A massive well done to the hockey team last night in the last round of fixtures. They put in a very spirited performance in their first game against a very strong Long Bennington side who had a lot of experienced players. Unfortunately despite some resolute defending they went down to a 1-0 defeat. However they bounced straight back with consecutive wins against William Gladstone and Farndon in their last two matches. They played some great attacking hockey in these matches and scored some excellent goals.

Happy New Year to everyone. I hope you all enjoyed the Christmas period. Just a quick note to confirm the remaining Inset days taking place in the remaining months of this academic year. The school will be closed for training on the following dates:

• Friday 27th May 2016
• Monday 6th June 2016
• Monday 25th July 2016

Already the school choir have been involved in many exciting events. 

On Sunday 29th November (after the lights had been switched on in Newark) we took part in the Parish Church Carol Service. The children did an excellent job singing many carols and this saw them even more excited for the events to come.

The 2nd Dec saw the choir take a trip to Costa Coffee near the Odeon cinema where, after many songs and lots of fun, the children were rewarded for all their hard work with hot chocolate provided very kindly by Costa Coffee.

At Wollaton Hall on Sat 5th Dec the weather was bitterly cold but the children didn't let this put them off. While the wind whipped the fake snow into their mouths the children still managed to perform to an amazing standard and all the staff were extremely proud of each and every one of them.

The next event was the children performing on Newark Radio. This went so well and the children sounded so fantastic that the school are now considering producing an album later on in the academic year.

A BIG thank you must be said to all the parents, carers, grandparents and siblings that have supported the choir so far. Your support is very much appreciated and we hope you have enjoyed the shows.

Still to come

13th Dec - Carol service at Charles Street Methodist church 6pm

14th Dec - The senior choir will be at Newark Hospital 1pm

16th Dec - Newark Wharf Christmas Caroling! 6pm

The first round of the Newark Schools' Chess League took place last night at John Blow School in Collingham. Barnby took 4 teams consisting of a mixture of experienced competition veterans and up and coming rookies. In total there were 14 teams at the event from 5 different schools including the chess powerhouses of Sutton on Trent, Holy Trinity & Highfields.

Each team has 4 members who play 3 games during the evening. Points are scored for each win meaning the maximum points available to any team is 12.

At the end of the evening all of the Barnby teams are very well placed to move into the spring round; the 'C' team is in 7th place overall with 6.5 points, the 'D' team are 5th with 8 points, 'A' team in joint 3rd place with 8.5 points and current competition leaders are the 'B' team with an outstanding 11 points out of an available 12!

Individual medals on the evening went to Thomas Carter, Alfie Horne, Nathaniel Cooper, Daniel Pitchford, Toby White & Oliver Birkby for winning all 3 of their matches.

Well done everyone for a great performance.

Barnby Road footballers attended the Individual Schools' 7-a-side Cup County Finals at Sutton Lawns on Saturday morning, returning to Newark as proud owners of County runners-up medals!

The boys were representing Newark having won the autumn tournament at Flowserve in October. They were up against teams from each of the districts of Nottinghamshire.

Starting solidly and getting better as the morning went on, the boys were unbeaten through all their 6 matches, winning 3 and drawing 3. Only one goal was conceded all morning and that came in the first half of the first match!

Unfortunately too many draws stopped the boys being crowned county champions, with them finishing 1 point behind the eventual winners - St Johns (who they did beat when the two sides met!).

The standard of football played by the team was excellent.

Thank you to everyone who took part and especially to parents and staff who supported on an extremely cold morning!

The hockey team had their next set of fixtures last night. They had two matches and finished with a win and a defeat. The defeat was against a very experienced Bleasby side and although the children worked hard the Bleasby side proved too strong and we were beaten 2-0. In the second match of the evening they played against Sir Donald Bailey and secured a comfortable 3-0 victory in this match. Well done to all involved.

It was the Autumn Netball Tournament on Saturday and the girls were fantastic all morning. They won their group to progress into the quarter finals. In the knock out stages they had convincing wins in the quarter and semi finals against Coddington and Lowes Wong. This set up a very difficult final against a strong Chuter Ede team who had won every game on their way to the final. The girls started very strongly going into a 3-1 lead at half time. We then had to follow the rotation set up and this seemed to break our pattern of play a little in the second half with Chuter Ede coming back to win 5-3. It was a great match played in a super spirit and everybody should be very proud of their achievements on the morning. Well done to all involved!

We are currently advertising for a Teaching Assistant to join our F1 team on a part time basis. Full details are available in the vacancies section of the website.

Year 4 are having a fantastic time on their residential trip to Sherwood Forest. All children had a great day yesterday exploring the forest, making clay boggarts and producing some wonderful art using nature. Mr Barbuti informs us that all the children had a good nights sleep last night and were raring to go again this morning.

Apologies to those of you who have been looking on Facebook for updates, Mr Barbuti has told us there is no signal in the forest at all, which has obviously prevented him from posting.

The 'A' football team became the latest group to win the coveted Newark Schools' Autumn Football tournament. The boys were undefeated in their group, winning 4 and drawing 2 of their 6 matches including a resounding 3-0 win over fierce rivals Chuter Ede.

The team advanced into the semi-final without conceding a goal and continued in this style in the knock-out round. The semi against Coddington was an excellent match; Dean Robinson securing victory with an outstanding finish with 4 seconds left on the referee's watch!

The final was a tight affair too, pitching us against John Blow from Collingham, who we had beaten 2-0 earlier in the day. Still 0-0 after extra-time the match went to penalties.

The deciding kick fell to goalkeeper Harvey Willis who calmly slotted the ball home for a famous victory.

The boys will now go on to the County 7-a-side and 5-a-side finals representing Newark & Sherwood District. Thank you to everyone involved.