Sports and Celebrations

Our final Celebration Assembly was held on Friday afternoon and, after a busy fortnight of House events, it was wonderful to share the successes and efforts of children across the school.

Achievements outside of school are always celebrated at LJS and Mr Robertson shared news of Lila from Year 3 who has been playing with the National Youth Orchestra. From Year 5, we heard about Lleyton’s incredible prowess in the pool, as well as Jack’s place on the Royal Ballet School Junior Associate programme from September.

Mrs Hamilton-Charlton congratulated all of the children from Years 1 to 6 who had competed in the Speech and Drama heats. The bar was set high for the final last week and the finalists did their Houses proud as they performed poetry and prose of their choice. The overall results were announced to the school, with Burghley emerging as the victors, followed by Gloucester, Whitmore and Lilford.

Miss Danby reported that a hard fought House Tennis tournament across Years 5 and 6 resulted in Whitmore taking the top spot and therefore winning the Rothnie Cup for House Tennis The Rothnie Cup was donated by long-term Whitmore House teacher Mrs Kay Rothnie on her retirement – she will be most proud of her Whitmore Wasps! Gloucester, Burghley and Lilford took up the remaining positions in that order and Miss Danby was impressed by the standard of the tennis that was played across the tournament.

Instead of a whole school sports day, we had to take a different approach this year to account for the various restrictions still in place. We were thrilled that we were able to invite our families to join us for the events and thank them for their understanding and support in adhering to the various rules and requirements that were in place. Year 5 and 6 headed to the Oundle School Athletics track, where they hurdled, ran (sprints and long distance), high jumped, triple jumped and threw (both shot put and javelin) their way through the afternoon, each child determined to do their very best to earn points for their house. The Year 3 and 4 event was held at LJS and they also gave their all to compete for as many points as they could possibly earn. Last but not least was the Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 event, which again took place at LJS under slightly threatening skies. The Year 2 children were delighted to be taking part in their very first sports day since they were in Reception whilst Reception and Year 1 children and parents experienced their first of many. The novelty race was most definitely the most spectacular and it was wonderful to see the smiles on the faces of the children as they donned their colourful house t-shirts with pride and put into practice the skills they have been practising in PE over the last few weeks. Mr Larkin reported that an incredible 31 records were broken over the course of the three days! It was a tense moment as Mr Larkin revealed the overall results in reverse order… In 4th place, with 1039 points were Whitmore, Burghley finished 3rd with 1199 points, Gloucester were the runners up with 1212 points, just 55 points behind Lilford who emerged victorious. It was wonderful to hear Year 6, who were in the hall for the assembly that was being streamed live to the rest of the school, sharing congratulations and commiserations with such humility and respect.

Colours were awarded to several members of the Under 11 A Cricket Team. Mr Robertson was then able to award a silver badge to Archie from Year 6 – well done, Archie. Then came the announcement that there were also 2 coveted and extremely rare gold badges to award. Congratulations to Finn and Theo for this tremendous achievement.

We also congratulated the Housepoint Champions and the winners of the Values certificates for each Form. The overall Values Award and pin badge was presented to Lucy in Year 5, who has demonstrated care, her sense of community, a love of learning, quality in everything she does and her willingness to take every opportunity offered to her in all areas of her learning. Lucy’s huge smile as she collected her award was wonderful to see and a just reward for her efforts.

Last but not least, Mr Robertson handed over the reigns to Head Girl and Boy Naomi and Jack, who have the tricky job of awarding the Cup of Kindness each month. They outlined how impressed they have been with the kindness on display across the school, from our oldest children down to our youngest. They talked of how the LJS Community has battled against the restrictions that Covid has presented us with over the academic year and that they had concluded that their final Cup of Kindness award should go to the whole school and duly presented it to Mr Robertson as a worthy recipient on behalf of us all. Mr Robertson, in his own words, ‘boomeranged’ the award back and presented to Jack and Naomi for setting the most wonderful example to us all over the course of the year. Well done, LJS – what a wonderfully kind community you are. And to Naomi and Jack and your Year 6 friends – thank you for being outstanding role models during your time at LJS. Onto the last week of term – what an action packed week we have ahead of us!