view their work in person. What an achievement for such a young artist!

In Design & Technology (DT), the pupils have worked towards a project brief with criteria to fulfil. Like true

Not only have pupils from Years 1 to 6 enjoyed learning in their weekly lessons, but many have also chosen to attend a variety of lunchtime and after-school clubs run by artistic members of staff. They have produced wonderful pieces using skilled methods such as Batik and silk screen printing. Many Year 6 pupils signed up to Props Club to help create the props for their end-of-year production. It was a proud moment to see their creations on stage being used so enthusiastically by the actors in the show. Other girls signed up to Textiles Club and upcycled old-style Channing hoodies using their sewing skills and an array of embellishments. These newly-rejuvenated garments were given to a food bank charity and are hopefully being used by children across the capital.

Mr R Fellows

A homage to Warhol

A homage to Warhol

Screen print of a vase A Year 5 designed and constructed model of a ‘nature hide’

Jelly tasting

Homage to Kusama

A painting in the style of Matisse

Computing

This year, the pupils have continued to use technology to support all curriculum areas. We are always looking for new innovations to enhance our curriculum as well as to encourage our pupils to be computer literate. All pupils are continuing to use different learning platforms to share their work. The girls in EYFS and Key Stage 1 are continuing to work using Seesaw, while the Key Stage 2 pupils are continuing to use Google Classroom. Lessons are regularly enhanced using digital media including film clips, VR headsets and Kahoot quizzes to offer alternative learning opportunities.

The green screen has continued to offer us the opportunity to experiment. The EYFS pupils delighted us by travelling to meet their favourite fairytale characters. The Year 3 weather forecasters were able to predict the temperature for the week ahead, while the Year 6 pupils have prepared their own stories.

Online safety is an ever-present concern for our young people so we have continued to explore ways to allow them to enjoy their online experience. We are continuing to use the Rising Stars Scheme to support our lessons. We also celebrated Safer Internet Day, which this year focused on the theme of ‘All fun and games? Exploring respect and relationships online.’ The children were treated to presentations from the Digital Leaders, with the younger pupils being visited by Digi-Duck.

In an ever-changing world, it is vital that we keep up to date with new technologies and potential issues that the children may be exposed to. Our pupils have had the opportunity to share their thoughts and experiences of technology with Emma Robertson from Digital

Awareness UK. She worked with staff, parents and young people to offer a picture of current use across the school and to advise us how we can offer support.

Our fantastic Digital Leaders have continued to work exceptionally hard to promote technology across the school. They are producing projects to support the EYFS and Year 2 pupils and introduce them to more creative, new ideas. To help their peers to share some of their amazing talents, they encouraged the girls in Year 5 and 6 to enter the Young Coders Competition. The theme this year was ‘My World Our Planet.’ Forty-four amazing, creative entries were submitted to the judging panel so we wait with baited breath to discover the outcome.

It has been fantastic to see the girls participating in the extra-curricular activities on offer. The Minecrafters have designed and built their own creative kingdoms for each other to explore each week, while the girls attending the iBrick Club are continuing to work on their critical thinking skills to engineer their own moveable models using Lego.

It has been a fantastic year for Drama in the Junior school, in particular the joy of welcoming audiences back for live performances in the Arundel Centre.

In the autumn term, it was Year 2’s turn to shine in the Christmas Show and they certainly proved they had the ‘Xmas Factor’. They were joined by a sparkling Year 1 and resplendent Reception in songs such as ‘Knock, Knock’ and ‘Glory to the Lord’.

We had back-to-back performances in the spring term, starting with Year 3’s extravaganza, ‘When I grow up’.

Drama

A review-style show featuring songs, dances and sketches that had the audience laughing and crying in equal measure. This was followed by Year 5’s incredible performance of ‘James and the Giant Peach’ – a thrilling adventure that saw James escape his terrible aunts and embark on a wonderful journey with a group of insects.

We have fi nished the year with our Year 6 production of ‘Matilda Jr’. It has been special in so many ways. With a brilliant script and an incredible score, the girls have loved every minute, as have the staff involved. Huge congratulations to all the girls who took part; they did themselves, and the school proud.

This year, the girls of the Junior school have flourished as creative writers and poets. We have enjoyed celebrating stories and literature from around the world and have had some exciting opportunities to create some of our own.

For World Poetry Day back in October, all girls across the school wrote poems and creative pieces under the national theme of ‘choice’. This was great for us to tie in to our sustainable motives. The girls considered the choices we can make to save our oceans and the animals therein. We were very proud to be able to display every girl in the school’s work, allowing all to see creative poems based on ‘choice’. Each form was allocated a sea animal and the girls wrote some beautiful and thoughtful poems, displayed for all to enjoy.

As we know how much our girls enjoy reading and sharing literature with one another, we decided to turn this year’s World Book Day into World Book Week! The girls had a multitude of exciting activities throughout the week, with a competition to finish off our week of storytelling and creativity. The girls took part in our ‘Book Corner’ competition where each class worked hard to create a book-themed reading corner to enjoy not just for the week, but the remainder of the year. A huge congratulations to our winners of 2M and 4N who designed book corners based around ‘The day the crayons quit’ and the characters of Roald Dahl stories. The girls were thrilled to receive a special book to go in their reading corners as a prize for their creativity and hard work.

On World Book Day itself back in March, we were thrilled to welcome two fantastic authors into the Junior School: Sarah McIntyre and Karen Inglis. The girls were really inspired by the authors’ visits and took part in a costume parade. The girls enjoyed showcasing their innovative and creative costumes, sharing a love of literature and book

characters with their friends. We are thrilled and are very proud to have raised £333.90 for the World Book Day charity and their charity partners.

This year, we’ve embedded creative writing across our curriculum in many ways, connecting different subjects to our English learning. Year 6 welcomed the author Tom Palmer into their classrooms in light of their World War II topic. Year 6 pupils were excited to be some of the very fi rst children to get a glimpse of Tom Palmer’s new novel, linked to WWII experiences. It was a great opportunity for the girls to refl ect on creative writing and share their thoughts on literature.

Year 4 have also enjoyed tying drama into their learning this year. The Year 4s were inspired by the ‘dragons’ from ‘Dragon’s Den’ and wrote some engaging and persuasive pitches that they presented to one another, in true ‘dragon’ character!

