Brentwood Preparatory School Incipe 2017-18

Brentwood School Preparatory 12 Valete Andrew Matthams When I first met Andrew we were both pupils at Chelmer Valley High School in Chelmsford. Andrew was an important member of the school football team and I was not. In fact we rarely spoke during those years in the late 1970s. We then went our separate ways to university. I got one of my first teaching roles at St John’s School in Billericay in 1992. Andrew was there as the Year 6 class teacher. The following year he moved to Brentwood Preparatory School where he stayed until 2018. In 1998 I followed Andrew to Brentwood Prep and we enjoyed almost 15 years teaching in a great school together. Andrew was well known for his humour, for being in school early and leaving early! Turning up every day in one of his large vans often got people wondering why on earth he needed such a vehicle. However that was just one of the little idiosyncrasies he possessed. Andrew always took possession of the school newspaper. If you needed it, it could be found folded on his desk in preparation for break-time. He used to take home the school Christmas tree each year until the ever resourceful Mrs Sheridan introduced a raffle system to make things a little more fair! Andrew has always loved football and his beloved West Ham. Over the years he produced many league and cup winning U11 Brentwood Prep teams with his no nonsense coaching and team organisation. Brentwood School has had some very good young footballers over the years and many of them have benefited from some time under Andrew’s tutelage. The cricket season is also a fond memory from my own time at Brentwood; the glorious playing fields looked their best in the summer months and the children enjoyed their cricket as much as we did in taking the teams. Andrew, myself and Mr Brazier would also make regular trips to Chelmsford to watch Essex play a 20/20 cricket match. Great times were had drinking warm beer under the evening summer sun, putting the world - or Brentwood School - to rights. Andrew was a gifted teacher, albeit he had his own ways. He was an educator with a calm and patient manner. He could easily have been a headteacher had he so wished to pursue that particular godforsaken path. He was happier though with his Year 6 form and overseeing Quennell House. Sports Day was one time the rivalries of the House staff would rise to the surface. Mr Brazier would prowl the edge of the running track like an Essex Jose Mourinho encouraging his young Lawrence athletes and raising the stakes still further. Andrew would stand motionless behind his sunglasses muttering quietly. The rivalry was Borg-McEnroe-esque. One year we asked Mr Brazier if he felt his touchline antics made any difference to the children’s performance; his retort, “about 10%”. Several years back Andrew undertook a tough physical challenge in aid of Child Leukemia, a charity very close to his heart. He rowed 1000km over the space of a few weeks, on an indoor rowing machine. Andrew was a very good sportsman himself and this was just another area in which he excelled. Outside of school, Andrew was a family man; wife Lisa and children Joe, Lucy and Lizzie were of course the focus of Andrew’s life and in his retirement I expect him to spend even more time with them and in his workshop, waiting for his tea, cutting logs, watching West Ham and Essex Cricket Club. Anyone who has taught for as long as Andrew has, will have seen many changes in education, some of them good, some not so good. Teachers have had to adapt to many changes, email and the internet have changed the world immeasurably from a time when a handwritten letter was the favoured form of formal communication. Andrew likes to recall the story of a staff meeting from the 1990s in which the issue of classroom wall displays was raised. A teacher who has long since departed, lowered his newspaper and retorted, “ Wall displays? This is a prep school”. Jeremy Freeman April 2018 - Kenya Andy Prideaux Mr Prideaux knew he was up for a challenge when he met our class but what a fun year we have had. Mr Prideaux has been right at the top cool teacher list. The main thing everyone will miss most about Mr Prideaux is the fact that, unlike most teachers, he makes lessons relaxed and fun even when they are not. He explains classwork clearly and helps in a way we can understand. He always works hard to keep us all happy when in partners or groups and encourages us out of our comfort zone to be the best we can be. He takes us on the best trips ever - to Harry Potter Studios and Mersea in Enrichment week and to Brentwood theatre every Christmas - and he even plays table tennis with us at lunch time! Just a couple of things though - maybe he should consider supporting a worthy football team and his dancing is a little cringy!. We hope he enjoys his new life down under with the cute koalas and crazy kangaroos (yes that was an alliteration, he taught me how to do a good one of those)! Mr Prideaux is... Rare Peaceful Really helpful Imaginative Disorganised Exciting Amazing Unique eXtraordinary We will all miss him! Good luck to Mr Prideaux, Mrs Prideaux and Elliott!