Football Focus, Cracking Codes & It's Chilly Outside!

Welcome to the Third Year Blog!

Lordy BEANS, it has been cold this week! You’d think such cold would encourage Hamptonians to tuck their shirts in to retain essential body heat (you’d be wrong). You’d think such cold would discourage Hamptonians from flooding outside on to the 3G at lunchtime (again, you’d be wrong, although they are less likely to take their shoes off, being willing to accept the claimed discomfort that wearing shoes while playing football causes). You’d think such cold would mean that Mr Hooper would wear tracksuit bottoms while standing on the sidelines of a football pitch coaching the U14As but, yet again, you would be wrong (even if you should be right).

It was cold enough for it to snow for 15 gloriously exciting minutes. Fat flakes fell past the classroom windows and the words ‘Snow Day’ crept unbidden into the minds of every single pupil in the School (and, let’s be clear, the minds of a few teachers. The majority of teachers’ minds? Surely not!). Unfortunately (for the pupils, of course, not the teachers… no, no, no. Not the teachers), the flakes turned to slush and even the most convincing of pupils would not be able to make a genuine case for a ‘Slush Day’.

While the hardiest/most foolish Hamptonians remained on the 3G, it was certainly cold enough to drive many pupils inside at lunchtime, which was remarkably convenient as it was No Limits Week this week (not to be confused with No Limits Lessons Day, which is completely different, of course). No Limits Week is when the pupils are encouraged to try new clubs and activities they may not have done so before.

The reality is that the sheer variety of the lunchtime clubs on offer and the range of experiences they can provide is remarkable. This week a Third Year Hamptonian could have spent Tuesday lunchtime at Croquet Club, before a lunchtime of mental gymnastics at Cryptic Crossword Club on Wednesday, followed by planning their future investment strategies in Junior Finance Club on Thursday, and then finally being able to choose between a Friday lunchtime at Young Philosopher’s Club discussing whether God’s claimed omnipotence means that he could create a stone so heavy that even God himself couldn’t lift it, or alternatively letting off steam with Mr Berezhnoi’s Breakdancing, Locking and Popping Club.

A truly well rounded experience. You could even fit in a Monday lunchtime’s worth of hacking your mates down on the 3G with no shoes on alongside all that. What a life!

Heads of year Message

Third Year pupils were in the Main Hall on Thursday morning for important briefings on GCSE option choices and HELP Level 2 projects. GCSE option choices are due in January, so we encourage all pupils to start thinking about these now, giving them plenty of time to have conversations with subject teachers and parents to inform the decision. Dr Hendry will write to parents before the end of term with full details of the GCSE options process. Mr Hill encouraged pupils to consider undertaking a HELP level 2 project. Sign up for this is also due in January. Further details are available on SharePoint here.

Well done to everyone for completing the Bebras UK Challenge earlier this week and the GCHQ National Language Competition throughout this week… on top of No Limits Week.

No Limits Week

We have been delighted to see Third Year pupils engaging with No Limits Week and using it is an opportunity to try new activities. We hope everyone enjoyed themselves in the process and our sincere thanks go to the teachers who put on such wonderful and varied co-curricular activities. Having tried something new, our hope is that pupils will keep going to the club(s) that they enjoyed – this could be the start of a lifelong hobby, interest or passion! Third Years – these are the things that will enrich your lives, so the time you invest in them now will pay dividends in the future.

Uniform

In the colder weather, pupils are allowed to wear sensible hats, coats and gloves to keep warm on their journeys to and from school, but they must revert to full school uniform throughout the school day whilst on site. This means they must wear a school tie (properly tied) and school blazer, with a white shirt (tucked in and buttoned up), smart black trousers, dark socks and smart black shoes (non-trainers). If they are cold, it is permissible to wear a vest under the shirt and/or a black V-neck jumper. Coats should not be worn inside the school buildings.

Absences

If your child will be absent from School for any reason, please complete the absence reporting form, which can be found on My School Portal, on every morning of absence. For absences other than illness (e.g. if a pupil has a medical appointment during School hours) notice of this should be given in advance wherever possible. For planned absences, please contact the Heads of Year requesting the absence with as much notice as possible.

We hope that everyone enjoys the weekend.

Best wishes

Mr T Rigby & Mr H Moore

Football Focus

On Thursday, the U14B team played Glyn School. At the beginning, we were dominating the match, piling pressure onto the opposition. Eventually, with a cross into the box and a few rebounds, Rayan A scored the first goal of the game. However, right after that, they immediately responded with their own goal from a one on one. We kept putting pressure onto them from there on and Robert W found himself running down the line and scored Hampton’s second goal.

However, in the second half, Glyn began to slowly dominate, scoring goal after goal, with some excellent play by their forwards and a few clumsy mistakes from Hampton. In the end, the game finished 4-2, with Glyn claiming a hard fought victory. The U14Bs have now won five and lost five games, so we will look to bounce back against Ardingly on Saturday!