The Junior School Library is not only a quiet haven for browsing and reading, but is also often a vibrant hub of activity with fun reading challenges to collect stickers and house points, an illustration and comic club and colourful displays designed and created by pupils. Our Library Leaders have excelled in organising events this year, including lunchtime poetry performances, a quiz to celebrate Harry Potter Night, a competition to create a Halloween costume for a book character and a Roald Dahl quiz in the form of an outdoor trail.

The Library is also a place to discover new writers and the latest award-winning titles: Year 2 girls have had fun voting in-house for their favourite illustrated book from the Yoto-Greenaway Prize shortlist, and avid readers in Year 6 have taken part in the Bibliobuzz children’s book awards, voting with other young readers in Haringey to choose the winning title of 2022, ‘The Beast and the Bethany’, by Jack Meggitt-Phillips.

As ever, our Reading Champions and Library Leaders have done a fantastic job spreading a love of reading and literature across the school. Our book corners are brimming with a plethora of exciting fiction and non-fiction texts and I’m sure the girls are looking forward to delving into some new texts in their new classrooms next year!

Humanities

This year, the Junior School pupils have continued to enjoy learning about different people, cultures, times and places in both their History and Geography lessons. Classroom activities have included research tasks, map work, collaborative projects and the study of artefacts. This has been enhanced with plenty of learning outside the classroom, with trips, workshops and visits taking place across the academic year.

In the autumn term, topics included dinosaurs, the Great Fire of London, the Ancient Egyptians and a study of rivers in both Years 3 and 5, with the Year 3 girls enjoying a trip to the River Thames to carry out fi eldwork on the riverside. October marked the school’s celebration of Black History Month, giving girls the opportunity to recognise the achievements of Black Britons. October also marked Inspirational Women’s Week, which culminated in a non-uniform charity day where the girls dressed up as their female role models. The girls were delighted to celebrate those women who have shaped our past, present and future. November saw Year 6 pupils enjoying taking part in a virtual workshop about Ancient Greece, with activities including mosaic making, medicine making and tile painting.

As spring term began, the Year 5 pupils continued with their topic on the Victorians, where they learnt about the lives of signifi cant individuals, health, transport, and schools; they then presented the Junior School with an assembly to share everything they had learnt. Year 5 pupils also began a Geography topic all about India, whilst Year 4 pupils began learning about Kenya. Pupils in both year groups had the opportunity to study climatic conditions and daily life, comparing and contrasting life in the UK to life outside our own country. In KS1, the pupils in Year 1 were delighted to learn about toys and games, comparing toys from the past with the toys of today. In Geography, the Year 1 girls were introduced to the ecological challenges faced by the modern world in their topic: ‘Go Green’.

In the summer term, the Reception girls explored the similarities and differences between life in the UK, India and Kenya in their topic ‘once upon a time’: much like their comrades in Years 4 and 5 in the spring term. In Year 2, the girls enjoyed learning about famous inventors throughout history; in Year 3, topics included the Anglo-Saxons, the Geography of chocolate and ‘weather.’ Once again, many trips, workshops and visits played an important part in enhancing the learning experiences taking place in classrooms across the whole Junior School. The Year 3 pupils enjoyed an Anglo-Saxon

workshop where an expert visitor took them through activities including weaving, candle making and archery. In Year 4, the girls took part in an overnight residential trip aboard the Golden Hinde, the fi rst English ship to sail around the globe; this provided the girls with an immersive Tudor experience. Activities on board included weapons training and using compasses to learn how to navigate the ship.

As the year draws to a close we can refl ect on another successful year for Humanities with trips, workshops and cross-curricular learning playing an important role in developing History and Geography knowledge and understanding throughout the Junior School.

Many thanks to all the teachers who provided the girls with these cross-curricular experiences and planned carefully for many opportunities for the girls to learn outside the classroom; many thanks to the pupils themselves for their energy, commitment to the topics and their love of learning.

Mathematics

This year, our Maths Week focused on puzzles and challenges! We invited in The Happy Puzzle Company, who challenged the students to think more logically when completing a mixture of challenges. It was interesting to see how the students were able to work together using a range of strategies to complete them. The rest of the week continued with this focus, exploring different thinking skills that we might not usually use in our lessons. We also combined with some of the Senior School pupils in UKS2 to provide further challenges and prepare us for transition. Finally we joined in with the NSPCC Number Day, raising funds for the NSPCC.

We have held numerous competitions over the year, some within year groups, some within key stages and some whole school. Within Year groups the girls get very competitive when it comes to a TTRockstars battle, trying desperately hard to beat the other Year group, all the while consolidating their times tables. Well done to all the girls who took part in the competitions.

Key Stage 2 once again took part in Barvember, which is organised by White Rose Maths to encourage everyone to use the bar model. The Bar Model is a useful tool for helping children visualise and then solve math problems. Even some of the most complex problems can be seen much easier when represented visually.

The girls have enjoyed lots of practical Maths. Year 2 went outside when learning about volume and used water, bowls and cups to understand how the tallest container might not always hold the most water. Why is that?

Year 4 enjoyed making paper airplanes to test out speed! In Reception the girls have been learning to add singledigit numbers and count to 20. Every day they have been learning all about the number system through play. Most of the time they don’t even realise they are learning! This just goes to show that Maths does not have to be confi ned to the classroom and it can be a lot of fun!

Modern Foreign LANGUAGES

At the Junior School, our pupils start learning a language in Reception, where they have their first contact with Spanish on a daily basis and in a range of contexts. Regular Spanish lessons set a strong basis for them to explore both the language and culture. The curriculum has been carefully reviewed and modified for next year to establish steady progress in all skills: listening, reading, writing and speaking, throughout the different Year groups. The girls enjoy a range of activities that provide them with solid tools to put their Spanish into practice in their daily life, in school and at home. Their favourite activities during the lessons are learning new songs, playing different games and challenges to practise vocabulary and doing online quizzes.

This year, the main event has been watching ‘Encanto’ in Spanish. All Year groups enjoyed watching the film while they ate some ‘palomitas’ (popcorn). They had a great time and learnt how to sing the song ‘We don’t talk about Bruno’ in Spanish (No se habla de Bruno). We had the song stuck in our heads for a month!

