May/June 2012 Newsletter

Greetings Parents / Guardians,

Welcome back to school. We have approached the 2^nd term of the school year. We hope all parents had a great time with your children and family. We are looking forward again to your continue support and cooperation towards the development and progress of your child/children.  Thank you to all parents for your valuable comments and suggestions given during our Parent Discussion Week and please be assured that we will continue to give our best to your child/children.  I would like to take this opportunity to wish all fathers a Happy Father’s Day and a wonderful time with your family. Thank you for your unconditional love and support in the community.

Human beings are social beings. Responsiveness is built in; we come into the world programmed to respond and relate to others. Even infants turn their heads in response to the sound of a human voice. Early in life children begin to interact with children outside the family - in child care settings, play groups, and preschool programs. The friendships children have with each other are different than those they have with parents and relatives. Family relationships provide an ease, a closeness, a deep sense of intimacy. But they don't substitute for other relationships. Starting young and continuing through adulthood, friendships are among the most important activities of life.

Friendships are important in helping children develop emotionally and socially. They provide a training ground for trying out different ways of relating to others. Through interacting with friends, children learn the give and take of social behaviour in general. They learn how to set up rules, how to weigh alternatives and make decisions when faced with dilemmas. They experience fear, anger, aggression and rejection. They learn how to win, how to lose, what's appropriate, what's not. They learn about social standing and power - who's in, who's out, how to lead and how to follow, what's fair and what's not. They learn that different people and different situations call for different behaviours and they come to understand the viewpoints of other people.

Friends provide companionship and stimulation for each other, and they find out who they are by comparing themselves to other children - who's bigger, faster, who can add better, who can catch better. They learn that they're both similar to and different from others. Through friendships and belonging to a group children improve their sense of self-esteem. The solace and support of friends help children cope with troubling times and through transition times - moving up to a new school, entering adolescence, dealing with family stresses, facing disappointments.

Friendships are not just a luxury; they are a necessity for healthy psychological development. Research shows that children with friends have a greater sense of well-being, better self-esteem and fewer social problems as adults than individuals without friends. On the other hand, children with friendship problems are more likely than other children to feel lonely, to be victimized by peers, to have problems adjusting to school, and to engage in deviant behaviours.

Happy reading!

Children’s Friendships - by Ohio State University Extension

Working out peer relationships is an important part of school-age years. Children’s friendships do more than provide them with playmates today—they are key building blocks for children’s development and adjustment as adults. Friendships, for example, help children learn social skills, problem-solving skills and self-confidence.

Loving and nurturing family relationships give children a good foundation for moving out into the social world. What else can parents do to help their children navigate peer relations?

·      Provide opportunities for your children to socialize. Inviting a friend to your house to play is one option. Organized group activities such as sports, dance classes, art or nature classes, or special interest clubs are another. Some children who are shy may find it easier to socialize in a group that is focused on a special interest, rather than in a freeplay situation. Others may prefer one-on-one play in their own home.

·      Respect your child’s individuality. One child may like to have one “best friend” while another may be happiest with a variety of friends. What matters is what is satisfying and comfortable for your child—which may be different from your own social style. While it is reasonable to be concerned about a child who seems to have no friends, a variety of friendship patterns can work for children.

·      Talk with your child about social situations and their feelings and experiences with friends. Problem-solve together ways to handle difficulties with other children. Help your child learn empathy by talking about what others in a situation may have been feeling. Try to model a balanced approach to friendships — you can sympathize, for example, without blowing a problem with a friend out of proportion.

·      Let your children and their friends solve conflicts themselves as much as possible. Children tend to have more conflict with their own friends than with other children. If a disagreement bubbles up when your child is playing with a friend, give them a chance to work it out before you intervene.

·      Talk to your school counsellor if you are concerned about your child’s peer relationships. Children who are rejected or ignored by their peers may benefit from the counsellor’s support or local resources they can identify.

Giving to Others

Donate Old Toys

Make a list of local charities that need children’s toys. Talk over the list with your child and select one to which you will make a family donation. Go through your child’s toys together and identify ones that could be donated to a charity—toys your child has outgrown, presents he already had, or toys that have never interested her.

Sort them into two boxes: Ready-to-Go and Fixer-Uppers. Go through the Fixer-Uppers together, cleaning and making repairs. Depending on how many toys you collect and their condition, this project may stretch out over some time. When the toys are ready, take them to the charity together.

Donate Time

Make a list of local charitable or community activities that would be suitable for a child and that you could do together. A local foodbank or other organization that collects things might welcome your help in boxing items or stacking them. Or volunteer to help clean up a local park on a Saturday afternoon. Or call your PTA president and volunteer to organize a parent-child clean-up day for the playground.

