The Pilgrims’ Way Friday 3 March 2017

From the Headmaster’s Desk

You may be aware that Pilgrims’ teachers who work on Saturdays (and sometimes Sundays), have a “half day” during the week that generally starts at noon. I have a “half day” on Friday morning and tend to enjoy breakfast in town, often returning during morning Break. There is a very distinctive and pleasing hubbub (laughter, chatter, the occasional shout) growing louder as one nears School. I remember a neighbour commenting how they enjoyed boys playing as a soundtrack to their morning cuppa. It is wrong to say that children should be seen and not heard.

Silence, on the other hand, is rare. I enjoy those parts of the Winchester-London railway journey that have no ’phone reception; I admire the confident, assured character who speaks rarely, but with gravitas. One of the marks of a great school is that the boys can be silent, profoundly silent, at the right time. On Wednesday the boys were immaculately silent before, during, and after the Ash Wednesday service – just as they were on Remembrance Day. There are times when boys should work in silence, wait in silence, think in silence. God is the friend of silence.

See how nature – trees, flowers, grass – grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls (Mother Teresa) There is surely a connection between a calm spirit and a ready acceptance of silence.

However, there are times when silence is wrong. Qui tacet consentit, says Robert Bolt’s Thomas More. Silence gives consent. I have always wanted Pilgrims’ parents to say when things are not right. Boys sometimes have to ignore the Boy Code that forbids telling/snitching/grassing. Bullying is not covered by the Boy Code, we say at Pilgrims’. If you keep silent when others are being persecuted, eventually the persecutors come for you. Silence can be a very bad thing.

I like it when our boys are silent; and I like it when they make lots of noise. I like it when they are loyal; and I like it when their loyalty is to higher principle rather than a peer who is doing wrong. To quote Ecclesiastes: There is a time to be silent and a time to speak.

The 2017 vintage of Year 7 Pilgrims enjoyed the annual History trip to Hampton Court on Tuesday. With a tour of the Great Hall, the Chapel Royal and the Young Henry exhibition, the boys were able to learn even more about the Tudor history that they have been studying this year. As ever, a treat was provided by the Real Tennis professionals who gave the boys a chance to gain a 'taster' of this ancient and skilful game. My thanks to the boys for conducting themselves so well, as well as to Miss Curzon, Miss Micklethwaite and Mr Buckett for joining us on the outing. AH

Year 7 visit Hampton Court

Picture of the Week Observation drawing of soft toys

Victorian Open Morning

We are looking forward to our cross-curricular Open Morning tomorrow.

A choral recital was given in William of Wykeham’s fourteenth-century chapel on Friday 17 February as a prelude to Winchester College Chapel Choir’s tour of southeastern Germany. The music we heard spanned some four hundred years, and exemplified the intelligent programming and exceptional choral direction for which Malcolm Archer is renowned.

The evening began with the sixteenth-century Missa brevis by Palestrina, whose pure Roman counterpoint showed off the choir’s abilities in ensemble singing as well as in sparer imitative episodes. Then came a taste of Tudor England as the choir savoured the expressive dissonances of Byrd’s darker motets Ave verum corpus and Civitas sancti tui, their solemn resolutions as grave as they were inevitable. At the organ, Jamal Sutton, who in the latter part of the recital provided accompaniments of great musicality and magnet-like adherence to his distant conductor’s beat, gave a compelling performance of the harmonically adventurous chorale prelude on ‘O Mensch, bewein’ from Bach’s Orgelbüchlein. The Austrian composer Bruckner’s dramatic 1884 motet Christus factus est explored a post-Wagnerian harmonic world in which the choir took us to the remotest keys and back. Next up were the Quiristers alone, in an engaging rendition of Stanford’s lovely Song of Freedom. The boys’ airy treble voices were

ideally suited to this serene Edwardian setting of Psalm 126. The full choir returned for Steal Away and Deep River, Tippett’s own, later arrangements of two of the chorale-like spirituals from his oratorio A Child of Our Time, which he began as Britain declared war on Nazi Germany in September 1939. Their dense textures and ingenious scoring allowed the choir’s wide range of sonorities to shine. Given Tippett’s pacifism, it was poignant to reflect that we would hear these works next in a German city that was utterly destroyed by Allied bombs in February 1945. Last came a truly glorious performance of Howells’s Te Deum for King’s College, Cambridge, written in the last year of that war. Inspired by the vast, stone-canopied spaces of Henry VI’s great chapel, this is Anglican church music of a high order, weaving the traditions of centuries into a consoling and intensely moving whole.

