I am delighted to announce that Ms Annie Huang will be continuing as our third Chinese Educational Assistant next academic year.  Ms Huang joined us in November and was initially employed by the school until June of 2012.  However the model of additional support has been very successful and the children we talked to shared how a third Chinese EA has helped and supported them to learn Chinese.  They talked about the benefits of being exposed to role play and how they enjoyed the small group contact that they have had.

Ms Huang will remain with us for the 2012-2013 academic year meaning that we continue to have 2 full time Chinese teachers as well as 3 full time Chinese Educational Assistants.  My thanks to the school council for appreciating the need to continue this support and for fully supporting this initiative to further strengthen our Chinese provision at Peak School.

Last Friday, 15 June, we took the whole school to the Hong Kong Heritage Museum in Sha Tin to view the Picasso Exhibition.

It was a terrific morning and all the children, staff and parent helpers enjoyed the “once in a lifetime opportunity” to view work of such a high standard.

I had the pleasure of working with a small group from Year 1 and I was very impressed with how focused they were and interested in the work of Picasso.

Whilst I enjoy fine art I am not an art enthusiast and by no means an expert but I thought the exhibition was excellent and rivaled any exhibition I have visited in Europe.  If you haven’t had a chance to visit the exhibition I can strongly recommend it.

Student reports will be available from Tuesday 26th June at 3:30pm and can be accessed by logging on to the Parents’ Gateway (www.ps.edu.hk) or by clicking HERE. Once logged in, you will find the report by clicking on the ‘ARR’ link and choosing ‘ARR Report’.

Families that are not coming back to Peak School after Summer will able to access to Gateway until 31st July. Please download the report accordingly.

The report has been prepared by your child’s teachers (classroom and specialists) and provides a summary of progress and achievement made over the year in all areas of learning.

 

If you have forgotten your Parents’ Gateway login details, please contact

gateway-help@peakschool.net before 29 June 2012.

 

**Please note that we will not be sending home paper copies of the reports as in previous years as you can simply download them from Gateway as a PDF**

 

Children find out who their new teacher is next Tuesday afternoon (Tuesday 26 June).  At 2.30pm they will be visiting their new class and meeting their new teacher.  At the end of the day the children will be coming home with a note informing you of who their new class teacher is.

As per previous years the current Year 1, 3 and 5 classes are staying the same and children are simply moving up a year in their current class form.  Year 2 and 4 classes are being mixed and will form new classes in Year 3 and Year 5 next year.

Classroom teachers for next year is as follows;

Year 1M – Ruth Maclennan

Year 1B – Cathy Boon

Year 2A – Catalina Able

Year 2E – Mark Evans

Year 3D – Jane Durbin

Year 3T – Anna Trunkfield

Year 4M – Nicole Maclennan

Year 4F – Loraine Fay

Year 5B – Tiphany Bloomfield

Year 5T – Thomas Tobin

Year 6R – Sue Richards

Year 6B – Wendy Barrett

For a full list of our staff please visit our website by clicking HERE

 

I can confirm that we have decided to go with Tsunami as our provider of our new PE Shirts.  Tsunami were the only company who could provide an eco friendly option which was of utmost importance to the children and staff involved.  The children involved included Year 6’s from last year, members of our student council, “Principals for a day” and a random sample of children spoken to.

We have gone with their “Eco Fit” range which is made out of recycled plastic bottles and bamboo.  We already use these shirts for our sports team, when representing Peak School, and the feedback from those students who have worn them has been very positive.

The cost to us is $175 so the likely cost to our families will be $185 with the $10 difference being donated to a charity on behalf of our school community.  A decision has not been made on the actual cost of the shirts to families but we are aware of other schools who sell these exact same shirts for $195 so $185 would seem a reasonable compromise.

Below are drawings of the new shirts, which we have ordered today, for each house (please note the writing above and below the logo will be white for all 4 shirts).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please click on the below link to access a digital copy of our school calendar for the next academic year;

Peak School Calendar 2012-2013 Academic Year

As you will see it includes all public holidays and our professional development days (CPD) for teaching staff.

