Nothampton High School
High News

Friday 10 December 2021

As I write this we are currently preparing for our annual Chemistry Christmas spectacular, which, this year, has the theme of ‘The Magic of Christmas’.  Of course, I have taken this as another way to get the magic of Harry Potter into my year, lessons and life, and we have written the experiments around some of the spells from the films.  We have included Agua Menti, Expecto Patronum and Incendio to name but a few.  I often think back to my own school days and my Latin lessons when I hear the spells and have a wry smile when I can make the links.

I often wonder what other links I can make in lessons and in school to enlighten and enrich the Chemistry that we teach.  I don’t find it easy to write, but I have found lots of links between Chemistry and the 12 Days of Christmas, so I thought I might share a few of them.

On day one the gift was a partridge in a pear tree. In GCSE and A level Chemistry, we make a wonderfully smelly substance called an Ester, and if you ask your parents they might be able to tell you most esters smell like pear drops.  You can see where my tenuous links are going now!

On the second, third and fourth day of Christmas, the gifts were all feathered birds of some sort.  I’d like to draw a parallel here with Chemistry, but the more obvious link is the physics of flight.  Planes aren’t technically designed to fly, but science made that happen.  Aren’t we glad that those wonderful physicists made it happen, or we would never be able to escape around the world?

Please click here to read the full blog.

Mrs Hodgetts-Tate
Head of Science Faculty and Teacher of Chemistry

The week ahead

Monday 13 December
Senior School Assembly
Junior School House Singing
Junior School Christmas Performance Dress Rehearsal

Tuesday 14 December
Charity Christmas Market (morning break and lunchtime)
Nursery and Pre School Christmas Crafts
Junior School Christmas Celebration

Wednesday 15 December
Christmas Carol Concert

Thursday 16 December
Santa Fun Run
Gatsby Theatre Trip

Friday 17 December
Senior School Assembly
Junior Christmas Parties
Christmas Break Begins

High School>Hogwarts!

The Senior Hall was transformed into the Grand Hall this lunchtime, to commemorate Demeter’s House victory this term. Demeter were rewarded with a celebratory lunch in a Harry Potter-themed Hall, with lots of tasty treats on offer for all!

The hall was expertly decorated, with even the likes of Professor Snape on hand to toast the winning House! Congratulations Demeter!

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

Chemistree Christmas Cracker a fantastic success!

It was wonderful to see so many students and their familie members at Mrs H-T’s Chemistree Christmas Cracker on Thursday!

We are excited to bring you a full recording of the event next week, but in the meantime, we hope you enjoy a selection of photos from the Harry Potter-inspired event!

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

See all photos

Sixth Form Christmas Wreath Making for Charity

On Tuesday 7 December, some Year 13 students set off to make some Christmas wreaths for charity. I found it interesting to see how wreaths are made and great fun to have a go ourselves (albeit a little messy!).

It was inspiring to see everyone getting creative with their decorations and the wide range of designs produced were just stunning. It was a truly enriching experience and I’m glad to be able to bring some Christmas cheer to those in less fortunate situations this Christmas.

Mo
Year 13

Students take part in annual GDST Day of Dance

What an amazing opportunity for six of our students at the GDST’s Annual Day of Dance 2021, this year held at Base Studios London. We had a very early start but the students were excited to learn new skills and push themselves in all aspects of dance.

The day comprised of three workshops, working with industry experts from musical theatre professionals to contemporary masterclasses and commercial artists, all experts in their field and certainly pushing the students to try new styles of dance.

The students were incredible and even had teachers from other schools commenting on their talents and abilities. I’m positive they all had a wonderful day and they were very grateful for this opportunity. Thank you to Kira at Putney High School for organising such a brilliant event and, of course, to Jasmine, Kathryn, Katie, Lucie, Ques -Li and Rosie for representing Northampton High this year.

You were ALL amazing!

Mrs Jones
Teacher of Dance

Thank you from High Boutique!

On behalf of The High Boutique, I would like to say a massive thank you to everyone who stopped by our launch event last Friday, as well as those who made some purchases! We managed to raise over £100 for Baby Basics and hope to sell more clothes in the coming weeks and months.

Also, we would love to accept any of your old or unwanted clothing/accessories/shoes whether they be from you, your siblings, or your parents (with permission of course!). Please do contact us if you have any queries or you’d like to donate anything at thehighboutique@gmail.com.

