STMARKS NEWSLETTER 5 (9 SEPTEMBER 2022)

QUEEN ELIZABETH II

We mourn the passing of her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. We pray for all the people of the United Kingdom in during this time of sorrow. 

PROVISION OF ONLINE LEARNING WILL BE LIMITED TO STUDENTS WITH COVID-19

As learning onsite is a more effective means of teaching and learning, we would like to encourage all our students to return to school to learn in the classroom. 

Starting from Monday, 12 September, the provision of online lessons will only be provided to students who are not able to come to school due to COVID-19. 

All students who do not have COVID-19 are expected to return to school to study in the classroom. We are hopeful that this measure will enable our teachers to be able to teach more effectively and students will be able to catch up on the materials that they have missed or not fully understood during the past couple of years of lockdown. 

Your cooperation on this matter is very much appreciated. 

YEAR 1 COFFEE MORNING

Following our introductory meeting at the start of August 2022, we would like to invite Year 1 parents to our Coffee Morning, which will be held on Monday 12^th September, 8.30 am in the School’s Canteen.  

This will be an opportunity to meet the Year 1 homeroom teacher, as well as other parents across the year group in an informal setting.  We will discuss ideas about how we can work together for the benefit of our students to ensure they continue to thrive in the best way possible.

We look forward to meeting you and supporting the students in their development.  

We thank you in advance for your continued support and are excited to see what this year will bring as we work together for the benefit of the children in our charge.

PARALLEL MANDARIN PROGRAM OFFERED AT ST. MARK'S

The success of our Mandarin program is reflected in the number of A* our students received in the past IGCSE Mandarin examinations.  To date, almost all of our students who took their IGCSE Mandarin exams have achieved an A* for this subject.  This level of success is exceptional, and in order to maintain our quality, St. Mark's will run a parallel Mandarin program to cater for weaker groups of students, who have recently joined our school. 

Students whose Mandarin skills are not strong enough to get through in our mainstream program will be streamed to join our parallel Mandarin classes, where content is easier but teaching will be rigorous.  When their Mandarin abilities have improved to a satisfactory level, students in this group will be placed back with their corresponding mainstream classes. 

This arrangement has an added benefit to the mainstream students as well, since teachers in the mainstream classes will be able to teach more effectively in a class where the cohort hasa  similar ability.

With this, we are pleased to introduce two new Mandarin teachers who are taking the responsibilities in teaching parallel Mandarin programs at St. Mark's. 

Mr. Jason holds a Bachelor of Arts in Chinese Language and Literature from Tianjin Nankai University, as well as a Bachelor of Management and Engineering Management from Beijing Jiaotong University.  He has been working as a Mandarin teacher in China with over 10 years of teaching experience.  Prior to joining St. Mark's, he was involved in teaching Chinese, as well as in teacher-training and assessment.

Mr. Sean holds a Bachelor of Communication from the University of Zhejiang.  Prior to joining St. Mark's, Sean has taught Chinese broadcast and English classes for elementary and junior high school students in his home city in Zhangjiajie, China.  His attentiveness and caring attitude toward his students, have enabled him to earn the trust of his students.

TIPS FOR EARLY YEARS PARENTS ON STARTING SCHOOL

For many parents, your children are having some of their first school experiences, which involves levels of interaction, routine and socialising that will be beyond their regular experience.

 The newness of it is very unsettling and can cause some distress, but we would like to assure you that our staff are working hard to ensure that your children begin to feel happy, safe and secure at school. Over the past weeks they have begun to make connections with other students in their class, and have become more settled at school.  Due to COVID, lockdowns and limited experiences of the outside world, our youngest learners are quite rightly wary of the interactions that they are having.  With time, care and attention from those around them and with gentle encouragement from those at home, they will soon settle and flourish.

The most important thing for us as Early Years educators is to focus on forming good relationships, primarily with your children but also with parents.  It is important that our children see their caregivers demonstrating trust and being calm in front of the support staff for each class as it will help them feel reassured.

Communication With School

• Your class teacher will share updates through our weekly contact books, which contains information on the learning program that our students will learn each week.
  
• You will receive a weekly newsletter via SZapp App, that will include classroom learning activities that are taking place in school each week
  
• You can speak to your teacher at drop off and pickup, and if you require a longer meeting this can be made by appointment with your teacher by simply send us a Line message
  
• You can also email your teacher directly from our Student Portal, under the Contact Us section of the Portal.   During the school day it is difficult for teachers to be able to check messages as the priority is to support the children in class. If the message is urgent, please call reception and they will pass it on to the class teacher.

Lunch

We provide a snack and lunch every day, and the details of what your child is eating each day is on the canteen menu shared which can be accessed from your SZapp App.

Independently eating at school is a skill that takes some time to learn and your children will be supported by the staff to feed themselves, which may mean that at the beginning they do not eat as much as they usually do. In time, this will improve. We encourage children to eat the school lunch as it provides variety every day and helps expose the children to a wide range of different foods.

Due to COVID precaution policy at our school, all classes will continue to eat with their classmates in their classrooms.

Sleep

As the children get used to coming to school, it is important to ensure that your child is getting enough sleep. You will notice that their sleep needs will change due to the experiences of their school day. We recommend a bedtime no later than 7:30pm, and an afternoon nap (if your child has one) no longer than 1.5-2 hrs. It is important that the morning routine begins with enough time to get dressed, eat breakfast and have a drink, so that your child is ready to start school. It can also be beneficial to help your child lay out their uniform the night before school so that they understand that they have school the following morning.

