Tenison Times - Archbishop Tenison`s School

Christmas
2014
Te n i s o n T i m e s
Inside this
issue:
Cricket in
December
2
Spelling
Bee
2
WWI
Poetry
3
Theatre
Review
4
Theatre
Review
5
Puzzle page 6
Mastermind 7
Madame
Tussaud’s
7
PSA,
Website &
Contact
8
The second half of any Autumn Term is always very busy, with
this half-term being no exception. Students enjoyed a variety
of visits and raised funds for charities, such as Ascension
Trust, a school in Ghana, Wateraid, children displaced due to
war through the TEARFUND which is a Christian charity, and
our own Library.
Carol Services were conducted at the school for parents and
students, as well as at St Thomas’ Hospital by our School
Choir.
Our Year 7s embarked on the first Spelling Bee competition
with Henry Fawcett Primary School. This was a great event
which both schools enjoyed, and we are thankful to JohnLewis, Tesco and the Surrey County Cricket Club for providing
the prizes.
Our annual Christmas Drama production, ‘Class Act’, was
accompanied by super music from students in our Music
Department. It was great to see so many of our students
performing and we can proudly say that over 50% of students
at ATS now learn an instrument. Thank you to the Livery
Company of the Chartered Surveyors for their sponsorship in
this area.
Our second Mastermind competition has taken place and the
winner was Emmanuel Amadi in Year 7 who saw off all the
other competitors from Years 7 to 13.
Finally, I want to say thank you to two special people who
have served the school well and will be leaving at the end of
this term: Revd Matt Prior, who has been a brilliant Chaplain,
will be working much closer to home, and my fantastic PA, Mrs
Lin Arnold, is to retire at Christmas. Her love for the school
and her sterling service has done ATS proud; I will miss her.
My thanks also to the Governing Body, Southwark Diocesan
Board of Education, Lambeth Local Authority, local primary
schools and, of course, parents and carers who have been
supportive of our work.
Mrs Elizabeth Sims
Headmistress
Pag e
Cricket...in December!!!
On Monday 8th December, a group of Years 7 and 8 students took part in
an inter-school, under-13, indoor cricket tournament at the Kia Oval, which
is based opposite the school.
We won two matches and lost two,
showing signs of improvement as the
tournament went on. The highlight was a
convincing defeat of Elm Green School.
“I really enjoyed
myself today. I was
quite surprised how
well we did too…”
Michael Simpson stood out for Tenison's,
with some clean straight-hitting with the
bat, as well as some tidy bowling. It's no
surprise he is already in the Surrey County
system, and we wish him all the best.
Emmanuel Elvis also showed promise with the ball and he was scouted for
the Lambeth Youth Games trials. All seven students who participated
competed well throughout.
If you are interested in playing cricket at the school, please contact the
Head of PE, Mr Farnolle.
Years 6 and 7 Spelling Bee
“Some of the
spellings were
really hard but our
teachers had
taught us spelling
strategies which
helped us
remember them.”
Knowledge, intelligence and calmness under pressure were the qualities
needed to become a Spelling Bee champion. This hard-fought event
between Henry Fawcett Primary School and Archbishop Tenisons’ School
resulted in a tension-filled afternoon, but in the end there could only be
one winner!!
Henry Fawcett Year 6 pupils took an early lead and showed superb spelling
ability. However, Archbishop Tensions Year 7 fought back to triumph in the
end.
The eventual champion was Micah (ATS), while the runner-up and Year 6
winner was Chardanna (Henry Fawcett). Third place and Year 7 winner
was Isaiah (ATS). They all received an array of magnificent prizes,
including gift vouchers for £50 and £25, cricketing items and a free pizza
meal!
In addition, all participants received gift
vouchers and a one-year youth membership to
The Kia Oval.
The Spelling Bee was a wonderful experience,
and it was great to see students from primary
and secondary schools competing in such a
determined, but friendly, manner.
We would like to thank the John Lewis Partnership, Surrey CCC at the Kia
Oval and Pizza Express for kindly donating prizes.
Ms Emmett (Senior Leader)
2
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3
World War One Poetry Competition
To commemorate the First World War, Tenison’s held a whole-school poetry
competition. Some of the boys who entered shared their thoughts on their
poems in a recent assembly.
At Tenison’s we have
followed
commemorations of
the start of WWI
very closely. A
shocking number of
our old boys died in
the war and we have
remembered them
all over the last two
months.
