HighNews
Prep and Pre-School
Portsmouth High School GDST
Pre-School enjoy the signs of spring
Pre-School enjoy Forest School sessions each week and there is always something new to learn. The spacious school grounds, with both wooded and growing areas, means there is always an opportunity to enjoy trees budding and plants shooting from the ground. This term the class were excited to receive new bright yellow miniature watering cans and used
them for collecting natural rainwater from the water butts in the garden. The class explored the first signs of spring and are very much looking forward to watching plants growing and the gardens changing as the seasons progress.
Spring 2022
Welcome to Portsmouth High Prep and Pre-School
Young musicians make their mark
There was a fantastic display of talent at this year’s Young Musician competition with Director of Music, Mrs Hill, receiving an unprecedented number of entries from enthusiastic girls eager to perform for an audience.
The final this year was judged by Mr Curt Hill from Portsmouth Guildhall who found himself with an incredibly difficult task. Thank you to all the performers for a fantastic show and to Prep School Director of Music, Mrs Hill, for her skilful nurturing of young talent.
Young Musician of the Year 2022 - Lara Year 6
Young Musician Runner-Up - Holly Year 6
Making music at the prep school
Welcome to the spring edition of High News. There are not enough hours in the day to cram in a busy prep school pupil’s activities.
This term they have participated in British Science Week and World Book Day and showed off their performance skills in our Young Musician competition. They have performed in concerts and joined the whole school at the school’s 140th Birthday with a service in the Cathedral.
Lessons have challenged their intellectual curiosity through intriguing mathematics’ problems, science experiments and investigations. The generous gardens give much space to run around and play and engage in forest school activities and sport.
As one Year 5 pupil said to me recently “school is great” and I could not agree more.
Jane Prescott Headmistress
Junior Young Musician Cup - Poppy Year 3
Pre-Prep Young Musician Award - Molly Year 2
Love to perform…
Twenty-three girls volunteered to perform at our recent Teatime Concert with some touching and skilful performances. Girls are also keen for opportunities and play in Friday celebration assemblies, Harvest Festival, Christmas and Birthday Services and Family Day. In the local community, we have given performances at the Southsea Lights Event and Chamber Choir performances at the National Trust properties, Uppark and Hinton Ampner at Christmas.
Portsmouth High School is very proud of the tradition of music-making at the prep school from individual participation in class lessons to ensembles. There are ten visiting peripatetic music teachers who are able to provide a range of instrumental and vocal lessons, including drums, brass, woodwind, strings, piano and singing. The school has an excellent pass rate for external examinations from Trinity, ABRSM and Rock School syllabuses. ABRSM and Trinity examinations are hosted at the senior school.
Girls from Reception through to Year 6 participate in instrumental lessons. A love of music is fostered right from pre-school; with children enjoying weekly lessons from a specialist teacher. Recorder lessons start in Years 1 and 2, and violin and clarinet lessons in Year 3. At the present time 89% of the girls are learning an instrument in school, and 38% are learning two or more instruments.
The Chamber Choir and Little Voices meet each week for rehearsals and twentytwo girls regularly attend the school orchestra.
Lara Holly
Poppy Molly
Headmaster of
High Prep
I believe that Pre-School and Reception must be an integral part of the school.
Our ethos and approach is the same throughout preprep and the prep school. The geography of our site lends itself to integration. It is something that I am particularly proud of at Portsmouth High Prep School, where the youngest members of our school are fully incorporated into the heart of what we do. They attend assemblies, have
specialist teaching and are constantly visiting the whole grounds. The older children are always interacting with them and, indeed, have responsibilities which include reading and helping to look after the youngest ones.
The curriculum is also tied into the whole school. We have two learning wheels which form the basis of the culture, the EYFS wheel feeds directly into that of the preprep and prep. This ensures that common themes run throughout and that we are
giving the same messages in an age-appropriate way. Regular learning walks also help to review our whole school approach and how it progresses. In short, our desire is that all children within the school learn without limits and build their enthusiasm through enjoyable work and play. It is a happy place, and much of this must be put down to an ethos and approach that is common throughout the whole school.
“
Paul Marshallsay,
Portsmouth
and Pre-School reflects on the continuity of ethos and approach at the school.
”
The youngest members of our school are fully incorporated into the heart of what we do...
Reading is at the heart of Reception Class
A key learning goal for all pupils in Early years is to learn how to read and write. Their excitement at being able to read their first book or write their first sentence is always a fantastic moment in a child’s learning journey. The ability to read and write is fundamental to all learning and without a solid foundation in these areas, learning at later stages in school life can be made harder.
Reading is at the heart of any Reception class and pupils should be given every opportunity to listen to stories, poems and rhymes. These feed a child’s imagination, develop their comprehension, and enhance vocabulary. Sufficient time needs to be dedicated to the daily teaching of reading and writing to ensure that pupils are given every opportunity to build their skills.