It is perhaps worth considering that when Henry VI was building in the Fens, Winchester College was already approaching its centenary. There can be no doubt that members of today’s choral foundation are among Wykeham’s finest ambassadors. If the evening’s music-making was anything to go by, the good citizens of Dresden and Leipzig are in for a treat. Peter Sawbridge

Winchester College Chapel Choir Recital

Three New Prefects and a New Set Captain

We are delighted to announce that Jasper Jones, Hamish Rogers, and Tristan Wigley have been made Prefects.

Equally, we are delighted that Tate Dare-Bryan is now Joint Set Captain of Saxons.

Ollie Maclay (3S)

Hockey and Rugby Team Photographs

These will now take place on Wednesday 15 March. GH

A Week in the Life of Year 5

In French, Year 5 are starting to learn how to say what there is in a town, how to ask for directions, and in a couple of weeks, what there is to do in a town. Next week (I believe) they will start to design their own towns. Last half term they learned how to tell the time, as well as how to describe where they live (region, country, house, room etc).

The week started in DT where Year 5 were busy designing and crafting their own dice.

The process starts with the boys having a 66mm cube of planed pine (PAR).

Having prepared the block they then have to measure, mark and drill 9.5mm diameter holes using the pillar drills. The design stage allows

the boys to choose the colour of the dots on each face. Here they are using pre-cut 9.5mm acrylic rods.

Once the rods have been inserted using a mallet, the six faces are then sanded using the belt sander.

The final preparation of the product requires some dedicated elbow grease with some fine glass paper and a sanding block.

The finished product has to pass Mr Armstrong’s quality control (notoriously difficult!). If there is enough time, it is then polished and varnished.

For our rugby practice on Tuesday we were lucky enough to have Mike Marchant, an RFU coach at Peter Symonds and England Counties U20s, come to work with us.

A Week in the Life of Year 5

For Geography next week, the Year 5s will be visiting Kew Gardens for a multi-sensory journey through the rainforest and a hands-on workshop.

In Tutor time this week, the boys in 5P were enacting a call to Emergency Response to learn about when to call 999 and how the situation would play out.

In 5M’s tutor time, each boy entered the Circle of Fame and summarised their half term holiday within 30 seconds.

This week in music, Year 5 have begun a new topic on Gregorian Plainsong. They have been looking at the origins of plainsong and how it evolved. The pinnacle of this topic will be singing plainsong dressed as monks in the cathedral.

In English, Year 5 are studying narrative poetry this term and within this genre, they have looked at The Listeners by the British poet, Walter de la Mare. They have analysed the poem and learnt about various techniques which the poet used to create a sinister atmosphere. The class used the iPads to research facts about Walter de la Mare and recorded their findings in their English books.

On Friday morning, the boys were working very hard to earn their handwriting license. This means they are then allowed to use a fountain pen.

Book Fair

The second – and last – Book Fair of the academic year will take place on Wednesday 8 March in the Briggs Library and will be open to pupils in Years 3 to Year 8. £1 World Book Day tokens and book tokens are accepted.

No action is needed as parents have already sent instructions in the autumn. Anybody wishing to check their allowance can contact Mrs Brill lbrill@pilgrims-school.co.uk by the end of Tuesday.

Many thanks to P&G Wells Bookshop supplying both display material and stock. LB

Author visit Lucy Courtenay

Fact one: penguins do not live in the North Pole; fact two: there are

seventeen different kinds of penguins. All children in Years 2, 3, 4 and 5 knew the first fact, and most of us learnt the second from our World Book Day speaker. This and more we explored with author Lucy Courtenay who met the boys on the twentieth anniversary of this celebration. The boys sat totally enthralled by the tale of four space-travelling penguins living in a ship called Tuna Fish, enjoying birthday feasts and ignoring the threat of incoming pirates.

