WHAT? WHERE?

Gresham’s Prep is a co-ed day and boarding school which, together with its neighbouring Pre-Prep and Nursery, takes pupils from age 2 to 13. Located within the fashionable Georgian market town of Holt, it is just four miles from the beautiful North Norfolk coast.

Illustrious former pupil James Dyson has recently donated a cool £35m to create a new state-of-the-art Prep site, due to open in Sep 2026, set within Grade II listed Holt Hall and its 85 acres of ground which are in an Area of Outstanding Beauty. Prep pupils already benefit from the James Dyson STEAM Building at the Senior site.

The Senior School continues the seamless educational journey until the age of 18 (around 90% transfer over at the end of Year 8) on shared expansive facilities set over 200 acres.

The current Prep School is a brisk eight-minute walk from the Senior School towards the centre of Holt, with the Pre-Prep and Nursery positioned just across the playing field (it’s an easy passage for Prep pupils walking over at break time to hear their younger peers read).

There are around 273 pupils in the Prep School, with a further 126 boys and girls in the Pre-Prep and Nursery. It all has the feel of a small school, but with big school benefits.

In contrast to the grandiose buildings of the Senior School, the Prep School is housed in collection of low-rise teaching blocks built around a lovely garden. You’ll find the Pre-Prep and Nursery, however, in the elegant Holt Manor House, which was home to the original Gresham’s School founded in 1555.

It is currently a two-form entry from Reception, increasing to three classes from Year 1 upwards, with 90% coming up from Nursery. Expect a 50/50 split of boys to girls, class sizes from a minimum of 10 to a maximum of 18, and over 25% boarders/flexi boarders (from Year 3 onwards).

The Prep School has separate boarding wings for boys and girls within Dyson House, where boarders come together daily for meals and evening activities. There are two cosy social spaces where pupils can relax during the day: Crossways House for girls and Kenwyn House for boys. In the evenings, these areas are open to the boarders in addition to the relaxation rooms on the boarding floor.

FACILITIES

The buildings and facilities constructed over the past 30 years are served by a massive carpark – the likes of which most schools and parents could only dream of.

/SPORT

There are not many rest days built into this training schedule! Timetabled sports sessions are four days a week for Years 3-4 and five days per week for Years 5-8, with lots of match playing. It’s no surprise this is an area in which Gresham’s excels. Despite this energetic offering, it does take its sports-for-everyone ethos seriously, with an Alternative Games Programme for those who can’t access its core sports (athletics, cricket, netball, hockey, rugby and tennis) for any reason. Currently a handful of children have the alternative of swimming, kayaking or rifle shooting.

The Prep School boasts its own dedicated facilities including five tennis/netball courts and a large playing field, shared with Pre-Prep, but it punches above its size with access to the mind-boggling facilities at the Senior School, including a 25-metre swimming pool, 2 full-size astro turf hockey pitches, squash courts, large sports hall and rifle shooting range (for Years 7 and 8). For those children who really can’t get enough (or those parents who really need them to sleep), there are after-school sports clubs including dance, football, kayaking, cross-country, shooting, squash, dodgeball and swimming.

/CREATIVE ARTS

The Butterwick Centre is the Prep’s version of the Senior School’s STEAM-specialist Dyson Building – though it’s not as jaw-dropping in scale (I mean, what is?), Butterwick is a lovely welcoming space for drama, art, design technology and ICT, staffed by palpably enthusiastic teachers. It’s worth noting that Prep and Pre-Prep pupils get opportunities throughout the year to experience the outstanding Dyson Building itself, with some visiting weekly as three of Saturday’s optional activities held there this term.

Engineering projects are a go from Year 3 upwards in the progressive DT department, which has added a STEAM class to the timetable for Year 7s, lending a fun, practical element to physics topics. Most recently, teaching about ‘energy’ and ‘sound waves’ led to the building of mini wind-turbines and sound machines.

The vibrant art department is literally dripping with colourful creations. The children in Saturday’s Mural Makers hobby have clearly taken their remit to brighten any dull corner to heart, with every spare inch given the technicolour treatment (including backs of chairs). All professional artists, the three art teachers include the house mistress of the girls house, where her creativity is apparent throughout.