Have a lovely weekend!

Grace
High Boutique

Charity Christmas Market launch - Tuesday 14 December

This year, the World Challenge team is hosting a Charity Christmas Market to help raise vital funds for the Tanzania trip in 2022.

Next Tuesday 14 December at 10:10-10:30 (morning break) and 11:45-13:00 (lunchtime) there will be 20 stalls with games for all ages to enjoy in the Senior Hall.

There will be baked goods, a raffle/tombola, homemade gifts, pin the red nose on Rudolph, and many, many more! We even have Muddy Puddle Jewellery Co, North Tree, Calmer Crafting, High Boutique and Simply Steph featuring on the stalls.

Make sure you bring your pennies with some stalls also accepting contactless payments!

Whether it is the perfect Christmas present that you haven’t quite found yet or a treat for yourself, this is going to be the Christmas Market that you will never forget.

This is a very exciting student event for pupils in Year 4 through to Year 13, with all staff being welcome too!

Many thanks for your support. Please do get in touch if you have any questions.

Stephanie, Y13 
World Challenge Team

High Sports

U15 Hockey: The U15 Hockey team showed amazing grit, determination and dominance in the recent Ratcliffe Tournament. The match against Princethorpe helped to embed the confidence – they took the lead early on and won the match convincedly 3-0. Against Ratcliffe, the strength continued with a very early goal within the first minute. From then on the team never looked in any doubt to win the event. The Player of the Match went to Shruthi.

U13 Hockey: Under 13 As had four great games in a tournament this Saturday hosted by Ratcliffe College. The outstanding play resulted in three wins, a draw and an overall victory placing 1st! Charlotte won Player of the Match in all the games, and she also scored one goal, along with Isla who scored six, Khushi who also scored six goals and Isla who scored two. Lexi

1st XI Hockey: On Thursday 9 December, Northampton High School faced Wellingborough in their last game of the hockey season. With an intense training session before, we were set to face Wellingborough. Everyone in their positions and the support on the sidelines, the whistle went. In the first two minutes, Maddie scored an amazing goal on her reverse. Shortly after, Wellingborough scored a goal. Which meant we were back to being even, 1-1. The team kept their heads up and we got a short. A strong hit from Jodie and then a deflection from Maddie lead to a second goal. The team were on a high passing strong and upgrading. However sadly, Wellingborough scored a second goal just before the whistle for half time. With a ferocious team talk, we were raring to go. The second half everyone worked extremely well together, however we were unable to score. This led to the final score being 2-2. The whole team played fantastically and everyone should be proud. A great way to end the season. Well done to everyone who played this season and many thanks to all the supporters, who have been encouraging us throughout all our matches. Good luck to everyone playing next season and wishing the best for the whole 1st team and future players. Molly

U14 Netball: On Saturday 4 December seven Year 9s including myself travelled to Leicester. We played our best and even though we didn’t win I felt like we gave it our all. Here are some more of my thoughts about the tournament: Our positions were me (Kirsten) as centre, Gemma as goalkeeper, Jasmine as goal defence, Roja as goal shooter, Tanishqua as goal attack, Isla as wing defence and Ashana as wing attack. Even though Mrs Jennings put us in these positions (positions that some of us wouldn’t normally play), we did our very best to adjust quickly to these new positions. Coach’s Player went to Jasmine, who was an amazing goal defence, making sure to support Gemma who was the goalkeeper and keeping many balls out of the D. Captain’s Player was Roja who played goal shooter. Although Roja is more of a wing, her real talent for shooting was brought to light, as she hardly let any balls leave the court if Tanishqua missed a shot, and scored many points with her excellent shooting! Overall, the tournament was a huge success. We didn’t win, but we learned so much and now know some key things we need to work on to place even higher in the next tournament.  Kirsten

 

U12 Netball: We had a very good time at Ratcliffe, and we played many games with lots of success. We came joint 2nd with Ratcliffe, which we were very happy about. We were a very good team especially when it came to defending, mostly because of Lyra and Peyton (being goalkeeper GK and goal defence GK) – they are very tall which helped our team intercept the ball and stop them from scoring. Lily

District Cross Country Year 9/8: A great team effort from the Year 9 and 8 teams. Ella led from the start and maintained this lead to win the race. Grace came 11th, Isla and Charlotte had a battle for 20th and 21st (Charlotte led Isla around the course, right up until the last 6 metres). Well done to the whole team in some very tricky muddy conditions: Ella, Charlotte, Isla, Rose, Emily, Grace, Khushi, and Ruby.

