Beyond The Classroom

At Portland Place, we want to provide our students with the opportunity to:

• Excite and broaden their mind on their favourite topics and subjects.
• Stretch their learning far beyond the classroom.
• Empower them to set their own learning direction.
• Inspire and motivate them.

We want to provide our students with the opportunity to explore topics and issues further, to develop a sense of questioning and curiosity. When we are curious, we see things differently, making connections and experiencing moments of insight and meaning — all of which provide the foundation for rich and satisfying life experiences.

The Strive Booklets allow our students to harness their curiosity and deepen their interest and engagement of a particular subject through closer study. Each subject has suggestions about things to, WATCH, READ, LISTEN, SEE AND DO to foster passion and enthusiasm for the subjects our students love and develop strategies for independent learning. There will be lots of opportunities during the year to submit ideas and creations to our Strive Celebrations, where there will be awards for the most interesting, original and creative ideas.

You can download an interactive pdf of the strive document here:
Year 7 STRIVE 2022/23
Year 8 STRIVE 2022/23
Year 9 STRIVE 2022/23

At Portland place co-curriculum is at the very heart of our school ethos.

Our co-curricular programmes are customised to the students at the school and stem from the interests and passions of our students. The primary role of co-curricular activities is to simulate development whilst having fun doing an activity that is constructive and enjoyable.

We offer a wide range of clubs and activities which take place in all three of our buildings, these activities run throughout the course of the day; before school, during lunch and after school.

Students can choose anything from; LAMDA to debating club, design club and many of the sporting and musical offerings. The latest offerings include our MFL clubs, where students have a choice of doing Russian, Mandarin, Japanese and Spanish. There are a variety of clubs for all age groups and interests.

Our clubs and activities are often updated on a termly basis. This ensures we keep up to date with the requests from students and staff, personalising each club to pupils current interests.

We encourage our students to try something new although encourage them to persist with the activities that bring them joy.

Clubs and activities can be found in the weekly newsletter under the calendar page. This is emailed to current parents every Friday.

We host many creative art projects at Portland Place School and tend to start the year with Halloween where we change our school building into a haunted house. This is a perfect time for new students and parents to mingle to talk through the first few weeks of the school year.

Shortly after the Haunted House event, our attention shifted to the ISA Shakespeare Festival. This has been a great success over the past three years. This year’s entry of Hamlet was performed as part of the One Night of Shakespeare, with the cast of 14 students across Year 9 and 10, this was performed and recorded in our drama studio with appropriate lights, costumes, and sound, to bring to life this modern adaption of this Shakespeare classic. Last year one student won ‘best middle/senior girl performer, for her role of Ophelia.

The Autumn term includes a Christmas concert at RADA studios, to fully showcase the musical ability of the students, with items from the school choirs, including the Chamber Choir, as well as student’s performing solos and duets that they had put together, with the support of staff.  We also host carols in All Souls Church Langham and a separate senior chamber concert in the school hall.

Our creative arts lessons include elements such as set design, music technology using software such as Garageband, silent movie scheme (where students learnt the origins of this art form and then had the chance to film their own movie).

We offer Year 7 the Symphonfree Scheme, which gives free music tuition and the loan of an instrument for the whole of Year 7, and participation in the Year 7 Orchestra. We also host external projects such as workshops from the Berkeley Ensemble, which explored chamber music, the professional musicians in the ensemble, and the instruments that they played. We have many talented students and last year two entered the Young Musician Competition and were selected for the final.

Our busy and eventful year concludes with an all school music production and our Y6/7 Creative Arts showcase at the RADA studios.

Visit our curriculum page for more information on Creative Arts at Portland Place or see some examples of our Creative Art Events here.

Charity and public benefit has an important role at Portland Place. We want our students to have a greater understanding of the wider community and we support many local charities including All Souls, Euton Food Bank as well national charities such as Save the Children.

We support students with the volunteering element of the Duke of Edinburgh Award, which encourages them to make a difference and build a sense of achievement.

Portland Place School has a long standing relationship with the Livingstone Foundation in Tanzania and our students have visited the community on a bi-annual basis to help with practical projects, as well as fund raise.

Our aim is to make sport interesting, enjoyable and varied. All of our pupils are encouraged to participate in a comprehensive physical education programme.  The emphasis of sport at Portland Place is that of inclusion.  We recognise that sport instils self-confidence and develops leadership and therefore focus on giving our pupils the opportunity of participating in as many different activities as possible in the hope that they find and develop a sport that each individual is suited to.  Competitive and recreational sport has always had a special place in Portland Place and whilst some pupils have gone on to represent their county and country we also take pride in stating that most of our pupils have represented Portland Place in an inter school fixture whether that be A, B or C team.

Outdoor sports, which include, football, rugby, netball, tennis, cricket, cross-country, softball and rounders take place in neighbouring Regent’s Park ­ just a ten minute walk from the school.

Other activities, such as basketball, fitness, dance and athletics, are held at venues nearby including the Seymour Leisure Centre, Oasis Sports Centre, Parliament Hill Athletics track and the Paddington Recreation Ground.

We also have a dance studio on site which is also used for activities such as fencing and table tennis.

To find out more about sports teams and clubs at Portland Place visit the curriculum and select Physical Education.