All-singing, all-dancing children are not short of performance spaces here. The Prep School has its own spacious hall and access to the Senior School’s Auden Theatre, Theatre in the Woods, Chapel and Britten Building. There’s a range of orchestras, bands and ensembles, every pupil sings in a choir, and this term there are 180 individual instrumental lessons taking place each week with 50% of children learning a musical instrument. The music room is well-equipped for hands-on class lessons, exploring a range of instruments, and fully teched up for digital music composition. An All-Steinway School, Gresham’s Prep hasn’t been left out when they divvied out the grands either, with seven pianos sitting pretty throughout the music school and in the school hall.

Drama was on the tip of pupils’ tongues when asked their favourite subject and there was great enthusiasm for this term’s production, Bugsy Malone. All pupils are encouraged to perform on stage at least twice a year – in the year group production and on speech day. There are drama lessons for all and a weekly dance class until Year 6. There’s an option to keep on dancing into the top two years, which many do – no doubt inspired by the specialist teachers, both professionally trained dancers and acrobats.

/GENERAL

Two large science labs with a full-time technician offer wide-eyed pupils from Year 3s the full ‘lab coat, goggles and Bunsen burner’ experience. From Year 7, pupils embark on separate sciences. An attractive newly built wooden kitchen cabin, funded by FOGS (Friends of Gresham’s School), is used for cookery lessons and activities on Saturdays, and for refreshments for parent events. On my visit the library was temporarily rehoused in the Butterwick Centre, but still looked to be a warm, welcoming haven. All pupils from Years 3 to 6 have a session here each week, whilst Year 7 and 8 use it more independently.

OWLS (Outdoor Wild Learning School) is the Prep and Pre-Prep’s equivalent of forest school, with lots of practical learning about the environment, bush craft and adventure skills. It’s held at the Senior School’s seriously impressive outdoor activity centre. Pre-Prep and Years 3 and 4 use the open-sided outdoor classroom, den building areas, fire pits and theatre in the woods, with the rest of the facilities an enticing peek at what lies ahead of them from the age of 10 years upwards in Prep and Senior, including a new survival course for Year 9 pupils. It’s worth detailing what’s on offer here (take a deep breath!): a 21 obstacle armed forces style assault course; 220 metre zip wire; 22 element high ropes course; abseiling facilities; two climbing walls; 25 metre Bourdillon Tower (above), one of Britain’s tallest climbing towers; and a 20-person hammock-strung bunkhouse where pupils can spend the night.

ACADEMICS

It’s a non-selective school, with informal assessment in the early forms and a taster day with maths and English assessments for entry into Year 4 and upwards. From Year 5, children are taught in sets for most subjects.

From the get-go pupils are exposed to wide variety of languages (with Year 2 having weekly mandarin lessons). As they climb the year groups, pupils get a taster of French, Italian, German, Spanish and Latin. In Years 7 and 8 most pupils will study French and choose to study either Spanish or Latin as a second language. If two languages is not appropriate for a child, they will receive extra literacy lessons in place of Spanish or Latin at no extra charge.

With an aim to deliver over and above the traditional subjects, Gresham’s is the first school in England to introduce the ABE Endorsed KidsMBA intensive entrepreneurship programme for pupils in Year 8. This is a Dragon’s Den style competition with pupils pitching business proposals to a panel of entrepreneurs. Gresham’s Prep were recently crowned the runner-up at the international finals for the Future Entrepreneur 2024 competition.

Extra-curricular is a big part of Prep life, with evening activities until 6.25pm (choose from ballet, Taekwondo, squash, LAMDA, Lego, DT and Art, Street Dance, roller-skating, swim squad and more). From Year 3 to 8, Yearn to Learn is a lunchtime club available to who wish to catch up on work missed because of absence or sporting fixtures.

Preparing for Senior School life ahead, Saturday School is introduced in the Prep School from Year 5, with an academic activity in the morning and an enrichment activity in the afternoon. This is where the proximity to the coast comes in, with sea fishing, fossil hunting and welly walks on offer, as well as cooking in the kitchen cabin, retro-gaming, bullet journalling, etc.

