Newsletter Friday 1st February 2024

Ditcham Newsletter - Friday 2nd February 2024 Dear Parents One of our school aims this year is to provide more opportunities to stretch and challenge our pupils.

One of the ways we are doing this is by entering a host of competitions. This week we celebrate Henry Milne’s success in the Independent Schools Association (ISA) Young Musician competition. On Wednesday, Henry came second in the national final of this event which was held at Jacqueline Du Pre Music Building at Oxford University. A brilliant achievement. Meanwhile, Yr6 have been entering a poetry writing competition sponsored by the English Speaking Union (ESU) and 76 students for Yr10 and Yr11 took part in the UKMT national maths challenge. This afternoon our Yr9 and 10 academic scholars met over lunch. After a provocative introductory presentation from Head Boy Finlay Brett about whether Father Christmas is a suitable role model, a wide ranging and stimulating discussion took place around religion and communism!

Thank you to everyone with pupils in Y7-Y10 who has completed the short expression of interest form for our forthcoming Creative and Performing Arts Festival. If you are yet to fill it in, please try to do so by Monday morning so that the team and I can start allocated workshops in good time.

Wishing everyone a restful and enjoyable weekend

Graham Spawforth Headmaster

Junior Merit Winners Congratulations to all the Junior merit winners for this week!

Headmaster Awards Congratulations to the Seniors who have been given a Headmaster Award!

Dragonflies

Our Dragonflies have had a wonderful week welcoming new children to their Stay and Play on Tuesday and then on Friday, they went on an adventure into Reception for another Stay and Play!

We have the Creation Station team coming up on Thursday 8th Feb - if you have a child under 5 or know of anyone who has and might want to come along, do let them know, its a great session and fun is guaranteed (as is coffee for parents!)

We will be back with a full report next week.... Plus we have some exciting news about a new room we are currently busy creating in our wonderful Preschool building. Watch this space....!

Kylie and Claire

Juniors

Pre-Prep’s Toy Museum Visit.

As part of our topic on The History of Toys, we visited The Petersfield Museum last week. The children were given a bag of toys and asked not to look inside but have a feel and try to describe what the contents felt like. The children came up with wonderful adjectives to describe them and once seen some good ideas on whether they were new or old toys. They then had to sort the toys into groups, some chose colour and some different materials, which linked to our recent Science lessons, exploring Materials. They then had to think if the toys were old or new toy and sort them into two groups.

They learnt that there was a toy made called Minibrix, from 1927 - 1976 that was like a Lego brick but made of rubber in three colours (green, grey and brown) and made in Petersfield! They then were able to have a play with some of the old toys – the Minibrix were a big hit!

Once back in the classroom and inspired by their visit that day, they made their own old-fashioned Cup and Ball toy. In their Literacy lesson they wrote a set of instructions on how to make the Cup and Ball toy, then followed these to make one. They all realised that practice really does make progress and after a while playing, all could get their ball in the cup. Well done Pre-Prep!

Here is a little video of our trip for you to enjoy.

Mrs Somerville

Green Football Weekend Green Football Weekend is a national campaign which mobilises everyone to take part in climate change between February 3rd and 5th by taking climate friendly actions to shine a light on the issues of climate change. Middles joined the Ministry of Eco Education live lesson via Zoom, together with schools all over the country. They learned how we can become more sustainable in our lives, in our school and in our communities. We all want to tackle climate change and have many ideas about what we can do to help. Phoebe and Lawrence will be representing Middles at the next Eco School Council meeting with all the pupils' fantastic ideas to help make Ditcham Park School a greener place.

Jane O'Hara

Uppers ISA Poetry Competition Pupils in Upper Juniors have been working hard to complete a poem for the ISA Poetry Competition.

The poem title was, I Hope… and pupils thought hard about personal hopes as well as hopes for the world. Many of these poems were impactful and compelling. We will be sharing the top six poems over the next few weeks in this News Letter, so please enjoy.

Huge congratulations to Zac and Yasmin, as their poems will be submitted – we wish them luck!

Julie Mothersele

I hope

By Zach M

I hope the apocalypse will rise with wolves ripping up roads plagues lurking in every corner Tsunamis plunging towers down animal riots at the zoo the hurricanes wrecking the ships the volcanoes combusting The storms to shred up towns the hail to crush cars The heatwave to burn the world out but for now I wait for the rain to pass so I can finally go out and get my bone.

I hope amongst the darkness

By Jasmin P

I hope amongst the darkness, Nothing there to see, Just a coal-black world, Nothing to do, Nothing to hear.

