The Barometer Week 3

BAROMETER THE

WETHERBY SENIOR SCHOOL WEEKLY MAY 6th 2019 | WEEK 3

FROM THE HEADMASTER

Dear Parents, The short week started with some fantastic news. Miss Murray’s Creative Writing Club had submitted the boys’ work to two competitions and we were delighted to hear that Adam A-M in Year 10 is one of the finalists in the Wicked Young Writers Award. The competition is organised by the musical Wicked as part of their education programme and was created to link the important messages of the production with a competition that would inspire young people to use creative writing to look at life a little differently. The boys in the club are now working on their entries for the Betjeman Poetry Competition and I wish them luck.

This week’s edition focuses on the work of the Modern Foreign Languages

department and is timely given the news this week from the NAHT (National Association of Head Teachers) conference that young people are finding learning a language stressful and that some are being signed off by doctors. There is no doubt that learning a foreign language is hard work and I am concerned to read anywhere that the pressure of a subject can have such an impact on a child’s wellbeing, so I am pleased to see in this edition the range of techniques employed by our MFL department to engage and inspire the boys. At a time when we may become more insular, learning another language and developing an appreciation and understanding of the culture can only be a good thing and I am glad that numbers taking more than one foreign language at GCSE are healthy at WSS.

Talal’s essay, also included in this edition, examines the origin of the concept of a nation and the spread of this idea over time.

Language is one of the factors that contributes to national identity and the change to step over that division by learning another language is one that we will continue to encourage.

I hope that you all have a good weekend. Think of the Year 10 and Year 12 boys on Duke of Edinburgh expeditions who could be facing some challenging weather. Good luck to all the boys and staff involved.

WEEK A MONDAY

WEEKLY DIARY 13.05.19

PTA Committee and Year Group Co-ordinators’ Meeting, tbc 09:00-10:30 Year 10 Parents’ Evening (Surnames A-K), Drama Studio 17:30-19:30

TUESDAY

14.05.19

WEDNESDAY

15.05.19 Cricket WSS U12/13 WSS vs Kings House School (H) 14:30 Year 12 (Rugby boys) Rugby Tonight Trip BT Sport Studios, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford 17:00-21:00 Year 10 Parents’ Evening (Surnames L-Z), Drama Studio 17:30-19:30

THURSDAY

16.05.19

A Level Geography Fieldwork, Brixton Visitor Morning 10:40-11:50 All Yr 9/10 boys to Perivale Athletics Track 2pm – 4:30pm What is the best thing a school can have in Sport? (Mr Sullivan and external speaker), tbc 14:0016:30

FRIDAY

17.05.19

SATURDAY

18.05.19

SUNDAY

19.05.19

A Level Geography Fieldwork, Brixton Music tour to Disneyland Paris - Brass Band (return Sunday 19th May) Friday Lunchtime Clubs Programme 13:40-14:25 HM Whole School Assembly at Hinde Street Methodist Church 15:15-15:45 GCSE PE Boys Table Tennis, Drama Studio 16:00-17:00 INSET 16:00-17:00

WETHERBY SENIOR SCHOOL WATER BOTTLE Help reduce our school’s plastic consumption by using this personalised Active Bottle, emblazoned with the Wetherby Senior School logo and your own name. Made from highly durable materials, your Active Bottle is easy to open and close, won’t leak and will keep your drinks hot or cold throughout the school day.

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Can’t get better! You can order online at:

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Please ensure all uniform and equipment is clearly named.

IMPORTANT NOTICES

MONDAY

TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

Main: Grilled chicken breast with tarragon and mushroom cream sauce

Main: Spaghetti Bolognese

Main: Beef rice bowls

Meat Free: Falafel pittas with tzatziki and pickled cabbage

Meat Free: Vegetable and edamame bean noodle stir-fry

To Go With: Herbed couscous, carrots and peas, onion bhaji

To Go With: Vegetable nuggets, miso aubergine, steamed Pak choi

Dessert: Banana chocolate custard

Dessert: Carrot cake

THURSDAY

FRIDAY

EVERY DAY

Main: Coastal fish pie

Main: Beef or chicken burgers

Meat Free: Tomato, mozzarella, basil, pasta bake

Meat Free: Beetroot and feta burgers

Meat Free: Summer vegetable casserole To Go With: Creamed polenta, Steamed carrot rounds, Herbed dumplings Dessert: Strawberry mousse

To Go With: Ratatouille tian, French beans, cauliflower and broccoli florets Dessert: Raspberry mirror

To Go With: String potato fries, burger garnish, corn on the cob, boston baked beans burger buns

Homemade Bread Freshly made yogurt pots Fresh Fruit

Dessert: Chocolate sweet potato brownie

MENU

TU VEUX SORTIR? Mr Pattison writes...

