Following their success in the District competition last year, the year 9 boys football team were entered for the County Cup.

They travellled to Ashlyns school in the first round on Wednesday 18th October. The team started the game exceptionally quickly and went close to scoring multiple times in the first half. The Ashlyn side had a very strong goalkeeper who kept his side in the game with a number of important saves.

At half time, the boys were told that they would need to deliver a clinical finish to beat the opposition keeper. Jesse delivered on this request shortly after the break when he broke away down the left hand side, cut back across a defender and whipped the ball in to the top corner giving St Mary’s a 1-0 lead. It was a cagey end to the game as Ashlyn’s pushed on to try and equalise. St Mary’s showed a lot of resilience and kept their opponents out taking a 1-0 win away from home.

There is defintiely room for improvement but a strong performance from all! Definitely worth all of the traffic on the M25. The boys progress to round 2 of the cup where they take on Leventhorpe.

Yr 7s and Yr 8s have been busy making authentic Caribbean Dishes-Patties and Jerk Chicken Wraps in celebration of Black History Month.

They had a great time and as you can see the food produced looked and tasted amazing.

On 25th September Year 7’s participated in Team building activities at Tolmers activity centre in Cuffley.

The aim of the day was to work on team building skills, give students the opportunity to form new relationships as well as develop existing ones and to build confidence. Students worked really well together and had an excellent day.

Year 9 Drama work Autumn Term 1

Year 9 have been working hard on exploring the play Noughts & Crosses, adapted from Malorie Blackman’s novel by playwright Dominic Cooke.  They have been specifically learning about the structure of the play, the important and relevant themes of segregation and apartheid, the characters and the staging of the play.  They have had to take on a variety of roles and consider how they would use their vocal and physical skills to portray their characters on stage and how they want the audience to think and feel at key moments from the play and problem solve how they can best achieve this.

Year 8 Drama work Autumn Term 1

The year 8’s have been working productively on the Physical Theatre projects and this half term has seen them specifically use the technique of Body as a Prop.  They have had to collaborate on creating a variey of objects including gates, statues, doors, woods, leading up to an old house, which is developing into telling a story about the house using physical theatre.  The standard of work has been excellen so far, with lovely imaginative ideas and students being willing and able to engage in new learning.  This is a new style of drama for the year 8’s and is building on their knowledge and understanding of different genres of theatre.

Year 7 Drama work Autumn Term 1

The year 7’s have been working hard on the foundations that underpin good drama work:  collaboration, co-operation, creating, communicating, problem solving, compromising and leadership within a group.  Specifically, they have been learning about the drama technique of tableau and thoughts aloud and are now looking at plot and sequence to tell a story.

We have been very impressed with the year 7’s so far – they have just the right amount of enthusiasm without there being too much and they are keen to learn more.  It never ceases to amaze us that when the year 7’s first come to us, many wouldn’t have had any experience of participating in drama, and yet they just get on with each other as if they always have.  We are looking forward to getting a lot of them involved in the school production in the summer term and seeing what more they can do.