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Summer Term 2015 Newsletter INDEPENDENT DAY SCHOOL FOR GIRLS
Celebrating
VEDay
See page 5
Early Years Teddy Bears’ Picnic
ALSO INSIDE: ART & GRAPHICS EXHIBITION • THE GREAT OUTDOORS • JUNIOR HOUSE ACTIVITIES SPORTS NEWS • YOUNG ENTERPRISE • WESTFIELD ASSOCIATION NEWS - Back Page
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Highlights from the GCSE and A Level
Art&GraphicsExhibition
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Westfield Photography Competition 2015 We were delighted to receive over 50 entries from Junior House girls, Senior House girls and staff to the inaugural photography competition co-ordinated by Daniel Stone. There were some outstanding entries covering five themes …People Together, Detail in Nature, A Journey, My Favourite Place and Captured Movement. We were delighted to welcome John Faulkner, a fine art photographer, specialising in landscapes and portraiture to judge the entries. He certainly had a very difficult job! Congratulations to all our winners.
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The Great Outdoors
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Duke of Edinburgh’s Awards BRONZE
Adventure Race Our Westfield School girls' team battled it out at the Lake District for their challenge to win the Round Square Adventure Race. The annual Round Square Adventure Race between schools from around the country took place in the Lake District from Friday 15 May - Sunday 17 May. This year's team of Liberty Bailey, Lauren Bailey, Katie Garvey, Louise Greenshields, Lucy Hatton and Francesca Walker trained very hard and thoroughly deserved their Girls' Team win. The girls swim, paddle, climb, cycle, cook, camp and carry out night navigations which is no mean feat! The Girls' Race is marked on all disciplines, team spirit, sportsmanship, camp-craft and cooking. Congratulations to all our team members.
Mission Impossible in Wales! “Make your life a mission - not an intermission” was the theme of the Round Square Regional European Conference in June. Twelve delegates from Upper Three and Lower Four headed off to The Samworth Church Academy Adventure and Challenge 2015 which aimed to support young people to understand and develop the behaviours necessary to maximize the opportunities at school and in their wider community. The girls had a great time and forged many new friendships in their Round Square European Community. The delegates Beth Dean, Sydney Lewis, Jenny Wilson, Ellie Pearson, Saffron SimsBryden, Annabelle Deevy, Helen Edmondson, Victoria Miller-Charlton, Maddie Mohon, Katie Swan, Nina Wadds and Beth Swan were accompanied by Nicky Baguley and Phillip Russell.
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Archbishop of York Young Leaders’ Award Environmental Activities Day Upper Four girls embarked on an environmental service day on 5 May as part of their School Based Action Project which involves doing conservation work that also contributed to Westfield’s Green Flag activities. They carried out a litter pick in the school grounds, tidied the bug hotel, repacking sticks for the insects to live in and restacked the log pile to make it more environmentally friendly. They trimmed the buddleia, cut back nettles and brambles and generally tidied up the wild life garden and pond. A job very well done!
Upper Three Overnight Camp As an end of exam week treat, the Upper Three had a ‘sleep over’ in the school grounds. The girls were shown how to pitch a tent and then let loose on their own! They played games, then had dinner! After dinner it was time for a talent show! Then it was a hot choc drink and snack before bed! The next day we planned a teddy bears’ picnic, went to the park and shopped for ingredients, baked and then... we partied!!!
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Celebrating the 70th Anniversary of VE Day at Westfield Friday 8th May celebrated 70 years since VE day. There were numerous celebrations going on around the country, remembering how the Second World War affected the lives of millions of people and Westfield was certainly no exception! There was a sea of red, white and blue from all the bunting and balloons …and that was just the start. We invited all students and staff to dress up in 1940s attire and help raise money for the Royal British Legion to mark this auspicious day in British history. What a response …there were some incredible costumes and hairstyles with some brilliant photo opportunities! The girls kindly baked typical goods served during the 1940s to sell at our ‘rations’ cake stall with yummy rock buns, biscuits, cakes and even custard slices on offer! If that wasn’t enough rations for one day, our in-house catering team prepared authentic corned beef hash and bread and butter pudding for those who wanted to indulge fully in 40s fare. Thank you to everyone who supported the day in some way – it was an invaluable lesson for our girls on so many levels with a side helping of good old fashioned fun too!