Phonics is the key to unlocking the alphabetic code for children and gives them the tools required to begin to read and write. For pupils in Reception the teaching of systematic synthetic phonics is a daily focus, yet the beginning of phonics starts at home and in pre-school with the development of speaking and listening skills and the
awareness of sounds. At home, seeing adults reading and having books read to them, singing nursery rhymes and playing rhyming games all supports a child’s phonic awareness and develops the concept of reading for pleasure.
Children in pre-school are first taught to explore and experiment with sound and words and learn how to distinguish between sounds in the environment, learn rhyme and alliteration. These skills are critical to the success of phonic skills development.
Following on from developing sound awareness children are encouraged to develop the skill of segmenting and blending. These skills are taught in all aspects of reading, writing
and phonics and initially are all done orally with the emphasis on supporting children to hear the separate sounds in words to create spoken sounds.
Children are then taught the smallest unit of soundcalled a Phoneme. Phonemes are taught before the letter names to provide the foundations for reading and correct pronunciation is vital. The ‘grapheme’ is the written version of this and is the letter or letters that represents the sound in a word.
Learning all of these elements allow a child to take their first steps towards becoming a fluent reader and writer yet there are other factors that can influence the success of a child’s ability to read and write.
Children learning to read and write need to have access to resources that are suitable for their stage in development. The learning environment should be language rich, and children require access to a wide range of reading texts.
At Portsmouth High School our pupils are fortunate to be taught by highly trained teachers with a passion for teaching the skills of reading and writing. The stimulating, fun, language rich environment along with the opportunity for a wide range of experiences, encourages the girls to follow their interests and passions, developing and feeding their imagination, ultimately planting the essential seeds for success.
Head of Early Years and Reception Class teacher, Mrs Fabre De La Grange, looks to the heart of the Early Years learning journey.
Prep School children are science explorers
STEM Club
Pre-Prep STEM day gives food for thought
An extraordinary mix of challenges was in store for a Pre-Prep STEM afternoon held in celebration of British Science Week. Pre-school, Reception Class, Years 1 and 2 joined together in groups to think about simple scientific concepts and how to apply them in different scenarios.
How far does your sneeze travel?
Head of Early Years, Mrs Fabre De La Grange, had equipment set up in the hall ready to help the children find out. After some time spent experimenting with a spray bottle of coloured water to simulate a sneeze, the children were amazed to find that a sneeze actually travels a lot further than they thought and that sneezing into your elbow or hand is a very effective way of stopping a sneeze in its tracks.
STEM club enables the girls from Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 to explore a range of scientific and engineering challenges every Thursday lunchtime.
This term they have been asked to build a bridge that was at least 30cm wide and capable of carrying a 1kg weight, have explored static electricity, have learnt about sound waves by making cup and string phones and have used pinhole cameras. We have also been paper engineers by making a variety of origami animals. Many thanks to sixth former Sophie who helps us every Thursday lunchtime.
Mrs Parrott STEM Club leader and Year 2 teacher
Year 4 become tooth designers
What makes an aircraft travel the furthest?
Time constructing a paper plane was time well spent when the children found out how far their own planes travelled and how they compared with their peers. Year 1 teacher Mrs Michou had plenty of measuring practice in store, especially when some aircraft travelled much further than their creators thought they would.
Could a giant who wants to visit the prep school get into the buildings?
The school received a very nice letter from a friendly giant desperate to pay the school a visit and meet all the children and teachers. There was only one problem… could he actually fit through the school door? Judging by the size of a drawing of his thumb, it could be a problem. Year 2 teacher Mrs Parrott had some handy tips to help the children work out if it was going to be possible to welcome him or whether his visit would have to be confined to the grounds outside?
Year 4 met some interesting characters in their science lessons with Mr Rahman this term. Bluebuckle, Snorepaw and Flogoat gave the class an account of the environments they lived in and of what their diets consisted. The girls were tasked with working out what each animal’s teeth should look like and had to model them using clay.
Elsie in Year 4 said ‘I really enjoyed working out what the teeth should look like so the animals can eat their food. If an animal had the wrong teeth they wouldn’t be able to chew their food and could die.’ The class also met a real-life dentist and found out how to care for their own teeth so they really do last a lifetime.
Let’s get out and enjoy sport....
Condover Hall GDST netball event
The annual GDST netball tournament at Condover Hall in Shrewsbury was a great experience weekend for our Year 6 netball squad who played ten netball matches and reached the Plate semi-final. They worked incredibly well as a squad, being supportive to each other and learning from the level of play and professional umpires.
Feedback from the players included that it was an exhilarating and exciting experience, and they loved participating in different activities, with players from across all GDST schools as well as playing some great netball.
Cross country success
Being able to participate in cross country again was a hugely exciting proposition for many of our Year 5 and 6 pupils after the break due to the pandemic. Travelling to compete at the annual prep schools’ event provided a fabulous opportunity. Everyone gave their all and our fifteen runners should be congratulated for their excellent efforts.
A special mention should go to Beatrice in Year 5, who won the under-10 event, and to Holly, Phoebe and Penelope from Year 6, who placed 5th, 9th and 10th respectively in the under-11 event.
