180th Birthday Spectacular - Report and Pictures
Thursday was a simply wonderful day and the children looked marvellous as they arrived in their Victorian Costumes for their Victorian birthday party. Each child went into our Victorian Classroom and took part in a Victorian lesson – some children paid their ‘pennies’, one child in each class had to be given the back straightener because they were slumping at their desk and one child in each class received the attendance award. ‘Sir’ and ‘Miss’ from the Warwickshire Heritage Education Service were so convincing and the children had a superb time, learning about life in a Victorian school.
Throughout the rest of the day we had children playing with Victorian toys and investigating different ‘real life’ Victorian children. At lunchtime it was a pleasure to see so many of you at our family picnic and we were all, very sensibly, enjoying our picnics in the shade of the trees and gazebos. We welcomed back many past members of staff and Miss Gasson, Mrs Lester and Mrs Williams-Cooke were greeted enthusiastically by the children. It was a real testament to the event that we had 5 Headteachers represented and, at the end of lunchtime, Mrs Stubbings (widow of Bill Stubbings, headteacher from 1945-1986), Mrs Pat Daly (1986-1995), Mrs Helen Barnwell (1995-2004), Mrs Williams-Cooke (2005-2011) and Mrs Hine (2012-present) all helped to cut the stunning birthday cake, very kindly provided by Mrs Straw. I hope Mrs Straw could hear the round of applause and expressions of delight at her amazing ‘Dassett Logo’ cake, where she was! We had a very short Victorian drill (due to the heat), consisting of breathing exercises and stretching, before marching back into school for further activities.
At the end of the day each child left clutching their very own copy of our amazing book ‘Roof Off The Dassett’, which we feel is a beautiful memento of the day and a social history of this moment in the life of our unique school. We really hope you enjoy reading it. We do have some extra copies in the school office if anyone would like one for the price of £3.50. Your children were so impressive in every way on this special day – it was incredibly warm but I did not hear one moan or groan! We are very proud of them all! Photographs are on the ‘About Us/Curriculum/Enrichment Activities’ section of the website. Original large scale copies (up to 5mb) for printing can be ordered for 50p per photograph - please email school office with photos required.