Educating for the Future

From the Master 来自校长 마스터

Dear parents I am writing this on the first day since the coronavirus crisis began that China has been able to report no new cases arising from domestic infection. The battle still goes on, of course, as those returning from overseas continue their rigorous screening and quarantine procedures, but this news is certainly very welcome. There are just a few key headlines from me this week:   Reopening date We still need to confirm the physical reopening of the school estate with the authorities. I am afraid that the uncertainty continues, and we can no longer reopen the estate on 30th March as we had planned. It may now be postponed to Tuesday 7th April, but even that is not yet confirmed. I will, as ever, keep families informed as soon as we know more. The Nest will follow after the Junior and Senior Schools return, as we await the green light from the authorities.   Online learning survey I would like to extend my thanks to all those parents who helped us review our online provision last week. The results have been very positive, with 90% of respondents reporting that ‘Wellington has been open and responsive to my questions and concerns’ and that the level of parental support was ‘appropriate’. In other areas, over 80% of parents felt that their child had grown more independent and 77% felt that the quality of the work for their child was ‘of a high standard’ and that their child was ‘interested in the content and format of the independent learning activities’. As we have some time left in the e-learning phase, I am keen to press on and improve the provision still further. Next week, I will send out another survey – mercifully, far shorter than previous ones – that will focus on your comments and ideas. My colleagues and I take very seriously the feedback we get from pupils and parents as we continue to work hard in delivering the best educational provision for your child. I would urge you to take a few minutes next week to provide some thoughts.   Responding to the coronavirus as a community As the country and its schools gradually return to more familiar forms of operation, we can shift our thoughts from protecting our community to helping it to recover from this very difficult period. Wellington has always championed service to others and over the past few years has raised huge sums of money to support charities within the city, across China and globally. The impact of this disease is still all too evident across the country, and I have asked Ms Rogic, our charity coordinator to begin to draw up plans for events and fund-raising activities that we as a school community can do to help. Our principle focus will be to offer support to those hit hardest by the outbreak, but equally we recognize the selfless contributions made by thousands of medical workers and other volunteers in Tianjin and beyond. This work is far from completed, and if we can help, we will do. There have already been many acts of individual selflessness and giving across the community; the time is now right for us to move to a common approach and to help make a difference to the lives of those affected by the coronavirus. We will be appealing for parental engagement in the coming weeks, so please do reflect on how you would like to contribute to our efforts in school. Wellington College Sports Scholar gives back with a donation of masks and medical equipment   Pupil wellbeing I am acutely aware that many of our pupils have either been uprooted from their homes and flown thousands of miles away to stay with relatives, whilst others – many, many of our children – have been stuck indoors for over 6 weeks. That is, literally, housebound for over 50 days. I think that for many of them, a return to school will be welcome but at the same time it can be fraught with stress and anxiety: Will they catch the virus? How safe is it? Will I still be able to keep my friends? How can I cope with my exams after so long away from school? These and other questions will surface now that the prospect of a physical return to school is so imminent. To that end, I am very pleased to report that Mr Roundell and Mrs Wood are leading a pupil wellbeing working party that works across all the Wellington and Hiba schools in China. Their role is to develop a support and counselling service for our pupils, designed to be accessible to all age groups and fully ready to meet the needs of our youngsters as soon as the doors of the school reopen. You will hear more about their work over the next couple of weeks, but the move underlines our commitment to ensuring that your child is kept as physically and mentally safe as possible under the care of the school.   Finally, I would draw your attention to the articles below, outlining some lovely examples of pupil achievement and the celebration of their success. I wrote in my Week Ahead piece two weeks ago that the school is determined to make the remainder of the school year unrelentingly busy, purposeful and focused on achievement. I understand the challenges of working online, but the progress and effort shown by our pupils over the past two months has been very encouraging and I look forward to another term of hard work and justified success.   Best wishes Julian Jeffrey MASTER FROM THE DEPUTY HEAD OF JUNIOR SCHOOL Multi-media IPC Exit Point Showcase   Over the next few weeks our students in the Junior School will be preparing to celebrate their learning from the IPC units explored this term: MP1 Treasure Island, MP2 The Human Body and MP3 Making the News. This time, learning will be presented through the use of multimedia forms and you will be invited to join the celebration through your child’s virtual classroom Team. The IPC Exit Point is an important part of every pupil’s learning journey as it completes each unit by drawing on a child’s prior learning, reminding them of all the connections between subjects that they have made, and creates time and opportunities to build their understanding of their learning, and to reflect on this individually and as a group. The Exit Point will also showcase the technological skills that pupils have rapidly developed in this short space of time. Teachers will be supporting small groups of children using the Teams platform to reflect, evaluate, synthesise and to refine their thinking and new knowledge gained. Pupils will collaborate as they would in class, however, this time using the Team platform. We are very excited that our young learners are gaining these new skills. We will harness this learning and take it forward and develop it further when physically back on campus. Another layer of learning that is woven through the IPC units are the International Learning Goals. Each IPC unit has embedded within it, across the different subjects, learning-focused activities that help children start developing a global awareness and gain an increasing sense of themselves, their community and the world around them, as well as inspiring positive action and engagement with global issues. As all of us have been through a series of challenges over the past few months brought about by Covid-19 it is important for our students to process what has been happening in the environment around them; sharing thoughts and ideas and experiences with each other in the safety of a classroom environment albeit a virtual one helps them to come to terms with what has happened, develops further resilience and teaches them that life is powerful and does go on. Furthermore, this helps our pupils to begin to pave the way for our return to school campus and for us to resume our learning as before with additional health, safety and hygiene processes in place. Our pupils have been amazing and have certainly demonstrated the qualities such as: resilience, communication, thoughtfulness, co-operation respect and adaptability aspired to in the IPC Personal goals. I am really looking forward to watching our students celebrate their successes- look out for your multi-media Exit Point Showcase Team invite! FROM THE HEAD OF EARLY YEARS   As our home learning program grows from strength to strength, here is what children are busy learning about in the Nest.

Pre-Nursery children learning to count to 10 with their favourite shapes

Making a number train in Nursery

Reception Learning about healthy and unhealthy foods

Writing our very own poems about fruits 

Baking delicious cookies whilst learning about shapes and sizes