The Bulletin Edition 13

Happy New Year to all! I hope that you have had a restful and enjoyable festive season. To those whom I haven’t yet managed to greet in person, I extend my warmest wishes for 2025. May it be a year filled with happiness, success, and inspiration for us all here at Hampton Pre-Prep & Prep.

As we dive into the Spring Term, there is much to look forward to. Our assembly theme for this term for example is “Technology,” a word that encompasses so many intriguing and varied guises. From the most cutting-edge innovations to the everyday gadgets that have become part of our lives, we will be exploring how technology shapes our world and sparks our imaginations. Both Mrs Murphy and I introduced the theme in the Pre-Prep & Prep assemblies this week. I have no doubt that my colleagues and our pupils will bring their usual curiosity and creativity to this theme when it is their turn to showcase their thinking, and I am excited to see where their explorations take them as the assembly schedule unfolds this term.

Speaking of technology, on our first day back this week I was both amused and delighted to hear a tale of some highly successful gift giving over the holidays, which seems to have perfectly presaged our assembly theme for the term. A boy in Year 6, in a wonderfully Hampton Prep-type twist, asked for (and received!) an air fryer for his birthday. Now, as someone with a birthday slap bang in the middle of the year myself, I’ve always thought that those with birthdays so close to Christmas get a bit of a raw deal. But in this case, it appears the air fryer has provided nothing but much longed-for golden, crispy joy! The idea of a young boy requesting kitchen tech as a gift captures in part, I believe, our unique spirit where thinking outside the box (or, in this case, inside the fryer) is the norm. And while I don’t expect air fryers to become standard issue in the James Hall at lunch any time soon, I do look forward to plenty of other surprises and delightful moments in the weeks ahead!

Happy New Year to you all! I hope you had a wonderful break filled with rest and relaxation. It has been such a pleasure catching up with the children and hearing all about their exciting holiday adventures. We’re preparing to elect new members for our School Council, the forum designed to encourage children to share their ideas and suggestions for improving school life. Each term, two children from every class, starting from Reception, are elected by their peers to represent their class on the council. School Council provides a valuable platform for Hampton Pre-Prep pupils to contribute ideas that enhance our school and support the wider community, including the charities they choose to champion. Our new spring term School Council members will be announced on Friday, 17 January.

As shorter week but nevertheless a busy one! To celebrate the new year, we watched the fireworks in London on New Year's Eve. We loved the bright colours and the loud bangs. We also looked at how other countries celebrate the new year. We learned that grown-ups make new year promises called "resolutions" and thought it would be fun to make our own wishes for the year. Each of us thought hard about what we wanted to achieve and wrote our wish on a star, which we put up in our classroom. We also painted our hands and made handprint pictures with the number 2025 to create a special calendar! We have enjoyed sharing our holiday news with our friends.

We have had a fabulous start to 2025 in Reception! We hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and are ready for an exciting and productive year ahead. The children have returned to school well rested and full of stories of the most wonderful Christmas holidays; we have greatly enjoyed sharing their Holiday Snapshots! We all wrote special New Year Promises – you’ll be pleased to know that lots of the children promised to help more around the home. We do hope that you see plenty of these promises in action - do let us know with a Wow moment!

Year 1 have kicked off 2025 with enthusiasm and a super attitude to learning! In mathematics, we have been learning all about “teen” numbers, how they are made up of tens and ones, and comparing numbers and groups of objects using a range of resources. Keep it up, Year 1! In English we wrote about our New Year’s resolutions, and the children were incredibly thoughtful and reflective in their ideas.  Targets included remembering finger spaces, starting each letter on the line, practising maths skills and improving their swimming. 

Year 2 have kicked off the new year with some new topics for this half term and excitement is brewing. In humanities, we are learning about significant individuals. To find out about the variety of people who have made an impact on the world we will be learning to use our historical investigative skills. This afternoon, the children were historical detectives, examining a range of images to reveal this week’s significant individual: Alan Turing. Not only did they learn about his tremendous work during World War II but they also made their own codes and tried to crack their friend’s codes! The children are excited to find out who next week’s significant individual will be…!