Many congratulations to Holly Hong in Y10 who was runner up in the Junior Section of this year’s EAL Public Speaking Competition last week against Kingswood, Prior, Monkton, and Stonar.

The title of Holly’s speech was ‘Finding your self-worth’ and she spoke very eloquently and personally on her own experience of overcoming the very significant disadvantages of arriving in a school/country where everyone speaks another language and restoring her confidence and belief in herself.

Yuna Sohn (Y8) and Kate Huang (Y12) did not win prizes but they also did a brilliant job. Yuna was probably the youngest pupil in the competition but she more than held her own. Both Yuna and Kate had worked really hard on their speeches on ‘Egyptian artefacts in the British Museum’ and ‘Cyberbullying’ respectively and were extremely clear, composed and engaging. I was enormously proud of them.

The winner of the Junior section was a boy from Hong Kong who was exceptionally confident and funny and gave us advice on how to deliver a good speech. He blatantly winked at the middle-aged female judges when he was advising us to make eye contact with the audience! He also had quite an effect on our Y8 and Y9 boarders who were hugely impressed and the excitement of getting his Instagram number added to the fun of the evening.

by Mrs Owen