Spring 2010 Newsletter
Dear Parents
2010 started with a spring at Gatehouse. The children continued to work hard and play hard with increasingly diverse opportunities to find their niche and shine.
Music Report
Music at Gatehouse continued to thrive strongly. We now have enough pupils sitting music exams to warrant an Associated Board examiner coming to the school for the tests which is a great advantage and causes much less disruption to everyone.
We are very lucky to have excellent and talented full time staff and peripatetic staff (joined now by John Randall who is a competent drummer and gives tuition in this subject). All the music teachers stress the importance of regular practice and say that there is little point in a child learning an instrument if he or she is not prepared to find time to practise between the lessons.
We are very keen to enrol more children for flute tuition. When our three flautists in Year 6 leave this July, we shall be much in need of younger children to replace them. The flute is a lovely wind instrument and not too difficult to master so we hope to have more pupils wanting to learn.
The concert in the last week of term was a great success, giving lower junior children an opportunity to play and sing solos and listen to older groups of singers and instrumentalists. Miss White and Mr Sheinman ended the event with a roaring performance of "Hardrock Blues".
We congratulate Molly Sayer and Phoebe Gately who both won music scholarships to secondary schools this term.
Sport at Gatehouse
This was an extremely successful term for the PE department at Gatehouse. We have built on some excellent performances from the previous term and are now really beginning to establish ourselves as a good sporting school.
In football the U11 5-a-side team achieved great things and (with added coaching from Mr Hayes) have become an excellent passing side. Last term we finished runners up at the area championships out of 24 teams and reached the last 8 at the national championships. Given our facilities and the size of our school these are fantastic achievements.
In cross country we fielded U9 and U11 teams at the area championships who all ran well. I was extremely pleased by the performance of the year 3 boys and girls who are competing for the first time. A special mention however has to go to Callum and Maxine for making it to the national championships where they were both 36th out of at least 80 runners.
Netball is becoming more and more popular and we took part in the Bancroft's tournament which the girls enjoyed. Thank you to the year 6 girls for organising lunchtime netball club for the younger girls. Your enthusiasm and skill are a demonstration of the incredible spirit we have at Gatehouse.
This term I am looking forward to all the Summer sports and we have entered competitions in rounders, athletics and cricket. My aim for this term is to have pupils from Gatehouse representing their area at the national athletics championships. If we achieve this then we would have had pupils from our school going to national championships in football, swimming, cross country and athletics.
Finally thank you to all the parents who have supported us directly and indirectly to ensure that we continue to be successful and turn out national standard pupils.
Children last term have visited a variety of different venues including The Bloomsbury Theatre, The Little Angel Theatre and St. Luke's (LSO Re-mix Orchestra).
We also had visits from the fire brigade and an author and we had a very successful Book Fair, culminating in a wonderful "dress up as your favourite character" assembly. Mrs Gately continues to enthuse the children about all matters relating to the library.
House events continue to be very popular, some with a fund raising element, such as cake sales and others with a fun element of shared house songs. Mrs Whitaker introduced for the first time a maths competition for the upper juniors which exercised all the children's adding up and taking away skills, indeed many of the teachers were also on their toes, thinking fast. The winners were Sphinx with Molly, Toby, Frankie and Martha.
The Lower Junior Play was a great success. Mrs Moll managed to include all these young children in the performance of The Selfish Crocodile played to a large crowd of appreciative parents. The music was particularly memorable thanks to the musical talents of our many teachers and teaching assistants who contribute to this event.
We took part again in the science competition held at Forest School. Mrs Ralph reports that an enjoyable day was had by the children. We were very pleased to come first of the independent schools who participated in this splendid occasion.
For Year 6, senior school entrance exams came with gratifying results. They are the best we have achieved in the last five years. Molly was awarded the Drapers Scholarship at Bancroft's and also won scholarships both music and academic at Forest. Phoebe won a music scholarship at Forest. Rachel won scholarships at Forest, Highgate, Channing and Northbridge House. Duncan won a scholarship to Ashford School and passed the Kent 11+ Grammar School Entrance. Leo was successful in gaining a place at Latymer, a huge achievement for an out of area grammar school candidate. He also won a scholarship at Forest. Henry won a scholarship at Colfe's and Elias won a place to board at Cheltenham College. Four pupils who applied to City of London Girls' School were awarded places. We were also successful gaining places at City of London Boys' School, Queen's Harley Street, Portland Place, Francis Holland, Forest Boys' School, Forest Girls' School, Coopers Company and Coborn School, Morpeth, Haggerston, Petchy, Raines, Anglo European at Ingatestone and Greycoat.
We have held parents' evenings for all the year groups outside the Foundation stage. Last term we spread them out more and, I hope, this led to shorter waiting time for the many patient parents waiting to see form teachers. We also again held our open evening for current parents. This term the Senior Leadership Team - Mr Mylne, Miss Tighe, Miss Reidy and I, gave a focus to this occasion by talking with parents about Gatehouse's role in the community near and far. We were able to hear questions and try and respond with suitable answers over a glass of wine. This is an occasion designed for parents to talk to the managers of the school about the future and the current organisation of Gatehouse School.
Leading on from this, as you know, our Parents' Association has become well established under the chairmanship of Ms Beck. They have organised several very successful events. The drinks party and auction night with a Rat Pack theme, was a very grown up occasion with cocktails and delectable canapes to smooth the path towards the auction. This event raised the fantastic sum of over 3,000 pounds for the school. The film club was an occasion for the children and they watched "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" which they thoroughly enjoyed along with the popcorn and soft drinks.
All parents are automatically members of the Gatehouse Parents' Association and Ms Beck is hoping to increase the active membership. I, personally, would like to thank Ms Beck and the committee for all their hard work and commitment to this important area of the Gatehouse community. Apart from the wonderful sums of money raised, it also provides a social focus for parents and children alongside their school life. We are particularly delighted with the interactive whiteboards which have been funded by the GPA and are hugely appreciated by the pupils and the teachers.
Term ended with our traditional final Easter assembly followed by the Nursery's Easter bonnet parade then a whole school egg hunt followed.
May I give you for your diary the following key dates of events taking place this term?
Thursday May 27th, Dance Production @ 11.00am.
Friday May 28th, Upper Junior Sports Day @ 10.00am - Mile End.
Friday 18th June, Lower Junior Sports Day @ 10.00am - Victoria Park.
Saturday 19th June - Summer Fete 1.00 - 4.00pm
Monday June 21st - Friday June 25th, Outward Bound for Year 6.
Tuesday 22nd June - Thursday 24th June, French trip for Year 5.
Friday 25th June - Nursery Sports Day @ 1.30pm.
Wednesday 7th July - School play @ 2.00pm
Thursday 8th July - School play @ 6.30pm
Friday July 9th - Prize Giving @ 11.00am.
Friday 16th July - End of term - half day.
Mrs Belinda Canham
Headmistress