Also, the ‘Flamenco & Salsa’ Club that Miss Jimenez ran in the autumn and spring terms has been very popular this year.

The girls enjoyed dancing and learning choreographies every Wednesday and they also loved playing statues at the end of each session.

Miss Jimenez also did a special assembly for ‘El Día de Andalucía’ on 28 February. She told us more about where she comes from and her culture, helped by the girls that joined the Flamenco club in the spring term.

A huge thank you to all of them for the excellent work, especially to Valentina (3C), one of our bilingual girls, who read a poem in Spanish about the eight main cities of Andalusia.

The girls had a fantastic time taking part in the assembly and practised a lot of Spanish in it. They fi nished the assembly dancing flamenco and everyone enjoyed it and congratulated them for the great performance.

Our pupils have their fi rst contact with the second language, French, in Year 3. They start learning how to introduce themselves and basic vocabularies such as numbers, colours, fruits and animals.

The girls learn French all the way through until Year 6. The girls really enjoyed playing games with their peers to practise the topics they have learnt.

Online quizzes are very popular in every Year group. Our pupils love taking part in them at the end of each topic. They compete with each other and get house points if they are in the top three podiums.

Finally, we would like to mention our bilingual programme, where we work closely with the Spanish and French speaking girls to improve their skills in their language.

Alba and Emma, our language assistants, have done a great job doing many creative activities for our bilingual pupils this Year and helping all the girls through different year groups to practise their speaking.

This term, they have searched for information and have learnt more about countries where their parents come from, such as Spain, Argentina, Mexico and Colombia.

We will keep working hard to give them the best language experience every year.

Language Assistant Alba with some of her students

Flamenco

Music

Once again, this year has been a whirlwind of musical activity. Hardly a week goes by without girls proudly showing off their hard work in the classroom, in assemblies and in formal concerts.

In the autumn term, Year 2 took the lead in the Christmas Show and they certainly proved that they had the ‘Xmas Factor’ when singing and dancing for their audience. They were joined by a confident Year 1 and Reception in songs such as ‘Knock, Knock’ and ‘Glory to the Lord’. Since then, Year 2 have worked hard to learn the recorder and have especially enjoyed playing along with jazzy accompaniments in pieces such as the ‘EBGBs’ and a funky version of ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’. More recently, Year 2 choreographed and performed ‘Questions’ for their class assembly and then moved on to exploring how composers represent different animals in music. This included learning how to play different ‘bird calls’ on the xylophone and swimming in an imaginary fish tank!

Year 1 have loved learning the ukulele this term and have made fantastic progress in mastering different strumming techniques. It has been a pleasure to hear them beginning to be able to sing and play their instruments at the same time – no easy feat.

Huge congratulations also to Reception for performing in their very fi rst Christmas Show and Fairytale-themed assembly. They worked incredibly hard to memorise many songs for each event, alongside learning songs relating to their class topics. Favourite songs this year have included ‘Baby Beluga’, ‘Gravity Gets You Down’ and ‘A Tiny Seed Was Sleeping’.

The girls have also had the opportunity to take part in a string group scheme whilst they are in Year 1 and 2. This

is a chance to embark on a wonderful musical journey together as a group of violins, violas, cellos and minibasses! It involves a weekly session singing and playing together as a whole group, as well as having lessons on individual instruments in smaller groups to fi ne-tune their skills. Each year always culminates in a fantastic concert, where the girls demonstrate how far they have come during the year to their peers and parents, inevitably to rapturous applause!

Year 3 gave a fantastic performance in their schoolthemed show in the Spring. They memorised some incredibly fast choreography for songs such as ‘Flash, Bang, Wallop’ and gave an exciting rendition of ‘Revolting Children’, amongst other repertoire. Over the past two terms, Year 3 pupils have been busy exploring music from around the world. This has included African drumming, playing pentatonic melodies from the Far East and, most

recently, Scottish dancing. Year 3 have also shown that they are equally confident in singing songs in Japanese as they are in Ghanian. What a flexible bunch of musicians!

Year 4 have been mastering the art of ‘quodlibets’ (stacking different songs on top of one another) and singing in rounds. They performed superbly in their recent singing assembly, devising actions for their year group song ‘The Proposal of Henry VIII’. The Tudor music unit also brought the opportunity to learn maypole dances, which brought the girls on to the multi-use games area for their music lessons in the sunshine. They have also been experimenting with GarageBand, creating their own fanfares and learning all about the basic skills of music production. In their around the world week visit to Sri Lanka, they learned all about the amazing singing fish of Batticaloa and even learnt how to play their underwater calls on tuned percussion instruments.

Year 5’s part singing skills are developing beautifully and they are beginning to explore accompanying themselves with chords on the ukulele as they sing. The around the world week brought them to New Zealand, where they encountered ‘The Wellerman’. This sea shanty from the 1800s was made famous on TikTok by Nathan Evans last year. The girls have enjoyed learning their class arrangement of this song and learning all about the careful discipline needed in recording sessions. They have also been exploring Tango music, with its syncopated rhythms and minor tonality. The girls used an A minor chord to experiment with improvisation on tuned percussion instruments, using spoken word to generate interesting rhythms.

In Year 6, the girls have been working hard on their mastery of performance. They put together a wonderful performance in the Key Stage 2 Spring Concert, enjoying their performance of ‘Three Little Birds’ in particular. The summer term has brought the challenges of singing Tim Minchin’s ‘Matilda’. Their harmony work on some of the slower numbers has been absolutely beautiful and is a culmination of all the singing work they have done throughout the Junior School.

In the summer term, the girls in Years 4 to 6 took part in a wonderful Samba workshop led by Miss Lilly from The Beat Goes On. This workshop had the girls exploring interlocking rhythms and working on playing as an ensemble. They tried out all of the different instruments found in a samba band, from the great big surdos to the small shakers and the high sound of the agogo bells. They had a wonderful time – percussion will continue to be a big hit in the curriculum next year, too!