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ACTIVITIES IN The City Athletics Championship at Monkton Stadium
Junior H
Upper One had a great time investigating the Romans during their visit to Hadrian’s Wall
Outside Gibbs Hall Farm, where the girls spent the night.
Out and About
Make £5 grow! Junior House took part in an enterprise project sponsored by Virgin Money, called ’Make £5 Grow’. The girls were challenged to initiate ideas which could develop into a profitable business, financed by loans from Virgin Money of £5 per person. Pupils from Nursery through to Upper Two were involved developing a range of interesting products which the girls presented in a Dragons’ Den format.
Upper One Virgin money cake stall Map reading near Berwick
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Upper Three enjoyed visiting Edinburgh Zoo
Karima as a bee at the Royal Botanic Gardens
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r Housee Eco week
Teddy Bears' Picnic
Rag bag collection Junior House collected a fabulous amount of unwanted clothing and textiles ready for our Rag Bag collection in Eco week. Money raised went towards the school grounds and Eco activities. During Eco week Transition made butterfly feeders, a bug hotel and light switch covers.
Nandini
Runaysa Eco codes prize winners Junior House held a competition to redesign the Eco code. Nandini Yasmin Karthik in Kindergaten won the Early Years prize, Runaysa Ahmed in Transition won the KS1 prize and Yasmin Todd in Upper One won the KS2 prize. They each won a ‘grow your own’ pot of sweet peas.
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Junior House SPORTS DAY
The teams present their Joker cards
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Senior House SPORTS DAY
at Gateshead International Stadium Mrs Gill Hall kindly presented the prizes
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Pictured 1-4 above 1. Sophie Curtis receives the Senior Victrix Ludorum 2. Molly-Bo Kelly receives the Intermediate Victrix Ludorum 3. Hannah Moore receives the Scott Intermediate Trophy for Cross Country Running. 4. Lauren Hamilton receives the Senior Inter House Shield on behalf of Coquet.
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Science
Upper Four took part in a special ‘Island Escape’ workshop in school, which was run by Newcastle University. The girls enjoyed working in teams to complete problem tasks based on different STEM careers.
Annabelle Todd, Upper Three, demonstrates designing cars that can be powered any way they choose in their Science lessons.
Upper Four enjoyed a
STEM workshop
Salter’s Chemistry Festival Anish Smith, Jane Collier, Rosie Makepeace and Jessica Yip made up the Lower Four chemistry team which took part in this year’s annual Salter’s Chemistry Festival held at Newcastle University. The girls were given a murder mystery and rates of reaction problems to solve and also attended a lecture on the chemistry of jelly and ice cream. The girls came second out of the 19 schools that took part which was a fantastic achievement!
Geography Highlights from a visit to Wheelbirks Farm for Upper Three
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Young Enterprise
COVERED COVERED e h t t a h p m u tri a e r A t s a E h t r No event
Aiden Rutherfod interviewing Covered, Westfield School
Westfield’s 2015 team ‘Covered’ represented the school magnificently in this year’s Regional finals at the Marriott Hotel Gateshead on 9th June. The other competitors were a Team from Durham High School for Girls and two teams from Cumbria who had been through a further stage of the competition to reach this position.
The Covered team managed to prepare a great presentation despite the pressure of exam season and had polished their performance to professional levels.
15 01 June 20 Their trade stand, product and presentation had been further improved since winning the Area finals and confidence was high. The trade stand team of Megan, Emilia, Sophie, Charlotte and Georgia had prepared fully after developing the financial section of the report with Robyn and were more than a match for the intense grilling given by the four rounds of judges.
This was followed by the presentations by Alex, Antonia, Alice and Lauren, who stood on stage in front of an audience of business representatives, judges, YE panels, competitors and teachers and gave an utterly professional business pitch. Although they did not win the overall round, the Covered team won the Creativity Award sponsored by Disney for the most innovative product and production process. Congratulations to the Covered team for a tremendous product and performance at the Regional Final(
Music Sam Maxted and Evelyn Gascoyne performed at the Creative Art Soirée held in May.