You can also access our school calendar, that is on our website, by following the link below;

School Calendar (on our website)

Issy Carey, Jessica Keighley, Conor Kent and Joshua Jackson all had the privilege of being “Principals for the day” at Peak School today (Monday 4 June).  They were given this opportunity by winning the best dressed at the recent PTA Danceathon.

I was extremely impressed with how they coped with the many challenges and how they interacted with the children from all year groups.

An outline of their day

– Run assembly including; reading out the Golden Book recipients, hand out the TOM Cup and a medal and introducing Year 6 Exhibition groups wanting to present to the school

– Read to the Year 1, 2 and 4 classes

– Visit classes to talk to the children about what work they have been doing

– Meet with a PE T Shirt company representative to “grill him” about his product

– Complete duty before school, during break and lunchtime

– Discuss the benefits of the many astro turf samples I have in my office for the upper playground (we are looking to replace it in December)

– They even found time to complete 2 x 45 min sessions in their classrooms as students!

They had a very productive day and some of the quotes from the four “principals” that I would like to share include;

“I enjoyed the power”

“It is a lot harder than it looks”

“I really enjoyed seeing what the other classes are working on”

“It is hard work looking after a large group of children”

“I was shaking at the start but I got more comfortable during the day”

“It was great to be part of such an important decision” (PE T Shirts)

“It was hard to read the teacher’s writing in the Golden Book!”

“The young children came up and hugged me, they don’t normally but they did today”

“I felt very sophisticated”

 

I read an article recently that highlighted the strength of the IB PYP and MYP program.  It highlights that children who are attending IB schools are outperforming other international schools and school systems when it comes to key assessments (ISA).  As you know we do the ISA assessments at Peak School and across all ESF Schools.  It is interesting to note that the gap between IB Schools and Non IB Schools widens as the children get older (large gap particularly at Year 9 and 10).

It is ironic that IB Schools, Peak School included, who do not promote the practice of teaching to a test are actually outperforming other International Schools and school systems who have developed a reputation for doing just that.

Below is a summary of the article I read;

“Research shows that IB primary- and middle-years students perform better on international assessments than their peers at non-IB schools.

IB Students out-perform their non-IB peers in academic areas, indicating high social and emotional well-being

Singapore May 23, 2012 — A research study completed by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), on behalf of the International Baccalaureate® (IB), examined student performance among IB and non-IB students on the International Schools’ Assessment (ISA) and determined that IB Primary Years Program (PYP) and IB Middle Years Program (MYP) students, in most instances performed as well or better than their non-IB peers across all four ISA assessment domains, including math literacy, reading, narrative writing, and expository writing. Particularly strong differences were observed in grade 10, the final year of the IB MYP. The study, conducted with data collected from 2009-11, included 270 schools—117 with the PYP and 86 with the MYP—and 50,714 international students, of which 68% were IB students”.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support with our drive to have our excess stock of PE T Shirts donated to children from Cambodia.

In conjunction with the PTA, our school community will donate a large number of T Shirts (several hundred) to an orphanage in Cambodia as well as to CCF (Cambodia Children’s Fund).  CCF have made a huge difference to hundred’s of children in Cambodia in a relatively short period of time so it is fantastic that we are able to support them as well.  If you would like to know more about CCF please click on the following link;

http://www.cambodianchildrensfund.org/index.php 

Students from KGV who have been visiting Cambodia for a number of years now, as part of their CAS (community service), have kindly offered to take the T Shirts over with them when they return to Cambodia later this year.

Again, this wonderful achievement by our school community is a result of action taken by our Year 6 students as part of their Year 6 Exhibition.

NEW PE SHIRT UPDATE (as of Monday June 4)

In terms of our new PE T Shirts we will have them in stock in early August before the children arrive back to school.  We are looking to sell the new PE Shirts at cost PLUS $10 which would then be donated to a charity or used to sponsor a child/family (through CCF).  For example – if the cost for the new shirt is $185, we will sell them to our families for $195 and the $10 “profit” will be donated to a charity.  This initiative has been suggested by members of the PTA and School and allows our school community to support those that are less fortunate than ourselves.  A terrific way for our school to make a small difference for others.