It was great for the whole Prep Leadership team to watch the public speaking competitions take place in the week before half term. Many eloquent and compelling speeches were delivered in the course of a gripping contest but what was just as pleasing was the camaraderie that seemed to unite the pupils. Particularly striking was the group of boisterous 11 year olds who I found had gathered in the corridor to offer constructive suggestions to a more diffident speechmaker on speaking confidently and calming nerves.
It’s good to witness first hand this spirit of mutual support taking root in the Prep, especially as it’s a quality which we have highlighted as part of the subject - contribution - that we chose as our Prep theme for the term. Since early January, we have been devoting our assemblies to exploring what contribution means and why it is so important to Harrodian culture.
We started with an assembly that introduced the idea of making a contribution across a range of different school contexts: in class, on school trips, in our house structure, in extracurricular and charity fund-raising activities. Among other things, we asked children to search within for the empathy for fellow pupils and teachers that motivates them to help in different situations and to become ‘good citizens’ within and beyond the School.
A subsequent assembly at which the Leadership team shared the stage with the Prep School Student Council addressed how, by ‘speaking out’ and contributing new ideas to the community (see above), children can empower themselves and their fellow pupils to enable change. Among the many creative ideas brought to the table by the Council this term were suggestions for introducing playground equipment, reading with Pre-Prep children, a school newspaper and at least a dozen more.
One example of the special value of contribution came with the house running competitions which took place on the Thames towpath over the fortnight before half term (see below). All pupils take part in this activity, with the emphasis less on individual placings than the overall house performance. Everywhere you looked this year, pupils – many of them not normally associated with high sports and running achievement - were setting new personal bests and surprising themselves with their capacity to exceed their own expectations as their fellow competitors cheered them on. Contribution is an essential ingredient of Harrodian’s special spirit of co-operation and community but its positive impact on the ability of individual pupils to build the resilience so crucial to ‘a growth mindset’ cannot be overstated either.
