Welcome to the Second Year Blog!
In the run up to Christmas, the Music Department at Hampton have been hard at work with our musicians across a range of choirs and ensembles as they prepare for the much-anticipated Carol Service at St Mary’s Church in Hampton next Tuesday, which promises to be a lovely festive treat.
The Second Year pupils are an interesting bunch, with a huge range of passions and interests. This term we’ve been fortunate to hear lots of different ‘Passion Projects’, which is when a member of the tutor group presents on a subject or area that they’re interested in. This year I’ve been fortunate enough to watch presentations on Schrodinger’s Cat, The Eden Project and even Spiders! This week we’ve got four different articles all about passions, I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I did!
As promised, this week we’ve also got a wonderful and detailed report on the Rugby Middlesex Tournament – it sounds like a fantastic day, well done to everyone involved!
Merit Milestones
Another bumper week for merits:
Asher Connor – 10
Joe Wrathall – 10
Sasha Bagrov – 10
Uzair Vali – 10
Finn Timba – 10
Jack Thorne – 10
Riyaan Gajendran – 20
Wyatt Musil – 20
Dan Ellis – 20
Tom Jiang – 20
Finn Timba – 20
Ilakian Dhandapani – 20
Aaron Janoo – 20
Toby Baker – 20
Eddie White – 20
Arjan Chana – 20
Max Miller – 20
Magnus Findlay – 30
Ryan Sumanasekera – 30
James Ayres – 30
Ben Fulford – 30
Ruaan Vamadevan – 30
George Corbett – 30
Leonardo Pereira Xavier – 30
Ian Lu – 30
Ethan Choi – 40
Harry Cole – 40
Reuben Nicholson – 40
Lion Merits
Ian Lu – 10
Naivedya Agarwal – 10
Reuben Nicholson – 10
Liangxu Zhong – 30
TUTOR QUESTION OF THE WEEK
Each week the pupils decide on a question to ask all the Second Year Form Tutors. This week…
What is your favourite biscuit?
- Digestive (including dark choc, white choc, normal choc, caramel – 2W were very specific about this) – Mr Harrison – Dark Chocolate Digestive
- Custard Cream – Mr Worrall
- Oreo – 2H, Miss Tiller
- Cookie
- Other (please specify) – Miss Owen’s favourite is Biscoff
Miss Holt has picked Leibniz biscuits and says, ‘not only are they chocolatey and delicious but they are also named after a philosopher (who the Second Years have all learned about this term)!’
Miss Winstock has gone fancy and picked Milk Chocolate Viennese!
Have you ever had a burning question you’ve always wanted to ask your form tutors?! If so, then please send your suggestions for next week’s Tutor Question Time to b.tiller@hamptonschool.org.uk.
Middlesex Festival
We all got on the coach on Monday morning filled with anticipation, ready for a big tournament ahead. Everyone was nervous but excited as we made the short trip to St James’s School. When we got there, it was boots and mouthguard on and onto the pitch where we would play the games in our group. We were in Group B along with Turing House, St Richard Reynolds and Richmond Upon Thames.
Our first match in our group was Turing House. Everyone believed we could win this game and win our group. We had a strong start immediately on the attack with Patrick J scoring right in the corner. Then minutes later, Oscar G made a great darting run dodging many tackles to score our second. We were very happy at half time. But we let slip after half time as we allowed Turing House’s speedy winger to make a great run along the touchline to score. The game was back on for Turing. Luckily, we managed to dominate the rest of the half with a great try from David T after some excellent teamwork. Game done and 3-1 to us.
Our second game was against St Richard Reynolds and we were certainly in for a treat. We started off well with a try in the first couple of minutes. After that, we couldn’t stop scoring. By the end of the 14 minutes, we had won 9-0 with a great performance from the whole team but particularly Pablo RB scoring 4 tries and making a try-saving tackle. We were elated after a great win and ready to take on Richmond. After a break, we were back to play Richmond who looked like a strong opposition. After a slow start, Oscar G broke the deadlock with a great try, twisting and turning to dodge tackles. In the end it was comfortable for Hampton, winning 4-0 and topping the group with 16 tries scored and only one conceded.
After a lunch, we would see who we were playing in the Cup (the teams which finish top of their group). We were playing London Oratory, Halliford and St Benedict’s. Ready for the game against London Oratory, we made a fast start with Pablo RB scoring a cracking try, making a great run through their team. However, concentration levels dropped with us almost conceding two tries and I made two tackles on their wingers into touch to stop them scoring. We managed to get the job done with Oscar G scoring, along with David T. The game finished 3-1, we were ecstatic and with a great record having not lost a game yet. However, we knew we had our toughest games yet against Halliford and St Benedict’s. We were nervous for the first game against Halliford as we hadn’t beaten them before but we believed after our excellent performances swe could do it this time. It was intense from the start, players battling hard in the rucks and the Hampton forwards were fighting to hold their own in the scrum. All of a sudden, as Pablo RB contested for the ball with Halliford’s winger he caught the kick and went on the most amazing run. Breaking Halliford’s tackles and fending off their defenders, he eventually went down near their try line. However, we soon recovered the ball and Toby B made a great line-break and leap to score in the corner. We were very happy to go 1-0 up but we knew we still had a long way to go. A few minutes later, Halliford’s centre ran through the whole team and scored right on the half time mark. 1-1 at half time, we were happy with that. In the second half, we were defending well but the same player for Halliford made another great run and squeezed it over the line. We were exhausted after an intense game but proud of ourselves after a great performance against a tough opposition.