PASTORAL CARE

Houseparents have pastoral responsibility for all pupils within their house and children meet with their tutor twice daily. All children register with their Tutor first thing and return for supervised prep at the end of the day, giving an opportunity to share celebrations or worries. Two full-time mental health nurses, members of Gresham’s whole-school Welfare Committee, both spend a day a week at the prep seeing pupils on a 1:1 basis in the new wellbeing room.

BOARDING

Most children are day pupils with about one quarter boarding (from Year 3). Parents rave about the option to flexi board with last-minute notice (Friday night is always popular with Saturday School in the morning). The children I spoke to seemed pretty sold on boarding, especially Wednesday movie nights with tuck shop. The two single-sex boarding houses provide a base for all pupils and are staffed by a residential houseparent and a matron. The Houses provide an optional hangout at break and lunch times.

I popped into both houses and was impressed with their homely vibe, stylish common areas, and cheerful, themed bedrooms (‘Star Wars’ is a sought-after room in the boys’ house and ‘Rainbow and Cupcakes’ is a winner with the younger girls). Parents who don’t want the chaos of a birthday party sleepover, can simply book them into school for the night. Result! The pretty lawns outside the houses provide designated boys’ and girls’ play areas or they can mingle in the playground and playing field. It was lovely to see a bundle of 13 year old boys playing together on the rope swing. Older pupils are certainly not too cool for school in this childhood-preserving environment.

SEND

Supporting 25% of pupils in the younger years, the SEND provision is robust, as you’d expect in a non-selective school. In the Prep School, a large learning support department is run by five SEND-qualified class teachers offering one-to-one tuition, small group sessions and in-class assistance (some at an extra charge). Whilst in the Pre-Prep, the Learning Enrichment Lead (a neat combo of a SENDCO and DSL) delivers an imaginative range of support options, from play therapy, classroom assistance, weekly or twice weekly sessions and even a catch-up if a child has missed school (all at no extra charge).

HEAD

Previously deputy head, Cathy Braithwaite has been in the hot seat since November 2018. Her career includes 10 years as head of maths and director of teaching and learning at St Francis School in Wiltshire. Braithwaite is brimming with can-do and positivity. She’s overseen many progressive initiatives at the school including teaching entrepreneurial skills. The children seem to like her a lot – every child I asked named Mrs Braithwaite among their favourite teachers (she teaches English).

LITTLIES

The Pre-Prep and Nursery are both housed in the charming grade II listed former Holt Manor House within the town centre. The Head for the past six years is the amiable Sarah Hollingsworth, previously director of pastoral care at Oswestry School. Pre-Prep and Nursery have just been extensively renovated throughout and, I have to say, look the business!

The 126 children have access to fantastic facilities on site, including a well-equipped ICT room, cooking room, two halls and a large outdoor space, including an adventure play area with a tree house. It also gets a share of the Prep playing fields and many of the facilities at the Senior School (Auden Theatre, Theatre in the Woods, Britten Building, Dyson Building and the Chapel). When I visited, children had just returned back from their weekly dip in the vast 25m swimming pool, with a trip to the much-loved outdoor activity centre in the woods booked for later that week – an absolute highlight.

As you’d expect, there are small class sizes (14 max, at the moment) with a 55/45 split between boys and girls. Languages are high on the agenda, with children from nursery age introduced to French, Japanese, Italian, German and Spanish, and weekly Mandarin lessons for the Year 2s. All children do ballet once a week and music lessons twice a week. To ensure a smooth transition to the Pre-Prep (87% moved up this September), children in Year 2 have weekly games sessions with the older children on the Prep playing fields.

Hobbies (from 3.45pm to 4.30pm) include yoga/pilates, acrobatics and eco warriors. Once every half term, instead of their OWLS session, the children pack their buckets and spades for Beach School, where they go crabbing, fossil hunting and learn about water safety.

The Little Grasshoppers Nursery has been newly rehoused in a calm, uncluttered Montessori-esque space with lots of low-level shelving, nature-inspired decor and soft twinkly lighting.

THE QUIRKS

By all accounts School’s full-time chaplain is quite the effervescent personality (each year he invites pupils to bring their pets into chapel for a blessing: most recently 37 dogs, 3 tortoises, one cat and 7 horses traipsed in!). Year 5 to 8 pupils and their parents attend chapel on Saturdays.