Emmanuel Godfrey
8.18:
“I wrote the poem in
order to think about how
life in the trenches was. I
wanted to think about
how life in the trenches
affected the soldiers. I
was interested in what
happened to the soldiers
when they left the
trenches and went home.
The thought of families
waiting to find out if their
relatives had died in the
trenches was powerful.”
Vasco Andrade 8.7:
“I was inspired by a documentary that I watched about teenage soldiers in
World War One. After I watched it I wanted to write a poem to
commemorate all the lives of such boys. This is why the poem could be
seen as violent as I wanted to portray it for what it was.”
Michael Adjei 8.7:
We will publish a
selection of
these WWI
poems in our
next edition of
Tenison Times the standard is
very high, so
WATCH THIS
SPACE!!
“I was inspired to write my poem from the original poem of Dulce Et
Decorum Est, which means it is an honour to die for one’s country. It was
written by Wilfred Owen who was a poet in the war. He died months
before the end of the war. I wanted to enter the World War One poetry
competition to commemorate all of the soldiers who fought in the war.”
Te Sing Burley 8.18:
“I was reading some poems about how the war affected families. I wrote
my poem to express the feelings that resulted from the war.”
Daniel Godfrey 8.18:
“I watched clips on World War
One on YouTube. That is why
I wrote this poem, because
we were recently learning
about World War One in
History. I was interested in
soldiers who were so
desperate to leave the war
that they were willing to
injure themselves to be sent
home.”
BUMPER THEATRE REVIEW SECTION!!
In October, there was an opportunity to go on a
trip to the hilariously funny, ‘The Play That Goes
Wrong.’ The mood of the show is astoundingly
comical; from the moment you walked into the
auditorium, you could tell something was going
to go wrong.
The show is a fun attempt to try and put on a
murder mystery extravaganza but as you can
tell from the title, the play does go wrong.
Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong in
this production but that is the intention of the
writers.
The year is 1930ish and on the night of Charles
Haversham’s engagement party, he has been
found dead in his parlour. All the guests to the
party have been cut off from the outside world
due to a horrendous snow storm. So you have
the perfect setting and plot for a murder
mystery… what can go wrong?
Of course, all the things that do go wrong are
well planned by the theatre company and they
are all part of the script and the overall plan and
plot. Everything had to be precise and the timing
had to be slick and well co-ordinated as Mr
Melvin pointed out. There are ‘dead’ bodies,
collapsing sets, wild snowstorms and more.
Timing is crucial in this sort of play as without slick timing it does not add to the sense of mystery
and humour.
There is SCANDAL, CHEATING, MURDER, INTRIGUE, DISTRESS, MELODRAMA!!!
By the end of the show nearly all the stage had collapsed and the actors have delivered an exciting
and exhilarating production that had us all laughing until we were practically crying. It was one of
the funniest shows we have ever seen.
Our thanks to Mr Melvin for arranging the trip - it was great!
Ben Roden 10.28
Pag e
Theatre trip to ‘The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party’
On Monday, December 8th, 40 Year 7 and 8 boys went to the Linbury Studio
Theatre in Covent Garden, which is part of the world famous Royal Opera House.
We went to see a performance of ‘The Mad
Hatter’s Tea Party’, performed and staged by
one of the very best dance companies in the UK.
The company took the story from ‘Alice In
Wonderland’ and adapted it to the stage of this
experimental theatre arena. Through the music
and dance and the bizarre costumes and props,
this company put on a SMASH HIT!.
This is what our students had to say about this production in their reviews:
“The show was very good”; “Fantastic, amazing, very funny and enjoyable, highly
recommended”; “A truly great show to go and watch”. One boy said that he was
‘blown away’ with the performances,
especially the Hip Hop dancing.
All the boys liked the twins in the
show and agreed that their dancing
was ‘awesome’ and that they stole
the show.
We had such an amazing time and we are so lucky to receive all the cut-price
tickets from Mousetrap Theatre Projects throughout the year. We all look forward
to Mr Melvin organising more theatre trips in 2015.
REMEMBER: THERE IS NOTHING TO BEAT OR RIVAL LIVE THEATRE AND PERFORMING ARTS IN AND AROUND LONDON!!
