Weekly Update #27, 3 April 2020

I want to thank parents, students and staff for working together to provide continuity of learning at this challenging time. Everyone is developing new skills and levels of resilience that they did not know they had or ever needed before. But my hat goes off to our parents who are now juggling family life, work life and school life all from home. Us teachers have the utmost respect and empathy for you. We know it is never possible to replicate fully the experience that students would get on a daily basis in school – via Online learning, however judging from the positive feedback from parents we have received, we are doing a pretty good job. We always value your feedback in ways we can improve and therefore a parents survey will be coming out soon for you to complete.

Year 11, 12 and 13 students should be now be fully geared up for their exams in mid May which will either be online or at school. Hopefully this will keep them very busy over the holidays with their revision programmes. But for them and everyone else in the HeadStart community, I want to emphasize the importance of looking after yourselves and looking out for each other as a community. Firstly know you are not alone. This is affecting billions of people around the world. Reach out to friends and family daily, stay connected and supportive. We are all experiencing the same daily issues. Keep to routines, exercise and keep to a healthy diet where possible. Focus on what is important. Be kind to each other and grateful for what you can do. Hopefully we will all be back in school face to face soon. Stay healthy and stay focused on your future goals!

Dear Foundation and Primary Parents,

I would like to wish you all a fun and safe Songkran Holiday. Over the Songkran break, I will be working with my teams to further improve on the on-line provision we have put into place thus far. We all look forward to reconnecting with you all again after the holiday period, and to continue to provide a quality learning experience for your children.

All best wishes,

Sam Khan

The Foundation Teaching Team

The Primary Teaching Team

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Another week of online learning complete. Well done to parents, students and staff for taking on this challenge! Follow our very active HeadStart Facebook page and YouTube channel for updates, announcements and ideas on how to stay busy during quarantine. Click here to visit the HeadStart Facebook page Click here to visit our YouTube channel

Thank you for your patience and support as we have moved from normal classroom teaching to the online provision over the course of the last two weeks. I know things were not smooth for everyone and we have been working to try and address some of the issues as they were raised. As yet there is no certainty that we will be able to return to normal classes on the 20th of April, and it looks likely that the shutdown will continue to the end of April. It is of course our desire to return to our usual provision as soon as it is possible and safe to do so. In light of our desire to continue to improve the online provision, we would like to hear from families about what has gone well, and what can be improved if we do require another two weeks of home/online learning after the Songkran break.

We have setup three surveys covering each phase of the school for families to fill in. This is because the provision is quite different in the different phases of the school. If you have children in multiple phases of the school, please feel free to fill in the different surveys. Your feedback will help us to continue to improve the provision for our your children and make any necessary changes. -Mr Adam Drew, Headmaster

Foundation

Primary

Secondary

It has been brought to our attention that parents are concerned about going to immigration in person to renew Ed-Visas during the outbreak of COVID-19. As the COVID-19 situation concerns everyone who lives and works in Thailand, as a school, we would like to offer a one off extra service to ensure that everyone in our HeadStart family feels safe and supported. If you are due to extend your visa, we are offering a service whereby our team will hand in all documents and go through the entire processes and all that you have to do is appear for the photo at immigration. We have been informed by immigration that the student must physically go to take a photo at immigration in order to prove their presence in Thailand; however, this process takes only 5 minutes. We are glad to support our HeadStart family and your health is our priority.

If you would like to take advantage of this opportunity, please drop your child’s passport at the school security office by Monday 6th April 2020, and meet us at school at 01:00 PM on Tuesday 7th April 2020 to go to Phuket immigration for this purpose. The total cost of extending visa service is 5,000THB. If you have any questions or require assistance please call the HR team on 092-067-9294

Across the country, people have applauded health care workers helping in the fight against Coronavirus. This took place last Sunday evening 8.00pm Thai time but has in fact been happening around the world in an effort to thank and encourage those on the front lines of the outbreak. #togetherathome #เสียงปรบมือคือกำลังใจ

This information was posted on the HeadStart Parents Community Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/groups/436982670432596/) but is worth a share as it’s a great initiative. Get in contact to donate!

“I just returned from the Covid-19 Field Hospital. Working together with a husband/wife Phuket Town owned restaurant and another Headstart mother we were able to feed 60 people today. Nancy Wiegand has done an incredible job coordinating all of this. She negotiated a price of 25 baht per meal! So, a 1500-baht donation will feed 60 Healthcare Workers at this hospital each day. Today I donated the meals on behalf of my daughters who remained safely at home. Tomorrow Nancy will donate the meal which will be Garlic Chicken with Rice and Egg. The next day another friend of mine has kindly offered to pay the 1500 baht.

