Year 9 Flexiday
On Flexiday, our Knights and Ladies girded their loins, polished their chain mail and saddled their mighty steeds to do battle, mediaeval style. The Year 9s were given a brief to construct the mightiest siege weapons and castles they could, using paper, string and their own ingenuity. They also had to design a heraldic banner and flag for their class groups to march under.
The kids had a lot of fun, researching various designs of artillery, castle building and heraldry. The day was more of a Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths Day than pure science, with a little bit of history thrown in for our colleagues below us. The sheer industry of the Year 9 group was astounding, testing their weapons, in particular, to the point of destruction. You thought Wayne Rooney looked tired in the 3 rd minute against Germany? That was nothing compared to the exhaustion felt by our warrior boys and girls.
More impressive was the blatant cheating exhibited by some teachers and their students, and the espionage efforts employed by the other classes to spy and sabotage their enemies before they entered the fray would have made James Bond look inept and idle by comparison. It was a proud sight to watch the armies of Year 9 students march down the stairs in disarray, holding aloft their castles, catapults and trebuchets.
The tournament got underway on the MUGAs, with impressive distances being achieved by a lot of the entrants. Who would have thought that a catapult made only of paper, cellotape and an elastic band could fire a projectile a hundred feet? ‘Cheat’ went the cry from the assembled ranks of onlookers, ‘prove it!’ went the retort.
In the end, though, there has to be a winner. Or in this case two. No competition in schools indeed! Honours were split between Squire Neckles’ class, and Baroness Trefz’s new model army. To the victors went the spoils of war, in the shape of the entire stock of ice lollies from Sir Morrison’s Olde Tea Shoppe of Acton.