We had a short break before St Benedict’s. We knew if we could beat St Benedict’s we would win the tournament. However, fatigue took over and we were running out of steam. We ended in disappointment after losing 4-0 to St Benedict’s. We finished third in the tournament, a great achievement, a day to be proud of and which will live long in our memories.
By Alex P (2F)
Hampton Paarlauf
The Paarlauf is a Cross Country race originating in Germany in the mid-twentieth century and is probably one of the most obscure racing formats in Cross Country. In German, it means, ‘pairs running’ because the original format of the race consisted of two people trying to complete as many laps of a circuit as they could in a particular time period. But the way we did it at Hampton on Wednesday was that we had to do as many laps of the School as we could in 24 minutes in teams of three.
The track started at the Old Hamptonians Cricket Club and went down to the far corner of the fields, then, turning right to follow the fence between LEH and Hampton, next, turning right at the end of the 3G and running alongside the History classrooms and finally running next to some of the football pitches, round the Cricket nets and eventually coming back to the start having done 1600 metres. Amongst our team, we could hand over the baton to somebody else at any point in the race as long as we had run at least 400 metres beforehand. This was the first Paarlauf I had done so I was quite excited, I was doing the first leg from the start to about 530 metres into the circuit were Navid (in Third Year) would take over and do the next leg. After waiting for Mr Ting to count down all the way to exactly half past two, we were off and I ran as fast as I could to our change over point, then I handed the baton over and jogged back to the start where we would do it again. This happened several times until Mr Ting sounded the airhorn again and the race was over, we had managed to do three completed laps and about 1500 metres, coming to about 6.2km. In the end, we came inside the top ten which was very good considering there were twenty teams racing and we were racing in the Third Year category. I’m looking forward to the Paarlauf (if I am selected) next year.
By Reuben N (2W)
Passion Projects!
Video Game Design
I love technology (coding/programming) and engineering (designing and using machines to make things). I have found a way to combine these into one hobby – developing games. While I could make robots to carry out simple tasks around the house, I am very interested in trains and planes, especially driving and flying them. This is why the games I make are all based on trains and planes, just transport in general (I am not a fan of cars). I have decided that the easiest and most simple way to make these games is in Roblox Studio. It is a very easy game creation engine to use and, as some of you may think, is not just blocks pieced together – it has advanced way further than that in the past few years.
Using traditional CAD (Onshape) I make the models that I can then import into Studio. These vary from the trains you see on Southwestern Railway (SWR) to the London tube to the Paris metro. I also create different pieces of scenery (like trees and bushes) as well as the stations themselves, possibly my favourite type of building in the world. These stations are made as the platforms themselves, and then I use Roblox’s blocks to create the station buildings, as it is much easier to create brick-like structures like this. Things like ticket machines, being the same everywhere on the National Rail network, are models that I have created once and then either updated to look more realistic or I just keep them the same and use them forever. Trees are by far the hardest to make. Sometimes, I can spend about 15 hours working on one tree, and, as the world is unique everywhere you go, I usually have to make at least 30 different trees to then mix together, they are all slightly different shapes and sizes.
We are now in 2024, and at the beginning of the Summer Holidays. I had an idea – I would create my own game, realistic like British Railway, but a combination of automatic and player-driven trains. This game is still in development and will feature a very small amount of the SWR network, from Hampton Court to Surbiton. My aim for this game is to make it very realistic and have features that no other game on Roblox has. I will not give up on this journey, and I have also got some other developers to help with the coding and modelling parts, to get the game out quicker (hopefully less than a year).
By Alex Z (2P)
Cryptocurrency
Whenever you talk about cryptocurrency, the first thing that comes to mind is Bitcoin. Bitcoin is the first decentralized cryptocurrency; ‘decentralized’ meaning that something can be controlled in many different places – in this case, it is Bitcoin. Bitcoin was invented in 2008 by Satoshi Nakamoto, an unknown person. Use of Bitcoin as a currency began in 2009, with the release of its open-source implementation. This cryptocurrency is an innovative payment network and a new kind of money. In simpler words, it enables people to send money without the interference of banks. It has been stated that this new technology can bring significant change to societies around the world. Another one of Bitcoin’s benefits, is that – unlike central databases, Bitcoin lacks a central point of vulnerability. In the digital world, this means that it prevents any hacker in including invalid transactions. The high security makes the cryptocurrency more reliable and trustworthy. On the other hand, Bitcoin does face some criticism as well. The biggest being its negative impact on the environment; Bitcoin miners rely massively on renewable energy. It consumes a vast amount of electricity to operate the machines as well as to cool the equipment from overheating. Moreover, the majority believes that the pros of Bitcoin outweigh the cons. As a result, they are confident that this complex cryptocurrency will continue to positively impact the world, directly and indirectly.