The UNESCO group enjoyed a summer picnic to celebrate the end of a very busy year Pudsey Bear with his Young of campaigns and activities. Enterprise COVERED book.
The evening was a huge success with girls from Junior House and Senior House performing throughout the evening which was conducted entirely in French. They chose and recited poems and readings for the evening. The delicious home baked French inspired canapés were made by our Home Economics students.
Une soiré e merveilleuse!
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T H E W E S T F I E L D A S S O C I AT I O N The Westfield Association organised a nearly new sale in June which was well attended and kitted out lots of girls with new uniform. All proceeds from these sales goes back into The Westfield Association to help in their fundraising efforts for the school. Thank you very much to committee member Liz Keightley and Wendy Robson for organising this sale. The new school minibus, kindly donated by The Westfield Association, is out and about and looking very smart. Thanks to Liz Keightley for helping with the lovely new graphics. The Artisan Food Fayre held in April was a new event for the Association and sadly not very well attended. Thanks to Julie Mohon for drumming up so many stall holders and thank you to all the staff, parents and friends who attended and helped on the day. We couldn’t’ do it without you. The Camellia Ball Hollywood style was a huge success and thanks go to all the team of organisers, particularly Julie Mohon, Debbie Oldroyd, Deborah Simpson, Suzy Ballantyne, Helen Murray, Philippa Briggs, Millie Ball, Lesley Gordon and their team. Thanks go to Graeme Wilson, our Master of Ceremonies for another great performance and all the ‘backroom’ helpers – too many to mention by name.
Thank you!
Out of school activities
A few changes... After many years as Secretary of The Westfield Association, our wonderful secretary Philippa Briggs is stepping down from her role. She has tirelessly organised many events, written hundreds of sets of Minutes, worked very hard as the Christmas Fayre ‘fairy organiser’ alongside her merry team of helpers and generally kept the team going with her wonderful sense of humour! She will be sorely missed. Julie Mohon has very kindly stepped in to take on the role of Secretary
and with her brilliant organisational skills will be a great asset to the team. Two more of the stalwarts are also moving on, Deborah Simpson and Karen Tate, who have also given their time and energy to help at many Westfield Association events. The Westfield Association would very much like to welcome some new members to the Committee. It’s a great way to meet other parents and staff and learn more about Westfield School. The events hosted by The Westfield Association are organised and run by our parent and staff volunteers and without them, the events could not take place. We hope you will be able to come along to as many as events as possible during the next academic year and look forward to seeing you there.
Julie Mohon and Philippa Brigg enjoying VE Day s
Mr and Mrs Ian Briggs Martha Jobling Purser Martha qualified two ponies for The Royal International Horse Show to be held at Hickstead in July. She will be flying the flag for the North and Westfield !! Good luck Martha.
Freya Simpson Saffron Sims-Bryden Baby Joshua arrives You’ll be delighted to know that our Senior House English and Drama teacher Mrs Emma Forster gave birth to Joshua Tom Forster, weighing 6 lbs 12 oz on 2 June 2015.
Congratulations!
Saffron represented the North East in the UK Regional NDP Graded Competition recently. Her coach is Kat Driscoll who is the Olympic Trampoline Champion. The competition was held in Peterborough and Saffron just missed out on winning a medal but has qualified for the NDP National Competition which is to be held in Telford in July. Good luck Saffron.
This photograph was Freya Simpson’s entry in the Photographic Competition run by the Friends of Jesmond Dene in May this year. The photograph was awarded second place in the 12-18 year old category of ‘Wildlife in the Dene’. Freya has developed a real passion for photography since getting her new camera and is always looking for the ‘perfect’ shot! Freya also entered 3 photographs in the school photography competition.
Oakfield Road, Gosforth, Newcastle upon Tyne NE3 4HS Tel: 0191 255 3980 www.westfield.newcastle.sch.uk Produced by: Ian Brown Design Ltd. Tel: 077 326 700 20
