Weekly Update #11, 15 November 2019

Upcoming events can be found on the website under School Life → Calendar and are also outlined here for easy reference.

For daily updates and news follow the HeadStart Facebook Page and You Tube channel.

HeadStart’s Creative and Performing Arts Academy (CAPA) presents FAME, the Musical. Join us for an evening of fun, laughter and tears as we relive this famous tale from the 1980s. Book your tickets by clicking HERE. As mentioned in an all school email on Tuesday, all tickets booked after 5.00pm on Friday the 15th of November will be fee paying. Thank you for your support for our young actors and actresses and all of the expenses that go into making a production of this magnitude a success. We look forward to sharing this special moment with the HeadStart community and members of the public.

Join us in building a community of like minded people and share any discounts or promotions that you can offer to HeadStart families by writing to [email protected]

Term 1 assessments commence on Monday 18 November during regular classroom lessons. When not completing assessments, students will attend lessons as per their usual timetables. These assessments are for internal school use only, and they should not cause unnecessary stress. Nevertheless, we do encourage everyone to prepare and try their best so that we can determine how well students are progressing, and establish if any interventions are required. Results will be printed on the Term 1 reports which will be published to the Parent Portal and discussed at parent-teacher conferences on Tuesday 17th December. Please do contact me if have any questions. Ms Jennifer Blackweir, Academic Director

• Information about Primary assessments (Years 2-6) can be found HERE
• Information about Secondary assessments (Years 7-10) can be found HERE

Library fines are an enforcement mechanism designed to ensure that library books are returned within a certain period of time. The penalty is more the longer the book is overdue. Books borrowed can be kept for 2 weeks before they must be returned or renewed. Books that are held more than 2 weeks without being renewed or returned are recorded as overdue. Items overdue by more than 30 days are considered lost and will be charged to full cost of items include daily fines incurred. We will not issue a refund if the book is found. The borrower is responsible for the safe return of all library materials by the due date and is subject to all fines incurred whether or not they received a notice. It is the responsibility of the borrower to notify by their own. If a borrower does not return an item to the library by its due date, they will incur daily fines THB5- per day per book until the item is returned. The borrower will not be allowed to check out another book until the book is returned or the fine is cleared. Mai, Librarian

This week has seen students throughout the school from Foundation to Sixth-Form, participate in Anti-Bullying Week. The focus of this years’ event was ‘Change Starts With Us’ and at HeadStart, we have used this opportunity to hear from our students about how we, as a community, can make an impact in seeing and dealing with bullying. This was launched through assemblies and in Secondary, students shared their persuasive writing stories focused around bullying. Across the school, students have participated, through PSHE, in designing their perfect school focusing their ideas around making it a positive, safe and happy place for everyone. Students worked together to collate their ideas about what more can be done by the community to make a positive impact on bullying. They looked at different scenarios focusing on where appropriate intervention could take place to prevent escalation and shared their opinions and ideas with the Secondary Leadership Team. It is this student voice that is vital in helping the school continue to develop.

On Tuesday 12th, students and teachers alike joined together to wear their wackiest and oddest socks to celebrate how it’s great to be unique. It has been great to hear students talking about the school environment and sharing what they believe can be done to continue to ensure we have a positive, happy and safe HeadStart community. Mr James Barker, Deputy Head of Secondary

UPrep Talk

A big thank you to all who came along to this week’s UPrep talk on the subject of University Applications. Below are the notes if you were not able to join. Our next UPrep drop in session will be on 21 November at 8:15am in the Coffee Shop. Grab a drink and feel free to ask our UPrep team questions and have discussions that could impact your child’s future.

Positive Parenting Talk

Learn how good self-esteem helps children try new things, take healthy risks and solve problems. Find out more about social-emotional development and the impact this has on your child’s experience, expression, and management of emotions and the ability to establish positive and rewarding relationships with others.