It has also been a very busy year for our hard working ensemble groups. The String Orchestra meet every Monday and have been working hard on playing pieces with lots of parts. They have been very dedicated practising their music in between rehearsals and can now play ‘Drowsy Maggie’ with style and panache. The Spears

Vocal Ensemble met every week under the direction of Mr Boxall. Over the year, the choral sound has developed wonderfully as has their experience in part singing. They are currently working on ‘I Shall Sing With the Spirit’ by John Rutter. It is certainly a treat to hear the strains of their rehearsals carrying across the playground of a Tuesday lunchtime. The newly-formed flute quartet has also made a splash in the concert calendar in the Junior School. They played a wonderful rendition of ‘God Save the Queen’ on the Jubilee Celebration, and impressed our new parents with arrangements of ‘Dona Nobis Pacem’ and ‘Amazing Grace’. Our younger players have also had some excellent performances. The Blast Off Brass crew has enjoyed working with Mr Dodds to perfect its rendition of ‘Love Me Tender’ by the one and only Elvis Presley.

In addition to ensemble performances, our soloists have been working week in and week out with their instrumental music teachers to learn pieces for exams and for solo concerts. These concerts are always a highlight – it is wonderful to see the pupils so proud of their success. The recent crop of superb ABRSM results is also testament to the hard work of our musicians. Our Visiting Music Staff are precious to the Music Department and they enrich the musical lives of pupils at Channing Junior School more than words could say.

Physical Education

CURRICULUM

Physical Education (PE) in the Junior School has been extremely busy this year. All of the girls from Reception to Year 6 have worked through a robust curriculum that has allowed them to build on their knowledge of familiar sports such as netball, football and gymnastics. The girls have also had the opportunity to experience new sports such as hockey, trampolining and pop lacrosse. The introduction of swimming weeks into Years 2 to 4 and games afternoons to Years 5 and 6 have been welcome additions this academic year. Every pupil has made progress and their approach to learning has been outstanding. The PE teachers are very proud of each and every one of the girls.

EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES

This year saw an increase in the variety and number of extra-curricular sporting clubs on offer in the Junior School.

The girls really embraced this and, where possible, extra cubs were opened to accommodate all of the pupils who wanted to participate. The girls have been able to participate in a variety of sports across the week. We must say a huge thank you to all of the club leaders and to Miss Wright for coordinating such a varied programme for our pupils.

FIXTURES

The amount of fi xtures our pupils have attended this year has been outstanding. Pupils in Years 3 to 6 have competed in netball, cricket, athletics, football, crosscountry and swimming events; they have performed exceptionally well in all of them. The completion of our new facilities this year has also meant we have been able to host events such as the Haringey netball fi nals.

ENRICHMENT ACTIVITIES

In addition to delivering the curriculum and extracurricular activities, the PE teachers also hosted numerous whole-school enrichment events. These included: termly inter-house competition days; Healthy Schools week; Park Runs; and a PE trip for all pupils in Key Stage 2. This year, the girls have visited some incredible venues across London, including Lord’s Cricket Ground, Twickenham Stadium and the Olympic Park. Our Junior Sports Leaders have thrived this year and have been truly inspirational to the younger girls in the school, leading Key Stage 2 lunchtime sporting sessions on the multi-use games area for all girls to participate in.

These activities and initiatives are an integral part of what we do at Channing and they permit girls to compete in a different setting, put their leadership skills to the test and to work with children outside of their usual grouping.

Religious Education

Curiosity, exploration, learning, sharing, celebration and joy has permeated this past year as the RE curriculum has continued to open minds, fill hearts and nurture spirits. Our girls have not only developed their understanding of culture and religion through discussion, access to a rich programme of study and valuable interaction with community leaders, but they have demonstrated in their own attitudes the values of acceptance, unity, equality and respect.

The newly implemented RE scheme has been designed to ensure the above. Crucial elements and thought-provoking terrains of different religions have amalgamated to form a study that ensures both breadth and depth. The scheme considers why gifts are given at Christmas and what ‘church’ is, as well as why the Torah is special to Jews and what ‘Worship and Community’ means to them. It also delves into Buddhist ‘Worship and Beliefs’, reflects on the importance of Muhammad and the Qu’ran in Islam, explores the festival of Diwali and Hindu stories and also looks closely at Sikh beliefs and Rites of Passage in Sikhism. Wider conversations about culture and religion have celebrated our ‘Wonderful World’, marvelled at how people express their faith through the arts, pondered over what happens when we die and investigated belief in our community. This has made for a powerful and enriching learning experience for our pupils.

Alongside this, we have availed every opportunity to infuse pupils with a sense of joy and jubilation. From our Easter bonnet celebration which invited every member of our school to participate, to our delicious whole-school Christmas lunch, festive Christmas jumper day (which boasted an array of colour and character against the backdrop of a grey Winter!), Santa’s grotto, melodious

Furthermore, we had a number of religious and community leaders grace our school grounds to offer us insight, wisdom and exchanges of thoughts, words and sentiments. Rev. Kunle from St Michael’s Church and the respected Buddhist Chaplain, Mariano Marcigaglia, were amongst those individuals. Our pupils benefi tted from fi rst-hand knowledge and experience of religious practice, with the privilege of being able to quench their curiosity.

It was poignant for us all to behold the unbridled passion, boundless talent and infectious energy of our own pupils through the RE implementation in our school. Reception, Year 1 and Year 2, for instance, performed beautifully in the school Nativity Play. There was also a wonderful collaboration between the Junior and Senior school, as Year 7 pupils delivered a presentation on Sikhism to our Year 6 classes; this not only consolidated and celebrated their learning, but enthused and inspired them. We look forward to welcoming many more such collaborations across the schools.

As this year’s chapter of RE study draws to a close, new chapters of understanding, growth and community begin to spring and be written in the minds and lives of our girls. This past year, our pupils have continued to work and grow not just as individuals, but as a part of a school community. Through further discussion, questioning, immersive cultural experience and collaboration within and beyond our schools, may this journey of learning continue for our pupils.

carols in the courtyard, Christmas carol singing at St Michael’s Church and a whole-hearted celebration of World Religions' Day… we have not missed a single chance to mark religious occasions with ceremonious splendour.

Science

This past academic year has been extremely busy; with as always a vast range of theory, practical investigations and amazing trips to enhance the teaching and learning of Science at Channing Junior School.

