Testimony from Mrs Yan
(Mother of Celine Yan Pui Kei, 2012 Graduate)
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
May/June 2012 Newsletter
Greetings Parents / Guardians,
Welcome back to school. We have
approached the 2nd 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.
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,
Happy reading!
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 28th 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.
Helping Your Child Learn Responsible Behavior - Edited by Theodor Rebarber
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.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
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