Happy Children Achieve More

I am writing this feeling very proud. All the teachers at Wandsworth Prep have been so impressed with our Year 6 children who have worked so hard on their 11+ entrance exams...through a pandemic. We have a successful, structured, tried and tested approach to supporting children and their parents through 11+ exams, always keeping wellbeing at the heart of the process. This year, due to Covid, most of the secondary schools changed their exam structure at short notice. Many pupils who were expecting their exams in January found they had been moved forward to November. Not only that, many exams were structured in a completely different way.

This is where developing the whole child and drawing on those growth mindset qualities are such an important part of our education process here at Wandsworth Prep. Our children aren’t robots; they proved they could adapt quickly to new situations. The children were very resilient, supported by their families and their teachers. Even if they did have a wobble, they showed that great quality of ‘bouncebackability’ (no - you probably won’t find that in dictionary corner) and practising that particular skill at a young age is immensely important.

So bravo to every child in Year 6. We like to think of our pupils as individuals and that shines through when you see from our destination schools that every child is going to a different school. We have some families moving out of London, so we have an even richer range of schools this year with a range of scholarships including academic, art and drama and Headteacher awards.

So how do we celebrate the children's effort and resilience? We give them a ‘Waffle Breakfast’ with every unhealthy topping you can ever imagine (well there is a bit of fruit). This year’s Year 6 have broken the record for the number of ‘pie faces’ they could achieve and even carried out a Mexican Wave of Pie-Faces with the creamy waffle toppings! They obviously wanted to make sure the class of 2021 were never forgotten!