This term, Year 7 Francophone students studied the topic of going “En ville.” This included students describing what buildings there are in London, where they go at the weekend and when and ordering food and drink in a café. The boys also studied inviting friends out via text message and below you can see some different conversations about what people suggested doing and reactions to those suggestions. The bowling alley and cinema were top of people’s lists!

LE COMMERCE ÉQUITABLE Mr Pattison writes...

This term in year nine French, the boys have tackled a challenging topic of “Moi dans le monde” (me in the world.)

During this time, students have learnt how to say what rights they have and don’t have, what their priorities are in life, and their shopping habits in a variety of tenses. When studying shopping habits, boys also learnt about Fair Trade in different countries, including some Francophone countries.

In the work below, students have produced sentences in a variety of tenses and included their opinion on Fair Trade products. C’est juste!

MON TALENT! Mr Pattison writes...

In Year 8, boys have been studying the topic of talent shows. Students have learnt how to say what their talent is, why they would want to win a talent show, how to encourage and persuade a contestant and how to give feedback to a performance.

The boys worked together in pairs or small groups and brought all of their learning together in a comic strip which they then illustrated individually. Talents ranged from being multilingual to singing‌some characters did not seem to have much talent at all according to some of the cartoons!

The boys worked really hard on their cartoons, with some fantastic drawings and

some very accurate French alongside them.

MES PASSE-TEMPS PRÉFÉRÉS Mr Pattison writes...

Nico S, Year 10 writes...

This term in French, students in year 10 have studied the topic of self, family and friends, at home and abroad.

During this time, the boys have learnt how to say how they help at home, describe their relationships with their family members and friends as well as talk in detail about what they like to do in their spare time. Over the term, students have focussed mainly on the present tense and have always strived to include a range of vocabulary and structure in their work. Unsurprisingly, sport featured quite heavily in boy’s work!

Mon passe-temps favori est le football. D’habitude, je joue environ deux fois par semaine avec mes amis. Je soutiens une équipe appelée Arsenal, qui a connu une saison décevante.

La semaine dernière, je suis allé les regarder jouer et malheureusement ils ont perdu. Espérons que la saison prochaine, ils feront mieux, car je veux les voir remporter le championnat. En dehors du football, j’aime aussi jouer au tennis car je trouve que c’est un sport agréable de jouer quand il fait beau. Mon joueur préféré est Rafa Nadal, mais je dois avouer qu’il n’a pas joué de son mieux lors des derniers matches, mais je pense que sa mauvaise forme a été causée par ses blessures.

Stefano A, Year 10 writes...

Pendant mon temps libre, j’aime jouer au rugby et rencontrer mes amis après l’école. Je joue dans un club de rugby depuis j’ai eu huit ans. Cette année, j’ai rejoint un club qui s’appelle “Regents Park Royals”. Nous nous rencontrons le dimanche pour deux heures. C’était génial!

Je suis un demi de mêlèe (le numéro neuf) et je dois passer le ballon à le demi d’ouverture.

J’adore le rugby parce-que c’est un sport d’équipe et c’est une bonne chance pour passer de temps en plein air. Aussi, je fais des activités culturelles comme lire et visiter des galeries d’art. Je suis intéressé par l’art moderne et surtout la sculpture. Pourtant, mon peintre préfère est Vincent van Gogh. Le weekend prochain j’irai pour la deuxième fois à l’exposition sur lui au Tate Britain. Je ne peux attendre!

En fin, avec ma famille nous mangeons beaucoup aux restaurants des autres nationalités: ma cuisine préférée est Chinoise!

YEAR 11 SPANISH In their final lesson, Mrs Atkinson’s language students merged their vocabulary skills with their engineering skills. Students were challenged to build the tallest balloon tower they could, but there was a twist; in order to earn balloons for their team, students had to write a minimum of five theme-specific, accurately spelt, vocabulary items on each balloon! Well done Year 11, and best of luck in your exams.

YEAR 9 SPANISH Mrs Atkinson writes...

Last term, some of our Year 9 Spanish students were working on extending their writing using opinions and connectives, as well as learning how to describe people.

They used their new skills to create some “wanted posters�, and described some pretty gruesome criminals! Buen trabajo, Year 9.

YEAR 10 SPANISH Mrs Atkinson writes...

