What a way to wind up this first half term of 2026! Our annual Health and Wellbeing Week is always a highlight, but this year it’s been bigger and better than ever.
A huge thank you goes to our award-winning PE department for their impeccable organisation of a brilliant week, and to all our families who joined us… in the rain for a very wet walking bus through the woods on Wednesday, for family tennis on Tuesday, family swimming on Thursday, and badminton this morning to start the school day with a racket!
The power of always trying your best was the lesson from Olympic golden girl Anna Hopkin MBE when she kicked off our week on Monday with a high-energy sponsored fitness circuit in our Sports Hall, a swim squad showcase in our pool, and an amazing motivational assembly – complete with nail-biting, heart-pumping, real-time footage of her 4x100m win alongside Adam Peaty at the Tokyo Olympics!
Anna, who won gold in 2021 with the mixed medley relay team, challenged our children to believe anything is possible – as long as they try their best. “I first joined a swimming club around your age,” said Anna. “Do you think I knew then I would win an Olympic gold medal? I never in my wildest dreams thought I would! But you can do anything if you put in 10 out of 10 effort, every time.”
It was organised chaos in the Sports Hall this morning as our classes took part in our annual Inter-House Pancake Races, complete with frying pans and real pancakes!
The children had to run an obstacle course, over a springboard, twice round a hoop, and pause to toss their pancakes in the air, before sprinting back to join their House team-mates at the start line – all ably assisted and cheered on by their House helpers from Prep 6. Special mention to Mrs Buchanan who was up at the crack of eggs, sorry, dawn this morning making – yes, actually making – the pancakes for the races!
And yesterday it was the turn of nutritionist Lottie, from our super school dinners team Thomas Franks, who dropped into our food technology suite with chef Keith to show the children how to rustle up healthy homemade hummus for a protein-packed snack.
Each class took turns blitzing chickpeas and butterbeans, adding garlic, a squeeze of lemon, chopped coriander and a kick of spice and, best of all, getting to taste-test their concoctions afterwards with a piece of pitta or a crunchy crudité dipped in. Delicious!