Starting from Friday we are looking for other families to feed our local Field Hospital. Please contact me via Facebook and together with Nancy we will help your family take on a day donating 60 meals. Basically, it only involves you transferring the 1500 baht to the Restaurant’s Bank Account and letting us know if you would like your name on the meal boxes. The current laws state that the Restaurant Owner must put his name, date and time the meal was cooked but a personalized message is completely optional.” -Melanie Clark, HeadStart parent

On Wednesday the 1st of April the Student Support Team (SST) supported homeroom teachers in Foundation, Primary and Secondary by devising lessons and content that provided guidance for our students about taking care of their mental health and well-being whilst at home. The aim was to encourage our students to think more about their daily routines; such as waking up and having a healthy breakfast, getting sufficient physical exercise and managing their screen time throughout the day. Students enjoyed the lessons and the content that was provided and we were really impressed by their enthusiasm.

We also ran three ‘Virtual’ Coffee with the Counsellors sessions via Google Meets on Wednesday. Thank you to all those parents who attended and shared their experiences of supporting their children with their learning at home. The feedback that was received was passed to the relevant Headteachers as we continue to improve our online learning provision. Thank you once again for all those students, teachers and parents that took part.

Please see the timetable for the Primary and Secondary PE daily activities after the Songkran holidays. Have a fantastic break. Stay active and healthy and don’t forget to take part in the #HeadStartStayAtHomeChallenge. -Mr Carter & the PE Department

Hello girls and boys! It’s Miss Hannah here again, reading A Squash and a Squeeze. It’s time for our Home Learning to stop for a break, but we will be back very soon! Over the break you might get a little bit bored, and you might feel a bit squashed and squeezed in your house. Mummy, Daddy and any other adults at home might feel like this too! So, after reading this story, I had an idea. I know that you are all super sorters and super tidiers at school, so to make your bedroom or your house feel a little bit bigger you could help to tidy up your toys, make your bed and put the clean clothes away! Have a great break and stay healthy! See you all soon!

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In English we asked the children to draw stick people to show how they were feeling about being at home. They then needed to write some sentences too. It was a great lesson following on from the lovely wellbeing activities we did yesterday. Here are some examples of the work in Year 1 Blue. -Ms Lucie Bevins

Year 1 Reading Competition

The Year 1 teachers asked the children to show us that they were reading at home by sending nice videos or pictures of them reading in creative or funny ways. It was very hard to choose some winners as we had so many lovely entries!

Thank you to all of the children who sent in entries. We loved to see them!

In the Secondary ‘Thai as a First Language’ Year 8-11 classes, students have expressed support and thanks to doctors and their teams for their effort to stop Coronavirus. The students drew pictures and wrote sentences to show their support for the learning theme: “ Our Doctors and Nurses are Superheroes!” -Kru Karn

Despite these difficult and challenging times, and my questionable ICT skills being put to use, the wheels haven’t stopped turning when it comes to Year 8 Austen learning! They have all been working incredibly hard to finish their last scheme of work for the term: Heroes & Villains.

They were given the task of designing and branding their own magical potion, complete with a range of persuasive techniques. To add to this, they were also given the challenge of writing their own sales pitches in the style of Dragons’ Den. Well done all! Take a look at some of their err… wonderful creations. Thank you Krit, Christina, Erica & Kristina! I think I’ll play it safe and stick to coffee… -Mr Ashley Paice

A huge well done to Stella Ballini in Year 11 who has spent hours producing this beautiful, deconstructed self portrait. Stella completed this in just one day, demonstrating that with a little focus and determination, students can still create amazing outcomes, despite being at home! I can’t wait to see the next pieces in her creative journey! -By Miss Gill

I am very proud of the year 7-9 Art students who have created some beautiful eye drawings at home, some expressing how they are feeling whilst in quarantine. -Ms Jody Leow

In IGCSE First Language English, students have to answer a question in which they need to develop in detail explicit and implicit ideas in a stimulus text, all the while affecting a convincing ‘voice’, which is appropriate for the text type they’ve been asked to produce. For this task, they were asked to write a speech in the role of an experienced hunter, in which they were giving information to would- be adventurers on the dangers of hunting bears and their own experiences in wild Russia! In order to encourage students tho consider their tone more, Year 10 produced these pieces as audio files- have a listen and decide who sounds most like an grizzled outdoorsman! -Mr Pollicutt, Head of English