STUDENTS left school behind to get back to nature on an ‘Empty Classroom Day’ at Bedales prep school Dunhurst.

They cooked paella round a campfire and enjoyed spending time with their newly-hatched chicks.

Dunhurst has also commemorated the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme with a morning of themed events and the students were ‘recruited’ into the Hampshire Regiment. At a history lesson they learnt about the battle and practiced French phrases that would have been useful on the battlefield. During a geography lesson they explored the problem of remaining concealed in that area. The pupils were finally put through their paces in a drill session by the school’s very own ‘sergeant major’, deputy headteacher Nick Robinson.