Beech House School

Jennifer Garrity and Ameer Mohammed Ali

We are delighted to report that Beech House School Art department achieved another successful year in the Independent Schools’ Association (North West Region) Art Competition which took place at Greenbank School.

This year’s success was with two of our students in the under 16’s Drawing competition: 

• 1st was Jennifer Garrity with ‘Eyes.’ 
• 2nd was Ameer Mohammed Ali with ‘Flower.’

Congratulations to them both.

Jennifer Garrity’s ‘Eyes’ will now be entered in the National ISA Competition. We would like to wish her every success.

On Thursday 6th October it was our annual Jeans for Genes Day. Yet again, this was a resounding success, with most pupils paying more than the nominated £1 to dress up in their jeans. At break-time, over 250 doughnuts were sold to the hungry mass, making even more money for Jeans for Genes Day. Total raised, at time of writing, was £256.60.

The Nursery and Reception children enjoyed a visit to the Greater Manchester Fire Service Museum in Rochdale, as part of their learning about ‘People who help us stay safe.’ The children toured the museum in groups, looking at fire engines, equipment and uniforms from days gone by and enjoyed trying on various fire-fighters’ helmets for size. The visit ended with an opportunity for the children to try their hand pumping out water through a hose – great fun on a hot, sunny day. Many thanks to Bob Bonner and his team of helpers at the Museum.

Along with London Mayor Boris Johnson and Business Secretary Vince Cable, a group of 28 pupils and 3 staff visited WorldSkills London 2011 on Friday. The WorldSkills London 2011 Competition saw almost a thousand young people battle it out to be the best of the best in a range of vocational skills, ranging from dress making and cooking to web design in the largest international skills Competition the world has ever seen.. The three day event was expected to attract 150,000 visitors and each could have a go in dozens of skills from electronics to plumbing and welding to fashion design. With top employers such as Bentley and Samsung to visit at the exhibition and specialist careers advice right on hand, this gave pupils the opportunity to get inspired and learn about the world of skilled professions.

The 28 pupils, who were offered the opportunity to take part in the visit as a ‘well done’ award for their excellent behaviour and conduct for the last academic year, met Dr. Hudson, Mrs. Grange and Mrs. White early on Friday morning at Piccadilly Station. For some it was the first time on the train down to London (and the first time to experience being awake at six o’clock in the morning!). On arrival in London we negotiated the underground and the Docklands Light Railway out to the vast ExCel Centre in east London. The registration process was very efficient and we were quickly issued with our passes and maps of the venue. Pupils then went off into groups to visit the huge number of activities and exhibitors. The centre has a boulevard with numerous eateries so for lunch each group chose their own favourite, whether it was bagels, noodles, pizzas or burgers. After refuelling it was then off to do some chocolate welding (with Mrs. Grange and Mrs. White helping to eat the finished item), bedroom burglar alarm manufacturing, pipework construction or catwalk modelling. Many came away with goody bags of information and souvenirs of a very interesting and informative day.

On the return journey we asked the pupils what they thought of the event. All had found it very interesting and were very impressed with the size of the exhibition. Hopefully it will have opened the eyes of some to the many jobs out there and the number of opportunities available in the world of work.

House Point totals for the week: Jupiter 40, Neptune 33, Saturn 32 and Mercury 25.

The Pupil of the Week certificates go to:
Nursery: Neha Shahzad
Reception: Nishika Lakshmi-Narayonan
Year 1: Rais Khalid
Year 2: Joseph Bingham
Year 3: Daniel Rigg
Year 4: Elana El-Hage
Year 5: Joe Noon
Year 6: Zechariah Omagbami