Iain Hovell – Chair (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)
Tasmyn Simpkins – Deputy Chair

The purpose of the Advisory Board is to provide counsel and advice to the School’s Leadership Team regarding the operation of the school.
The Advisory Board is comprised of seven members (current and past parents), and the length of service on the Board is typically two to three years.
The Advisory Board’s focus is the continuous development of pupils and staff at the school, in accordance with the school’s ethos:

"The Grove will provide excellent education and welfare within a creative family environment where each child and adult is stretched to achieve their full potential. We will enrich the human mind, body and spirit by delivering outstanding knowledge to all, alongside ideology and healthy living".

The Advisory Board meets at least once per term to review various aspects of the school and nursery including:

• The quality of education provided (curriculum and teaching);
• The spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of pupils;
• The welfare, health and safety of pupils;
• Suitability of staff and supply staff;
• Premises and accommodation;
• The provision of information;
• The way complaints are handled; and
• The quality of leadership and management within the school

ETA: 5:15pm (please see our twitter feed for further updates to the ETA during our journey)

Friday (Home Day!) Good morning, the children have packed and are gathering their bags in the holding marquee before breakfast. We have two more sessions of activities before our lunch and departure.

Group 1: Climbing and Aeroball
Group 2: Aeroball and Climbing
Group 3: Climbing and Aeroball
Group 4: Aeroball and Climbing
Group 5: Climbing and Buggy Building
Group 6: Buggy Building and Climbing
Group 7: Buggy Building and Climbing
Group 8: Climbing and Buggy Building

Our last night: We have finished our activities for today and as it is our last night of Travel Week 2019 we are going to have a camp fire. We will be uploading photos again later this evening.

Thursday Morning: Our last full day of activities begins; the children are gathering outside before we head over for our breakfast.

Group 1: Raft Building and Buggy Building
Group 2: Buggy Building and Raft Building
Group 3: Abseiling and Buggy Building
Group 4: Buggy Building and Abseiling
Group 5: Archery and Sports and Team Games
Group 6: Sports and Team Games and Archery
Group 7: Archery and Sports and Team Games
Group 8: Sports and Team Games and Archery

Thursday Afternoon:

Group 1: Sports and Team Games, Beach Games.
Group 2: Sports and Team Games, Beach Games.
Group 3: Sports and Team Games, Beach Games.
Group 4: Sports and Team Games, Beach Games.
Group 5: Aeroball and Trapeze
Group 6: Trapeze and Aeroball
Group 7: Aeroball and Giant Swing
Group 8: Giant Swing and Aeroball

Wednesday Morning: Another glorious day with plenty of fun activities!

Group 1: Archery and Orienteering, Group 2: Orienteering and Archery, Group 3: Raft Building and Orienteering, Group 4: Orienteering and Raft Building, Group 5: Raft Building and Problem Solving, Group 6: Problem Solving and Raft Building, Group 7: Trapeze and Challenge Course, Group 8: Challenge Course and Trapeze

Wednesday Afternoon:

Group 1: Abseiling and Coastal Walk, Group 2: Coastal Walk and Abseiling, Group 3: Archery and Coastal Walk, Group 4: Coastal Walk and Archery, Group 5: Abseiling and Challenge Course, Group 6: Challenge Course and Abseiling, Group 7: Problem Solving and Abseiling, Group 8: Abseiling and Problem Solving

Tuesday Morning: The time is 06:48am, all of the children are wide awake with excitement. An amazing sunrise earlier this morning and plenty of fresh air with a hint of coffee… We will be heading over for our breakfast once everyone is dressed and ready which will provide energy for our exciting morning activities below:

Group 1: Giant Swing and Survivor, Group 2: Survivor and Giant Swing, Group 3: Giant Swimming and Survivor, Group 4: Survivor and Giant Swing, Group 5: Jacob’s Ladder and Survivor, Group 6: Survivor and Jacob’s Ladder, Group 7: Jacobs Ladder and Riffle Shooting, Group 8: Rifle Shooting and Jacob’s Ladder

Tuesday Afternoon:

Group 1: Challenge Course and Sensory Trail, Group 2: Sensory Trail and Challenge Course, Group 3: Challenge Course and Sensory Trail, Group 4: Sensory Trail and Challenge Course, Group 5: Giant Swing and Rifle Shooting, Group 6: Rifle Shooting and Giant Swing, Group 7: Raft Building and Survivor, Group 8: Survivor and Raft Building

Monday: Please arrive by 8:00am to enable us to depart on time. We will be traveling to Bawdsey Manor in Suffolk for Travel Week 2019. We will publish daily updates to this page during the week and travel updates.