Cultural awareness and diversity is something that we celebrate at Wetherby Senior School, and we aim to learn about various cultural topics throughout our language lessons. Recently, our Year 10s have started to learn about a variety of festivals celebrated in the Spanish-speaking world.

Here are a few photos of some of the most famous ones; how many can you name?

Miss Eaves writes...

Last term, Year 9 Germanists studied the topic of ‘Meine Ambitionen’. This included talking about our ambitions, discussing the pros and cons of part time jobs and work experience and imagining what our dream jobs might be. We had a few interesting options, (beer tasters, Lego architects, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream tasters, caretakers of private islands) but when we decided to write applications for our dream jobs, unsurprisingly most boys went for something sporty!

Below you can see some of their applications for ‘der beste Job der Welt’.

BEWERBUNGEN

MARMORKUCHEN Miss Eaves writes...

In Year 8, boys have been studying the topic of food and drink and healthy lifestyles. This topic is always a challenge, as we spend 80% of it making ourselves hungry talking about food! It seemed sensible therefore, to ensure that we exploited this topic and took the opportunity to eat plenty of German food whilst practising our topic language! This started with a delicious German breakfast in the school dining room, with boys practising their vocabulary across the dining table, and finished with boys following a German recipe to make their very own Marmorkuchen, (marble cake). Both cakes were impressive, although I could not possibly comment on which classes’ cake tasted better‌

OSTEREIER In Year 7 last term, boys had the chance to learn about the German traditions practised at Ostern (Easter). After discussing the traditions with Jonas, the German language assistant, we decided that most of the celebrations are very similar, Easter egg hunts, a meal shared with family, eating lots of chocolate… One of the key differences is that German children have lots of fun decorating their own Easter eggs, and these are often hung from an Ostereierbaum (Easter egg tree) – the results are very impressive!

The boys had the opportunity to ‘blow’ their own eggs, a complex activity that involves blowing out the egg yolk so that the shell can be decorated.

Well done to all who took part and a special mention to Alexei M, Mark M and Alexander F for their winning contributions! Take a look at the final products and decide on your favourite!

NATION: AN ESSAY BY TALAL H. Perhaps the most pertinent starting point for any discourse on the concept of nation is the understanding that it is a relatively new idea, rather than an unquestionable metaphysical truth. Consequently, we should not limit ourselves to analysing ‘nation,’ in the form of the modern commonplace it has become, but instead direct our attention to nation’s quality as a by-product of historical conditions. Completing such an analysis requires that we delve into the development of ‘nation,’ over time, whether we can truly speak of historical nations, and what the transient nature of this abstraction reveals about our societies, which seem to have made ‘nation,’ concrete. For the purpose of this discussion, I have used ‘state,’ to refer to government, and will therefore define the nation-state as a synthesis of a nationalism and a unifying political administration.

Nationalism, which shall be treated as the assertion that a group of people under a state can share interests on the basis of “common descent, language or history1,” can be traced back quite pointedly to the 1789 French Revolution. The educated middle-class or ‘bourgeois,’ proponents of early liberalism were deeply invested in asserting the unity of French citizens, beyond provincial affiliations - and conveyed their message in terms of patriotic duty in their pamphlets. The divine right of kings was no longer the source of power, but rather sovereignty belonged to the nation, whose will would define the state’s existence. Frenchmen had begun to articulate a new identity, a selfrighteous one that would breed a problematic romanticism vis-à-vis French history, among other things2.

From our 21st century standpoint, this early conception of nation was

hardly faultless. At the outset, the French revolutionaries defined the nation in plainly discriminatory terms: the nation was not the clergy and certainly not the monarchy, but it was the third tier - the common people.3 That begs the question: who was meant by ‘the common people?’

For most of the pamphleteers, it meant being a taxpaying propertied man, or an owner of industry. This sliver of the population was deemed the real citizenry of the nation. It therefore logically followed that these persons’ aggregated interests constituted the national interest.

Hence, there is sound evidence that the intention behind at least some of the French ideologues’ propagation of nationalism incorporated suspect economic motives. It was strongly maintained, for instance, that the financially precarious royal state had to pay back its debts fully, often owed to middle-class bondholders, or else the national pride of France might be hopelessly tarred.4 Today, national identity seems far more accessible, bestowed upon a polity by virtue of birth. We should therefore understand that nation, and who is and is not a member of the nation, is a fluid abstraction, influenced heavily by context.

