CHESTERHOUSE INTERNATIONAL, INDEPENDENT, EDUCATION The Call of the Gryphon 17 October 2014 No: 030/2014 FROM THE HEADMASTER............. Dear Parents My newsletter this week is in the form of an article in the Telegraph, titled, “Ofsted chief: we don’t want “lefty” child-centred teaching”. As a Cambridge school it is important that we take note of the educational debates in the UK, one of which no doubt this article has generated. Ofsted stands for Office for Standards in Education and is the UK inspection service for schools. Courage Inspires Justin Harvey HEADMASTER Justin Harvey HEADMASTER FROM THE COLLEGE……… Dear Parents and Guardians It is exam timetable day. The pupils received their personal copies during their tutor lessons today. We have also put up the timetables on the general pin boards and posted it on the school’s website. With the exam timetable goes a strong signal that the final assessment of this year’s work is nearing. Many pupils find exams extremely stressful and we want to encourage all our families to assist by focusing on a balanced, healthy lifestyle for the remainder of the term. Sport and exercise must continue to form a part of our teenagers’ day; there should still be time for family and friends; their music and drama lessons should continue: everything in balance. Pupils who have mastered their work daily will find that they need to work through their year’s work systematically, but nothing should be beyond their grasp at this point. Work that still eludes a pupil must be tackled now while there are still three more weeks to ask for help in clinics. Estelle Snyders Head of College Here are some tips relating to academic preparation for exams: 1. Your child must know the number and name of every paper they write and what that paper entails. Too often pupils try to find out the day before the exam what they need to study, or even worse, they prepare the wrong work. 2. Each pupil must find which study method works best for him or her. There are two tests that each pupil must perform on their study method: can they recall the required content weeks after the test or exam? Are they able to apply their knowledge? The Cambridge curriculum demands that pupils have made sense of their work, and have internalised it sufficiently to be able to discuss it within a given context. Reasoning and verbal communication form a very big part of their curriculum. 3. Studying must thus be focused and active. A child cannot expect to lie on his or her bed, read the work and master it sufficiently to succeed. 4. All teachers are available to guide and advise. The responsibility, however, rests with your child to ask for advice and help timeously and regularly. 5. An examination revision timetable is essential to stay focused and revise systematically. 6. Goal setting is a very effective way of making systematic, purposeful progress. Pupils must set their targets in such a way that they are challenging but achievable. The pupils must have to work a little more effectively each term: eliminating lack of understanding and insight, filling in gaps in their knowledge and mastering the skills required in the various subjects. We wish all our families a week-end filled with sunshine and laughter Estelle Snyders and the College Team Page 1 Bronwen Stewart Head of Academics Junior School Lieze Puren Head of Pastoral Affairs Junior School From the Junior School….. Dear Parents The weeks keep on flying past at a tremendous speed. It’s been a jam-packed five days in the Junior School. Our prefects have launched a wonderful initiative called the Rainbow project. Each week the children will celebrate a colour of the rainbow that is linked to a value. To celebrate each value our children will be allowed to wear the colour associated with the value. Please be aware that it must be something discrete like a hairband or a ribbon. Our prefects have chosen the following values: Love – Red Trust - Orange Forgiveness - Yellow Respect – Green Honesty – Blue Courage – Purple Peace – White Each week in assembly our prefects will tell a little story associated with the value. In order for us to always be reminded of these values, our prefects will tie different colour balloons to our perimeter fence. It would be wonderful if you as parents can talk to your children about these values and how we can incorporate them into our everyday lives. As you might know, October is Breast Cancer awareness month. To show our support as a school we will be selling pink ribbons next week for R10 each. Please support this wonderful initiative. Bronwen presented an excellent talk on Assessment for Learning on Tuesday evening for all our parents. It is wonderful to hear how education is changing in the 21st century and who better to ask than the experts. Thank you to LOST PROPERTYLOST PROPERTY Bronwen for a very informative talk. Our Grade 6 children have finished writing their first ever Cambridge Checkpoint tests this week. Although there were some nervous children, very soon into the first paper, our children looked completely relaxed; one child even commented that ‘this is the most fun paper I have ever written’. Well done to all our Grade 6 children. Last but not least; we would like to congratulate our choirs on a spectacular evening of song and dance last night. Our children have been so excited and some children even kept quiet the whole of Thursday because Mrs B said they must save their voices. Thank you to Mrs Beelders and her whole choir team for an unforgettable evening. Just a few reminders; please note that the date for the Sports and Culture awards was moved from the 22 October to the 30 November at 08.00. Please book for our highly anticipated Sensory Intelligence parent workshop on 31 October. Please invite your friends and family. Have a peaceful weekend Bronwen and Lieze CHESTERHOUSE CONTACT DETAILS Phone: 021-975 6650 Fax: 021-975 6649 Email: [email protected] or [email protected] Webpage: www.chesterhouse.co.za Cnr. Mosselbank River & Falcon Streets, D’Urbanvale Estate, Durbanville 7550 Newsletter comments to: [email protected] Page 2 Key Stage 1 Gotcha Day At the end of Term 3, Grade 6E was given the daunting task of putting on Gotcha Day for Grade 1P. However, after the fearful stares subsided, the class was incredibly excited and came up with loads of ideas to give these children the best Gotcha Day ever. Jordyn Davy