Reception classes have enjoyed their ‘Healthy Eating’ topic by learning about the importance of eating healthily and exercising. They had the chance to grow runner beans as part of their animals and growing plants topic this term, linking this to their reading of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’.

In Year 1, the girls learned all about plants and living things as they participated in an exciting trip to the Chelsea Physic Garden. Much anticipation awaited as they planted and harvested potatoes. These potatoes were subsequently used to make Malawian vegetable stew as part of our around the world week. In the summer term, they visited the animals at Kentish Town City Farm and were complimented on their extensive knowledge of farm animals.

Year 2 have enjoyed investigating materials and their properties. They carried out an investigation to discover if ice would melt faster in particular locations. The girls had a great time making a ‘paperclip’ dance using magnets!

Year 3 designed a raft using recycled materials as part of their materials and their properties topic in the

spring term. They learnt about the magic of magnets by exploring and creating a magnetic game.

During the autumn term, as part of their animals including humans topic, the girls made a real-life digestive system, by funnelling food items into a pair of tights to replicate the movement of food down the oesophagus. In their Forest School time, they were set a challenge to complete an invertebrate hunt.

Year 5 have enjoyed learning how to plan and create scientifi c investigations of their own, by posing a question, then planning, predicting, collating the results and analysing their fi ndings.

We had the pleasure of welcoming a parent expert as we learnt about the wonders of space.

In Year 6, the girls were fascinated as they observed mould growing on bread as part of their learning about microorganisms. They were keen to extend their experiment for longer as they were intrigued by the possible level of mould that could be achieved.

Charity & SCHOOL COUNCIL

The Junior School has raised a laudable amount of money this year. In the autumn term, we launched our first Inspirational Women’s Week where we raised £2232.37 through a combination of donations for dressing up as an inspirational female and a raffle to be Head of the Junior School for the day. Additionally our version of the Rebel Girls stories, ‘Channing Junior School’s book of Legendary Ladies’ was published and went on sale to parents. All proceeds went to Inspiring Girls, an organisation dedicated to raising the aspirations of young girls around the world by connecting them with female role models. At Christmas, we officially took part in the Save the Children Christmas Jumper Day, where the girls were encouraged to upcycle and repurpose existing jumpers. In total, we raised £430.76.

Once again this year, we supported the Metropolitan Police Christmas Tree Appeal. The girls helped their Form Teachers and teaching assistant/s choose a gift for either a boy, or girl aged 0-18 years in foster care, living in a residential care home, living in a refuge and/or from

We also dressed up as numbers to take part in the NSPCC Numbers Day. Not only was this part of an exciting week of Maths filled fun, but we also raised £411.

This year we have also developed a more formal relationship with The Alexandra Wylie Tower Foundation and have been collecting food items to donate to its food bank. Alongside this, we collected toiletries as part of the Little Village’s Mother’s Day Campaign; there were bags of treats for mothers less fortunate than ourselves to pamper themselves with.

A particular highlight this year was supporting the Marie Curie Daffodil Appeal throughout the month of March. It started with Year 6 girls selling daffodil badges on the gates every morning. Later on in the month every girl made a daffodil to display around the school and we held a ‘Yellow Day’ where we all dressed in something yellow, bringing in a donation. Finally, over two days, the School Council organised and ran a fair, with all activities costing £1. The stalls were all yellow-themed and included: a cake sale, hook a duck, guess the number of sweets in a jar, guess the yellow food, pin the stem on the daffodil and target throwing. In total, we raised a tremendous £2243.59.

Funds were also raised on World Book Day, as girls donate to dress up as their favourite character. For this, £333.90 was raised for the World Book Day Charity,

a very low-income family. We warmly welcomed PC Saddle and PC Terry to our assembly. They spoke to us about the laudable appeal and how grateful the children are to receive our gifts.

which aims to give every child and young person a book of their own.

Additionally, five of our amazing teaching and support staff cycled 100 miles each in 6 days for Smart Works and raised £1815. Not only did they cycle on the road and on exercise bikes at home, but they spent their lunchtimes fiercely adding to the miles (and they even did this in their World Book Day costumes!).

More than 100 girls in the Junior School took part in the Swimathon at the beginning of the summer term. They

SCHOOL COUNCIL

School Council has played an integral role in the school this year, suggesting improvements now that we are back to ‘normal’. They have been instrumental in our charity events and have played an integral part in fundraising. Every fundraising event has seen the School Council with its blue buckets on the door, collecting donations on entry. Additionally, it has worked with the Channing Association to select the termly charity for community events.

were sponsored to swim as many lengths in one hour as they could, which took place at Poolside Manor and the Mallison Centre. More £10,000 was raised for the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal.

We were also very excited to be planning our first daytime disco in the summer term, where girls raised money for the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. An idea initially proposed by girls in Year 6, they donated to add songs to the playlist, to visit the VIP karaoke area, have their faces painted and buy snacks. In total, we raised £1036.67.

Other notable achievements include revamping our playground toys and rules, they have played an important role in suggestions for our Around the World Fortnight and the girls have created top tips for each Year group to help with transition.

Forest School

It has been a very exciting and eventful year for Forest School at the Junior School this year. Forest School has expanded to be available to all pupils from Reception up to Year 4 and this has met with a very enthusiastic and favourable response from the girls! As a consequence, several members of staff have been training for Forest School qualifications, enjoying learning about new tools and techniques and also about the particular ethos of this wonderful part of our curriculum.

Forest School is a child-centred inspirational learning process that offers opportunities for holistic growth through regular sessions. It is a long-term programme that supports play, exploration and supported risk taking. It develops confidence and self-esteem through learnerinspired, hands-on experiences in a natural setting.

The range of activities enjoyed by the pupils in Forest School sessions has been growing as the year has progressed. Some activities, such as climbing trees and sliding down ropes, have been enjoyed by all. The mud kitchen is another favourite

that almost every Form loves – the girls create all sorts of recipes; cakes, soups, pizzas and a huge variety of mocktails! Other activities have been more specialised, such as First Aid training, linked to the Junior Duke Award, which Year 4 participated in. The pupils considered how to carry out a primary survey and assess the need for help, how to use slings to support minor injuries and how to help anyone suffering with a choking situation.