By Rayan A (3G)

Cracking Codes

This week, Third Year Hamptonians stepped into the world of cryptography, linguistics, and problem-solving as they participated in the GCHQ National Language Competition – a nationwide event designed to inspire the next generation of linguists and analysts.

Organised by GCHQ, one of the UK’s intelligence agencies, the competition invites pupils from schools across the country to tackle a series of language-based puzzles which range from deciphering rare languages to cracking codes in entirely invented tongues. Well done to everyone who took part in the competition and showing that languages aren’t just about words – they’re about unlocking secrets!

Drama Club

The Drama Club’s mind-blowing and completely improvised show, “The Houses of Doom,” will be performed on 4 December! With no script, witness the chaos unfold as two rival estate agencies fight only for profit. The performance promises weird house touring, outrageous scams and the most ridiculous bidding wars you’ve ever seen over some truly crazy properties.

Make sure you come along!

By Shaurya D (3H) and Harry C (3J)

Fingers on Buzzers!

A big shout to one of our Intermediate Quiz teams (George W, Ryan S, Alexander A and Dante A) who answered plenty of fiendishly difficult quiz questions in the first round of their Schools’ Challenge Quiz campaign against Bolton School for Girls – onwards to the next round!

Bebras Challenge

Across the course of this week, most, if not all, of the pupils competed in the UK Bebras competition.  I personally competed in the Intermediate ages 12-14 challenge along with the First, Second and Third years.

This competition consists of 15 questions ranging in difficulty and they’re all logic-based, problem-solving questions. Bebras is an international competition with the top scores receiving certificates and some even advancing to the next round! I really enjoyed doing the Bebras challenge as I love problem solving questions and the range of question types went from beavers and postmen to cars and parties! Overall, I loved this competition and can’t wait for the results to come in by the end of this half term!

By Noah M (3F)

Teaching about the Holocaust

On Tuesday 18 November, four Hampton School pupils, me included, travelled to JW3 in north London to attend the “Teaching about the Holocaust” conference with Mr Lawrence from the History department for our project about the Kindertransport. We started by listening to some interesting talks from people around the world about using “testimonies” to teach a range of school pupils. A testimony is an interview with a survivor or relative of a Kindertransport survivor. We then had a vegetarian lunch and time to prepare our own speech. Our speech went brilliantly! We had plenty of hard questions to face after the talk but we dealt with them well and even met a survivor of the Kindertransport. We had an amazing time and learnt more about the importance of teaching all parts of the Holocaust.

By Ben F (3G)

Four Truths and a lie

Last week, our liar was Mr Leafe. These were his claims:

• Once Mr Leafe met Harry Maguire at a black-tie function and strongly felt that at that moment they were essentially equals
• Mr Leafe has never eaten a yoghurt
• If Mr Leafe hears the phrase ‘sweet treats’ he physically shivers
• Mr Leafe used to be called Mr Leaf, but changed his name by deed poll as he felt his original name was ‘too common’
• Mr Leafe once won a head-to-head mascot race dressed as a duck, defeating a crocodile

Well, let’s pick the bones out of all this.

Firstly, while in terms of physical head size, you could argue that Mr Leafe and Harry Maguire are absolute opposites, let alone equals, in the moment of being faced with the international footballer at a black tie function, Mr Leafe did indeed feel the absolute equal of the man. One would assume that there would not be yoghurt served as a pudding at a black tie function, but if there had been, Mr Leafe would not have eaten the yoghurt. Or if he did, it would have been breaking the habit of a lifetime (if ‘not eating yoghurt’ can be described as a habit?). If, however, there were ‘sweet treats’ on the menu, the mere phrase would have caused Mr Leafe to shiver with a frisson of awkward, unexplainable, dread.

Moving away from the black tie do to an entirely different environment, Mr Leafe did once win a head to head mascot race dressed as a duck. Be careful not to ask Mr Leafe about this, as his defeat of the crocodile was so crushing that he is only to keen to offer a blow-by-blow account of the race, which may not be the best use of your time.

What all this means is that Mr Leafe’s real name has always been Mr Leafe. He was never Mr Leaf. And, if he was, he would not have felt the need to change it to Mr Leafe because Mr Leafe is, as we all know, a man of the people.

This week our willing liar is Mr Berezhnoi. Can we possibly believe any of this? At least there are only two truths and a lie this time…

• Mr Berezhnoi previously worked on a farm
• Mr Berezhnoi is utterly, UTTERLY terrified of volcanoes
• Mr Berezhnoi is a blue belt in Jiu-Jitsu

Connection Corner

A big shout out to everyone who had a go at the last Connection Corner and well done those of you who answered all the questions correctly. Lots of you guessed that the answers were all Tube Stations but the correct connection was that they’re all related to the board game Monopoly! Merits go to Rishi V, Josh D C, George T, Jonathan T, Jack T, Alex P, Alex Z, Mehrad M, Harry M, Caesar C and Liangxu Z.

Another tricky one this week, have a go and see if you can spot the connection:

Have a great weekend!