Then comes a glimmer of hope amongst the darkness, As bright as a star in the dark universe, A glistening jewel we must treasure, Though it weighs just a feather, We must remember this day,

When hope appeared, From Pandora’s box, As sly as a fox, Escaping the glare of darkness itself.

Compared to hope, Death is weak, Cowering under the aura of hope itself, It keeps the world alive, Hope overpowers all, Brightening the world as it goes, Hope helps hold the world together.

Transitions Journey to Ancient Egypt (via Haslemere...)

Last week, Transition went on a fascinating trip to The Haslemere Museum to study the Ancient Egyptian art of mummification. We started off by placing the Ancient Egyptians on a timeline and sharing our own existing knowledge of them as a group. Then the exciting bit happened! As a part of learning about the mummification process, the children were given the opportunity to remove the ‘organs’ from a dummy and place them in the correct canopic jars. We learnt that each jar had a different lid and that only the organs that were considered important were removed from the body after death. Later in the day the class had the opportunity to mummify a toy they had brought in from home (don’t worry – no toys were harmed!) which was harder than it looked! The children also had the opportunity to study and draw some Egyptian artifacts, play some Egyptian games and decipher some hieroglyphics. We also were able to look around the museum and see their resident mummy and his stunning sarcophagus. A fantastic day was had by all and we certainly learnt a lot!

Mrs Newton and Mr Livingston

Prep Poetry (and cake!)

In Prep we have enjoyed sharing Michael Rosen’s poem “Chocolate Cake”. We discussed Michael’s decision to sneak downstairs and help himself to the leftover cake and enjoyed finding onomatopoeia in the text. We had a lot of fun working with a partner to collect as many onomatopoeia as we could and then used these sound words to write our own poems about being tempted by forbidden treats in the night!

This term, we have researched and designed our own chocolate bars. This week we were very excited to make them and our packaging. We then took these home to share with our families. They now have the job to help us evaluate the chocolate bars and make suggestions for improvements if we were to make them again. What a fun project – we have all enjoyed every stage of this (especially as it involved eating lots of treats!). We hope you enjoy looking at some of our bars and also some of the wrappers.

Mrs Witte

Stretch And Challenge award in Juniors

We were delighted to award a certificate in Assembly for completion of all five Stretch and Challenge home activities to:

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Zac C (Prep)

We are looking forward to many more children also completing these exciting challenges!

Seniors

STEAM power!

Year 9 students have been looking at 'forced perspective' as part of their STEAM rotation lessons.

Taking their inspiration from the movies, they had a huge amount of fun making images that made every day items look massive or tiny! Here are some of the creations they made for you to enjoy.

Report on the second round of the ESU Public Speaking competition on Wednesday 24th January

We were very excited to reach the second round of the ESU Public Speaking competition for the first time this year. Our stellar team compromised Finlay B our Head Boy as Speaker and Hester E (Year 10) as Chair and Nell H (Year 10) as questioner.

The second round took place in the historic venue of the Sherborne Room in the Bishop’s Palace in Chichester on a very cold January day. The room felt both imposing and cosy with it’s dark panelling, huge fireplace and magnificent ceiling dating back to the late 1520s and inscribed with the initials of Henry VIII and his first wife, Queen Katherine of Aragon.

There were four teams in total from schools from the surrounding areas and the topics ranged from Finlay’s deceptively light-hearted take on ‘Is Father Christmas doing a proper job?’ to more serious subjects such as ‘Should public figures be subject to scrutiny?’. The speakers demonstrated exceptional skill in communicating sophisticated and complex ideas and arguments whilst also being engaging and enjoyable to listen to. The chairperson held the group together and calmed the nerves by introducing the speakers and ensuring that the speeches ran on time, and everyone felt comfortable, whilst the questioners had the unenviable task of having to interrogate the speakers about the content of their speech with perceptive and pertinent questions.

It was wonderful to see the young people take on these roles with such confidence and aplomb and although we were disappointed not to progress through the next round, we all felt so proud of our boy Finlay who won (again!) Best Speaker. Finlay has a talent for public speaking. He manages to make a well-rehearsed speech feel ‘natural’ in his delivery. One of the judges commented that he ‘wielded humour like a weapon’. We are really proud of all the team who represented the school so well. We will be back next year!

ISA Music Competition Results!

Wednesday 31st January – Jacqueline Du Pre Music Building, University of Oxford Congratulations firstly Henry M for getting through to the finals of this competition. Huge credit to him for reaching this far.

Henry came away with a 2nd position in his age category, with a trophy awarded to him in the KS3 level, performing ‘Concertino For Xylophone, 3rd movement' by Toshiro Mayuzumi on the xylophone.