There is another question which must also be addressed, namely, how were nations conceived prior to the new vocabulary of the late 18th century? In Europe, antecedents to the word nation did not come close to identifying a unified people under a single state. The evidence suggests that during the Medieval period, nation was a term used to denote one’s specific origin or ancestry, with no apparent link to the state. In Spanish, prior to 1884, the word ‘nacion,’ often applied specifically to foreigners. Locutions like ‘fatherland,’ or ‘homeland,’ did not suggest the entire territory of a unified state, but rather one’s local

or regional birthplace.5 The obvious conclusion is that the meaning of the word ‘nation,’ changed during the modern period, primarily for political reasons. There is a notable gap in history between the existence of words like ‘nation,’ and the birth of the inextricable nation-state, which now forms the basic unit of the global diplomatic system.

In order to ensure that our analysis is holistic, we may also choose to investigate the history of the rest of the (non-European) world.

From this perspective, the situation is remarkably uniform. Nation did not carry any of its present political connotations, if it carried any meaning at all, in most of the world for most of history. Whilst we can observe large, contiguous pre-modern states, especially in the form of empires, an idea of civic and political unity reminiscent of nationalism is not what held these states together. The evidence more convincingly demonstrates the importance of language to pre-modern unity, particularly the existence of a religious language, which allowed these societies to view themselves as sui generis.

Ancient China is instructive in this respect. When people living under the Zhou dynasty referred to their country as the ‘Middle Kingdom,’ they did so out of notions of celestial, theological importance.

Entry into the community was not based on vague principles of common nationality, but rather predicated on learning the literary or religious language.6 And while common language is a portion of our current idea of nationality, it is certainly not as crucial for defining one’s identity as it was in the past, when distinctive local dialects abounded alongside the lingua francas of the literate population.

There are currently eighteen native English-speaking countries in the

world, according to the UK Home Office, yet no attempt has been made to classify them as a single nation.

Another essential element in perpetuating the unity of premodern states, aside from religion and language, was hereditary leadership. Before proceeding further, it must be understood that a large part of our conception of nation today relies on conditions that have hitherto been near impossible to maintain. Take, for instance, the notion of borders.

For a nation-state to exist, it requires well-defined, generally static territorial boundaries. Yet all academic investigations into the past few millennia have revealed that war, and dynamic, flexible borders have been a feature of life for most of organised human existence. Thus, a pre-modern state could not reasonably stake its political legitimacy on its nature as a geographically stable entity.

Furthermore, pre-modern rulers did not derive their power by acting in national interests, as such interests had not even started to be properly articulated. Rather, an evolving realm, in expansion and contraction due to conflict and diplomacy, was unified mostly because of continuous rule by one dynasty over time. Hereditary rulers of this period were not bound by ‘nation.’

Consanguineous nobles would not shun going to war with one another, regardless of whether they shared language, history or descent.7 Put simply, the national outlook had not yet been established.

It is therefore quite appropriate to ask ourselves how we came to be a part of a global system where nations exist institutionally. We should further ask whether this institutionalisation of nationalism globally has been generally beneficial or not. Substantively, nations are self-determining entities associated with a single state, which has sovereignty over its defined

boundaries under international law.

This Wilsonian picture, brought on by the need to end the bloodlettings of the early and middle 20th century, has ostensibly prevailed since the Second World War. Most of the human race is now in possession of a nationality, and only a fraction of the world population, about 10 million people, are thought to be stateless.8 But what good has this brought? Why has the national idea, once so impressionistic as to be described by one historian as a “soul,” and “spiritual principle,”9 become a reality to every person acquainted with citizenship?

It may be argued that nations have, in line with internationalist thinking, led to the construction of a productive, peaceful global community, where many are represented and can express themselves through multilateral dialogue. Indeed, it cannot be rationally disputed that humankind now lives in an age of peace unprecedented in history, but whether this is the result of new national identities remains controversial at best. One needs only to look at the Second World War and what preceded it to understand how jingoistic nationalisms can wreak incredible destruction.

Moreover, it is not an insignificant fact that many of the world’s nations have been established against, or without consideration for, the will of the people inhabiting them.

Africa, the second most populous continent on earth, had its national boundaries drawn haphazardly

by European colonial powers in the late 19th century, and there is “widespread agreement," 10 on this point. Considering that a similar experience rings true for the Middle East and elsewhere, to what extent does nationalism have anything to do with self-determination? Given that there were historically vital elements of coercion and pressure during the formation of the current international system, it seems that nation should be treated as

something of a European paradigm, for nationalism started in Europe, and was only later exported globally and adopted by both empirebuilders and anti-colonial liberation armies.

