Talbot's House

This has been a fantastic week in the house!  Most importantly, our community has grown to include M in the 4th Form who has proved a popular, friendly addition.

The sunshine has also been amazing and meant that there has been the return of some great garden football sessions in the evening and a fantastic fire on Thursday (photos below).

In music, Ben, James, and Marcus have been preparing for tonight's big bands concert and played superbly in assembly today.

Edwin also got a shout out in assembly for his efforts at the model UN.

Lennart is returning late as he has been pushing hard for German rowing selection; we hope it has gone well.

Kabi has also been continuing training after his county hockey selection.

This week sees the start of summer sports and the following have matches:  Will is in the cricket U15C & Kabi in the U14C.

The following have gained merits this week:
1--Theo, Alex E., Zakhar, Roy, Seb, Divine, Simon, Tizian, CUrtis, and Niklas
2--Orlando, Will, Moritz, Edwin, and Evgenii

Amazingly, Roy also gained a commendation for his sterling efforts representing the school at the regional maths challenge.

Top Bloke
James for his impressive BBQ skills

Man of the Week
Edwin for his amazing contributions to the Harpur Trust Debate & the model UN.

Special Note
George for being selected for the Samurai Sevens next weekend

 Last night was the traditional Talbots House Quiz night. Rounds included questions about the school (What was Philpotts previous name?); questions about the house (How many rooms are named after a previous House Master?) and some less fiercely contested rounds about sports, history, science, music and more.

It was a great night with some rather vocal performances of some of the answers for the music round and some hotly argued scoring (you had to spell each answer correctly to receive the points).

It was a really well put together quiz and we are grateful for the huge amount of work that the lower sixth had put into creating it for us.

We also had an unexpected visitor, as old boy Jonas, turned up to say hello and hand out some of the prizes for the evening.

The winning team was Alex's with Duncan's team in second and Harun's team third place. Obviously the staff team probably smashed them all, but we withdrew from the competition entry, largely because chocolate prizes don't seem to hold the same value once you reach the grand old age of 21+




We also handed out our prizes for the term, with some fantastic efforts for the King of Merits title. In joint third place we had Kostya and Henry with 17 merits.

In second place it was Andrew with 22 merits.

But in joint first, with an incredible 38 merits each it was Jason and Divine.







Speaking of Divine, he also won our Man of the Term prize not just for his continued attitude of getting involved with everything, performing well in all areas, but for doing so with an air of humility and approach-ability that  embodies everything we want to see in boys as they grow through the house. His commitment to bettering himself, without making others feel less is something special that we really wanted to honour.





We also gave out two sets of house colours last night, for boys who have been consistently exhibiting the character qualities we love throughout their time in the house. The first set went to Adrian in the lower sixth. Adrian is someone who draws others in and makes them feel included. He's a man who younger boys consistently tell us feels like a 'safe' person to talk to if they are unsure or need help with anything. His nurturing qualities and ability to make others look to him for guidance is something we wanted to celebrate.



The second set of colours went to Matthew. Matthew has been with us since the fourth form and over that time his contributions to the house have been too many to count in terms of the number of competitions he has represented us in, the number of competitions he has gone to support others in, the number of football matches and games he has organised in the back garden, and his cheeky smile that changes the atmosphere of a room into a place where others can experience relaxed fun. These are definitely character qualities that we want to set as an example to others and we are proud to see him finally wearing his colours tie.

One of the major projects of the summer was refitting the SCR with some very fancy furniture and shelves to turn it into a library that is a bit more befitting of our status as an amazing house. We hope it also should be a place that starts to really encourage the boys to read and relax away from screens and will become another option as a place to do some really focussed work.

Simon has also started running a photography program in the house, taking lots of photos on the house camera and trying to encourage others to do the same. Here are some photos of his session in the new library with Alex and George tonight.