Well done Henry, we are all incredibly proud of you! Definitely a musician to watch for the future...

Visiting Speaker Matt Dunkley Yesterday, we welcomed an extraordinary musical talent, Matt Dunkley, who is an international leading orchestrator, arranger and conductor, and composer too. He has worked on over 200 movies.

You can read further about his credentials here: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0242161/?ref_=nm_mv_close

Matt kindly gave up his busy schedule to spend much of the day with us. He spent two hours or so in the morning with our music and drama scholars and our GCSE music students, and then in the afternoon he delivered two talks, one to our KS2 children and one to our seniors. He started off the three sessions showing the pupils a show reel of examples of the films he had worked on. With the select group of pupils in the morning, he was able to delve a little deeper into what he did, talking about and demonstrating the process in which he did his work: He showed us how he orchestrated a piece of piano music accompanying a scene to a film; we saw him in action as a conductor, working with some of the top orchestral performers in the world recording part of the score to the video game, ‘Halo’; he showed us a beautiful piece he composed, called ‘Sink or Swim’ featuring a principal dancer from the Royal Ballet https://villagegreenrecordings.co.uk/news/watch-sink-or-swim-withmusic-by-matt-dunkley ; we also heard a number of his stories including how he received a call from Mark Ronson to help him arrange the music to the recent Barbie movie; and how he was in a studio with Hans Zimmer, Billie Eilish and her brother, Finneas O’Connell, having been asked to turn their demo to No Time To Die into a the final product we all now know. Matt also kindly left some copies of his orchestrated scores of some of the films he has worked on.

I think for many who witnessed just a glimpse of what Matt has achieved in his career will take something away from his visit, even if it was just the huge scale of his output, and who he has worked with. We were very lucky today to have the opportunity to shine a spotlight on this specialist area of the music industry.

Mr Williamson

UK Maths Challenge

This week 78 of our Form 3-5 were entered into the UKMT Intermediate Maths Challenge. This challenge not only tests their mathematical skills but also provides them with an opportunity to compete against some of the most talented mathematicians across the country.

In the spirit of inclusive involvement, the remaining Form 3 and 4 pupils embarked on their own mathematical adventure through the Ditcham Maths Challenge. Engaging in team relays and problem-solving exercises, they embraced the joy of mathematics while fostering teamwork and critical thinking skills.

Well done Ditcham Mathematicians!

Sarah Whittle Head of Mathematics

Maths - the Final Frontier...

Despite the winter chill, the eager pupils of Form 2 embarked on a mathematical journey that echoed the discoveries of ancient mathematicians. Armed with curiosity and rulers in hand, they ventured around the school grounds to uncover the mysteries of pi.

Their mission? To locate and measure at least five objects scattered throughout the school, recording both the circumference and diameter of each item. With noses tingling in the cold air, they diligently measured and noted down their findings, each step bringing them closer to unravelling the enigma of pi.

Upon returning to the warmth of the classroom, the real magic unfolded. Armed with their measurements, the students delved into the realm of calculations. With their circumference and diameter data, they embarked on the timeless formula: circumference divided by diameter.

Despite the chill, their curiosity ignited, bridging theory with practical exploration, echoing the timeless pursuit of knowledge.

Sarah Whittle Head of Mathematics

Sports News

U8/9 Hockey V Barfield The U8/9s took part in a competitive hockey match against Barfield Prep school. The game was played in five-minute bursts, changing the team each rotation to give all players plenty of pitch time

and competitive play. The game was back and forth with plenty of chances for both teams. Some last ditch defending from many players including Darcy, Honor and Tildie. Early in the first rotation Ditcham main a run down the wing through Darcy and the ball made its way to Oscar who beat a few players before slotting the ball into the corner of the goal. Throughout the next few rotations players worked hard on their spacing and getting into strong tackling positions. With the game going back and forth the score with only two rotations left was 2-2. A balanced game with good play from both sides. In the penultimate rotation Ditcham Park took the lead through two well struck goals, one from Lucas and one finished off by Darcy. A great improvement throughout the game from all players giving their best. A final score overall of 5-3 to Ditcham Park School.

Lydia Harris PE Department

Sports Matches Round Up On Friday our injury ravaged Under 16 team travelled to Boundary Oak for a triangular tournament that also included Mayville. Despite being understrength, superb performances from all of the squad resulted in two victories. They got the measure of the hosts winning 36-12 before following this up with an even more impressive 43-5 victory over Mayville! Well done all On Tuesday our Under 15 boys Basketball squad travelled to Frensham Heights. Despite watching the opposition players ‘dunk’ in the warm up our boys were not overawed. A great game ensued with a final score of 35-23 to the hosts. Max Edwards hit a couple of 3 pointers and the whole team worked tirelessly to keep the score close.

