The Ultimate Latymer Strings Party!!!
Monday 27th March 2017
 
Workshops 4.15 – 6.15pm
Concert 7.00pm, Recital Hall
 
Visiting presenters: Joe Townsend and Neil Valentine
Event designed and coordinated by Helen Neilson, Head of Strings
 
It is my great pleasure to welcome you all to our Ultimate Latymer Strings Party!  We are delighted to be joined in this event by students from Sir John Cass Foundation Primary School in Aldgate, where I teach them every week on their whole class strings programme. Our visiting presenters are going to be doing some really exciting work with our students on world music and creative composition, encouraging understanding and appreciation of different cultures through music and developing paths of communication through music.
Our concert will showcase many of our chamber music groups who rehearse regularly throughout the term from both the prep and upper school.  This is a valuable opportunity for our prep students to hear our upper school students, and vice versa.  Gaining windows of perspective on the longer journey is an essential part of developing as a string player, and here we have an opportunity to share with each other.
Thank you for joining us for this special event.
Helen Neilson

Strings Day concert: Monday 27th March 7.00pm, Recital Hall
 
Year 7 chamber music group: Mozart: Divertimento in F, 1st movement, Allegro
Kenza Stamselberg, Christina Stoniav, Simone Vestergaard-Poulsen, Leyla Robertson, Freya Sutaria, Daniel Orton, Michela Ashworth, Taisia Novoselova; with Helen Neilson (double bass) – coached by Helen Neilson
Martinu: Nonet 1st movement
Lexie Fielding, James Kelly, Alex Tolokonnikov, Christina Stoianov, Kenza Stamselberg, Olga Devine, Michela Ashworth, Taisia Novoselova – coached by Stephen O’Regan
Prep String Quartet: Trad Russian: Dark Eyes
Madeleine Grambow, Rebecca Alishaw, Phoebe Lowe, Stella Konshina, with Liz Bradley (double bass) – coached by Lauren Abbott
Yr 9/10 String Quartet: Arlen, arr. Ryden: Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Laura Flenley, Tianrun Xu, Nikolas Brown, Clodagh Bottomley – coached by Helen Neilson
Yr 8/9 String Quartet: Haydn String quartet in G major, op. 76, no. 1 – 1st movement, Allegro con Spirito
Alexander Goodbody, Priya Caswell, Alexia von Ag……, Yuling Hewitt – coached by Helen Neilson
Bass trio: Jan Alm: Astounding Antelopes
Jan Kelly, Lottie James, Archan Walters – coached by Liz Bradley
Latymer Prep cello group joined by students from Sir John Cass Foundation Primary School: Thomas Gregory: Blue Blazes, Ballad, Pineapples are Juicy
Latymer: Constantine nur Shah, Tom Bradford, Jai Patel, Piyush Garodia
Cass: James Moukoue, Markos Panoutsou, Iris Birchall, Jasmine Collins, Orson Teckman, Marcel Jarrold-Manning, Frankie Vasseur, Eyoel Kassa
Workshop items presented by Joe Townsend and Neil Valentine  themed on world music and creative composition.
All students!
 
 
 
A bit about our visiting presenters:
 
Joe Townsend is currently Head of CoLab at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London and teaches creative leadership for The National Youth Orchestra, Serious Productions and the V&A Leadership Programme. 
Joe is a violinist. His work as a composer and performer is around the core themes of folk music and culture through improvised and devised performance in music, theatre and opera. The central themes in his teaching and academic work are collaborative learning; the cultural industries and early career survival for the emerging artist. He firmly believes in music as a tool for social change and empowerment.
As a teenager he left school at sixteen to study art and design and performed on the electric bass in both punk and folk bands. At eighteen he moved to Paris and after a four years immersed in jazz, theatre, travel and street culture he returned to the UK to study jazz violin at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.Through the 1980s he was inspired in the possibility of music as a tool for social change and empowerment. He worked with Community Music delivering music workshops and training with John Stevens and played with his own trio and other free improvisation groups such as People's Liberation Music and the Lapis String Quartet.
Since then, as a composer he has created works for Opera North (The Gypsy Bible, Foiea Verde, St George), The National Theatre (Oresteia, Macbeth, Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet), Shakespeare’s Globe and the Unicorn Theatre, and has collaborated with a range of different artists such as: Gavin Bryars, Nik Baertsch, Laurie Anderson, Roma musicians and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
His work in Education has ranged from work with LPO, Welsh National Opera and Opera North in addition to running workshops in collaborative performance in China South Korea and Japan.
Joe will be assisted by Hannah Thomas, cello.
​
Neil Valentine began his musical career as a violinist, until he grew really tall and at 14 switched to the viola, never to look back. He studied at York University and Trinity College of music and was a member of Southbank Sinfonia. Now he is an Associate Musician of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and has delivered music projects, workshops and performances with the Philharmonia Orchestra, LSO, Wigmore Hall, London Music Masters and many others.
 
He works in all areas of the community including people suffering from dementia. The music and dementia project he leads 'Music for a While' was shortlisted for the Arts & Health Award at this year's RSPH Health and Wellbeing Awards.
 
He is passionate about music making in all settings and with all groups of people. He believes everybody is musical and that anyone can make music with anyone else. He is privileged to be able to facilitate this process; it is a source of unending inspiration and enjoyment.
 
Neil will be assisted by Mark Lipski, double bass.

Grant us, O Lord, the will to accomplish all that pleases you; the strength to do all that you command and the reverence to respect all that you have made; for your own name's sake. Amen.
Francis of Assisi (1182-1226)

School Council met last week and one topic on the agenda was sandals! Councillors were concerned that shoes could be very hot and uncomfortable in the summer months. We agreed that during the summer term, sandals could be worn in school. We had a long discussion about the types of sandals which we thought would be safe on the school playground and the type which wouldn’t be safe to wear. 
 

Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of the victims of the horrific incident this week in Westminster. The City of London Police have asked that we pass on the following guidance to parents, carers and staff.

You will all be aware of the shocking events at Westminster this week. The Metropolitan Police Service is not advising that people change their plans, lock down buildings, or anything of this kind. We do continue to advise, however, that all our communities and partners remain alert but not alarmed. 

Businesses in the Westminster area should be prepared for likely congestion that will potentially last for several days. 

In common with all Police Forces across the UK, the Metropolitan Police continually trains and plans for incidents of this type and several of those plans are being put into place now.  

Many of you will have customers or staff who will look to you for advice/guidance.  
Our advice to you is: 
· Remain alert not alarmed
· Review your plans
· Report all suspicious sightings as soon as possible
 
We regularly review our safety plans and emergency arrangements. We have provided additional guidance today for school trip leaders about managing risks during educational visits around London. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch.
 

​Did you know that in Tower Hamlets and the City we have some of the poorest dental health in the country? You may have seen a recent report on the news about the huge increase in the number of extractions of baby teeth: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-39327425
 
The NHS Community Dental Services will be visiting the Children’s Centre on 2nd May, 2017 from 9.30-11.30am. All parents are more than welcome to attend. 
 
If you’re interested in improving your family’s oral health or would like information and advice about keeping your children’s teeth clean and healthy come along to our workshop.
 

​The Governing Body of the school met last week for its termly meeting. Among topics for discussion were pupil progress, residential trips, and new initiatives in mathematics.
 
Governors also approved a new policy on Sex and Relationship Education (SRE) that had been proposed by Mr Wilson and the Senior Leadership Team. The policy emphasises the importance of safe and healthy relationships and brings forward the teaching on body changes during puberty to ensure children within the school are adequately prepared for these.
 
The review of this policy is well timed as Justine Greening, Secretary of State for Education, recently announced proposals that will make elements of SRE mandatory in all schools from 2019.
 
We are aware that SRE has the potential to be a controversial subject amongst parents. The new curriculum has been designed to sit within the Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) programme and makes use of the PSHE Association scheme of work, which teachers have already begun to use in other areas. It has also been the subject of extensive consultation with governors and parents, through discussion groups and a questionnaire. We hope you were able to contribute to that.
 
Parents expressed a range of views during the consultation process. There was general and broad support for the new curriculum and a clear feeling that the subject should be taught in the same manner as other topics in the PSHE curriculum. Parents also requested that faith and cultural contexts be explained and that teaching should be sensitive to these. The teaching team already considers such sensitivities in its delivery of the Religious Education curriculum and we are confident that topics within SRE will be delivered in the same manner.
 
If you wish to contact the Governing Body on this, or on any other matter relating to school strategy, you are very welcome to do so via the school office.
 
Mr Matt Piper
Vice Chair of Governors
 
 
 

We held a meeting with parents and carers today about the Key Stage 2 assessments. If you didn't get chance to come along, take a look at the video below for all the information you need. 

We had a morning telling jokes to each other on the playground today. Thank you for your effort to get dressed up and join in with the fun. 

I've just returned from Stansted Mountfitchet. The children are having a glorious time. We had an excellent day yesterday and enjoyed 3 different activities- gardening, archery and shelter building. In the evening the children had the opportunity to explore the grounds and play in the different activity areas. We settled down inside with board games when it got dark and enjoyed a hot chocolate before bed time. 

Everyone slept fairly well- two rooms we're excellent and we had very few tears indeed about missing home. 

This morning everyone woke up bright and early and after a short period of free time we had a breakfast of croissants, toast, cereals and porridge. Ms McCarthy inspected rooms at 8.45am and then children enjoyed a play on the adventure playground. 

There is a full day of activities on Tuesday including mountain biking, campfire building and art. It's roast chicken for lunch followed by Jacket potatoes for the evening meal. 

And, just one more sleep before the children get home on Wednesday. There will be more photos on the website and twitter later on today. Don't worry if you don't see a picture of your child - some children don't like having their picture taken and we don't have a very reliable internet connection at any of the Centres we visit! I can assure you, everyone is having a great time!

​Thanks to Ayala who kindly donated a new squad kit for the children to wear when they go out on competitions. Ayala are fitting out the new hotel just by St Botolph’s Church. The children had their first outing in their new strips at Kobi Nazrul this week. We are pleased to announce the team won this inter-school competition!
 

Over the next couple weeks we're mounting some new art displays in the entrance hall. What wonderful work?!

​Our new scheme of work in RE promotes learning about major world faiths. As part of our implementation of the new curriculum the staff are taking part in visits to local faith groups to extend their professional learning about different faith traditions.
 
This week we visited Bevis Marks Synagogue, just down the road from school. We learnt about the Sephardic tradition at the Synagogue and little about the worshipping community and discussed some of the key practices in Orthodox Judaism.
 
In the coming months we’ll be off to a couple of other institutions—we’re in discussions with a local Mosque to arrange a visit in the Summer term and we’re hoping to plan visits to other settings in the coming year. We’d be very happy to hear your suggestions.
 
We’re also hoping to hold a faith and education workshop in the summer term where we’ll be inviting parents and carers in to talk with staff and a guest speaker about faith and education in the context of inclusive Anglican schools serving diverse communities.
 

​Thanks for coming along to our discussion about home–school learning and the little red books we used in the Early Years. You’ve give us lots of ideas about how we can develop these next year including sharing more information about our approach in different areas of the curriculum. We discussed having a growth mind-set at the meeting and a video called, Austin’s Butterfly. You can find out more about these ideas in the video collection below.