and Anaïs Wentzel ran such an amazing nail bar that even Ms Prins and I got into the action by making sure our nails were sorted for the holidays. Matthew Herbert brought his entire Lego collection, causing a mass rush by many of the boys. Paige Forrester and Lauryn Giles painted faces like professionals while AJ Henn, Niccolo Guerrini, Monwabisi Sekwane and Chengetai Mugabe kept our budding sports stars busy outside, despite the intense heat. Lastly, I-Hsin Wu ran a drawing table where all of the children could showcase their creative talents. I would really like to thank all of 6E who were present that day for making Gotcha Day a huge success for 1P. Ms Prins and I are so appreciative that we could leave this in your extremely capable hands. Marisa Esterhuizen Grade 6 Teacher Page 3 Tygervalley Centre’s Art Competition The artistic talents of our Chesterhouse children during Tygervalley Centre’s Art Competition was excellent! The participants should all feel very proud of themselves for producing such great work. The judges were impressed by the standard of the art work and found it difficult to choose a favourite. For the younger children Jini Kim (Grade 5) came in 4th place. Category B- for older children- we excelled with having Chesterhouse children taking first and second place! We are so proud of Alicia Bekker (Grade 7) who came in first place, Alexis Rossouw (Grade 7) in second and Georgia Roux (Grade 7) and Nikita Stock (Grade 7) also featuring in the top 6. Well done! Brigitte Wiltshire Grade 6 and 7 Art Alicia Bekker Alexis Rossouw Georgia Roux Nikita Stock Page 4 Jini Kim Varsity College Quiz Towards the end of last term, two teams of four Grade 11 pupils took part in the Varsity College quiz. This is a general knowledge quiz and the questions covered the topics of Current Affairs, History, Geography and Nature, Sport, Science and General Knowledge and Trivia. Pupils who take part need to have a varied and large general knowledge. It's almost impossible to prepare the pupils in a meaningful way as the questions are very diverse. Questions about current affairs, such as the latest rugby score, to a historical question about Helen of Troy were among the offerings this year. The parents and teachers in the gallery were also finding some of the questions challenging. The winning team left the hall with R1000.00 in prize money per team member and a full three year Varsity College Bursary for a matric recipient in their school. Team members were Tessa Hall, Carla Joos, Kyle Warren, Joshua Redelinghuys , Daniella Davies, Danielle Hugo, Aimee Cunningham and Kristin du Plessis. Although the questions were not easy, everyone had a great time. We hope to return to the quiz in 2015. Kim van der Merwe Chesterhouse Librarian. Carla Joos, Danielle Hugo, Kyle Warren, Aimee Cunningham Joshua Redelinghuys, Tessa Hall Kristin du Plessis, Daniella Davies CHESTERHOUSE ARTIST OF THE WEEK Vida Madighi-Oghu Grage 9 Page 5 All Chesterhouse families are invited to join the Meerendal Multi Sport Club at the Meerendal Wine Estate. The club offers both mountain biking and trail running facilities on separate dedicated trails manned by 24hour security. The 2015 memberships are now open and the club is offering a special price for all Chesterhouse families! The fee for 2015 is as follows; 1. Children - R100 for the year 2. Parents of pupils - R300 (the normal membership fee is R350 per annum) The above fee allows them access to both mountain biking and trail running (on separate dedicated trails for each sporting discipline). The fee for the children provides them access to Meerendal only as this is a "child friendly trail" and their statistics show that this trail is commonly used by children and families. The adults however have access to both Meerendal and Hoogekraal. Memberships can be purchased NOW ALREADY and they are valid IMMEDIATELY and expire in December 2015 only. The following benefits are attached to membership; 1. 2. 3. 4. 10% discount on wine purchased at Meerendal Wine Estate 10% discount on all meals purchased at the Crown Restaurant 10% discount on accommodation at the Hotel on the Estate Automatic access to the Meerendal Wine Club Contact detail for Meerendal Multi Sport Club Prudence Adams - Meerendal Multi Sport Club, Meerendal Wine Estate 082 851 7007 - [email protected] Sonya Adams Head of Sports SA Gymnastics Daneel Fourie (Grade 3) has taken part in the SA Gymnastics games held in Cape Town this year. He has competed in the tumbling competition and came 3rd receiving a bronze medal for SA. Well done Daneel! Hard work pays off. Wilna Fourie Mum Page 6 Page 7 2014 TERM DATES TERM PERIOD Term 4 Monday 6 October – Friday 5 December 2015 TERM DATES TERM PERIOD Term 1 Wednesday 14 January – Friday 27 March School holiday – 27 February Monday 13 April – Friday 26 June School and public holiday for all pupils -27 April to 1 May and 16 June Tuesday 21 July – Wednesday 23 September public holiday – 10 August Monday 12 October – Friday 4 December Term 2 Term 3 Term 4 Parent Prayer group We would like to invite parents to join us in praying for Chesterhouse on Friday 7th November @ 7am in the school Library. “I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.” John 14: 13-14 We look forward to seeing you there. Nikki Carstens [email protected] The 2nd hand store The 2nd Hand Store is finally open! The 2nd Hand Store will be open on Fridays from 12 till 2.30pm. All stock can be viewed on the website at http://www.chesterhouse.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2nd-hand-stock-list.xls We would appreciate any donations of school clothing which are no Longer needed. Your donations can benefit other parents as they will pay a fraction of the cost for the clothing. Please leave your donations with either of the secretaries. With your assistance we can make the 2nd Hand Store a great success. Michele Heinrich 2nd Hand Store/Lost property Email: [email protected] Page 8 Page 9 SH’ZEN 2 FOR R179 SAVE R179 | FOR ALL YOUR SH'ZEN REQUIREMENTS, OR FOR ANY FURTHER INFO REGARDING OUR WIDE RANGE OF PRODUCTS, PLEASE CONTACT JOAN NORTON On 0837270005 OR VIA [email protected] PLEASE CHECK THE WEBSITE FOR ALL OUR OCTOBER SPECIALS www.shzen.co.za Page 10 Chesterhouse Detailed Calendar Term 4 2014 Date Junior School College Page 11 Chesterhouse Detailed Calendar Term 4 2014 Date Junior School College Page 12