The move from junior to senior school is a milestone filled with excitement, curiosity, and, let’s be honest, a few butterflies. This autumn, our newest members of the Oxford High School community have been busy finding their way around new classrooms, discovering favourite clubs, meeting teachers and making friendships that will carry them through the years beyond Year 13.
To capture what this transition really feels like, we asked two of our Year 7 pupils to share their experiences of their very first term at OHS. From House Dance and badminton club to experiments in Science and mouthwatering tuck-shop cookies, Isabel and Maria take us through the moments that surprised them, challenged them and made them feel at home.
Here is their story, in their own words.
Isabel’s First Term
Hello reader!
My first term at Oxford High School has been amazing so far and it’s just the beginning. I was nervous at first, but quickly I made loads of new friends who shared my interests and passions. We all had so much fun together, whether we were making poems in English or solving equations in math even when we all were so competitive in P.E. The lessons were a highlight too- I really enjoyed having to solve complicated problems that needed us to work together as a class and all the activities the teachers had us do.
At the beginning of term, I participated in a house activity called House Dance. House Dance is where everyone in the house gets together and makes up a dance to a specific theme and song. It was amazing to see how everyone’s creative minds worked together to beat the other houses. Everyone got on stage and all of us had so much fun dancing to the audience.
I was nervous about learning different subjects. I thought it was going to be hard and sad like how the movies say. But in my first lesson I realised the teachers are all very supportive no matter what level you are at. We’ve done lots of interesting things in class experiments in group projects, which has helped me understand others’ points of view (not just mine). In science we’ve been learning about how to make formulas like a cooking recipe and every lesson we get to do experiments using the terms and knowledge we just learned. In English, we’ve been studying books and novels, even trying to make a PEA (Point, Evidence, Analysis) paragraph about them. The work has been challenging and has made me work hard. I’ve felt like I’ve learnt a lot, and I have enjoyed most of the lessons. I’m really looking forward to next term.
Maria’s First Term
My first term in year 7 is something I still remember even with my horrible memory. I remember on my first day going up the stairs into my classroom and sitting down and just staring at the piece of paper in front of me (questions about me!). I also recall the day I found my house. Athena. And I was like YAYYYYYY after my buddy said it’s definitely the best house.
I was so excited to join all the clubs there, when I first saw the clubs booklet I was like wow., that’s a LOT of clubs. When I joined the badminton club it was so fun,although I’m really horrible at it, the teachers are really encouraging and overtime I got better and stopped always hitting the air instead of the shuttlecock! For house activities, I ABSOLUTELY loved the house activities after I found out what fun stuff happens in this school. I had joined house music and it was so fun, on the day of the performance I had really enjoyed going up on that stage and singing and dancing and being me. This was a new experience for me as in my old school I didn’t have houses so this was a new fun day.
Now, the food. The first time I bit into that mouthwatering cookie from the tuck shop I LOVED it. I bet I could’ve eaten 7 of them because of how good they were.
I really enjoyed my first term in year 7, teachers were kind, everything was fun and the food is AMAZING.
