The Oakhill Association held its second roller disco in the sports hall.
We had a huge response from families and friends of Oakhill.
The event was enjoyed by all judging by the smiles and laughter.
The Oakhill Association provided a tuck shop with drinks, cakes and hot dogs for parents and children to purchase.
A massive thank you to all who supported the event.
Lunch time sessions are now available for girls to experience rugby in a fun, safe and enjoyable environment.
The players will be introduced to the values and skills of rugby through fun activities, modified games and drills.
There will be an opportunity for the girls to play against other schools during the year.
Only 6% of the world’s population speak English as a first language.
75% of the world’s population don’t speak English.
60% of British trade is with non-English speaking countries
These and many other interesting facts were highlighted to Year 10 and 11 Language students when they enjoyed a trip to UCLan this week to celebrate the European Day of Languages.
They had the opportunity to look around the university facilities and meet students who had recently returned from their year abroad. The students recounted their many adventures in Japan, Spain and Germany and Oakhill pupils were able to hear first hand of the amazing benefits of spending time in other countries.
Lunchtime brought the chance to meet International students and taste some local delicacies. The afternoon was thoroughly enjoyable as pupils experienced taster sessions in Arabic, British Sign Language and Catalan.
Oakhill children were treated to a host of foods from a variety of countries this week as we celebrate the European Day of Languages.
Everyone from the nursery children to the Year 11s were keen to sample the culinary delights which included dishes ranging from Paella and Salade Niçoise to Crêpes Suzettes and Apple Strudel.
With other events planned for this week, we are looking forward to an enriching experience of culture and language.
On Wednesday 16 September, Fr Peter Hopkinson, from St. Mary’s, Burnley came to celebrate our Welcome Mass for the whole school.
In his homily, Fr Peter told the children how good they were at reading and performing in public, especially in front of all their peers.
He remembered the first time he got up to read in public at St. Joseph’s College, Upholland – he was very nervous and made a lot of mistakes. Fr. John Baron who was the Drama and Classics teacher at that time took him to one side and made him practice in front of some photographs, pretending he was addressing the people in the photographs. This helped him to grow in confidence and not be afraid of addressing people in public.
His gift of public speaking needed nurturing and that is what he thanked the staff and parents of Oakhill for doing with all the children – nurturing everyone’s gifts and talents so that they may grow and shine brightly in the world in which we live.
We prayed for the plight of refugees; our family and friends and thought about the many opportunities that lay ahead of us in the year to come.
At the end of Mass, Fr Peter thanked the parents, the staff and the governors for all that they do at Oakhill in nurturing and caring for the students. May God bless you all in everything that you do.
Election fever hit the Preparatory School on Thursday as pupils headed to the polling station to cast their votes in their first ever Student Council elections.
With candidates standing in each of the year groups it promises to be an exciting outcome.
Pupils will have to wait until Mondays merit assembly to find out who the new Student Council will be.
Year 11 Geography ventured out of school to the Forest of Bowland to be real Geographers and conduct a field study into rural life. They conducted a survey of services and functional land use survey as well as interviewing the local residents.
The people of Slaidburn, Newton and Dunsop Bridge were extremely helpful and Slaidburn turned out in force to meet us at the Village Hall. However, when the work was done there was still time for a well deserved ice-cream.
Students will now collate and analyse their data ready for their final write up. Keep up the good work, Geographers!
There were shrieks and cries of horror in Year 6 last week as they looked at a real lamb’s heart as part of their topic about the human body.
The children put on latex gloves to explore and label the four chambers of the heart. They particularly enjoyed poking their fingers through the pulmonary artery and aorta!
Year 1 and 2 got scientific and sticky in their science lesson this week as they used sticky labels to label all the body parts they know. They impressed Miss Baron with their super knowledge about the body and the names for things. A special thank you to our live volunteer James Hennighan who remained very patient and still!
Another new venture for Oakhill this year is the introduction of boys gymnastics led by our excellent coach Zoltan Lang or Coach Zoli as he is known in school!
Monday lunchtimes are now a hive of excitement when boys from prep attend the sessions in order for them to increase their flexibility and develop core strength.