By Riyaan G (2B)
Game Development
For the past three years I have been interested in game development. In Year 5, I was introduced to scratch at my school. The day I learned about it I went home and watched about an hour of tutorials, experimenting and playing around with the game engine. I would go to school and show my classmates and teachers all the games I had made. In a year I went from making little games to large, more complete games. My best project which was largely inspired by Geometry dash had amassed a measly 200 views. Yet at the time, I felt extremely proud. But then I wanted to take it a step further. In First Year, I realised that Scratch was extremely weak as a game engine since it was extremely hard to produce 3d games and most 3d games on scratch are very low quality. That’s when I learnt that people make games on Unreal Engine. A very powerful game engine used to make triple A games. I was intrigued by this and instantly wanted to get into making games with it. However, I forgot that it would take time to learn a completely different game engine. So, when I loaded it up. I didn’t know what to do. So, I scrapped Unreal Engine, for now, and started to learn Python. It will be a while, however before I go back to Unreal Engine!
By Kavith T (2P)
Wormholes
So, what is a wormhole? It is a solution of the field equations in German-born physicist Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity that resembles a tunnel between two black holes or other points in space-time. Although none has been discovered yet, Albert Einstein predicted the existence of such things. In theory, a wormhole might connect extremely long distance such as a billion-light year, or short distances such as a few meters, or different points in time, or even different universes. Wormholes are formed when two masses apply enough force on space time to create a tunnel connecting distant points. So, the Theoretical Kerr black holes aren’t the only possible cosmic shortcut to the past or future. If you happen to fall into a wormhole, you would be pulled down to particles and energy, falling along with the faster than light speed motion and quantum gravity and the quantum gravitational force of it, within the wormhole. Wormholes sometimes connects blackholes which exists in different parts of space, universe of time. The existence of wormholes could lead to improvement in the understanding of the universe, travel, help us find aliens and possibly help historians find people who lived in a different time period.
By Ian L (2F)
Special Shoutouts!
We love to hear about what you have been getting up to outside of school and to celebrate your successes in the Second Year Blog! Please do send any information about any of your achievements through to Miss Tiller. B.Tiller@hamptonschool.org.uk
Who’s that baby?!
Last week’s baby was Miss Tiller, 2L’s form tutor!
Who do you think it could be this week? Don’t forget, I make all the photos black and white to make it that much trickier!
SHOEBOX Appeal
The 2024 Shoebox Appeal is now live! This Christmas, Form Charity is organising a Shoebox Appeal in aid of Solace Women’s Aid. Solace is a leading specialist charity in the UK supporting women and children experiencing domestic abuse. The lifesaving support that Solace provides to over 20,000 women, children and young people each year is so important.
Each form is being asked to donate three shoeboxes filled with items including stationery, toys, vital hygiene products, games and so much more. What are you waiting for, let’s get filling those shoeboxes!
Innovation Competition
What will Hampton School look like in 100 years?
Do you have an innovative idea that could contribute to a more sustainable future?
Think vertical food gardens on the walls, rain-catching toilets, or maybe even a School-wide composting system that turns cafeteria scraps into energy! The sky is the limit and we would like to see out-of box, creative solutions that might be able to tackle some of the environmental issues that we all face in the future.
- Mission Objective Propose a sustainable solution for a greener future!
- Solo or Team Up? go this mission alone or work with others (maximum 4).
- All year groups are welcome to take part
Please ensure that you submit your ideas by 13 January 2025 through the link here.
There is an awesome prize on offer – beyond the eternal glory of victory!
Riddle of the week
This week Ridhaan G (2F) has sent us a riddle to get our brains moving – see if you can work it out!
Riddle: What question can you never answer yes to?
Find the answer at the end of the blog!
QUIZ OF THE WEEK
Welcome to the Quiz of the Week! Every week, we’ll post five general knowledge questions. Take a look at this week’s questions, have a go yourself or challenge people at home and see if they know the answer.
Points for the Interform Competition will be awarded to the form with the most entries over the term.
This week’s questions come to us from Henry S (2W). Why don’t you have a go and enter your answers here.
Here are the answers to last week’s quiz:
- What was the name of the youngest player to be auctioned in the IPL (cricket)? Vaibav Suryavanshi
- How many matches has Manchester City not won consecutively this season (as of Friday 29 November)? 5
- Who has the most race starts in F1 history? Fernando Alonso
- What is the most recent production from the Junior Theatre Club? The Comedy of Errors
- Which player has won the most NFL titles? Tom Brady
Well done to Sebastian M, Ilakian D, Arjan C, Alex P, Naivedya A and Wilf W who answered everything correctly.
And the answer to Ridhaan’s riddle: Are you asleep yet?