Teams play hard for football victory
The prep school interhouse football has seen some hardfought matches on the all-weather sports pitch. Congratulations to all the teams for their enthusiasm and ever-increasing skill set during their games.
Congratulations to winning teams:
Dolphin - U8 (Year 3)
Warrior - U9 (Year 4)
Vernon - U10 (Year 5)
In PE lessons during this half of the spring term Reception have been focussing on developing their fundamental movement skills and fitness with specialist sports teacher Miss Hall. They have participated in a variety of activities set up as a circuit on the prep school’s sports pitch.
Dolphin - U11 (Year 6)
Reception Class enjoy sport
Supporting mental health and well-being at the prep school
During the spring half term, we had a real focus for two weeks on how we can best support our own, and other people’s, mental health and wellbeing. Girls and staff took part in activities which addressed all five of the NHS steps to mental wellbeing, in assemblies, lessons, form time and break times, as well as participating actively at home.
Across the fortnight, girls got the chance to connect with other people by taking part in whole school activities such as playing board games on Warrior House charity day. Lesson times also gave us chances for positive interactions, such as when writing compliment notes to another member of the class using as many of our weekly spelling words as possible.
Girls were encouraged to be physically active, taking part in fun fitness sessions, as well as an exciting treasure hunt, which saw groups of girls busily hunting emotion cards around our beautiful outdoor area, and then solving the clues to find a hidden word.
We practised paying attention to the present moment, making lists of things we were grateful for at home, and adding to thankfulness jars in the classroom. There was a display of books in the library related to mental health and
positivity which girls chose from to have a moment of calm. There were plenty of opportunities to give to others, whether that was designing and writing postcards for elderly residents in local care homes, or baking treats at home to share with neighbours. There was also a very popular card making workshop, where messages of love and thanks were created for friends and family. The thread of learning new skills ran throughout the fortnight, as it does through every week of the year at Portsmouth High School.
We shared our top tips and messages of hope and happiness by hanging labels on our Positivi-tree, which took pride of place in our Reception Area. We also shared a few of our most popular wellbeing strategies with our sister schools, via the GDST Well of Wellbeing. After two years of the strains of the pandemic, it was wonderful to have this time to think positively and look forward.
Mrs Ruth Irvine-Capel Prep School Assistant Head (Pastoral)
Prep school news in brief...
World Book Day inspires a love of reading
Portsmouth High Prep School celebrated the wonder of books when pupils and staff came to school dressed as their favourite book character. Many colourful costumes adorned the classrooms and grounds at breaktime.
Classroom activities focussed on the joy of reading. Reception each brought their favourite book into school and gave a short presentation to the class on why they like their book so much. Year 3 went on a scavenger book hunt challenge in the library and the day inspired a love of reading across the school.
Year 4 spent an exciting three days exploring the Anglo Saxon way of life at Hooke Court. They immersed themselves in cooking, jewellery making, rune writing and weaving, as well as taking part in a wedding ceremony and a fireside Saxon saga. The girls demonstrated excellent teamwork whilst den building and participating in shield combat.
GDST National Pi Day celebrations
Girls celebrated National Pi day through connecting with other GDST schools.
Year 6 linked the day to their circles topic in their mathematics lessons and created Pi plates. They had previously learnt about circles through exploring take away pizza menus to discover the best value deal giving the largest pizza area for the price.
Many other different activities happened on Pi Day. Year 2 made Pi landscapes and Year 1 had fun building Pi with lego. Year 3 drew circles and labelled them. They used string to measure the circumference of circular tins, plastic containers, plastic jars and rolls of Sellotape and using their string they saw that the circumference of their circles was about three times the diameter of each one. They looked at the number for Pi and recorded it on their chart. The girls also really enjoyed trying to memorise as many digits as they could from the never ending number.
Books on plastics shared with Year 1
Year 6 wrote books for the younger girls about the effects plastics are having on the environment. Year 1 enjoyed listening to the older girls read their stories and were able to say what the key messages were and ask questions.
Ms Scovell and Mrs Kopitsa from the senior school were invited to listen and were impressed with the standard of work produced.
HighNews
Portsmouth High School, Kent Road, Southsea, Hampshire PO5 3ES www.portsmouthhigh.co.uk
admissions@por.gdst.net 023 9282 4916
Year 3 enjoyed a day at Butser Ancient Farm in surprisingly mild weather. They explored the job of an archaeologist, getting hands on experience. They also explored all the different types of ancient houses and how they were built. It was great to sit by the log fires and hear how ancient peoples lived, what they ate and the types of work they had to do. The highlight of the trip had to be the workshops; building a fence, making a wrist band with a bead and digging for finds.
Holiday Clubs
Multi-activity day camps take place at Portsmouth High School during the school holidays and are open to girls and boys from 3 to 11 years. Children do not have to be a pupil at the school in order to attend. All children are welcome to join us. Find out more and book your place via the school website.
Hands-on experience at Butser Ancient Farm
Anglo Saxon Time Detectives