7.11 students and Mr Melvin
PS - if you are interested in seeing live
theatre in London, see Mr Melvin and he
will try to include you in an upcoming
theatre trip.
5
Pag e
Puzzle Page
ARE YOU A PUZZLE-MASTER? Try your hand at our puzzle page...
Sudoku—easy!
Christmas anagrams
How do you think you did? Under 10’s can
contact the editor (Mr Elstub) at the
school and will receive a prize if they have
all answers correct!
6
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7
Mastermind 2014
Each year we hold 3 mega-competitions to test and challenge
students’ abilities to the full. The Short Story Competition and
Dragons’ Den tend to reward innovation, whereas Mastermind
rewards straight-forward knowledge and learning. This year’s
nail-baiting final was held before a packed audience in the Great
Hall, with the winner, perhaps surprisingly, coming from the Lower
School.
The competition began way back in September when the form
group stage took place. Having identified the winner in each form
group, we moved on to the year group finals. The year group
winners (and subsequent finalists) were: BRENDAN JONES 7.8,
EMMANUEL AMADI 8.7, SHEREEFDEEN JINADU 9.31, KACPER GIL
10.M2, APIWAT CHANYACHARUNGCHIT 11.T1 and MEDRIC ADJOH
13A.
With specialist topics ranging from the European Union to Formula
1, the finalists all had to show their expert knowledge on a topic of their own choice. The
competition really hotted-up in the second round, when each contestant faced one minute of
questions on general knowledge. In the end the winner came from...Year 8. With a stunning 15
points across the two rounds, Emmanuel Amadi took the champion’s prize and with it the stunning
prize of a high-spec Raleigh bicycle.
The competition was a great advert for the level of intellect we have amongst students at
Tenison’s. With a demanding standard set right from the off, it would have been easy for our
finalists to fall by the wayside. All of them, however, showed steel and a cool nerve to answer the
questions fired at them. Congratulations to all of them and let’s hope the Short Story Competition
can prove just as competitive.
Mr Elstub (Deputy Head)
Leisure & Tourism Trip to Madame Tussauds
Ms Emmett’s Year 11 Geography class were lucky enough to visit one of London’s most
popular tourist sights - the sensational Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum on Baker
Street. We saw a range of great waxworks whilst there, some of them scarily like the
people they were representing. Of course, there was a more serious purpose than just
having fun - we were trying to find out what type of attractions they offer to what type
of tourists. My favourite part of the trip was the
so-called horror walk which caused us to scream
when the actors jumped out at us. It was much
scarier than we had imagined.
Madame Tussaud’s is definitely to be recommended
for people of all ages as it’s fun trying to see how
many stars you can recognise and name. Thanks to
Ms Emmett for taking us along - we learnt a lot while
there.
Alijandro 11.10
A Church of England secondary
school for boys (and girls from
2015)
55 Kennington Oval
Kennington
London SE11 5SR
Phone: 020 7735 3771
E-mail: [email protected]
Founded over 300 years ago by Thomas
Tenison, Archbishop of Canterbury,
Tenison’s has continued to provide a
high quality education for boys aged
11 - 19, with girls admitted in the Sixth
Form.
As a centre for learning, academic
success takes place within a stimulating
and happy environment, which encourages full development of abilities,
personality and talents.
For further information about
admissions, please feel free to contact
Mrs Arnold at the school.
‘Justice, Mercy and Humility’
Parents and Staff Association – dates for your diary!!
We can only improve the school if we know what parents and carers are thinking.
Please attend PSA meetings so your voice is heard.
Upcoming dates:
Wednesday 21st January
All meetings start at 6.30pm and run for no more than one hour.
Meetings take place in Room 3. Please attend – your presence is vital!
Mr Elstub, Deputy Headteacher
Website
In response to feedback from the PSA, we have made further changes to the website which we
think will make it easier for parents/carers to find the information they want. You will soon be
able to see a STOP PRESS ‘ticker’ where all essential information will go, for example if school
is closed for any reason, dates for parents’ evenings etc. Another change is that we have added
a tab for HOMEWORK. This tab will take you to Show My Homework, the new system we are
using to ensure that homework is completed to a high standard. Show My Homework will allow
parents and carers to know on the day what homework their child has and when it’s due. Make
sure you receive your login details and contact Ms Emmett at the school if you have any
queries. We hope it will be of help to you.
Please do contact Mr Elstub at the school with any further suggestions about the website.