Dear Parents
WELCOME CONTINUED
Last week I omitted to welcome Cindy Anstey back to the Prep. Cindy taught Grade 3 at the Prep for a number of years before moving to the Pre-Prep a few years ago as a Grade 2 teacher. We are very happy to have her back again as a Grade 3 teacher.
Welcome too to La’eeq Abrahams who joins us on a teacher internship. He will be based in Grade 4 this year.
MULTI-X SPORTS AND ADDITIONAL SWIMMING
I have been very pleased with what I have seen at the above sessions. The Multi-X sessions after summer sport practices are games-based and not sport-specific, focusing instead on age appropriate physical literacy levels as well as the sports-related skills of agility, eye hand co-ordination, ball skills, etc. The need for this has come about with the more sedentary lifestyle affecting our boys and the myriad of attractions offered by technology from television to mobile devices, not to mention the range of social media options. With boys at an age where communication and entertainment are so important and enjoyable, it is difficult to compete with this attraction. We can also not under-estimate the impact of the two very abnormal years of Covid which impacted our boys at a young age.
We can see that a number of boys had to miss out at the early age on private swimming lessons and had far less access to swimming facilities outside of the home and school, hence extra swimming sessions as well as a compulsory afternoon swimming for Grade 3s. I think being able to swim, and preferably swim well, is an essential life skill from the point of view of water safety, strength and fitness.
This is the first time and the first week of the first time that we have implemented such a programme, so there have been a few teething problems which we will iron out. What I have seen, most importantly, is our boys having enormous fun and playing together, regardless of talent.
COMMUNICATION
We have a 24 hour turnaround time for answering emails, although most will be answered far more quickly than that. Teachers are not expected to answer emails during teaching time, so if there is a change in arrangements for your son for the day in question that you could not communicate in advance, please phone the office to ensure that the message will be received and acted on.
If your son is ill and off school or at school but not well enough to do Phys Ed or sport, please email the House Director and teacher concerned. Your son will tell his teacher if he is at school, but we need parental confirmation too.
We do endeavour to communicate as well as possible and do correct when something is missed, but please also encourage your sons to take responsibility for their day, special arrangements, kit, etc. There is a great danger that we disempower our boys from taking responsibility for knowing all the details of arrangements; they need to ask their teachers if they are uncertain - who, what, where. If the coach tells their parents everything that is needed and parents make the arrangements, our boys can comfortably be very passive, something we don’t want to see.
SCHOOL MAGAZINE
We have had a few reports of problems with the 2022 school magazine handed out at the very end of term last year, such as pages falling out. If there are any such problems with your copy, please return it to school with your son’s name clearly marked and the printers will replace it. Please do so before Thursday next week.
It has been a wonderful week with all our activities and lessons in full swing and the boys energised and happy – they seem very pleased with their 175 caps.
Kind regards
GREG BROWN
HEADMASTER |
