Anti-Bullying Week – ‘Reach Out’
On Monday, pupils and staff came to school in odd socks to mark the start of National Anti-Bullying Week. This year’s theme was ‘Reach Out’, encouraging children to speak out if they are being bullied and to stand up for others if they see bullying behaviour taking place.
Children have been discussing this in their form times and PSHE lessons this week. We spoke about how we can use our NHP Habits to help us: Acting Responsibly, Being Kind and Courteous and Showing Independence. Here at NHP, we are a community and we all play our part in making sure everyone feels safe and happy here. It is important to feel you can reach out to people if you need help, as well as reaching out to help others in need.
5HP and 5HJ also created acrostic poems in Dig Lit. They had to use their skills for safe researching, formatting documents and saving to Teams!
Read MoreYear 5 Netball Tournament
On Thursday 10th November the Year 5 travelled to Ravenscourt Park to play in a netball tournament against seven other schools. For some pupils this was the first time they had ever participated in a tournament. There were 3 different competitions: the Championship, the Shield and, the Plate. Notting Hill Prep took four teams; entering two teams into the Plate competition which meant NHP Storm and NHP Stars played each other in a close-fought game.
The pupils had the opportunity to practice their versatility throughout the afternoon by playing a variety of different positions on the court. Even under the pressure of a tournament, they took this in their stride and demonstrated great determination and resilience. We came away with a bronze medal in the Plate competition and a silver medal in the Shield competition.
Overall, it was a fantastic afternoon of netball for all of the Year 5 pupils involved. They should all be very proud, well done!
Read MoreArundel House Fundraiser!
On Thursday 10th November, Arundel House hosted their annual House Fundraiser. This year, they supported the charity CPotential, which provides integrated tailored therapy and support to children and young people with movement disorders, due to conditions such as cerebral palsy, global development delay or acquired brain injury.
House Captains Wilf and Wilf chose to focus on the incredible LEGO therapy the charity use to develop social communication skills and also fine motor skills and coordination. Fundraising activities included a collection on the gates to dress up in the colours of the letters L.E.G.O. and a lego-portrait competition. The competition was fierce but well done to our winning entries, featured here. And thank you to everyone who donated, helping to raise £400 for this incredible cause!
You can read more about the fantastic work of CPotential at https://cpotential.org.uk/.
NHP Year 3 Football Tournament
Last Friday we invited 15 other schools to Chiswick Rugby Club to take part in our own Year 3 football tournament. It was a fantastic afternoon with some excellent play on display. NHP finished 3rd in the Plate tournament beating Norland Place 2-0 in their final game. Well done to everyone who took part and congratulations to Latymer Prep who won the overall trophy.
A huge thank you to our Year 8 children who helped support the tournament by refereeing, scoring, timekeeping and being general superstars. They were fantastic ambassadors for the school.
Read MoreComputing news!
This week and next pupils in Year 4-8 have been taking part in the Bebras Computing Challenge. This is an international challenge that introduces computational thinking to students. It is organised in over 50 countries and designed to get students all over the world excited about computing.
Each pupil answers questions online that focus on computational and logical thinking within a 40 minute window, and there are certificates for those that do well and the possibility of being invited to future competitions for those outstanding in their group.
Ms Kirkland
Read MoreNHP’s metacognition event
NHP was delighted to host our first Metacognition event on Wednesday 9th November in partnership with Thinking Matters. Over 30 Heads and teachers from schools all over London and beyond came to NHP to see what being a Thinking School looked like, as they embark on their own thinking school journey.
After a brilliant tour led by the Drive Team and Year 6 pupils, Ms Swales and Miss Chute presented the benefits of being an advanced accredited Thinking School and why it makes NHP a unique place to be, not just for pupils but for teachers too!
