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6
January 2012
7
News
Foreign Exchanges
German students from the Ratsgymnasium in
Bielefeld arrived for a ten-day exchange on 9
October. Whilst some of their time was spent
in school, the rest was spent sight-seeing in
Oxford, Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwick Castle and
Portsmouth’s historic dockyards.
As the German students left for home, Abingdon’s
Spanish linguists departed for a week with our
exchange school in Santiago de Compostella,
with its beautiful thirteenth-century cathedral
where the boys were lucky enough to see the
famous botafumeiro ceremony. A day spent at La
Coruña took in the oldest lighthouse in the world
and the Aquarium Finisterre.
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Abingdon news
Joint Modern
Language Club
The School celebrated European Day of
Languages on 26 September with a specially
created international menu and the launch
of a number of language related activities,
including the inaugural meeting of the Joint
Modern Languages Society with St Helen’s.
The popular Lower School Modern Languages
Club (also run with St Helen’s), celebrated
German Unity Day on 3 October and at the
beginning of December created Christmas
cards in five different languages.
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Kids’ Lit Quiz
Two Abingdon School teams pitted their literary
knowledge against thirty-five other teams in
the regional heat of the Oxfordshire / Berkshire
Kids’ Lit Quiz. Abingdon 1 were beaten into
second place by a mere 1½ points.
Abingdon 2 came 16th.
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The Return of Books
Reports of the ‘death’ of books have been
much exaggerated – at least at Abingdon
School. As highlighted in the first issue
of the new Waste Court newsletter, the
House computer room has been fitted with
bookshelves and stocked with books by
popular request of the boarders.
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A Multilingual School
About one tenth of the current school population is bilingual and over eighteen different languages
are spoken throughout the school on a daily basis. Watch the fascinating 1.09 minute film that
OA Will McDowell made on the subject.