After months of project management, installing weather sensors, coding and web development, our team of Year 13’s have finally gone live with their website which can be found here

This is a truly remarkable achievement and we will be looking for recognition beyond the school. The students have needed minimal supervision, and watching them working on the project it is easy to imagine them in highly technical professional roles in the future.

Well done to Devayan P, Henry O, George A, Sam P and Isabella B.

This week we feature Thanisk in Year 7 who has been shortlisted in the final of this year’s World Class Schools Essay Competition. His essay will now be judged by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, Professor of English Literature at Oxford University. What an achievement! A huge well done to Thanisk. 

If you would like to nominate someone for the student spotlight, please email Melissa.holian@sandringham.herts.sch.uk with any details and/or photographs.

Oaklands College is running a National Saturday Club’s Art and Design club which is absolutely free to students age 13-16 yrs.  It starts on the 14th January and is a weekly two hour session every Saturday.  Students will have the opportunity to fully explore all the elements of art and design, mix with children of their own age and develop both their skills and confidence all for free. This is a fantastic opportunity for those who love art. You can find out more and sign up here

As mentioned in the Headlines, former student Emma F is now working for Mind in Mid Herts, the local Mind charity, as a Fundraising and Communications Officer, and would like to promote their family friendly fun run taking place on Sunday 4th December in Clarence Park. The run is 3.7km and is for all abilities. Registration opens at 10.15am and the race starts at midday. Please scan the QR code above for more details. You can run or walk the route and there are medals and goody bags for taking part. Thanks for alumni Emma for highlighting this event.

It is the Sandringham School Christmas Fair this Saturday from 11am until 3pm and we are delighted to let you know about our Christmas raffle – back for second year with more fabulous prizes. Tickets can now be bought via ParentPay for £1 each. Each ticket purchased online will be allocated a paper ticket and added to those bought at the Fair on Saturday. The draw will be made on Friday 16th December and winners notified by email. We are very grateful to everyone who has donated a prize. These include:

Sunday afternoon tickets for Pub in the Park 2023, Panto Tickets for 4 at the Sandpit theatre, Christmas Hamper, Designer Christmas Cake, Trip to the Royal Courts of Justice in London, Cut and Finish at Mosaic Hairdressers, Free Pilates classes, Facial or Manicure, 2 months free bootcamps, Meal at Verdis, Take away voucher from Nouvelle Lounge, Headshot Studio Photography session, 5 hours dog training, Wine tasting event, Bottles of Italian Wine, Signed Starfolk books and more!

Every penny raised from the Christmas Fair and from this raffle goes towards supporting the school and its students, so please do get involved. Thank you and merry Christmas

The Fo$S Team.

As mentioned in the Headlines, one of our former students Madeline, has been in touch regarding an important research study that she is conducting. She is now a trainee clinical psychologist at the University of Oxford, and looking into the self-blame and trauma symptoms in parents of young people with anorexia nervosa. She writes " we hope that gaining understanding around this topic will help support carers in the future. For instance, by identifying those more at risk of carer burden and providing increased support or intervention, which in turn could improve the young person’s outcomes. The study involves an anonymous questionnaire which covers a number of topics including demographic information, information about the young person’s eating disorder, information about their mental health, and any thoughts around self-blame." You can find out more by clicking on the QR code above and we wish Madeline all the best in completing her report. 

Fawcett are still in this lead this week with an impressive 7,920 points so far this term with Austen, Shakespeare and Newton not far behind. Well done to Freddie B in 7T this week who gained 14 house points and 7S, 9F and 7F with the highest average points (61.3, 59 & 56.5 respectively.) Elgar won this week’s house points overall (1255) and Turing won the ‘maths puzzle’ of the week. In other news 7H and 8E won the house football for their years. 

UPCOMING EVENTS:

• Girls house football – (Year 9 & 10 – WED 14th December)
• MFL house competition – TBC
• Photography competition – TBC
• House maths – After Xmas
• Staff bake off

Congratulations to the following students who have recently passed music examinations.

Alex S, Year 11, Grade 7 Violin – Merit

Hayden W, Year 11, Grade 6 Violin – Merit

Annabelle N, Year 9, Grade 3 Piano – Merit

Atharva K, Year 11, Grade 3 Piano – Merit

In other Music News, Year 13 A Level Musicians have been studying the music of British jazz musician Courtney Pine. They have written some interesting articles about his life and music which you can read here if you are interested!

Well done to everyone who entered last week and got the answer right!  This week's puzzle is shown above.  For every entry you will receive 1 house point, if you answer correctly you will win 2 housepoints and if you are the fastest person to answer the puzzle correctly then you will win 5 house points!  To enter, simply scan the QR code and fill out the google form.  Good luck! Why not play at home and see who is the quickest to get the answer?