Above all, the preponderance of nations in the world today seems to indicate a profoundly unimaginative status quo, based not on pursuing a set of principles geared towards determining the most beneficial systems of human organisation, but rather a blind fumbling that refuses to question the suppositions of the past out of deference to what is politically expedient in the present.

References: 1 Compact Oxford English Dictionary 1993 2 B. C. Shafer, Bourgeois Nationalism in the Pamphlets on the Eve of the French Revolution, The Journal of Modern History, 10(1), 1938, pp. 31-50 3 Jean Paul Rabaut Saint Étienne, Considérations sur les interêts du tiers état adressées au peuple des provinces par un propriétaire foncier, n.p., 1788, cited in J. Clarke, A Protestant Philosophe

at the Constituent Assembly, The Historian, 20(3), pp. 290-304 4 Shafer, Bourgeois Nationalism 5 E. Hobsbawm, Nation and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality, Cambridge,

Cambridge University Press, 1992 6 B. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Revised edn., Fairfield, Verso, 2006 7 Ibid.

8 The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Global Trends Report, 2017 9 E. Renan, “What is a Nation?”, Paris, Presses-Pocket, 1992, translated by Ethan Rundell 10 J. Herbst, The Creation and Maintenance of National Boundaries in Africa, International Organisation 43(4), 1989, pp. 673-692

CREATIVE WRITING CLUB Miss Murray writes...

Since January, Wetherby’s Creative Writing Club have been ardently putting pen to paper in the hope of becoming the new Charles Dickens of Marylebone! The excerpts below showcase the range of narratives and characters that the boys have been meticulously planning and editing and highlight the wonderful writing skills that Wetherby has! The entries have been submitted to national competitions including the BBC 500 Words and the Wicked Writing Competition and we have just received the fantastic news that our very own Year 10 student, Adam A-M, has been selected for the finals of the Wicked Writing Competition! He will be attending the final ceremony next month so we have our fingers and toes crossed for him. You can read an excerpt of his short story below and it shall soon be published in the 2019 Wicked Young Writer Awards 2019 Anthology; well done, Adam!

Expectations are now high for the new Creative Writing Club members who will be writing their own poems for a chance to win in the Betjeman Poetry Competition!

Adam A-M, Year 10 – Wicked Young Writers 2019 Finalist

Albert S, Year 7

Wake up darkness, darkness is all My pace quickened to match I hear see. It feels like all the love the sprint of my thudding heart and happiness in the world has as cold sweat sluggishly trickled vanished. Am I in hell I think to down my panting face. myself dread and fear I don’t know It seemed like an eternity had what is going to happen? Then elapsed since I had grudgingly all of a sudden a light turns on a accepted the lucrative proposal for feeling of relief runs through but this late night delivery. I clearly it’s quickly squandered by the man remembered the crisp, callous I see sitting across from me in the voice, minaciously whispering its back of a van he is carrying a gun, command through the speaker of I also realize at this moment my my phone as a chill darted down hands are chained to the wall like my spine. shackles binding me to the side of my cell. There are people on the Immediately I had accepted the floor crying and yelling the guard offer: it was far too brilliant to with the gun shoots a bullet right resist, after all, I was being given a in the back of one of the children’s king’s ransom to act as a courier, heads then everyone immediately delivering a seemingly innocent goes silent the truck goes over a parcel to a nearby location. bump everyone feels the ripples Ignoring my inhibitions and of pain it caused. The last thing I concerns, I made my way to the remember was hiding in the attic collection point. The frigid air with my son and two daughters was thick with fog and the slight when one of my daughters coughs breeze pierced through my coat because of the dust then we are like steely, grey needles. The all silenced by one of the soldiers charcoal sky seemed to block out yelling the attic they’re in the attic all light and goodness as wraiththen I woke up here. I see a green like clouds ominously drifted gas pour out a vent and the guard through the sky. These translucent, put a gas mask on then I fall back silvery spectres hovered above asleep. me like the ghosts of intangible dreams.

When I wake I’m in a small room maybe four square meters big the As soon as I had secured the walls covered in white foam and package, I began to feel a sense a small metal vent in the corner of unease. The golden light of also a glass window into a dimly the regiments of lamps which lit room all of a sudden dark gas lined the street reflected off of enters the room through the vent the globular, grey bulk of dreamy like a rain filled cloud has started fog, creating an ethereal glowing pouring down pain, I begin to halo of dimming, honeycomb choke grasping at my throat I’m light. This shimmering mass dying I yell the loudest my lungs appeared to stretch out to infinity, could handle no response then encompassing the entire city and nothing, silence I am floating obscuring all vision. through a large dark void….