Supporting Your Child in Reception

It was a pleasure to see lots of Reception parents attend the presentation on Supporting your child with reading and writing in Reception. We hope it has helped you have a good understanding of how we teach phonics in the classroom and have gained some tips on how you can help your child at home. Reading is a challenging skill to learn, so give your child lots of encouragement and praise, show them reading is fun and remember, be patient! Ms Milly & Ms Candice

Year 2 Maths Workshop

On Tuesday 12th November, Year 2 parents attended a Maths Workshop hosted by our Year 2 Homeroom Teacher, Mr Marx. The focus of the workshop was to explain the maths homework allocated to Year 2 pupils, and how parents may be able to support at home. There was a lively discussion regarding the types of problems posed to pupils through our Diagnostic Questions maths platform. Mr Marx demonstrated some of the calculation strategies we teach our pupils at HeadStart so that parents can also use these strategies with their children at home. We all agreed that we were all taught how to solve calculations in different ways, and that more parent workshops were needed. In the New Year, HeadStart Primary will be hosting a hands on maths workshop for parents. Parents from Years 1 to 4 are encouraged to attend. No calculators allowed! Mr Sam Khan, Head of Foundation and Primary

It’s the end of Week 2 of Movember. Some teachers are looking far more manly and dandyish in with their newly adorned top lips. Others, possibly less so (Mentioning no names of course cough Mr. Cramp cough). However, we are MoBros united, working together for a great cause - raising awareness for men’s health. With this in mind, please spend a few moments reading this article on symptoms of prostate cancer in men. Prostate Cancer Symptoms Article CLICK HERE!. If you would like to donate towards the Mo Bro Foundation visit their website by clicking HERE. Remember to vote in the atrium for the best moustache! Parents can vote too! Mr David Pollicutt

Swimming

The Aqua Panthers had such an amazing weekend at the International School of Bangkok annual Swimfest! The competition had over 1,000 swimmers in attendance and 21 teams. We placed 11th overall and Anton Solnyshko single-handedly placed our team 8th in the 8 & Under Boys group category!

Our point earners were: Anton (55 pts), Cameron (28 pts), Michael (9 pts), Vitalina (7 pts), Nae Nae (4 pts), Meakin (2 pts), Ryan (1 pt)

Overall this was an amazing trip for all who attended, trips like this offer great team bonding opportunities and help build our swimmers independence. The next competition is the first session of the Thanyapura Open League on November 30th. See you poolside! -Coach Brown

Football

The Under 11 girls were outstanding in the PISAC tournament this week winning the competition and playing brilliantly throughout. All the girls played brilliantly and have a great future ahead of them.

The Under 13 girls battled really well and put in a lot of effort in the PISAC tournament on Tuesday. well done girls.

The Under 15 girls played some excellent football and represented the school well in their PISAC competition Thursday night.

The Under 9 boys were desperately unlucky not to have won their PISAC competition, finishing second on goal difference to BISP.

The Under 11 boys sparked wild celebrations when Lincoln scored a dramatic late goal to secure first place in their PISAC tournament.

The Under 13 boys put in a typically dominant performance to finish in first place in their PISAC competition on Tuesday. The boys scored a brilliant team goal praised by both HeadStart and our opponents to overcome UWCT in the final match.

• This weekend the U13 and U11 boys play BCIS at HeadStart. The meet time is 8.45am here at school.
• Next week the U9, U11, U13 and U15 boys play against UWCT in our final matches before the BISP Soccer 7s tournament next weekend.

The school is now settling down after the wonderment that was Science week. During Science week there was a plethora of activities and competitions going on throughout the school, including; treasure hunts, demonstrations in the atrium, explosions in the science department and an engineering challenge in partnership with the Design and Technology department. The week quite literally started and ended with a bang! Mr Timothy Davidson, Head of Science Faculty

A lovely first week for our Teddy Bear Picnic topic! Ms Charlotte Myers

Last Friday parents and pupils alike enjoyed a fun and entertaining assembly from Year 3 White. They told a story about the wonderful digits of Onestown, and how one visitor (‘Ten’) changed everything for them. Mr Ian Jackson