In the spring term, students in Years 2 and 4 participated in some traditional British festivities – ‘beating the bounds’ and ‘egg rolling’. This linked in with discussions about religious festivals, traditional boundaries and how humans have learned about geography and the different faiths that the pupils follow. Egg rolling was a particular favourite as it meant that each Form had to work together to create a course first, before working in smaller teams to send an egg around it.

Christmas trees were brought into the Forest School area in January so that pupils could practise using loppers and bow saws to trim and chop with safety and accuracy. These trees were then used for a variety of purposes, including making a kubbe set, creating a wishing tree and whittling small items chosen by the pupils. An excellent example of recycling, and one that we hope to recreate next year!

Pond dipping has been a favourite activity for many pupils, who have been able to observe and handle a number of common newts and even a frog. As part of this activity, the girls have been introduced to the idea of removing pond weed to keep up oxygen levels. They have made significant progress in separating pond nails from the

excess weed – excellent management of the environment to maintain biodiversity.

We reflect on a very successful year, full of learning opportunities, and the Forest School team looks forward to new activities and new developments in September! Thank you to all for your support – pupils for your creativity, positive attitude and teamwork; parents and families for your help with clothing and organisation; and the Forest School teaching team for leading such a wide range of challenging activities!

The House Captains have continued to grow the House programme at the Junior School. They have taken ownership of House points in assemblies, choosing and researching different languages to announce and sing happy birthday each week. These have included: Tagalog, Swedish, Dutch, Swahili, Greek and Mandarin, to name a few. The autumn term House Captains introduced a competition that invited the girls to create the best chant for their house. The competition was fierce, with lots of catchy lyrics and funky dance moves. The winners were chosen by the girls during House assembly week. The chants have featured in a variety of House events throughout the remainder of the year, including sports day. You can find the lyrics below to help you practise and join in the chants at future events.

WATERLOW: Blue team blue team We can win the race, Whatever we do, we can face. Gooooooooooooo blue team!

GOODWIN: Go green, we are keen and we have lots of self-esteem. Go go green girlies, Go go green girlies. Come on Goodwin we can win, Go go green girlies woo! Go go green girlies woo!

SHARPE: Red, red, roar like thunder, We run for our pack and We won’t stay back, So goooooooo red!

SPEARS: Bumblebees for the win, Bumblebees we’re going to win bzzz, bzzz. We’re kind, we're cool, we rule the school bzzz bzzz. Go Spears!

House competitions have continued to feature in the school calendar this year; the PE department hosted a competition in the winter term, a Football Week and competition in the spring term and a Cricket Week with a competition in the summer term. The Yellow team highlighted their competitiveness, being the overall winners across the Junior School at all three events. Not only have the girls taken part in house competitions but they have also gathered with their house buddies to natter over a cup of hot chocolate during ‘Brew Monday’ and create keyrings and ‘scoubidous’.

Pastoral Care

This year, we have continued to develop and educate the girls about mental health and wellbeing through our comprehensive Personal, Social, Health and Economics Education (PSHE) scheme, Jigsaw, which includes Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) and mindfulness. We have continued to grow and have now introduced a new School Counsellor who supports the pupils through her work with the girls, parents and staff.

We have also loved being able to hold more House Buddy Form Times where the girls meet their Buddy in the younger/older years. In the spring term, the girls met their Buddy for a hot chocolate, which was connected to the Samaritans’ ‘Brew Monday’. Additionally, staff were also encouraged to have a cuppa and a catch-up. The importance of talking and listening was emphasised and promoted in assembly and it was fantastic

watching the girls enjoying a warm cup of chocolate with each other.

Additionally, we were excited to hold another Children’s Mental Health Week in association with Place2Be in February. The theme was ‘Growing together’, which introduced the idea of growth and change, as well as emphasising that we can keep growing emotionally – even when things get tough. The girls took part in activities that nurtured their mental health and promoted wellbeing, including yoga, mindfulness and relaxing and ‘switching off’ in our sensory room. This was a classroom repurposed into an oasis of calm. They also came to school ‘Dressed to Express’ where they could be proud to just be themselves.

The Junior School also marked Anti-Bullying Week with a series of activities throughout the school to raise awareness of bullying. The girls showed their individuality by wearing odd socks and showed how proud they were to accept difference and individuality.

We have all been waiting patiently this year for our new adventure playground to be completed. We have watched as the ground has been levelled and landscaped, and then the arrival of the equipment which will become a swing, a slide, a cradle nest swing, tractor tyre swing, a suspension bridge, a fireman’s pole and a seesaw. Furthermore, the cedar tree has been carved into a beautiful owl, sitting on a pile of books. The girls cannot wait to play and enjoy the time they have outside with their friends!

PSHE

Having introduced a new Personal, Social, Health Education (PSHE) scheme – Jigsaw – last year, we have now embedded this approach fully into our curriculum. Jigsaw brings together PSHE, emotional literacy, social skills and spiritual development in a comprehensive scheme of learning. It is a whole-school approach, so all the girls work on the same theme at the same time.

As this subject is always changing and developing, we look out for new updates and add them to our PSHE and Circle Time lessons. The girls have really enjoyed using the Jigsaw characters linked to each Year group to help them think about and discuss the themes, which are:

• Being in My World

• Celebrating Differences

• Dreams and Goals

• Healthy Me • Relationships

• Changing Me

In PSHE we fi nd lots of interesting ways to present our learning such as posters, debates, photographs, drama and team games. Each Year group updates its PSHE Firefl y page every half-term so that our families can see what the girls have been learning about. We hope that you enjoy sharing and discussing the Jigsaw themes at home as much as we do in school.

Below are some highlights from across the PSHE curriculum this year:

‘BEING IN MY WORLD’

The Jigsaw scheme aims to teach children to be responsible citizens. The girls in Year 6 debated the potential consequences for a scenario in role, as part of the ‘Being in My World’ theme in the autumn term. This helped them to produce their own class charters based on their rights and responsibilities.

CELEBRATING DIFFERENCES

Year 1 and Reception focused on fi nding and celebrating similarities and differences between themselves and their families.

‘DREAMS AND GOALS’

Year 5 refl ected on the hopes and dreams of young people from another culture and explained how it makes them feel. They also wrote letters to their Jigsaw character, Jez, about their aspirations for the future.

