Weekly Update 20, 2 Feb. 2018

Dates for Your Diary

Upcoming events can be found on the HeadStart calendar on the website School Life → Calendar but we have outlined upcoming events for the month here for easy reference.

Immigration Notice

The Chief of the Phuket Immigration Office, Col Kathathorn Kumthieng, has confirmed that all foreigners registered as living in Phuket must re-report their address to immigration after being registered as staying in a hotel within Thailand, even for just one night. The confirmation follows complaints from long-term expats that they were fined B2,000 for not re-registering their home addresses after travelling within the country.

Furry Friday Casual Clothes Details

Ms Fiona Scott went to visit the Bohdi Dog Shelter to see if there is anyway that we at HeadStart can help Ms Tina Maria (founder) to care for the numerous neglected dogs that have found their way to the shelter. Tina has created a safe and clean environment for countless dogs and has been able find people to adopt over 300 dogs in less than 5 years. Let’s show our support for this fantastic project and participate in the fundraising organised for Bohdi Dog Shelter.

For more information about the Bodhi Dog Shelter visit their website: http://bodhishelter.com/

On 9 February we would like to invite everyone to join in the fun and come to school dressed up following our theme of ‘Furry Friends’. Some suggestions are to wear animal patterns, dog ears, brown clothing, or, if you already have it, a dog or furry animal costume. We would like to request a voluntary donation of 50 Baht which will be collected through out the day.

There will be a ‘Book and Bear’ donation box where children can donate books and cuddly toys. They will be on display so that other children can buy them for 20 Baht. There will be many other fundraising activities dotted through out the school as a fun way to raise fun for the Bodhi shelter so send your child to school with some spare change for this event.

Thank you for your support.

Thai Parent Meetings

Please note the Thai Parent Meeting schedule for term 2 is in the download below.

Maths Faculty Week

From 5-9 of February, the Maths Faculty has organised a whole variety of games, activities and competitions to challenge our minds and practice using mathematics in daily life. Below is a look at the timetable of events. By Mr Craig O’Nions, Head of Maths Faculty

House News

By Mr Nick Carter, House Coordinator

• Winners of the Weigh Your Waste: Red Phoenixes (3.1kg)

• Primary Activities: Yellow Cheetahs (Granny’s Footsteps)

• Secondary Activities: Blue Tigers

• House Quiz: Green Dragons

Sports Department News

Football News

By Head Coach JR

On Sunday, 28 January, the Under 11 and Under 13 football teams played matches against UWCT and KIS. The Under 11 Blue team played very nice football and all players deserve congratulations on their performance. Everyone performed very well and the team made great progress in the way they played. The blue team won all their games. The under 11 orange team showed a lot of courage. I would also like to congratulate all those players for the effort they put in. A big thank you to all the parents for supporting the teams. It really makes a difference to have parents being so positive on the sidelines. Overall, the whole day was positive and encouraging for the teams’ future.

• Under 13 after the first match against UWCT, HeadStart won 2-0

• The second game against KIS, they defeated us with a score of 1-0

Important note from the coaches: The only way we progress as a team is if every player attends their training sessions. We work as a team and grow as a team; the only way to get better is to play together.

Swimming News

By Coach Zak Brown

Time to prepare for the Rocket Science Competition at Thanyapura on Friday, February 16 at 4:00 pm and on Saturday, February 17 at 8:00-4:00 pm as well as on Sunday, February 18 at 8:00-12:00 pm. HeadStart will be taking a large team to compete, come and watch!!

Basketball News

By Mr Richard Lukats

On Wednesday, 31 January, the HeadStart Panthers Senior Girls team played against The Phuket Wittayalai High School. It was a thrilling game with the visiting team taking an early lead leaving the Panthers on the back foot for most of the game. However the young HeadStart ladies showed great determination and team work to gradually reduce the gap to the visitors and in a nail biting final few minutes to the game the Panthers drew level. The game finished with honors even at 32 - 32, a brilliant game!!! The match started with a fab performance by the Mini - Cheer Team (Mini Cheerleaders) who entertained the fans at Tip Off!!!

Foundation and Primary Sports Days

Below is the information that you need to know regarding Sports Days for Foundation and Primary. Parents are welcome to come along and cheer.

Foundation Department Announcements

By Ms Fiona Scott, Deputy Head of Foundation

Our Friday Foundation assemblies just got a whole better as we now welcome Early Years to join us for our end of the week celebrations. We are also very excited as the Thai teachers have been so impressed with the work and progress being made in Foundation that they too would like to add Thai Star of the Week to our assembly.

From Early Years, a big well done to Thamas, Jude, Leo and Napat for a super effort and working hard this week in class and in Thai lessons.

From Reception we celebrate Yasya, Freya,Taisiya, Jahja, Nate and Dai Dai for trying hard and showing great progress in Thai and English. Well done everyone!

Secondary Department Announcements

By Ms Elizabeth Mason, Head of Secondary

I look forward to seeing all of the parents of the Year 11 students on 7 February at 3:35 pm in the Sports Hall. Please note we will start with vital talks regarding exams, motivational camp and the Sixth Form.

During February and March HeadStart has organised several workshops for students in Year 9 in order to support with check point revision and preparation as well as motivation and exam techniques for Year 11 and the Sixth Form.

The sessions will run from 2:00-3:00 pm in the Sports Hall on the following dates:

Students News

The children have had lots of fun on the new playground equipment during break time!

Reception blue have had so much fun with our Red Riding hood topic this week. The children used props to act out the story to their friends and also chose scenes from the story to write about. They are able to recall what happened in the story and write sentences to describe it. We have also been playing games relating to the story in our outside areas. By Ms Candice Smithie

This week during our Minibeasts topic, Early Years have been learning all about spiders. The children learnt that they have 8 legs and eyes and that spiders use their webs to catch food! The children discovered a huge spider web in the garden. They tried their hardest to tiptoe and jump through the web without touching it, so that the spider wouldn’t trap and eat them! Ms Holly & Ms Amy

Reception students learning the vowel ‘a’ in Thai class. By Kru Tae

Year 1 students enjoyed learning the vowel ‘oo’ ( สระอู) in Thai class. We organised games and a word search to make it lots of fun! By Kru Dia

This term Year 2 have been learning about plants and what they need to grow. We have also learnt about the process of germination. This week we got the chance to investigate what would happen if we tried to germinate seeds in the dark and in the light. Everyone predicts that the seeds in the dark will not grow. We will find out next week. Mr Paul Williams

Year 3 and 4 had lots of fun exploring the density of liquids with salt during science club this week. By Ms Danielle Jones

In Year 6 Yellow, the children have been revising their knowledge of sound. They created their own instruments and had to ‘rock out’ in front of the class before explaining how their instruments worked and how the sound traveled. My ears will never be the same again! By Ms Sophie Webb

This week three Year 13 English Language students, Anastasia, Hyerin and Ken, paired up with three students at the other end of the spectrum in Reception Yellow: Pun, Jazzy and Aaron. The Year 13s are currently studying a module in Child Language Acquisition, learning how babies and children come to pick up the grammatical structures of the English language. They recorded 10 minute clips of themselves working closely with their younger counterparts. They will follow this up by transcribing the conversations for analysis next week. It was a fantastic reminder of the miracle that is learning your first language, and the Y13s particularly enjoyed the final thirty minutes where they observed a brilliant lesson on Little Red Riding Hood taught by Teacher Hannah. Needless to say, they wish it was fairy tales and not A-Level exams waiting for them in May of this year. By Mr Ed Dixon

Year 12 silver DofE group - assessed expedition in action! By Mr Duncan Peake

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