Zoli is very much a believer of making the activity fit the class he is teaching and he is set to use the freestyle gymnastics approach with the boys, this is known as freeG and is similar to parkour or free running.
The lessons are fast paced and exciting and the boys will develop in confidence weekly along with learning the basic principles of gymnastics such as flight, rolling and stillness.
Many of the boys aim to learn a technical goal celebration like some of their football idols and with hard work, focus and determination this will be achievable.
So look out for some dynamic and dramatic celebrations throughout the season!
Yesterday we bid a sad farewell to Mrs Watson. Mrs Watson has been at Oakhill for 22 years and seen hundreds of children go through Oakhill. Debbie started at Oakhill as Nursery Co-Ordinator and then after Nursery’s first successful OFSTED report was promoted to Nursery Manager.
Mrs Watson joined when Oakhill nursery or Acorns as it was then know had been opened only 12 months and has seen it grow form strength to strength into the outstanding Nursery it is today. Mrs Watson was treated to a farewell assembly from Prep and lots of hugs and presents from Oakhill’s Early Years Department. You will be sadly missed Mrs Watson but we wish you all the very best for the future.
This week we hosted our inaugural basketball training session, this is a new venture at Oakhill for all seniors. Tuesday lunchtime sessions will be run by Steven Gayle one of the Lancashire spinners team and highly qualified and experienced coach. He will coach the pupils and also mentor Mrs Smith for her on going professional development.
Over twenty pupils ranging from years 7-11 took part in the session where they fine tuned their shooting technique and enhanced their dribbling skills. Steven was impressed with their attitude, focus and effort in the session and said the group have great potential.
We aim to run basketball throughout the school and engage in competitive matches and tournaments against local schools at the u14 and u16 ages.
Basketball is a fantastic sport for both boys and girls to compete both together and against each other. The friendly rivalries were apparent today and we look forward to watching each and every pupil thrive and achieve in future sessions.
The London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) lessons continue to grow stronger here at Oakhill College. There are now 26 students from Pre- School all the way through to Secondary School taking these lessons with our teacher Claire Haymes.
The LAMDA lessons are a great extra curricular lesson for our pupils as they help with reading and literacy skills, confidence, communication skills, diction and of course performance skills. The examinations with LAMDA also enable our students to gain extra UCAS points if they wish to attend University in the future.
Recently 16 of our LAMDA students took examinations with LAMDA in July. The results were outstanding, with students gaining either a Merit (with 65 marks or above) or a Distinction (with 80 marks or above)!
The results are fantastic and we would like to say a huge well done to all those who took the recent examinations, the results really are a testament to all their hard work and talent. We would also like to say well done to those students who didn’t take exams this time but have all still been working so hard during their Speech and Drama lessons and their progression has also been outstanding.
LAMDA lessons are starting again in school on Monday 21st September, please make sure you have signed up for these lessons.
There was great excitement at Oakhill today when the Tour of Britain passed by the bottom of Wiswell Lane.
In true Oakhill style pupils and teachers lined the road with banners and flags supporting the cyclists.
The children waited patiently for the cyclists to arrive.
After a short wait the cyclists sped by in the blink of an eye.
Everybody was there from the Baby room to Year 11.
Last term, Year 5 and 6 entered a design-a-garden competition run by the Southport Flower Show. They had to design a garden with a Chinese theme and incorporating recycled materials wherever possible.
There were over 800 entrants and we are very proud that Joshua Stewart was one of the 10 runners up. Joshua was presented with a certificate at the show by TV gardener, Joe Swift. He also received a £50 prize for school which is to be spent enhancing the school garden. Congratulations, Joshua, we are very proud of you!
Our ‘aftercare’ club has had a makeover during the summer holidays. School Plus will operate from 3.45pm to 6.00pm each school evening. The club will be run by Mrs Livesey, Mrs Turner and Mrs Chew and will be based in the Preparatory building.
If you would like your child to attend School Plus it is preferable that your child’s place is booked in advance by mid-morning that day to enable us to monitor staff child ratios and inform the catering department. However, if an unforeseen incident arises, your child can use the School Plus club, but please email schoolplus@oakhillcollege.co.uk or contact the school office on 01254 823546. The service costs £9 and is available for Prep and Senior pupils.