‘HEALTHY ME’

Year 3 came up with their own fi tness challenges as part of this important theme. Some of their ideas included: star jumps, running, sit ups, walking handstands, squats, scoring goals and bouncing on a space hopper.

‘CHANGING ME’

In the summer term, Year 4 learned how their bodies will change, as well as doing some work on understanding genetics. They learned that they get half their genes from their mother and half from their father, and assessed some similarities and characteristics.

‘RELATIONSHIPS’

In Year 2, the girls discussed the different types of families that they have and how everyone’s family is different. They talked about how we have special relationships with the people in our families and how they are all important to us. They created recipes for a happy home.

Sustainability

This year the Junior School Sustainability Team have continued building on the successes of previous years, encouraging their friends to be ever more environmentally friendly! The team met in two groups – Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 – on a regular basis, sharing ideas about how to make the school more sustainable.

In the autumn term, the Sustainability Offi cers began working on our new action plan, aiming towards the Eco-Schools Green Flag. They enjoyed auditing the school and learning about the ways in which we are already doing a great job. The Junior School scored very well for biodiversity, school grounds and global citizenship. Mr Alan McCarthy, Senior Caretaker, talked to the group about issues such as energy and waste management and the team were pleased to learn more about running large buildings and organisations sustainably. The Key Stage 1 team also took part in several litter picks around the school, collecting a signifi cant amount of rubbish and encouraging their friends to be responsible on the playground.

As the year progressed, the Sustainability Offi cers identifi ed three areas that they would target for improvement around the school – energy, transport and water. To improve our energy usage the offi cers carried out a number of patrols around the school, checking that lights and computer screens were turned off when not in use. They also encouraged their own classes to keep an eye out for this kind of energy saving.

Water was the next topic that the team worked on –writing and presenting an assembly to all pupils to develop their awareness of how to use water responsibly and how

to use bathrooms in the correct way. Gardening Club was also an area that benefi tted from some improvements –we have several new water butts installed that will help to improve our water management and ensure we become more aware of the climate around us. This will help the gardeners water some of their new plants, including a range of herbs and edible perennials that we are hoping will begin to be used by our catering team in the future. Hopefully this will help with food miles and encourage all our pupils to try new flavours at lunch time!

Our friends in Gardening Club have also been responsible for the development of a beautiful section of the garden that is designed to encourage bees, butterflies and moths. The area includes a little rockery and looks absolutely stunning in the early summer months. Our thanks to Mr Tony McCarthy for continuing to support the range of biodiversity at Fairseat. Meanwhile, the Forest School team has also been working sustainably, encouraging a wider range of fauna in its area and even recycling festive trees in January. The trees, kindly donated from pupils’ families, were used to teach the use of loppers and bow saws to groups of pupils from Years 1 to 4 and then were used for a variety of projects, including creating a kubbe set.

The fi nal events of the Sustainability year were the Big Battery Hunt and the Clean Air Day, both led by the Senior School Sustainability team. The Junior School pupils were delighted to learn more and participated in a really positive way, gathering batteries to be recycled and trying to improve the numbers of pupils travelling to school by walking, cycling, travelling by scooter, bus, train or park and stride. Thank you to all of the Channing family who participated. Thank you also for all your support across the year, pupils, staff and families – here’s to even more success next year.

Trips, WORKSHOPS & TALKS

RECEPTION

In the spring term, Reception learned all about ‘Under the Sea’. To support their learning on this topic, they read the story ‘The Rainbow Fish’ and took part in a drama workshop led by Freshwater Theatre. The girls enjoyed using their senses to fi nd out about the ocean and retold the story with props.

Reception completed their fi rst year of school with an exciting trip to Hampstead Heath, linked to their summer topic ‘Get, Set, Grow’. They enjoyed a wonderful ‘EcoArt’ workshop, where they learned to take inspiration from nature to help them create and name their own pieces of art. Afterwards, they rewarded themselves –and their teddy bears – with a picnic lunch and some fun parachute games!

YEAR 1

A highlight for Year 1 this year was their visit to the Chelsea Physic Garden to learn to identify and name a variety of plants.

In the summer term, they enjoyed a trip to the Kentish Town City Farm to observe, identify and group various animals. They had a hands-on experience as they learned about different diets and found out the names of adult and young farm animals.

YEAR 2

The girls in Year 2 have enjoyed several exciting trips this year. In the autumn term, they had a Florence Nightingale workshop to support their History and Topic work. In the spring term, their trip to Hampstead Heath involved pond dipping, insect classification, shelter building and fire starting.

Linking to their final English theme of the year – an author focus – they enjoyed a trip to the Roald Dahl Museum in the summer term. They discovered lots about his life and created their own characters.

YEAR 3

Year 3 has been a busy year for trips, with lots of new and exciting visits planned. In the autumn term, they visited the river Thames to go mudlarking, which was part of our Geography curriculum.

In the spring term, Year 3 went to Verulamium in St Albans to explore life in Roman Britain. In the summer term, they explored the Olympic Park. After watching the Winter Olympics and meeting an Olympic athlete during Healthy Schools Week, the girls were excited to visit the park and see where the action took place in 2012. Whilst there, they also learnt about the 2012 legacy. They finished the year with an exciting Anglo-Saxon workshop where they were able to experience life in Anglo-Saxon times. With expert support from Wolfguard, they were able to learn how to make candles, ink, use mini-looms to weave, produce clay pots and faces as well as writing in runes. In the afternoon, they became archaeologists, discovering lots of exciting, ancient treasures.

YEAR 4

Year 4’s first trip in the autumn term was to St Paul’s Cathedral, where they participated in the nativity story for their topic on Christmas, moving around the Cathedral.

In the spring term, the girls also took part in an Aztec Minecraft workshop. They learnt how to navigate minecraft and used their knowledge of the Aztecs to build an Aztec city on Minecraft.

In the spring term, the girls also visited the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. They visited the changing rooms, the pitch, the stands and the hospitality area and learnt some of the history of the grounds and the teams.