District Cross Country Year 6/7: This was our first Cross County match for Y7 and was very challenging. There were four of us (not including Y6 who ran the race with us): Lucy, Ava, Eleanor, and (the captain) Lily. We had to run 1800 meters (1.1 miles) around Abington Park. We did very well and got some very good results: Ava came 24th, Eleanor came 21st, Lily came 18th with Lucy. This was very good because anyone in 20th position or below should qualify to compete in the county round in January.

District Cross Country Year 5: On Thursday, the U11 Cross Country team went to Abington Park for a Cross Country District competition. The race was 1800m / 1.8km and very muddy. We ran around a lake, up hills, and across bridges. At the beginning of the race, lots of people sprinted, which was an advantage to us. Our team, Risara, Harini, Zoe, Harriet, Ellie, Jessica, Ishani, and Emily, were all amazing and I am very proud of them. Thank you to Mrs Littlewood and Mr Rickman for coming with us to this event.  Risara 

GDST Select Football Trials

Girls from across the GDST, who were nominated by their respective schools, attended the GDST U15 Select XI Football Selection Day on a bitterly cold Wednesday in December, at Oxford University. Northampton High School nominated Ella from Year 9. Although a year young, Ella is an outstanding footballer and deserved the opportunity to compete for a place. All the girls displayed a passion for their sport and were generally outstanding all day.

Mr Gilber and Miss Hayes from Oxford High School were the coaches for the day and demonstrated a high-paced, wonderfully executed trial that gave all participants a positive experience of high-level football. The selectors are still making their final judgments on successful students, and we hope to find out the selected squad soon.

The Select teams are very important in our Trust sports programme, as they really have an opportunity to celebrate and nurture the very best talent from our 25 schools.

Miss Fraser
Acting Director of Sport

Creative Arts Spotlight

This week, the Creative Arts Spotlight falls onto Sassy, in Year 9.

Sassy made a Victoria sponge cake layered with whipped cream and jam in our lesson this week. She added fresh berries and dried bananas to decorate; it looks amazing, well done!

Miss Knight
Food Teacher

 

Book of the Week

Unwell Women: A Journey Through Medicine and Myth in a Man-Made World by Elinor Cleghorn

‘We are taught that medicine is the art of solving our body’s mysteries. And as a science, we expect medicine to uphold the principles of evidence and impartiality.

We want our doctors to listen to us and care for us as people, but we also need their assessments of our pain and fevers, aches and exhaustion to be free of any prejudice about who we are, our gender, or the colour of our skin. But medicine carries the burden of its own troubling history.

The history of medicine, of illness, is a history of people, of their bodies and their lives, not just physicians, surgeons, clinicians and researchers. And medical progress has always reflected the realities of a changing world, and the meanings of being human.’In Unwell Women Elinor Cleghorn unpacks the roots of the perpetual misunderstanding, mystification and misdiagnosis of women’s bodies, and traces the journey from the ‘wandering womb’ of ancient Greece, the rise of witch trials in Medieval Europe, through the dawn of Hysteria, to modern day understandings of autoimmune diseases, the menopause and conditions like endometriosis.

Packed with character studies of women who have suffered, challenged and rewritten medical orthodoxy – and drawing on her own experience of un-diagnosed Lupus disease – this is a ground-breaking and timely exposé of the medical world and woman’s place within it.

Miss Buxton
School Librarian

Christmas Concert - Wednesday 15 December

Join Our Team - Minibus Drivers Wanted

At Northampton High, we are proud to have a pristine fleet of school minibuses, and we are very excited that this will be expanding in 2022. We are therefore looking to appoint several drivers for transporting pupils on morning and afternoon school runs, Monday to Friday.

If you are interested in joining our team we would love to hear from you.

For more information and to apply please click here.

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

Term Dates 21/22

Term Dates 22/23

Northampton High School
Newport Pagnell Road, Hardingstone Northampton NN4 6UU
T: 01604 765765 nhsadmin@nhs.Gdst.Net