Junior Reflections Week 15 January 2025

Dear parents,

What a super start to the new year this week has been. We welcomed six new pupils and their families to the school and I know that your children have made them all very welcome to the school and the start of their Exeter School journey. The corridors are full again and even though the twinkly lights and tree have all come down, the laughter and chatter certainly makes up for dark mornings and nights.

New year’s resolutions

New year’s resolutions were the order of the day on Monday. My lovely dog, Rocco, the fox red labrador, made an appearance (not literally) whereby I shared many photos of all the things that he had chewed/eaten, much to the amusement of the pupils: homework, airpods, many pairs of flipflops, books, his bed, sunglasses and finally my iWatch. My new year’s resolution was not a new dog but a new watch to include keeping my steps up, from which the dog, of course, benefits…. Let’s see how long it lasts. It is always good to reset, think about all the good things that happened in 2024 and of course be thankful for all the things that we have to look forward to this year.

Positive start to the year

This week, our junior school buddies gathered to share their hopes and dreams for 2025. It was a delightful session where they reconnected and kicked off the new year by discussing their resolutions and goals for the year ahead. Good work has started with a bang and as always I am blown away by the standard of work that comes to my office. A highlight was enjoying a rap created by three Upper Two boys, bringing in our school virtues; it was simply brilliant and made my day.

Junior school quiz

Our junior school quiz is fast approaching on 24 January, 7-10pm. If you would like to join, please do contact your form rep or email familysociety@exeterschool.org.uk and we will add you to our list. You can also book via the ESFS website and more details can be found below. We are also looking for donations for our raffle prizes so if you are able to contribute please do send any items to the junior school office. It has always proven to be a fun (with a little bit of competition) night out and an opportunity to catch up with the school community.

Warm clothing

Finally, a reminder that your children will need to wrap up warm over the course of this half term, with chilly, wet and windy conditions almost guaranteed! Each morning, we would like them all to bring in the blue branded school coat, gloves and a woolly hat (school colours only, please – red, white, blue). Please also ensure that all items of clothing are named, which makes returning misplaced items so much easier for us.

Stay warm this weekend.

Mrs Saskia van Schalkwyk

Playground people of the week

Theo S-M F1C

Georgia L U2E

ESFS pre-prep and junior school parents quiz

Exeter School Family Society are hosting a fun quiz night on Friday 24 January at 7pm in the main school hall.

Teams of up to six are welcome and tickets can be purchased for £5 each, below. (Please use the password: ESFS1633 when prompted)

Additionally, if any parents have any prizes they would be willing to donate for the raffle this would also be very much appreciated.

 

Click here to book tickets

Junior School News

Junior Sport News

Do you have a story or pupil achievement to share with our community?

If you have a couple of lines of information and a photograph that you and your child are happy to be shared we will try to post these at relevant times through the year.
Email our communications team
Alumnus Steve Dukes (1992-1997), CEO of @confused_com, returned to school this week to give an assembly. He advised pupils about aspiring to reach their goals, using negatives to fuel your journey. He said, 'when you’re at school, being called names like ‘odd, weird and awkward’ can often mean something completely different in adult life - these words become ‘creative, unusual and innovative’.  His top advice was to become like a sponge, find what learning method works best for you, learn fast and act on it. Great advice Steve - thanks so much for visiting us!  @exeterschool_alumni #visitingspeakers

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While it was hard to get a good photo of our sixth form linguists attending an online conference on Wednesday, pupil Sophia's feedback was that "it was really good to see how linguistics goes into so many areas and how some things seemingly unrelated (so far away from linguistics) can have a big/strong connection with linguistics."   They were treated to four diverse talks, ranging from how AI can help us learn foreign languages, how forensic linguistics can help compare different texts and ascertain if the same person wrote both texts (helpful in identifying and profiling criminals), how idioms are processed in our brains and used in social discourse, and how dormant languages can be reclaimed. The talks were 25 minutes each with a Q&A afterwards. As well as being informative, these talks allowed pupils to see what a course of study or a career in linguistics might look like. Many thanks to @oxfordhighschoolgdst for running the event.   #onlineconference #linguisticsevent #forensiclinguistics  #exeterschools #independentschoolsuk #sixthformlife

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