Thinking Matters wrote a brilliant paragraph to summarise our event, seen below:
‘In November, we were greeted by Notting Hill Prep, West London, an advanced Accredited Thinking School. As a school that has been embedding Thinking for over 10 years, it was great to see the different stages of their journey and how embedded the tools and habits are within their curriculum and language of learning. Nicola Swales, Deputy Head Academic, talked about the impact of metacognition for Senior School preparation. It was a powerful reminder of ‘why a Thinking School’ and the importance of preparing children for the future and developing their capacities as happy, healthy learners. They want their students to ask a multitude of questions, be curious, to read widely and not be flummoxed by unfamiliar material. How they achieve this is through the use of meta tools – Thinking Hats, Thinking Frames, NHP Habits and P4C. As we walked around the school, with our student guides, we could see all of the meta tools in action being used confidently and dexterously. Arabella Chute, Thinking School Coordinator reiterated the importance of THINK: Tools, Habits, Infusion, Nerds (The Drive Team!) and Knowledge to help embed whole school metacognition.’
Click here for the full article.
Read MoreHalloween at NHP
We’d like to wish all of our pupils, parents and staff a happy Halloween and a big welcome back after half-term!
In true NHP style, all of the buildings were fully transformed with spectacularly spooky decorations, from eyeballs hanging from the trees to a ginormous ghost in front of our Upper School entrance. We would like to thank our incredible Parents’ Association for the effort they put in to bring Halloween to life at NHP.
The children also came into school wearing their best costume (ready for trick or treating later!). Take a look at some of their outfits…
Priya Ahluwalia visits NHP
This morning, British designer, Priya Ahluwalia, came into school to speak to the children in Middle and Upper School in assembly. She spoke about how she started her career in the fashion industry, her studies, setting up her own business and the process of designing clothes. She told the children what inspired her designs: her heritage and the music she loves. She then tasked the children with their own task – to design an outfit inspired by their own musical tastes. Priya will be judging these designs and prizes will be awarded to the winners after half term.
Thank you to Priya for coming to talk to us. It was an inspirational talk and has sparked the creative minds of all our future young designers at NHP! What a fantastic way to end our celebrations for Black History Month.
We would also like to say thank you to our incredible kitchen team for providing the most yummy food in honour of Black History Month. It was fantastic to try a range of delicious dishes to celebrate Black History Month!
Read MoreBlack History Month: Art lessons
As part of Black History Month, Year 2 have been learning about the quilters of Gee Bend in Alabama, USA. The ladies here are from a long line of quilters who, for generations, have been coming together to sew and make quilts. Year 2 learnt how, over a hundred years ago, they did this from old cloth scraps, making quilts to keep themselves warm in the winter. Now their work has become world-renowned and can be viewed in galleries across the globe. Year 2 made their own quilt squares using collage, each table collaborated to choose a colour scheme and then the class put their squares together to make a large class quilt. Each class will put their quilts together to make a whole year collaborative quilt in the style of these amazing African-American artists.
Year 4 have also been busy learning about the artist Augustus Savage. They thought of links between her sculpture ‘The Harp’ (1939) and a hymn they listened to called ‘Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing’, before discovering that this hymn was actually what inspired Savage to make this sculpture. The poem was written by James Weldon Johnson and was written as a song of freedom and liberty for all black people. Year 4 learnt about Augusta Savage’s life growing up in Florida where she used to play in her back garden and make little clay figures. She became an artist and teacher, becoming part of the Harlem Renaissance and opening her own art school in Harlem which paved the way for many other black artists. As a group, Year 4 made their own version of ‘Harp’ by lining up in height order. They then worked collaboratively and used their photo as a plan to make their own clay version of ‘Harp’.
Read MoreSharky and George visit NHP
On Monday morning, the thinking skills of Years 7 and 8 were put to the test. Sharky and George and NHP’s Thinking School worked together to create a unique morning of fast, fun and curious challenges to test the brains.
Using Edward de Bono’s thinking hats, the children were split into groups of 6. They discussed different strategies for each task and the group who collected the most coins were crowned the winners. From building the tallest towers, to memory tests to who could carry the most shoes (not forgetting flipping the frisbee with flippers.) The children worked hard to collaborate and think flexibly to win the gold coins.
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