Year 6 students in the ‘Thai Foreign Language’ class have been learning to tell the time with a variety of activities. Kru Yui

Year 6 visited Aquaria as part of our English unit this term. We have written about the ocean biome and we are now looking at balanced arguments. Going to the aquarium gave us lots of ideas for the balanced argument we plan to write about aquariums. Should aquariums be allowed? The aquarium gave us a huge appreciation for the beautiful wildlife in the ocean biome, but is it the right place for them to be living? We’ll be debating this topic next week. Ms Sophie Webb

We are pleased to announce that the winners of our Oceans for All Art competition have been selected. Last term students from KS1 to KS3 created artwork on the topic of protecting, nurturing and restoring the Ocean’s ecosystem. The winners will have their work published in the upcoming Oceans for All book. Ms Jody Leow

Last Saturday (09/11/19) 11 students went to UWCT to participate in a Model United International event alongside BIS and UWCT students. What is Model United International? It’s an educational simulation and/or academic activity in which students can learn about diplomacy, international relations, and the United Nations. We learnt skills such as how a MUN event is run, words to use whilst debating and even got to do a practice debate. UWCT will be holding an event early next year and we plan on attending. If you’re interested you should definitely sign up for the Thursday ASP. Lucy Mester, Deputy Head Girl

The BTEC students visited Thanyapura Health and Fitness Resort last week where they received a tour and educational talks from industry experts. They learnt how the HR, Marketing, Hotel and Sports teams contributed to the successful running of the Business. The students returned on Saturday as they were given the amazing opportunity of volunteering at the 2019 Colour Run. They had a lot of fun leading the run and working on different stages of the 1.5 & 5km courses. What an amazing experience being part of an event that inspires participants to live a more active lifestyle, on top of having fun! Ms Yardenna Jones

This week 22 intrepid Year 12 and 13 students decided to dip their toes into the world of university study. HeadStart has been working on a collaboration with Assumption University in Bangkok to provide a taste of college life and we spent 3 days living and learning like university students. Life in dorms, feeding ourselves and getting to class on time unassisted were all effortlessly achieved, showing there’s hope that we can survive in the real world. More excitingly, we tried our hands at a whole load of college courses including film-making, mechatronics, economics, coding for game design, hospitality service and even flying a plane! Well done to all the students who were fantastic ambassadors for HeadStart and to Mr Cramp and Kru Gem who, although they were not needed, were there just in case efforts at “adulting” failed. UExperience will be a yearly project that students in Year 12 and 13 can participate in so watch this space for details of next year’s programme. Full album can be found on the HeadStart Facebook page Ms Gemma Caines

We are now starting to approach the last few weeks before the Term Winners are announced. The Term Winners will be awarded with a trip to the cinema. Therefore, every member in each house needs to keep working hard to score as many points as possible. The points are incredibly close and there is no telling who this term’s winners will be. We still have many activities over the next few weeks. These include 2 rounds of secondary activities, house quizzes, weigh your waste Fridays and primary lunchtime house activities. Here are the current house totals points. Ms Kirstie Melville

Touch Rugby Event

On 1st December there is a Touch Rugby Tournament at the ACG Cricket and Sports Ground in Talang. We are entering a students’ team who will play from 09:30-10:30 and a HeadStart staff/invitational team who will be playing from 10:30 onwards. Contact Mr Jamie Sadler in the PE department by writing to [email protected] for more details.

Outdoor Screening of Sharkwater Film at Blue Tree

What’s on in Phuket? This is what! On 22 November 2019, Blue Tree Phuket welcomes Oceans For All and Shark Guardian in support of their shark breeding project and the online petition to declare the Zebra Shark an endangered and protected species in Thai waters. Come and meet marine conservation experts David Martin and Brendan Sing to discover the importance of sharks and the threats they currently face. The talk will be followed by an outdoor screening of the award-winning movie Sharkwater at Blue Tree Lagoon.

The event starts at 7:00pm and is FREE!