We are delighted to announce that we have secured a visit from a professional theatre group for a performance of an adaptation of ‘The Strange Case of Jekyll and Hyde’. ‘Box Clever’, the theatre group in question, performed at Perins in 2023 and received great reviews from both pupils and staff. All students in year 11 will, by then, have studied Jekyll and Hyde, so this is a valuable opportunity for students to revise the text and gain a better understanding of key details, as well as to enjoy a different presentation of the story. The group will visit us on the morning of Thursday, February 27th and will provide a performance and a workshop across 90 minutes.
Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic text is one of the most famous works of literature in the world and is used by AQA as an examined text at GCSE. Students here at Perins have been preparing for this by studying other similar texts throughout their five-year learning journey, including 19th-century greats such as Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’ and the short stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Whilst those were practice, they offered a great deal of breadth to students’ studies and helped to prepare them for their GCSEs. Jekyll and Hyde, which many students are studying now, will be one of the final GCSE examined texts, and it is therefore paramount that all students have a strong understanding.
The visit to the school by ‘Box Clever’ has come at no small expense to the English Department, and we would greatly appreciate voluntary contributions in covering that cost to enable us to continue to provide these types of rich learning opportunities, as well as to continue to update our book cupboard and other departmental resources. On this basis, while there is no obligation to pay for the performance, which will be given to all of year 11, we would be very grateful for donations of £8.20 per student which can be made via Scopay. Whilst the performances will not take place until February 27th, we would like to initially set a deadline of Wednesday 4th December for payments – if we do not meet a certain threshold, unfortunately, we will have to cancel the event and payments will be reimbursed.
I hope you share our enthusiasm for this opportunity and with enough uptake, we look forward to running more opportunities to enrich our students’ learning experience at Perins.
Yours sincerely,
Simon Barber,
Team Leader of English
