Y5/6 Girls Football Primary Schools Tournament – Thursday 27^th September

We had a wonderful sunny afternoon to host our Primary Schools Football tournament!  Who would have thought blue sky, gorgeous sun and the girls would need to seek shade at the end of September?

Eight 5-aside girls’ football teams came to compete in our cluster competition.  For some girls it was their first ever experience playing competitive football and for others they were able to put their skills to the test against the brave and the courageous.  Over all 60 goals were scored in total with many more saved!

The play-offs took place after 6 rounds and the gold/silver match took place between Towcester Primary and Greens Norton.  Towcester eventually took the title after a well fought game with the final score being 2-1, which took their total of goals score overall to a massive 16 – well done Towcester.

Without our Sponne Leaders these events cannot take place and yet again I was very proud at the way our young people conducted themselves, organising, refereeing, encouraging and cheering on all of our young visitors.  Thank you Sponne leaders, you are fantastic.

Second half comeback not enough for the Sponne U15, who go down 7-2 against Silverstone UTC

Monday 1^st October 2018

Hot on the heels of the away win over Guilsborough, came another fixture for the U15s, as they faced Silverstone UTC at Stowe School.

Another slow start for the Sponne side, and Silverstone made the most of it, scoring six goals in a one-sided first half. Not much else can be said here apart from that the second half went much better.

The second half saw a reshuffle as Ben Dimond joined the back line, and this change in approach made a huge difference as Sponne battled back in the second half.  We got on the scoresheet as Charlie Wood scored a neat finish from the edge of the box.

Tightly fought contest at NSB for the U15s, but are just edged out of the County Cup

Wednesday 3^rd October 2018

The Sponne U15 footballers travelled to NSB for a first round Northamptonshire Schools County Cup tie.  On the back of two slack first half performances, all focus was on starting the game well, working hard and pressing as a team.

Motivational words from Mr. Trusler set the tone on arrival at NSB, before the team went through a full warm-up drill, led by Mr. Cornelius, assisted by Ben Dimond and Luke Desborough.  We were fully ready to battle and compete, and an excellent 70 minutes of football was to be played.

U15s footballers fightback from 3-1 down to secure victory at Guilsborough
Wednesday 26 th September 2018

The first U15s fixture of the season came away at Guilsborough, in glorious conditions on a late September afternoon. Early play and possession was dominated by the hosts, comfortable with the ball and also making the most of some excellent long kicks from their ‘keeper.

Two early goals were conceded, the first from a cross, and next from a corner after some suspect marking from the backline.

Congratulations to the members of the Sponne Concert band, Brass band, Jazz Orchestra and String Orchestra who took part in the band tour to Paris at the end of last term. The groups gave three amazing concerts at Notre Dame, EuroDisney and Parc Montsouris. This was quite an experience being in Paris at the same time as the world cup, especially as one of the concerts took place shortly before the kick off of the final! In addition to the concerts, the students enjoyed a boat trip down the Seine, visit to Aquaboulevard, Musee d'Orsay and the Chateau de Versailles. It is amazing what you can pack into a short trip!
Sponne musicians have a busy term 2 ahead of them with multiple performances in and around Towcester leading up to Christmas. All the extracurricular music groups will be performing at the Christmas Concert on Tuesday 18th December. Tickets will go on sale, priced £7 via TUCASI after half term. So that all participating musicians have the opportunity to purchase tickets, two tickets per musician will be available to purchase until 26th November after which point they will be released for general sale. Book tickets early to avoid disappointment as this event is always sold out!

Students receiving their GCSE results at Sponne School in Towcester today were again delighted with their outstanding results.  This pattern of exceptional performance has continued for an eighth successive year with students not only attaining highly but showing significantly greater progress than would be expected nationally from their starting points at the end of Year 6.  Despite the uncertainty with the new and more challenging 9-1 assessments being introduced for most subjects the results at Sponne have held up and  in many aspects improved for students of all abilities.

Students and staff at Sponne School in Towcester are celebrating another excellent set of A Level results this year with many individuals achieving outstanding grades. Despite new specifications and a return to the two year A Level programme, results have remained very similar to previous years and most students continue to achieve the highest grades available. Just under 50% of students gained the very highest A*-B grades with all students passing. Students did particularly well with the very highest grades of A* and A grade with more than a third of all students achieving at least one of these.

Thursday the 12^th of July the whole of Year 8 were off timetable. In tutor times we had been working on enterprise skills such as thinking about what it meant, looking at presentations and evaluating their success and brainstorming ideas. Each form was split into groups who then had to come up with a product to pitch to our Business Dragons. The teams were expected to plan, market, price and pitch for their product. I got the wonderful opportunity to go round and to talk to all of the groups about their ideas and I can honestly say I was impressed with how they worked – the creativity and ingenuity they showed was remarkable.

On the 19^th of June, a group of Year 8 girls went to the University of Northampton for a “Women in Engineering” day. It was a very successful day which started with a talk from one of the organisers. We then visited a variety of local engineers by visiting lots of stalls all showing what they do and how they use both science and engineering. This included a robot that could move on its own and even sit down. There was a man called Cosmic Chris as well as people from the Army, some engineers who look at how to stem canal banks and we got a chance to test out some virtual reality kit. We also saw a giant 3d printer on an engineering bus.