Toileting

It is an expectation that by Kindergarten, all students are toilet trained. If children are not toilet trained we will work together in partnership with our families to help.

These are the key skills your child will need in order to demonstrate that they are ready to manage their own toileting needs.

• Working towards a consistent, daily pattern in relation to toileting
• Communicates their need for the toilet
• Can help with dressing and undressing themselves
• Has more bowel and bladder control and can attend to toileting needs most of the time

Your child’s class teacher will be in touch with you if your child requires any further support with toileting.

Separation

Separation is a challenging time for children, parents, and staff. A regular routine for separation is key to helping your child manage their emotions. Ensuring you hand your child over to the class adult, say a quick goodbye  and leave promptly are all key elements to making this process smoother. Please leave the classroom swiftly, resisting the temptation to peek through a window as this can prolong the distress. In a week or two, your child will begin to settle faster into their routines and enjoy their school day. Your teacher will provide you with updates and get in touch with you if any further support is required. For some students, this may mean a reduced day or a later starting time to ensure that they have the support they need to have a positive experience.

Starting school is a daunting experience but with all of our community working together to support one  another, your children will soon settle into school life. In the meantime, please do not become upset or worry that there is something wrong. If things do not improve for your child we will always be here to work with you but we are confident that with time and your continued support your children will soon be running through the gate each morning.

KINDERGARTEN MANDARIN: LEARNING ABOUT COLOURS

From as young as Kindergarten, our students are exposed to listening and talking with our teachers in Mandarin. There are numerous studies that show that students who are exposed to the language they’re learning in an immersive way exhibit higher levels of language fluency.

While immersive language experiences are effective in students of all ages, they can bear remarkable results in children. In second language acquisition research, there is something called ‘the critical period hypothesis’. It holds that all humans have a period, usually at a young age, during which it is possible to achieve full-native competence when learning a language in a linguistically rich, immersive environment – something that has not been observed with adults.

In this week's class, Kindergarten students learned words related to colours. Our teacher introduced new vocabulary related to various colours in Mandarin and reinforced the learning through various activities. This will help strengthen their memory of the new words learnt and help them get used to speaking Mandarin in their daily life.

YEAR 1 ENGLISH: SHOW AND TELL

In our Year 1 English class this week, students were given an opportunity to practise their "SHOW AND TELL" skills.

In our daily life, we often need to find words to describe an object, thus the ability to recall descriptive words is a very important skill. 

During this session, a student was picked randomly to give clues to the questions asked by his/her classmates in English in a quest to find out what the mystery object was.  Our teacher guided our students on what type of questions could be asked to describe an object under investigation.  The clue giver will only say "Yes" or "No" and after the answers are revealed, students will have to guess what the mystery object was. 

Students enjoyed this fun activity, which helped improve their English skills in describing an object.

YEAR 6 SCIENCE: KINETIC EXPERIMENT

In this week's Science class, our lesson focus was on kinetic energy. To facilitate the understanding of this science concept, our teachers set up an experiment for students to explore in a small-group setting. The objective of this experiment was to discover whether the mass of a ball and the speed of a ball will have a stronger impact on a stationary object when the ball collided with it. 

Students were asked to measure the masses of 2 balls, and then roll the balls separately, ensuring that the initial speed of the 2 balls was the same.  When collided with a stationary object, the heavier ball will cause the object to move further. From this experiment, students learned that kinetic energy is dependent on the mass of a moving object. 

In the second part of this experiment, students were asked to use the same ball but launched the ball at different speeds to find out if ball speed will make a difference in the magnitude of impact on a stationary object.  Students learned that a faster-moving ball made a stronger impact on the stationary object, so kinetic energy is also dependent on the speed of a moving object.

YEAR 7 MATHS: SIGNIFICANT FIGURES AND DECIMAL PLACES

During our Year 7 Maths lesson, students were introduced to a new concept of significant figures.  Our teacher gave some examples to point out how significant figures can be more useful than decimal places - a concept that they had learned since lower primary.   For example, a book's thickness measured 4.503 cm (0.004503 m).  If students were to round off this figure to 2 decimal places, the answer would be 0.00 m, which does not make sense mathematically.  While if students round off this number using 2 significant figures, the answer would be 0.005 m, which gives a more accurate answer mathematically. 

To determine the number of significant figures in a number use the following 3 rules:
1. Non-zero digits are always significant
2. Any zeros between two significant digits are significant
3. A final zero or trailing zeros in the decimal portion ONLY are significant

YEAR 9 ACCOUNTING: LEARNING ABOUT FINANCIAL STATEMENT

In this week's Accounting, our teacher explained the concepts of financial statements to Year 9 students.  Students were given a task to analyse and calculate relevant data given in an example of their textbook.

Our accounting program help students gain exposure to accounting concepts at an early stage and understand the role of accounting in monitoring economic activities, assessing economic benefits, forecasting, and making good economic decision.

YEAR 1-4 FIRE DRILL - WEDNESDAY, 7 SEPTEMBER

Every year, our students were given opportunities to learn simple fire-escape skills, an important skill for students to master in event of a fire.

This week, our teachers organised fire drills for Year 1-4 students to help them remember how to save themselves in an event of a fire.  Our teachers had the students blindfolded, simulating poor vision due to smoke during an event of a fire.  Students were taught simple procedures on how to move through a fire and their escape route to an open area in the school.  

We do hope that our students will master this simple fire-safety awareness from this simulation exercise and hope they will benefit from this activity.