A huge thank you for all the bottle tops you donated. Our D&T Faculty have had a great time using them on the heat press to make some abstract art. Great to see another Sustainability project taking place at the school.

For Pastoral Review Day we set students the task of completing an activity each from our Super Curriculum website.  What can I say? We were so impressed with the number of activities that students undertook! Over 1000 activities were logged and it was great to see so many students taking the opportunity to explore their subjects further and delve into subjects they hadn’t previously.  House Points have been awarded to all those students who completed a task and for 7N, 8H & 8J, 9F, 10H, 11S and 12E, who had the highest engagement across their year groups, more house points have been awarded.   Some students have now completed 3 activities and gained their Super Curriculum achievement on ePraise.

But I think the last word should go to the students:

It was fascinating to see snowy parts of our planet, since we don’t have much snow in the UK. It’s always nice to discover new things about our world that you might never know about before,  it’s a way to be more immersed in our world’s many wonders

This activity made me revisit some old [topics] and made sure I wouldn’t forget Yr7 French.

I think it was interesting watching a musical, as normally I don’t. I feel like the dynamics of the songs really illustrated the atmosphere within the specific scenes.

As mentioned in the Headlines- next Friday 9th December, is Christmas Jumper Day. Students are asked to come in regular uniform (including blazers) but can wear a Christmas Jumper or wear Christmas themed accessories. A donation of £1 is suggested on ParentPay or you can donate more for Save the Children if you wish. 

On Thursday evening, we welcomed almost 200 students and 300 parents to celebrate the success of our GCSE cohort of 2022. After three years of being unable to hold to ceremony in full, it was fantastic to see all of the students being recognised for their hard work. We were delighted to welcome Deputy Lieutenant, Marion Brown, Vice Chair of Governors at Sandringham School Mrs Chohan to the event and listen to speeches from Head Students Shiam and Sophia and music from our talented pianists, Ryan and Ellen. This was a chance for students to celebrate with their peers and reflect on their journey through KS4 and the amazing results that they achieved. We hope that everyone who attended enjoyed the evening and thank you to all of those involved in organising it. A link to official photographs will follow for those involved as well as details on how those who were unable to attend can get their certificates- but well done to our wonderful students. We are proud of you all.

This week’s whole school theme is Great Learning. Last academic year, Deputy Headteacher, Dr Creaby, and the Professional Learning team created Sandringham’s Great Teaching and Learning Framework. This strategy uses educational researcher Rob Coe's work on ‘What makes great teaching?’ to provide a bespoke strategy for how teachers at Sandringham can teach outstanding lessons. This is something we have used, and will continue to use, to improve our provision for all students. This week, we launched the complimentary Sandringham’s Great Learning Framework, which demonstrates to students what they can do to be effective learners. The students received an excellent assembly from Dr Creaby which exemplified the framework and encouraged students to take responsibility for their learning. We hope that all students use the framework to find some useful advice that will help them make more progress and excel in whatever they would like to achieve. 

Pastoral review day meant a shorter week with no assemblies. However, it provided an opportunity for the school to focus on our pastoral care with a whole school theme of Happiness. Happiness, in the context of mental or emotional states, is positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. Pastoral Review Day provided an excellent opportunity for staff to sit with students and discuss how much they are enjoying their time at Sandringham.  Wellbeing support, extra-curricular activities and careers advice are always discussed so that students can have their say about what the school can do to boost their happiness. 

Our Year 7 & 8 girls took part in house football this week. There were some brilliant team and individual performances and the final results were:

Yr 7: 1st- Hepworth 2nd- Turing 3rd- Elgar

Yr 8 1st- Elgar 2nd- Fawcett 3rd- Austen

We also had Year 9 boys house rugby. It was a superb competition with 3 houses finishing on 14 points and Austen taking the win with most tries scored.

Final results: 1st - Austen 2nd - Fawcett 2nd - Turing 4th- Newton 5th - Elgar 6th - Shakespeare 7th - Hepworth 8th - Johnson

Our annual Service of lessons and carols will take place at St Saviours Church on Monday 12th December at 7pm. This is a wonderful festive event featuring our choirs and small musical ensembles in a celebration of Christmas. Tickets are available via the Sandpit Theatre box office in the usual way but seating will not be allocated. Please visit here for tickets.

Herbert Lemon, Lost-and-Founder at the Grand Nautilus Hotel, knows that returning lost things to their rightful owners is not easy - especially when the lost thing is not a thing at all, but a girl. No one knows what happened to Violet Parma's parents twelve years ago, and when she engages Herbie to help her find them, the pair discover that their disappearance might have something to do with the legendary sea-monster, the Malamander. Eliza P, 7J, who has recently read Malamander says: 'This book draws you in. You can really visualise the monster and the creepy world of Eerie-on-Sea. Anyone who enjoys reading adventure and mystery would like Malamadner.'