Tamerlan P, Year 9 I had to sit at a slight angle to make sure my bare skin doesn’t touch the hell-hot metal pipe running down the left side and underneath my leg, just where the wound was. The bleeding stopped and it was cleaned of dust after our lucky escape at the beach yesterday. The thin, sharp, cigarette shaped metal rod stuck in my bone was impossible to remove and was already infected.

They said I must die, that’s it inevitable. My colleagues sat around me on rubber mats with steam hissing into their faces as they sat there, emotionless. There was barely enough room for us all and I had to sit on the scorching metal instead of the rubber mats, I was the least important here anyway, though I tried to pretend I didn’t know. Our equipment had to be abandoned, same as Ravish.

I liked him, he was different, but I liked him. Now we were about a day or so from home, but this beast couldn’t go any faster and was already overloaded with people. I tried to stand but suddenly heard a shriek from bellow me. A soldier was lying there, facing the flaming metal.

Li M, Year 7 Death. Body limp, unable to move.

Emotionless, face blank. Irregular squares of light fought my eyelids, struggling to get through. I felt the functions coming back to me like someone just dumped them in me. I heard the birds tweeting as the sea thrashed violently. Then, my defeated eyelids gave through and let the victorious, yet vicious sunlight break into my eyes, burning them. I stood up. It was extraordinary how hard it was.

My numb legs creaked like an old

machine working again. It took a few seconds for my droopy eyes to get used to the unforgiving and harsh environment. Then what I saw was spectacular. I stared incredulously at my surroundings.

Vast palm trees were planted randomly. A smooth blanket of orangey-yellow sand lay humbly underneath me. The noisy sea, purely blue flowed in patterns like a snake. I dragged my exhausted legs closer to the alluring trees.

The grass crunched underneath me as I heaved my body across the paradise. The unforgiving sun shot light rays into me like bullets from a minigun. I explored the wonderful land, gazing at everything I looked at. But then, I saw it. A dead body on the ground, covered in blood. Its arms and legs ripped off and thrown to the ground. I teetered closer to it and flipped it on its back. It was me, and I had no eyes.

Everything turned dark.

“This is not a dream,” a voice said in the darkness.

Henry B, Year 10 The Train Station Above, an immense white clock ticked rhythmically as swathes of people bustled below. They were packed into the station like redcurrants in a crate, shielded from the downpour by the vast roof, as the rain drummed constantly on the glass panes.

To the side, a row of dilapidated shops and stalls stood, empty, with the odd commuter pausing to take a brief glance before quickly hurrying towards the platforms as if being chased by a fierce predator.

Outside the station, a sea of taxis pooled, patiently awaiting the

exhausted hail of yet another tired traveller. A chime resounded through the station, shortly followed by a modulated, matterof-fact female voice announcing the departure of a train. Striding hurriedly, a ticket inspector, in a fluorescent orange vest, made her way towards the platforms, brushing past absent-minded tourists; she remained undeterred despite the cacophony of footsteps and suitcase wheels.

Hordes of people filled the station; some appeared rushed whilst others seemed relaxed.

A portly gentleman in a corris grey overcoat walked past, before checking his watch and accelerating rapidly towards the trains. Standing lazily, a group of young students, each with a differently-coloured backpack, dawdled beside countless vending machines. Like wolves, they gnawed at chocolate and devoured crisp packets as if they hadn’t eaten for months. They stared dozily at their mobile phone screens, entranced by them. Each face had more pimples than the last. A child with ruddy cheeks whined furiously. Frustrated, its mother dragged him into the grotty bathrooms, rolling her eyes as she did so. Beside the chewing gum-peppered steps, an old woman with a brown fur coat gripped her arms around a man in a blue linen shirt; a lonely tear trickled down her ashen complexion, followed by a proud and hopeful smile, as she waved him off.

Jeremy B, Year 9 There was a very putrid smell that hung over the whole neighbourhood, like a barbeque party gone horribly wrong. The

smell stung everyone’s nose and eyes, clawing at them and wishing to do harm. The bright red flames danced around in the night sky, playing with the house and begging for fuel like children. They destroyed everything that they touched and were not satisfied with just a house, nor a whole block, only when they had engulfed the whole neighbourhood would they finally consider resting.

