News

Whilst the headlines across the country are about falling numbers of A grades, results are still on the rise at HCH. The proportion of A and B grades achieved by our leavers is the highest to date and more than half of the grades were A grades.
More importantly perhaps, nearly all of our students will... be going to their first-choice universities. We wish them all well and hope they visit again soon to tell us all about their experiences.

In the Summer term of 2019 pupils in the Early and Lower Years, supported by students in Year 9, took part in the sponsored run bake sale for refugee children, both of which were very successful. The school raised £2,640 and bought 329 pairs of shoes for refugee children. The shoes arrived last Friday... in the refugee shelter of Ivry sur Seine.

Pupils from Pre-Nursery to Year 4 took part in the Early and Lower Years Sports Day this morning cheered on and supported by their parents and families. Track and field events included football and tennis ball throwing, javelin, long jump and various sprint races. For the first time children from Pre-Nursery,... Nursery and Reception classes took part in an obstacle race as well as a 40m sprint. Pupils from Year 3 and Year 4 demonstrated the relay skills they have been learning this term with seamless baton changes in the 4x100m relay races. For the first time the pupils were competing in inter-house events as a flavour of the competitions they can look forward to further up the school. Points were awarded for participation as well as technique and teams were given accumulative scores for their relay races. The final race of the morning was of course the much-anticipated parents and teachers’ 60m sprint which was a nail biting competition for first, second, and third place. Well done to Sam Dykes, Year 5 form tutor for winning the parents and teachers’ race.

Pupils from Pre-Nursery to Year 1 performed in their Summer Recital on Monday 1st July. Soloists from the Early years sang and performed pieces on the recorder, violin and piano, demonstrating weeks of hard work and practise in the lead up to the concert itself. Each year group came together to sing... one piece in French and one in English which had been rehearsed and developed in their music lessons with their music teacher Aleksandra, their form tutors and their French teachers. The theme of the concert was ‘Animals in the jungle’ with pupils dressed as different animals and a colourful jungle-themed set.

The sun was shining on another successful Middle and Upper Years sports day yesterday. This year the event was held at school with a selection of new events for pupils and their families to enjoy. Our school houses; Garrick, Halifax, Twining and Wright competed in track and field events for years 5 &... 6, 7 & 8, and 9 to 13 heats and finals. Old favourites like the 200m relay, javelin and sprint races were accompanied by new competitions such as shot put relay, 60m sprint and triple jump. The focus of this year was not on results and medals but on technical merit with prizes awarded to individuals who demonstrated the best technical competency irrespective of their place in the competition. The highlight of the day was the final event, the five minute run, which was new for 2019. Four representatives of each house ran as many laps as possible for five minutes with points distributed for the amount of laps run. The competition was nail-biting as the narrow point difference between each house meant there was a jostle for places throughout the afternoon but as the final scores were announced it was clear that the winning house was Wright with 637 points.

The Y1 children have been working on a project about ‘how to make a book’ which began in January. They took part in a number of writing workshops, during which they invented and wrote their own story and illustrated it. This was a project that we ran with the help of some sixth-form students. During... the project we also welcomed the French illustrator Marianne Barcilon who delivered workshops to Y1, Y2 and Y3 in February, thanks to the support of the HCH Friends. The book is in French, but it is also translated in English for the whole school to read.

On 11th June, Years 2 and 3 visited the Roald Dahl museum in Great Missenden. Upon arrival, we set off on the village trail, highlighting many of the places that inspired Dahl’s wonderful stories. We saw the bedroom window that Sophie peeked out of to see the BFG and we visited the library where Matilda... read all those books! The trail led us, with the help of the BFG’s footprints, to Roald Dahl’s grave and the beautiful bench dedicated to his children. Although it was raining, the children really enjoyed the walk through this rather special village.