Evening update: Once we arrived at Bawdsey Manor we met with the team and introduced them to the children. We made the most of the fantastic grounds for our lunch and outdoor games. The children are all in bed asleep getting their rest before our first full day of activities tomorrow. The group photos are on our gallery website.

Photos: During Travel Week we aim to upload as many photos as possible, a selection of photos will be uploaded here, the rest will be uploaded to our gallery website. If you require a password reset, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if the data connection is strong enough we will also upload occasional photos to Facebook and Twitter. The Group photos will be taken and published after we arrive on the first day.

Photos Update: We have uploaded most of the photos up to Wednesday afternoon.

Beech and Holly had a wonderful trip to Paradise Wildlife Park. We started off our trip with a hands on experience where we met a tortoise called Usain, a bearded dragon called Spike and a very friendly rabbit called Moana. After our workshop we visited the big cats and watched the white lions sleeping on top of their rock. We were very lucky to see the cheetah being fed and we listened to the talk as they explained that she was quite lazy and didn't like to run even though they have set up lovely tracks and games for her. We discovered that they therefore only run out of necessity which was very interesting. We spotted some playful jaguar's and sleepy tigers from the tree top walkway and descended to discover meerkats warming up under the heat lamp.

Our next adventure was into the reptile house and the Amazing Amazon exhibition where we saw a huge Anaconda swimming in it's pool. We also spotted an alligator, pythons and toads.

After lunch it was onto the penguin pool where they were having a swimming race and jumping out of the pool. Then we saw the alpaca's, zebra's and we even crawled through the meerkat tunnel to get a closer look at another group of meerkats who were foraging for their dinner. We had a quick ice cream stop to restore our energy and it was onto the Land of the Dinosaurs! We had a very exciting ride on the Dino Express and came face to face with some our favourite dinosaurs. Some of us even got squirted by the dinosaurs which was very funny.

We had a fun packed day and saw lots of wonderful animals. Many of us are keen to return as we enjoyed it that much and even one member of Holly Room declared as we were heading home "this was the best day ever!" All in all it was a very successful trip and we all left with lots of new animal facts to share.

Mrs Collins

Today, during our Eco House Day, we are celebrating the wonders of the Earth, organised a plant sale in order to raise money for our current charity Thames Valley Air Ambulance. Katie, a fundraising volunteer, joined us on this special day to give our thanks and encouragement for all the past and future fundraising our School Council, children and generously supporting parents are engage upon. We had a very important whole school assembly and learnt the amazing work the Air Ambulance does every day, with the support of all who raise money for it to respond to all emergencies. There are 21 helicopters nationwide, along with cars and medics which will fly or drive to any serious emergency, which is usually due to road accidents. Katie’s presentation showed us the work of all the people involved, from pilots to doctors and paramedics. Iman, from Spruce, got to model and wear the official uniform, an all in one red suit to keep the wearer warm as they could be called out at any time of day or night. This was teamed with a very technical white helmet which also sported a microphone on it.

It was a very special moment and we are so thankful to everyone for the support given on this very special day to this charity and for our school.

Ms Casiraghi

On the 16th of October The Grove was pleased to host a delegation from Barclays and Barclaycard. They came to school to run a workshop with years 7 and 8 covering life skills and financial management. The sessions included:

Practical financial management.

With case studies and working exercises with the pupils covering:

Security Basics (PIN numbers, Passwords).

Online Security – scams via cold calling, social media

Good vs. Bad Spending Habits, checking statements, only withdrawing money required.

Budgeting, savings and basic accounting.

Self Confidence and Meeting challenges.

The Pupils then undertook group work on inspirational characters / success stories / heroes. Through discussing the character traits of inspirational people, the pupils were encouraged to analyse and identify the attributes that made these people exceptional. The kind of qualities that came out in the discussions were determination, leadership. The kind of people mentioned were Muhammed Ali, Christian Coleman (World record holder for 60M dash). Mr Owen

The students arrived keen and ready at school for six thirty AM, despite the early start they were full of beans and ready to go. We headed for the Channel tunnel and managed to get on an early crossing which was very good news as what awaited us at the other side was a huge traffic jam through Brussels. The students sang lots of songs and stayed in good spirits until we arrived at the hotel in the evening.

The students were out of the car and ready to go in ten minutes and after a quick dinner they were out on the slopes and ready to ski. The students had a fun couple of hours skiing learning some new techniques and skills. After packing up they were straight to bed and asleep in moments. 