They licked the walls of nearby houses simply waiting to jump across on a piece of wood or in the form of sparks with wind. Playful like a dog they jumped and leaped from house to house, eating them up, blackening them and changing them in an unforeseeable way. No one had ever thought that a lone candle could cause so much havoc with just a little assistance from the wind. By now the screaming and terror of the crowds was louder than the fire and people were running in all directions, mothers, children, even animals were desperate to escape this blazing inferno before the person in front of them.

Max P, Year 10 The Marshes A tall man treads lightly upon the waterlogged track leading to the small village, “just a few more miles”, he thinks. The damp, weed infested causeway is surrounded by the thick, sodden waters of the bog where a strong stench of rot permeates from the surface; the man retches from the smell of it.

Trees rise out of the rancid waters, their branches like contorted bones with elongated, thick, sickly green leaves that drape over the branches like heavy curtains. He walks on with a lantern in front of

him, the only light around except for the dim moonlight permeating through the dense brush, as more sounds of long-legged pelicans and egrets stalking the blackened waters unnerve him ever more.

A couple of hours pass before he reaches a long, rotten bridge that stretches across a part of the bog too deep to pass through. Half of it lost to a thick, grey milk that surrounded him and chocked him like mustard gas. Its weathered planks, much like the trees, seem to twist and recoil away from themselves to then fall uselessly and sink into the great green water below. The village is close but the low hanging mist that chokes the marshland clouds the man’s vision like a blindfold and he can only see a couple of yards in front of him. He looks below him through the sorrowful planks to notice a pair of crocodiles synchronously wading through the bog, their sinuous scales disappearing into the pale green algae.

When the mist finally yields the village to his view, the man is presented with several wooden huts connected by shackles of small bridges made from cracked wood and moss stained rope; twisted vines seep into small rat holes like snakes that hiss at him, as if threatening him to leave.

shirt with long blue jeans complete his dilapidated look. Greeting the man at the entrance, the older one leads him onto the wooden platforms, their boots making the boards creak and squeal, until they reach a dock that reaches out a couple of metres into a large, open area of marsh. Tiny islands dot the area with a stumped, short tree on each one along with remnants of beaver dams floating to the banks.

Both men climb into a small rowboat, the younger man taking the oars while the older tells him where to go. While rowing, the young man catches a glimpse of green scales disappearing into the reeds at the banks and green mottled eyes appearing to his left before sinking again. When they reach one of the islands, the younger man grasps the side of the boat to steady himself and pulls himself out. His boots fall straight through the bog and is left wading in the green water at waist height.

He reaches down to try and find the catfish trap he has left there; he feels the touch of slime and moss at his fingers and reeds clinging to his arm like eels before he lifts up the trap. It is only until he lifts it up to his eyes that he sees the trap has been destroyed, splinters of wood falling from his grasp and useless chewed twigs are all that remain.

A few yards more and he sees a metre high-sign with the words, “Surret Marsh”, faintly written in black paint, the stand also suffocated in thick, eel-like vines.

At the edge of the village stands a man about sixty years old; his expression defined by a wrinkled chin, drooping cheeks and depressed, black eyes. He wears a flat cap as wrinkled as his weathered skin and as soaked as the bog that continued behind them. A stained, white collared

They both look to each other surprised. The next trap is also broken; he throws it far into the bog frustratingly. Wading through the green pool, several alligators pushing themselves into the bog catch his attention, some hiss at each other revealing hundreds of filed teeth, chipped and grey from decay as well as murky scales smothering their tails and backs. Their mouths form a crooked smile, the type of smile that suddenly makes your breath

quicken, eyes widen, lips turn blue with a sense of dread “We should probably head back”, says the older man as ripples come closer to the boat.

As the younger man rowed back to the shore, he sighed in dejectedness; he was going to be here for a while.

Theo W, Year 9 Dominating the skyline, the blazing fire tore apart all that stood in its path. This monstrous beast had no sense of apathy for the poor buildings, suddenly ripping them apart with minimal effort due to the energy and motivation it had to consume it quickly. The buildings, which varied in size, shape and colour were suffering terribly from the attack which ripped right through its immune system, leaving it with no chance of survival and scrapping for any scraps that could be found on the ground beneath it.