YEAR 5

A fabulous trip for our very sporty Year 5. In the autumn term, Year 5 pupils visited Lord’s Cricket Ground for the first time on a PE trip, linking their study of the Victorians; the grounds were built in the Victorian era. Whilst at Lord’s, the girls participated

in a guided tour to experience and describe the key features of the cricket ground and they visited the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) Museum – the world’s oldest sporting museum, housing an unrivalled collection of cricketing art and memorabilia. The girls excitedly learnt about cricket’s oldest rivalry and saw the Ashes on display before exploring the new media centre. The girls returned to school happily sharing their experiences and recalling the names of famous cricketers who have played at Lord’s.

Early in the summer term, Year 5 girls transported back in time to June 2 1953, the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II – a grand ceremony at Westminster Abbey. The whole world was watching, as it was the first such coronation broadcast live on television. Through a live Q&A session and a range of practical activities, the girls increased their knowledge and understanding of what a coronation is and why it is important; developed their historical vocabulary; asked historically valid questions and about aspects of life in 1950s Britain and relished learning more about Queen Elizabeth II’s life.

YEAR 6

The girls started Year 6 with a trip to Twickenham Stadium to learn about the home of rugby. Not only did they get to see the home and away changing rooms, but they also had a coaching session and spent some time in the hospitality suite. They also explored the interactive museum, where they learnt how to scrum and kick.

During this term Year 6 also took part in an Ancient Greece workshop to support their History studies. The day was full of activities, which included making laurel wreaths, mosaic tiles, herbal medicine bags and decorative bars of soap.

In the spring term, the girls were involved in many activities. The first was a workshop focusing on Shakespeare’s ʻThe Tempest’, run by the Young Shakespeare Company. Through this they learnt more about the characters and plot, and how acting can bring a story to life. Then they took part in Maths workshops with Year 7 and teachers to support the transition and to also have fun. Later in the term, the girls were very privileged to meet Hedi Argent Schnabl MBE, a Holocaust survivor, organised by the Holocaust Education Trust, to continue to develop their understanding of this period in history. This was also supported by a visit to the RAF Museum and their World War II Day – always a highlight of the year!

The summer term was equally as busy, with a visit from a cartoonist as part of the girls’ picture book projects in English, a visit from a local business owner to support their Junior Entrepreneur Programme in DT, a talk about Sikhism from the Year 7 girls and staff at the Senior School, a Sports Leader trip to Wimbledon and an archaeology workshop run by the Senior School.

Residential Trips

YEAR 3

This year, the Year 3 girls and teachers took part in the fi rst ever Camping at Channing experience. Camping in the school grounds, everyone took part in setting up camp for the night, archery, lighting fi res, eating pizza and star gazing! A fantastic residential and a brilliant way to end the year!

YEAR 4

In May, Year 4 slept onboard the Golden Hinde, a replica Tudor ship berthed in east London. They experienced life as a member of the crew, learning about how to man the ship in full Tudor costume! The girls worked together investigating sources to learn more about ailments and remedies, as well as what was used to navigate the ship. A perfect real-life experience that has enhanced our topic on the Tudors.

YEAR 5

In the summer term, Year 5 girls enjoyed a three-night residential stay at PGL Liddington. Our girls relished their residential! Over three days, they actively participated in a range of activities promoting wellbeing, positive attitudes and self-confidence. They participated in climbing, abseiling, canoeing and archery, as well as a range of team challenges. Living alongside their peers in the PGL activity centre dorms, the Year 5 girls each developed a wide range of skills as well as strengthening key characteristics: resilience, perseverance, empathy, responsibility, bravery, independence, respectfulness and curiosity.

YEAR 6

For the fi rst time in Channing history, Year 6 sailed the seas for their residential trip to the Isle of Wight. It was an action-packed adventure with a lot to do in fi ve days. It started with a trip to the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard before boarding the ferry to the Isle of Wight. That evening was spent getting used to our glamping tents and starting to learn the art of compromise in the 16-bed dorms. The rest of the week included: surfi ng, a visit to Osborne House, walking Shanklin Chine, visiting rescued donkeys at a local donkey sanctuary, playing on the beach and eating ice cream, a boat ride out to see the Needles up close and a ride on a steam train! The week was a fabulous end to the Junior School for the girls and a brilliant way to make life-long memories.

Wraparound CARE & CLUBS

WRAPAROUND CARE

The girls attending Early Birds and Late Owls this year were so excited to be able to mix in Fairseat Hall for the fi rst time, as the Covid restrictions eased. Beginning bright and early at 7.30am, they enjoyed a healthy but filling breakfast of cereal and toast. Those who stayed after school were offered tasty sandwiches, fruit and warming soup.

We continued to offer excellent provision for our wraparound care this year. Pupils enjoyed a range of craft and creative activities including mindfulness colouring, sewing, origami, singing and dancing, as well as puzzles, games and opportunities to complete their homework. The girls also made the most of the opportunity to make new friends in different year groups.

Pupils were pleased to receive some new beanbags to help them relax and unwind at the end of a busy day. When the weather was fi ne, the girls in Mini Owls and Late Owls were able to enjoy physical games outside on the grass, and found that they were not too big to enjoy a ride on the Reception bikes!

CLUBS

Clubs this year have been a roaring success. With a new programme developed post-pandemic, we now have over 80 clubs running before, during and after school, Monday to Friday, and clubs are open to girls from Reception to Year 6. There is no such thing as a quiet day in the Junior School!

Clubs have differed from term to term, but some have remained to allow girls the freedom to try something new or continue to develop specifi c skills. Some of our clubs that have been run by Channing staff include: Textiles (where our Art and DT Coordinator repurposed old Channing hoodies), Irish Mythology, Book Illustration and Comic, Football, Cricket, Netball, Unihoc, Prop Making, British Sign Language, Newspaper, Gardening, Spanish Oral & Listening, Athletics, Greek Dancing, French and an Introduction to British Sign Language. External specialists also have run clubs this year, some of which are: Karate, Ballet, Gymnastics, Science, Coding, Film Making, Chess and Musical Theatre.

We have also developed partnership clubs this year with local schools visiting for Philosophy and Knitting Clubs. Excitingly, the focus of the Knitting Club has been creating one large blanket from multiple 6 inch squares. The Channing community also contributed so we could donate a complete blanket (sewn together by our Sewing Club) to a family in need. This was completed with the support of the Alexandra Wylie Tower Foundation.