By Merlin’s beard, what a spellbinding week it has been! Our humble Boarding House was transfigured into Hogwarts itself for an evening brimming with enchantment and wonder. With a swirl of steam and a bubbling brew, the Sorting Potion placed each young witch and wizard into their House—no Sorting Hat required. A grand roast feast followed, with a pudding served atop of billowing clouds of dry ice, as if conjured straight from the kitchens of Hogwarts.

 

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Throughout the night, students flitted from one magical pursuit to another like nimble Nifflers. In Potions & Pyrotechnics, flames flickered in a rainbow of colours as aspiring potion masters brewed up dazzling fire displays worthy of the Weasley twins. Broomsticks were mounted for the Quidditch Challenge, where brave Chasers took aim at hoops with Quaffle-like balls, all while balancing precariously, like true seekers of glory.

Those daring enough faced the Triwizard Trials, weaving through obstacles with the courage of champions, extinguishing lights to complete their perilous quest. Meanwhile, mischievous minds uncovered hidden secrets in The Marauder’s Secret, where invisible ink messages shimmered into view under the glow of black lights. Paper planes enchanted by the Ministry of Magic soared through the corridors, with each witch or wizard hoping their memo would reach its destination first. In Divination, young seers crafted paper folded fortune tellers, attempting to glimpse into murky futures—no crystal ball required.

All the while, the Yule Ball enchanted a corner of the Great Hall, where witches and wizards danced under twinkling lights, their robes swirling behind them. And, of course, no wizarding escapade is complete without a sweet treat—our Honeydukes trolley of Chocolate Frogs hopped into eager hands faster than you could say “Accio!”

It was a magical evening that would have made Dumbledore proud. Mischief managed!

Professors Jones and Jones

On Sunday evening, the Years 7 and 8 Choir were invited to sing in the Evensong Service at Marlborough College. The choir sang the Introit (a piece of music that opens an Evensong service), performing ‘I Will Sing with the Spirit’ by John Rutter. The choir had to quickly adapt to singing in a new acoustic with the organ accompaniment, but managed this with much determination and excellent teamwork. They performed beautifully in the service.

In addition, our choir joined the Marlborough College Chapel Choir to sing some of the responses in the service, and these were conducted by their Head of Choral, Mr Adam Meehan-Staines. It was a joy for the Beaudesert Park choir to listen to the Marlborough College Chapel Choir sing the Anthem, the Gloria and the Nunc Dimittis, they are very inspirational.

Many congratulations to our Senior Choir for representing the School so brilliantly, and our sincere thanks to Adam for the warm invitation.

The Years 5 and 6 Choir had a super day at Wells Cathedral School on Tuesday. Alongside seven other prep schools, the children have been working towards a performance of Jonathan Dove’s ‘Seasons and Charms’. The children from Beaudesert had the pleasure of performing four movements, ‘Fire!’, ‘Summer’, ‘This is the Bird’ and ‘Slowly’ in the beautiful cathedral in Wells. Led by the Assistant Director of Music at Wells, the children also learnt ‘Siyahamba’ and ‘Red Shoes’ on the day and performed all songs accompanied by a band of music scholars from Wells.

This was a truly inspirational day of singing for children and staff alike.

We held our Years 3 and 4 Declamations competition on Thursday, where our finalists performed their poems to an audience of parents, peers and our adjudicator, Mr Jones.

Each of our finalists performed a polished performance which was full of character and confidence. It was a tricky decision for Mr Jones! Well done to our two winners, Myla and Bea. We're looking forward to our Prep School Declamations competition after Half Term.

In line with one of our core values at Beaudesert, Courage, we are always thinking about how to create opportunities for children to try new things, be brave and build resilience.

The Burning of Pudding Lane with our Year 2s was an excellent example of this. Children have spent time learning about the Great Fire of London, and working to answer the question ‘Could the Great Fire of London have been avoided?’ Children learnt about the history and the house materials, how old houses were built, created their own Tudor buildings, and had a lesson with Mr Waters, our Prep School DT teacher, about the models we had built. Children considered the feelings of the people who lost their homes back in 1666, and what it means to deal with loss. On Wednesday this week, we then took our houses and recreated our own fire in Pudding Lane out on the courtyard. There was much excitement and learning throughout this event, and we particularly commend the children for being courageous in taking part – even when it meant sacrificing their creations.

Our House Cross Country today was a huge success, and children talked in assembly this morning about how they could mentally and emotionally prepare for it. We explained that all children could earn House points by taking part, but not everyone could win. Children gave each other advice such as, "Don’t give up", "Try your best" and "Start slow and speed up at the end!" The cold weather did not stop us from being full of exuberance and pride, and a lovely hot chocolate afterwards helped to warm us up. Congratulations to Hazel who were the House winners, as well as to the bronze, silver and gold medal winners from each year group.

We have also been having a wonderful time at Forest School, slip sliding around in the glorious mud, as well as assessing the ecological impact of this. We have been looking for signs of badgers, visiting a badger set, and finding out lots of related facts. We are lucky to have such a wonderful learning environment around the grounds here at Beaudesert, thank you Mother Nature!

We have also been busy baking, creating wonderful castles and knights and learning about e-Safety, making sure we fact check information online.

Anna Packman, Head of Pre-Prep

To mark Safer Internet Day on Tuesday, Mr Robinson led our Prep School assembly. This year's Safer Internet Day hopes to highlight the different kind of scams that children might encounter online. After hearing about some examples, Mr Robinson demonstrated the importance of keeping ourselves safe with our online 'safety gear', using a swegway as an illustrative example! Remembering to use our safety tools like questioning offers that are "too good to be true" or talking to a trusted adult means we can navigate the web with ease.

Congratulations to the U11A and B boys' hockey teams who had excellent victories against The Elms on Wednesday afternoon. The boys have worked really hard in their training so far this term, and are making excellent progress. Our senior boys also had some excellent wins against The Elms; a confidence boost as they head into the Half Term break. All but one of our girls teams won their netball matches this week!

Many of our Prep School children have completed their wonderful Design and Technology projects, which they started last September. From boats to trebuchets and glasswork to pillows, Years 4, 5, 6 and 7 have created masterpieces to be proud of (and have hopefully brought them home to show off!).