How could this fire possibly have started? It was very odd for a fire to start at night time in this society, therefore something extremely potent must have cracked through the forces of the powerful security system, which did absolutely everything in its power to protect and serve this honourable society to survive a deadly attack, even an enormous one which was seen at best once every hundred years, which would use inexorable might in order to achieve its aims. In the distance I could see a figure, and I could just about make out with my glinting eyes that he was wearing a fire vest and had a helmet placed on his enlarged head. Most people would dismiss him as a servant helping the citizens of Alaminia

to live longer than this disaster would wish for, but I thought to myself that there was a chance, a very slim chance, yes, but still a chance, that he had started the fire itself. There were a mountain of reasons floating through my head like a balloon through air as to why that might be. The boldest of these was that he was the only one fighting this blaze, which made me ponder to myself that he may have acted alone to start the fire, perhaps to destroy something which he detested more than the sight of a fire. This would be accurate evidence as to why he was reluctant to put his full efforts on extinguishing the fire. I could have been completely wrong about firemen helping to save this shrinking society.

With those frightfully terrifying thoughts and amazement at how the society was declining going through my head, I realised that the area which was being worst hit by this terrible, destructive fire was the very area that I visited day in, day out in my regular life.

I must have not noticed before due to the extreme darkness and the smoke created by this disaster.

What was I to do after this? The repair would take a long time to be complete, which would leave me in limbo and on the brink of leaving this marvellous city to pursue a better life. I never thought I would be thinking of that betraying action, but now I have found myself thinking it, which brought horror to the forefront of my brain. The darkness drowned me, and I am sure every other soul that was out and had heard of the news that a storm of fire had hit the middle of the city.

Having stared into the sky to gather my views for a few

moments, I took the decision to scan the damage on the ground.

Pure distress pounded my brain like a hammer hitting a nail.

It now seemed as clear as a wonderful sunny blue sky that something had to be done to stop there being more incidents like this destructive fire that had ripped through the center of this fantastic city.

Voices by Lewis H Daniel is sitting on the bench watching the other boys play football wishing he could join in. He couldn’t go and play with them as he knew he would just get teased because he didn’t have any boots. He only had one pair of shoes and the shoes were two years old, falling apart and too tight.

“Oi, Boots” called one of the boys named Charlie, “what d ya think you call those pieces of garbage on ye feet?”

Daniel stays quiet pretending he didn’t hear him. At first, he didn’t like the nickname boots, but after a while he got used to it. Even the voice in his head has started to call him Boots. This voice has been with him for a long time, ever since he started at this new school.

It’s been two years now and it still talk to him. People call him a freak when they see him talking to himself. But he can’t help it, the voice has been telling him that an evil villain is going to be taking over the town Weatherbee.

Daniel and his family have lived here all his life. What does the voice mean? Is this true he kept on thinking to himself? it doesn’t sound real. Why would a villain take over his town? But he can’t ignore it, the voice is getting

louder and louder every day. The funny thing is, he has never heard the voice say these kinds of things before. Usually it just talks to him and keeps him occupied. He can’t sleep at night, so the next day he decides to tell someone what it has been saying.

“Mum, dad, I have something to tell you” he begins. He tells them about the voice and what it has been saying, once he has finished, he feels a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. But they don’t believe him. How can an evil villain come to Weatherbee and enslave everyone? He is angry that they didn’t listen to him, but knew if he was them, he wouldn’t believe it either. But something told him that this was real.

Over the next few days the voice got louder and more often. Also, the crime in the town has gone up and people have gone missing.

Daniel is worried because this is how the voice described it to

him. One of the people missing is Charlie. Daniel feels guilty because when the voice was telling him this, he had secretly hoped one would be Charlie.

On his way to school one day he realised there was no one around and he had thought his parents had gone to work early. When he arrived at school the building was empty. It was creepy when no one was there. The flag in the centre of the field was flapping on its own. No children were playing in the field. Daniel was scared, the words of the voice were true. The people of the town must have been abducted by the villain. The voice had told him where they had been taken, the basement. But whose basement? How was he going to find them he thought to himself?

Then he spots someone, it is Alex, the only person who has ever been kind to him in school. He tells him everything. Alex doesn’t believe him.

The voice was back, but this time

he was laughing. He was right all along, and Daniel should have believed him. Daniel starts to ask him for help, he pleads the voice to tell him where the people are.

Alex is watching him.

The voice says, “go the grocery store you will find something there”. Which one? There are lots of grocery stores in the town. No reply. He and Alex split up and search the grocery stores. They don’t know what they are looking for and they agree to meet back at the flag. After a long search Daniel heads to the flag without finding anything. Soon he sees Alex running towards him panting out of breath. He is holding a piece of paper, it has an address on it.

They go to the address. Daniel tells Alex to wait outside and he goes in. He looks around and hears a shout, he opens the door and has a brief look at the huge room full of people before he gets whacked on the head and falls unconscious just the way the voice had told him…

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