Pilgrims’ Express Friday 10 March – Sunday 12 March Exeat

Please let Mrs Short know by Tuesday 7 March if you would like your son to travel on the train return to Waterloo.

Tennis Coaching for boys in Years 6, 7 and 8

As in previous years, the Winchester College tennis professional, Tim Cawston, has kindly agreed to take some senior Pilgrims’ (Years 6, 7 and 8 only) for tennis coaching. This will take place on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons. Details have been emailed to all parents with sons in Years 6, 7 and 8. GH

Easter Holiday Courses

Mr Shroff is offering holiday courses for the first few days of the Easter holiday — Monday 27, Tuesday 28 and Wednesday 29 March. They will include sport, computer gaming and board games.

For more information please contact him at mshroff@pilgrims-school.co.uk

Mr Buck is offering an Easter Cricket Course from Monday 10 April to Thursday 13 April and continuing on Tuesday 18 April to Wednesday 19 April. Please refer to the letter that was sent out to parents on 24 February for details.

Nice One Jack!

Jack Boissier was a team mascot for the England v Twickenham match last Sunday.

World Book Day

The young audience loved listening to how Lucy finds sources of inspiration for her stories and to her tips on successful story-writing. Many thanks to Lucy, who is also a Pilgrims’ mum, for sharing with us her expertise and her infectious love for books and reading.

Having just listened to Radio 4 commenting on the decreasing role played by books in children’s lives, I am glad to report that here at Pilgrims’ we are happily and proudly bucking the trend! LB

Remarkable Women and Remarkable Anthems

In the week which celebrates the martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicity in 203AD, most of the anthems mirror the attitude of appealing to God. Purcell's magnificent eight-part Hear My Prayer (Sunday. Matins 0945) cries out as if at the moment of martyrdom. Theirs was a pretty gruesome and public one: two young women, one a new and nursing mother, her slave pregnant on the point of giving birth were scourged by gladiators, wounded by wild animals and then put to the sword, with part of the story apparently written by Perpetua herself. On the day of actual commemoration, Tuesday, the choir sings Blow's Salvator Mundi with its opening chromaticism echoing some of Purcell's suspensions, and the harrowing use of harmony suddenly blossoming into the major when it seems as if any more might be too much to bear. Purcell and Blow were contemporaries at the time when it was once again possible for choral church music to be written after the Restoration. There is a beautiful rose named after the martyrs. Julia Mackie

Boarders’ Excursion Sunday 5 March

Hawk Conservancy Trust

The Hawk Conservancy Trust is a conservation charity and award-winning visitor centre that has, for many years, worked in the fields of conservation, education, rehabilitation and the research of birds of prey. Set in 22 acres of woodland and wildflower meadow, there are over 150 birds of prey on view, from the tiny Pygmy Owl to the impressive Steller's Sea Eagles! Many of these birds are involved in spectacular daily flying demonstrations, whilst others are part of important breeding or environmental enrichment projects.

Weekly Lunch Menu - Week beginning: 6 March

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

Main Coq au Vin Macaroni cheese and bacon steak

Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding

Chicken and leek pie

Battered fish with tartar sauce

Exeat Veg and

pots Green beans

and rice Salad

Roast potatoes and roasted vegetables

New potatoes and carrots

Chips and baked beans

Pudding Jam sponge with custard

Pears and ice cream

Cut fresh fruit Cheesecake Chocolate crispy

cake and vanilla sauce

A selection of salads are available daily from the chilled counter and homemade soup is available on Tuesday and Thursday

A selection of homemade bakes and cakes, fresh fruit, yoghurts and pudding are offered on a daily basis

The Menu is subject to change according to availability

Lost Kit

It appears that at the start of half term, a parent or boy may have picked up a wrong bundle of games clothing. Could all laundry rooms be checked for the kit of Sulaiman Zafarul-Kayum. He would be delighted to be reunited with it!

Boarders’ Excursion Sunday 12 March

Air Rifle Shooting Commoner Exeat

Ready, Aim, Fire! Have you got what it takes to hit bullseye? Come and try some target practice using real air rifles.

Music in the Cathedral this week