FRENCH: Le mot de la semaine: bénin, bénigne 

GERMAN: Das Wort der Woche: gutartig

SPANISH: La palabra de la semana: benigno/a

Thinking Questions

• Languages naturally evolve over time – what factors affect the evolution and use of a language?

B is for… benign [adjective]

Definition: Gentle and kindly.

Example: The doctor had a benign but firm manner.

Synonyms: benevolent, friendly, mild

Antonyms: harsh, unfriendly, unkind

Etymology: From the Latin ‘benignus’, probably originating from ‘bene’ meaning well and ‘genus’ meaning born.

Our u19 Netball team had a very close match on Tuesday. It was a fantastic fight to see us gain a 37-31 win over SAS. OPM - Katherine M & CPM - Yas H. 

Our u16 Performance Squad also had a strong win in the National Plate! OPM - Martha D & CPM - Marelie R and our u14 performance squad had a brilliant game, winning 53-10 Great performances from everyone on the team, taking us through to the next round of SnS plate! POM Sophie B, CPM Daria B

But our u19 Netball Performance Squad saw their run in the national cup come to an end unfortunately losing 40-46 to St Helen & St Katherine. It was a fantastic game but we couldn't come back from our slow start. OPM - Katherine M & CPM - Bryony C.

Our U13 Netball team also put in a good performance in their County Cup game, but unfortunately St Edmunds proved just a little too strong for us and we lost overall. Outstanding performances in attack from OPM Lauren W and CPM Katie J

The U15’s played against Dame Alice Owens in a very competitive match this week. In their first match this season, the team gelled quickly with some excellent passing and defence. The team created some scoring opportunities but it was Dame Alice who converted two of their opportunities. Overall, the team played very well, enjoyed the match and should be very proud of their performance.

The team were delighted to be playing using our new team sticks which are a great improvement on our previous equipment and showed in the power of their passing and control. These have been bought with money left specifically to develop hockey in the school by Nick Pratt, who was an avid hockey player and long-time member of Welwyn Hockey Club.

Congratulations to Maralie Raath for a great week @ItfJunior Johannesburg J3 getting to the finals in the singles and taking the title in the doubles.

Well done to our U13 boys who took part in a County competition at Ridgeway Academy on Monday. They finished 4th in the county overall. Amazing work. There was some amazing Table Tennis played by the U16 Girls in the County Finals as well - coming 3rd overall! Well done Liv, Emma, Roslin and Kaela

The Year 10’s saw defeat in a match against RWP this week. A lot of very good individual performances, and a fantastic effort until the final whistle from those that played.

Our 1st XV also put in a dominant display against a strong St Clement Danes team. The game finished 17-12 with Bedwood scoring a hat trick.

Our Senior Boys Medley Team had a fantastic time taking part in the Essa Swimming Championships at the Aquatic Centre, swimming themselves to 8th in the COUNTRY last week. Well done to Kieran B, Daniel H, Nathanial M and Luke P who did themselves and the school proud.

Our senior girls played in very difficult conditions last week in the 3rd round of the ESFA! Despite an excellent first half performance, they couldn't hang on losing 4-2 to Chesham Grammar. CP - Hettie T & PP - Yas H

The Year 7 A team had a fantastic game to beat Henlow CE Academy 7-2 in Round 4 of the English schools cup. We now go on to round 5! POM - Sam A-A

Well done to the U19 girls football team for beating Haileybury 5-4 in the county cup! PP - Yas H & CP - Katie L.

All the latest performances are on our website, www.sandpittheatre.co.uk, and you can keep up to date with what’s going on by giving us a follow either on Instagram & Twitter or give us a like on Facebook, just search for The SandPit Theatre!

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The box office is open from 11.30am – 3.30pm Monday, Wednesday & Friday. Alternatively, you can call us on 01727 799565 or visit www.sandpittheatre.co.uk

A fun-filled, sugar-fuelled, family-friendly pantomime adventure that reminds us ALL not to take candy from strangers (even if they wow you with a fabulous song and dance number!)

Join ‘Hansel and Gretel’ in a new take on an old favourite; with tasty tunes, magical mayhem, and colourful characters (including a 7-foot yeti!) it’s simply not to be missed!

“Absolutely Incredible” – BBC Three Counties Radio

“Hilarious, Modern… an absolute delight” - Bedford Today

Tickets £12.50-£15

Tickets are available now at www.hanselandgretel.co.uk