APRIL 2012 Newsletter

Greetings Parents / Guardians,

We want to express our gratitude to parents for the support and understanding given to us for the past 2 months to help the school control the spread of HFMD.  We would like to apologize for any inconvenience caused to parents during this period of scrutiny and we trust that all children will now have a better and safer place of learning.

The school will be holding its Annual Family Day cum Mother Day celebration on 28^th April 2012, Saturday, 8 a.m. at KK High School Multi-Purpose Hall. However, for safety reason, our Pre-Junior children will not participate in this event.  We have also lined up a list of telematches for the children, parents with children and parents with teachers. We would like to urge all parents to mark your calendar and avail yourselves for the above event.

Today, there is wide recognition that many of our children are not learning to act responsibly while they are young. Studies show that many children see nothing wrong with cheating on tests. Some see nothing wrong with taking things that don't belong to them.

Our children deserve to learn important lessons from us and to acquire important habits with our help. They need help in learning what matters to us. We want our children to grow up to be responsible adults. We want them to learn to feel, think, and act with respect for themselves and for other people. We want them to pursue their own well-being, while also being considerate of the needs and feelings of others.

If proper attitudes and behavior are not learned early, problems can mushroom with even worse consequences when children are older. As parents, we can give our children the best in us by helping them acquire habits and character traits that they can rely on in their own lives. If we help them learn to take pleasure in thinking and behaving well, they will have the best chance to lead good lives as individuals and as citizens in the community. This will be true no matter what unpleasant situations or bad influences they come across.

Happy reading!

Helping Your Child Learn Responsible Behavior - Edited by Theodor Rebarber

What Do We Mean by Responsibility?

None of us is born acting responsibly. A responsible character is formed over time. It is made up of our outlook and daily habits associated with feelings, thoughts, and actions. Responsible people act the way they should whether or not anyone is watching. They do so because they understand that it's right and because they have the courage and self-control to act decently, even when tempted to do otherwise.

We want our children to appreciate the importance of being responsible. We also want them to develop the habits and strength to act this way in their everyday lives. Learning to be responsible includes learning to:

·                respect and show compassion for others;

·               practice honesty as a matter of course;

·                show courage in standing up for our principles;

·                develop self-control in acting on our principles;

·                maintain self-respect.

Respect and Compassion for Others

As part of being responsible, children need to respect and show concern for the well-being of other people. Respect ranges from using basic manners to having compassion for the suffering of others. Compassion is developed by trying to see things from the point of view of others, and learning that their feelings resemble our own.

Respect for others also includes the habit of treating people fairly as individuals, regardless of race, sex, or ethnic group. As we mature, respect includes realizing that not all our obligations to others, such as caring for a family member who is sick, are chosen freely. And it includes tolerance for people who do not share our beliefs or likes or dislikes, as long as they do not harm others.

These habits are especially important because many of the wrongs people commit result from indifference to the suffering they cause.

Honesty

Honesty means telling the truth. It means not misleading others for our own benefit. It also means trying to make decisions, especially important ones, on the basis of evidence rather than prejudice. Honesty includes dealing with other people and being honest with ourselves.

To understand the importance of being truthful to others, our children need to learn that living together depends on trust. Without honesty, trusting each other becomes impossible. Honesty with ourselves involves faring up to our own mistakes and biases, even when we have to admit them to others. It includes self-criticism. The point is to learn from our errors and to do our best to correct them, not to dwell on them.

Courage

Courage is taking a position and doing what is right, even at the risk of some loss. It means being neither reckless nor cowardly, but faring up to our duties. It includes physical courage, intellectual courage to make decisions on the basis of evidence, and moral courage to stand up for our principles.

Courage does not mean never being afraid. It can involve trying to overcome our fears, such as a fear of the dark. But our children also need to learn that sometimes it is all right to be afraid.

Courage becomes especially important by the time children become teenagers. They often have to stand up against peer pressure to do the wrong thing, such as using drugs.

Self-Control

Self-control is the ability to resist inappropriate behavior in order to act responsibly. It relates to all of the different aspects of responsibility mentioned so far, including respect and compassion for others, honesty, and courage. It involves persistence and sticking to long-term commitments. It also includes dealing effectively with emotions, such as anger, and developing patience.

Self-Respect

People with self-respect take satisfaction in appropriate behavior and hard-won accomplishments. They don't need to put others down or have a lot of money in order to respect themselves. People who respect themselves also view selfishness, loss of self-control, recklessness, cowardice, and dishonesty as wrong and unworthy of them. As they mature, if they have learned the lessons of responsibility, they will develop a good conscience to guide them.

In addition, people who respect themselves respect their own health and safety. Similarly, they are unwilling to be manipulated by others. Patience or tolerance does not mean allowing others to mistreat us.

While we help children have high standards for themselves, we also need to let them know that failure is no embarrassment when we have done our best. For example, losing a game when we have played our best, and our opponents have simply played better, is no disgrace.

Graduation & Ceremony Awards 2011 (Part 2)