Head’s blog
Common Entrance Success
I have just signed all of the Year 8 pupils’ Common Entrance results and they should receive them in the post tomorrow. I have been overwhelmed with the achievements of all of the children. There are so many brilliant individual performances not only in terms of numbers of As and A*s but, more importantly, thinking about the journey for each individual child. So many pupils have made fantastic progress in these challenging exams as a result of their determination and hard work. Congratulations to all of them, as well as their wonderful teachers. We really have signed off on Common Entrance with a bang!
Summary of Belmont CE results 2018
Activities and Languages Week
This week has been a tremendous success and all the children have had so much fun. Activities and Languages Week has been magnificent and our younger pupils have been on some exciting day trips and participated in a huge range of fun activities from archery, climbing, fencing, holding bugs and snakes, circus tricks, and magic workshops. Leon the Magician (not me!) was brilliant with the children and even popped into our new Year 3 Induction yesterday to wow the audience with his magical skills. The Year 6 pupils have been working hard on their tribute to David Bowie and it promises to be a wonderful show on Monday, 25th June. Year 7 and 8 have had a fantastic time on the Lake District Field Trip and Post-Common Entrance Trip to Cornwall. The children have been well-behaved, got stuck into the activities and really enhanced their teamwork skills. Thank you to Mr Fleet for organising another awesome Activities Week, Mr Bird for the day-to-day oversight at school, Mr Palmer for organising the Year 8 trip and Mr Hayward for overseeing the Year 7 trip. Finally, I’d like to thank all of the teachers for their enthusiasm this week, especially those who have been on residential trips.
I would like to thank all of the parents who came into school this week and shared their languages, from Farsi to Russian, Greek to Serbo-Croat with the children. They seemed to particularly enjoy dancing the Macarena in the Spanish session! The parents had prepared interesting and informative sessions about their languages and their cultures and we are very grateful to them for giving up their time in order to extend languages at Belmont. It was also wonderful to welcome some of the Mount Mill Hill International School students who delivered some language lessons to the children today – they were brilliant! Thank you to Dani Scott for proposing and arranging this wonderful initiative. There will be more exciting news about our future language provision later in the term.
Summer Concert vs World Cup Match
On Thursday, 28th June at 19.00 we have the Summer Concert. At the same time, England are going to be kicking off in their final Group G match against Belgium. Having spoken to a number of stakeholders, we have made the decision to start the concert earlier at 5pm to allow families to enjoy the concert and then make it back in time for what will inevitably be a must-win match for England! I apologise for the inconvenience but we feel that this is the best solution to ensure that we get a good turnout for what is always one of the highlights of the Summer Term. Mrs Perrin will be writing to families whose children are involved in the performance nearer the time to provide more detailed arrangements.
A Busy Weekend – Chess, Triathlon
A huge congratulations to all of our chess team last weekend. Four teams travelled to Prestatyn in North Wales last Friday for the Semi-Final and plate competition stages of the National Primary Schools’ Chess Championships. The children were just fantastic. Their continued practice, the inspiration of Angela Eyton (our Chess Coach) and the supportive parents taking the children to Wales are all helping to make Belmont a serious contender on the national chess scene. Well done to all of the children!
Thirteen members of Belmont’s triathlon team competed in the annual IAPS event on a glorious Sunday morning. The children showed fantastic resilience and determination in the swim, bike and run disciplines against some of the best young athletes in the country. Archie (Year 7) was Belmont’s fastest competitor home and also finished 7th overall for his age group. A brilliant performance by Ella (Year 7) saw her finish 10th overall for her age group. All the children taking part were outstanding and can be extremely proud of their own individual performances. Thank you to Mr Billows and Mr Symes for training and encouraging the children.
B-Fest 2018
Thanks to all the parents for all of their hard work over the last couple of days. B-Fest promises to be a great day and we are keeping our fingers crossed for the weather to stay dry. I hope to see many of your there.