The following morning the students were up early for a good breakfast and then straight out on the slopes for their morning lesson. They focused on their technique getting their arms forwards and engaging their body to ski down the slope with carving style turns and get ready for the gate training later in the day. They started to make progress in this before going in for a well-deserved lunch. The students headed out with us to warm up their legs and get ready for the afternoon gate training. We worked again on their technique before they went off to have their first run at the gates. 

In the afternoon the students had their first run at the gates completing some good times but still needed to work on their technique for turning into the gates. Luckily after dinner they had video analysis feedback to improve this.  

Looking at the video analysis the students studied their techniques and knew how to improve the following day. After an evening hot chocolate they were soon straight to bed sleeping through the whole night. 

Sunday morning came, and the students were up and out on the slope practicing some technique before going into the gates once more, where they started to use their body to turn and kept their hands up. The students stopped for an early lunch and were back out onto the slope ready for the final session. They hurtled through the gates trying their best to improve upon their scores from the previous day. After a final group picture, we were of the slope and ready for the journey back. 

The journey back was much quicker, we got back just after the scheduled time. All of the students were exhausted and promptly fell asleep as soon as they were with their parents. 

All of the students had a great trip and look forward to their upcoming competition later in the year. Mr Thorne and Miss Keates

A resounding win for the first fixture of the year. The Colts boys are off to a great start this year with a good win against Broughton Manor School. The boys started the fixture in high spirits, they couldn't wait for their first Rugby fixture of the year. For the year five boys it was their first opportunity to continue their successful run of wins from last year at an older level. The boys started well with Findlay scoring an early try to get the ball rolling. The boys then traded scoring with some great Rugby being played by all. Going into half time the boys were leading with a score of five to three.

After a team talk the boys were ready for the second half they came out very strong against the opposition raising their score to nine to five as the closing result. The boys scored some superb wins and demonstrated great tackling and pitch positioning throughout the match.

Total scorers

Findlay 1

Keith 3

Kayne 2

Ronak 1

Wilfred 1

Kwaku 1

Grove 9 Broughton 5

The boys are looking forward to their next win in the upcoming fixtures. Mr Thorne

I can tell that this year is going to be a very special one. The children who performed in the first lunchtime concert of the year were brilliant. It was a delight to hear all of their contributions and can’t wait for the next instalment.

Harini Sivavakeesar’s piano piece ‘Allegretto Grazioso’ was played with great musicality, she felt the music from the bottom of her toes to the top of her head. Emily Foster sang ‘We’re off to see the wizard’ with a rich round sound and Barnaby Davison’ ‘Catch a falling star’ was beautifully observed, full of confident feeling and the last note was awesome.

Elijah’s Speech and Drama poem ‘Cats Protection League’ was wonderful, funny and scary all in one great rendition! Freddie Lancaster’s ‘Theme’ was a stunning Mozart-like piece that sounded very tricky.

We say ‘Ye Ha!’ to Chibugum Iwuagwu, ‘Yo Ho Ho!’ to Giovanna Opoku and ‘AHHH!’ to William Lam for their fun filled performances. Teachers who are cowboys, pirates who play the piano and sharks for Father’s Day cards were a big hit with us.

Isobella McCall played ‘Old Mac Donald’ on the black notes for her very first piano recital after only five lessons and Tabitha Simpkins sang a beautifully sunny ‘Ride on a rainbow’ after only a handful of lessons too. How amazing girls!

All of our performers remembered to bow and we were very proud of them, especially the ones who carried on even if something went a bit wrong.

Please don’t forget to come along to our next concert. You will be amazed at the talent that is being nurtured in our school.

Practise makes perfect everyone!

Beech and Holly had a wonderful trip to Pizza Express where they went through the rigorous training to become a Junior Pizzaiolo. We had a very informative workshop about all the ingredients that come together to create the wonderful flavours in a pizza. They explored the different tastes of Mozzarella and tomatoes and then the exciting dough appeared. We discovered what we needed to make the dough and then we had to knead it, flatten it, spread it and roll it. It was so much fun and the children finished it off by throwing the dough in the air and catching it just like the professionals! Once our dough was safely in the pizza dishes they added their cheese and tomato toppings. They went into the stone ovens and then came out pipping hot and scrummy yummy. This was one of my favourite trips I have ever taken children on as they were so excited and engaged with everything that they did. The children were beautifully behaved and a credit to the school and I was so proud of them. Well done Beech and Holly- I look forward to our next adventure together. Mrs Collins

Our half term activity week begins on Monday 22^nd October. Please click the links below to view the timetables.