A nice touch introduced in the summer term is the option to eat lunch al fresco. They hope to eke this out for as long as weather allows, with plans afoot to extend the covered area.

On our walkabout, I was shown fruit trees beginning to grow up the front of the school, which were planted to soften the contemporary exterior and in the hope that children will pluck an apple to munch at pick-up.

WRAPAROUND CARE

For day pupils the school day starts at 8.20am (with drop-off available from 8am for all) and ends at 5.15pm on Mondays and Tuesdays and at 3.30pm on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Years 3 to 4 have an earlier finishing time of 4pm on Thursdays and Fridays with older pupils continuing until 5.15pm. Prep is completed within the school day. The optional evening activities programme runs until 6.25pm, with day pupils able to join boarders for a pre-activity snack at 5.15pm. Pupils in Years 3 and 4 are invited to stay for after-school club on Thursdays and Fridays to bridge the gap until older siblings finish lessons or until they join evening activities at 5.25pm.

For a one-stop pick up for families with siblings across all three schools (or for those who need wraparound care), all Prep School pupils can be collected at 5.15pm and Pre-Prep pupils can stay until 5.30pm, which ties in with the earliest of the three pick-up options at Senior School of 5.30pm. Prep School pupils are invited to flexi-board if they need a pick up beyond 6.25pm on Monday, Tuesday or Thursday, or beyond the end of the school day on Wednesday and Friday.

ISI REPORT

The most recent report is from 2023 with Gresham’s rated excellent, plus you can access various compliance reports over the last few years.

MOBILE PHONE POLICY

No mobile phones are permitted during the school day. Boarders hand all devices in to matrons and are given half an hour to contact home each evening, with provision made for international boarders to call their parents during the day if time zones do not match up with the evening phone home slot. Day pupils who travel on a bus may hand in their phones to the office at the start of the day if parents wish them to have a phone for the bus journey.

TRANSPORT

There are five routes run by the school from Monday to Saturday from Houghton Hall, East Rudham, Fakenham, Thursford, North Walsham, Norwich near Airport, Aylsham, Eaton (Norwich), Taverham. Buses are subject to availability and demand. There is a weekly bus from Cambridge. The school organises airport transfer for international students.

FEES

Ouch! However, you’d expect the fees to reflect the outstanding facilities and care here. In the Prep, day pupils are charged £6,140 per term (Years 3 and 4), £7,550 per term (Years 5-8) and boarding pupils £10,580 per term. In the Pre-Prep: Reception-Year 1 £4,190 and Year 2 £4,510. In the Nursery (age 3-4 years): £4,190 per term, £76 full time per day, morning £50; (age 2-3 years): £280 full week, £66 full day, £39 morning only.

Fees include lunch, but supper is a chargeable extra at £5 for day pupils. A Scholarship is up to a maximum of 10% off the fees.

WORD ON THE GROUND

The Head, Cathy Braithwaite, is highly regarded among the parent body and seen as a strong positive force in the school. “Nothing is too much trouble” is a phrase used a lot. Parents talk of a down-to-earth, caring school offering a broad, well-rounded education that produces happy, well-balanced kids. Food is the best part of the day I am told by pupils at lunchtime (indeed the cheese and leek puff with sautéed courgettes and carrots was delicious). There’s a bit of a juggling act required if you have children across the school, and into the Senior School, with meeting the many different pick-up times.

MUDDY VERDICT

Good for: Anyone wanting a small, supportive, caring school with facilities that punch well above its size. If you are in for the Gresham’s long haul, the younger years work hard to prepare children for what lies ahead and to provide a seamless transition. Children ready to seize the many opportunities on offer beyond the traditional subjects will thrive.

Not good for: Those wanting a 9-5 day school with no weekend commitments. Parents who want the Hogwarts experience might find it hard to overlook the purpose-built teaching blocks of the Prep School – although there’s lots of razzle dazzle to come when they move up to Senior.

Dare to disagree: Have a look for yourself! Gresham’s Prep is holding its next Open Morning on Fri 2 May 2025.

Gresham’s Prep School, Holt

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