On Wednesday our Under 12 and Under 13 boys went to Frensham for Rugby. They each played 3 games. The Under 13’s beat Frensham 3 tries to 1, before to titanic matches saw them lose 1-0 and 2-1 to Morehouse and St Eds respectively. The boys had seen off all these teams earlier in the term, but should not be disappointed as they were missing some key players this time.

The Under 12 beat Frensham and Morehouse, with some great attacking play, before narrowly losing to St Eds. They avenged some earlier results with these score lines and are really improving as a team.

A great afternoon for all involved.

Graham Vaudrey

PE Department U10/11 Tag Teams Tournament at St Eds The U11 and U10 were in separate groups but both teams did brilliantly well in this tough 22-team tournament. The U11 won their group in comprehensive style. They played some good attacking rugby at pace which caused issues for the opposition defence. Winning the group meant the boys moved into the Cup group and whoever won would win the overall tournament. The boys fought valiantly but came up short by one try and managed to finish 4th overall. This is a fantastic effort and the boys showed great resilience throughout. George W and Gus G were the top try scorers with 4 and 5 respectively.

The U10 team got off to a tough start losing narrowly to St Hillary's, a team we definitely should have beaten. The boys finished 2nd in the group and meant we went through to the plate finals. This was the turning point and the team really brought their 'a' game and beat the three other teams by big score lines which meant the u10s won the plate. Another great achievement and well deserved.

Danny M and Piers T were the top try scorers' with 5 and 4. Harry M was brilliant in defence and made two last ditch tackles in the final. It was a great afternoon and the boys attitude and behaviour were exemplary, well done to all that took part. A special mention to Miles B who ran the u11 team, your help was much appreciated.

James Walton Head of Junior PE

Forthcoming Fixtures Please see the attached image for our sporting fixtures coming up next week!

PE Department

Notices and Events

Safer Internet Day Next week, we shall be working as a team across the whole school to raise awareness about Internet Safety. Through a range of different activities that have been planned, children will learn about how to be safe online and when to get help if they are at all worried. We always promote the responsible use of devices online and the firewall and software we employ keeps children as protected as possible but its important to teach them what could go wrong and what the potential dangers are out there.

If you have any questions regarding our internet safety and keeping children safe online, please do not hesitate to contact your child(ren)'s class teacher in the first instance.

The IT and PSHE Team

Music Music Music!!

We have a lot of events coming up over the next few weeks. Please come along and support our students and enjoy the fruits of their labours.

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Thursday 8th Feb - Battle of The Bands Competition 2.30pm in MPB

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Wednesday 28th Feb - Saturday 2nd March - ‘GREASE’ featuring DPS Jazz Group in MPB

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Tuesday 5th March - Lunchtime Concert 1pm at St Peter's Church Petersfield featuring soloists (Y7-Y11)

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Thursday 7th March - SENIOR CONCERT 6.30pm in MPB featuring all Ditcham 'musical ensembles' and many soloists/duettists etc

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Thursday 14th March - ABRSM practical exams ALL DAY in Solent Suite

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Monday 18th March - Petersfield Musical Festival Youth Concert #1 7.00pm (Petersfield Festival Hall) featuring Uppers Junior pupils and senior musicians - book tickets here: https://petersfieldmusicalfestival.org.uk/event/youth-concert-1-2/

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Wednesday 20th March - Petersfield Musical Festival Youth Concert #2 7.00pm (Petersfield Festival Hall) featuring Uppers Junior pupils and senior musicians - book tickets here: https://petersfieldmusicalfestival.org.uk/event/youth-concert-2-2/

Half Term Tennis Club!

Sign up for our Half Term club with Ditcham Tennis Academy. Book through Ticket Source to secure your place on this popular 3-day camp.

Grease is THE Word!

Tickets are now on sale and going fast! Coming soon! We will have four evening performances and two matinees and there will be the chance to pre-order a traditional American Diner meal of burger, fries and a milkshake from our Ditcham Diner before the weekday evening shows - there will be a pay bar and a tuck shop available too for each performance.

We are also looking for anyone or any business who would like to sponsor the show in some way. If you are able to help us, please drop us an email and we can send you details of our sponsorship packages. Putting on a big, ambitious show like this requires a big and ambitious set and we can't wait for you to experience our bespoke black-box theatre and incredible set!

So spread the word. The only word. Grease. Its the word you need to be talking about....