Newsletter 34/2015-16

Quarry Bay School’s latest newsletter is available to read now. Find out the latest news around the school and upcoming events.

 Principal’s Comments

 Parents as Partners Coffee Morning

 Celebration of Learning Day – Friday 10th June 2016

 Expressive Arts News – Music celebration concert

 New furniture at QBS

 Winners of the Year Book Cover

 Charity News

 Personal action

 P.E Dress Code

 Hong Kong Soccer 7’s

 #Fearless Foxes Dress Blue Day

 Second Hand Uniforms

 “Parenting from the Inside Out”

 RTHK ETV audition advertisement

 PTA News

Principal’s Comments

Important dates for your attention:

Please click here for all the key dates in Term 3 at QBS

Preparing your child for the 2016/2017 academic year at QBS

We understand that looking ahead to changes of class teacher and class group may unsettle some students. It is natural for a child to feel apprehensive about a transition to a new year level, class or teacher. There are things you can do to support your child if they appear to be worried about moving to a new year group, class or teacher.

• Let QBS staff know before the end of this school year – contact your child’s current teacher so they know about the apprehension and possible reasons. The current teacher can respond and support your child and also pass this information onto the new teacher.
• Be positive about changes at the start of a new school year – focus on the things to look forward to in a new year group and class (e.g., different units of inquiry, trips or camps).
• Point out that just as they have made friends in their current class, they will make new friends.
• Set realistic expectations with your child (e.g, adjusting to changes takes time and it is a normal part of life).
• When the time comes to return to school include your child in organising and naming new belongings. It encourages responsibility and makes them aware of what materials they will be taking to school (e.g., hat, water bottle, raincoat, book bags, learning materials).
• Remember if you are anxious this may further unsettle your child. Model the importance of being resilient during times of change – life is endless change.

Parents might like to join the Parents as Partners coffee morning on Tuesday the 24th of May between 8.30am to 9.30am in the Learning Centre Amphitheatre. The focus will be on transition for your child. Please find the details below.

Class Mixing for 2016/2017

At Quarry Bay School, we recognize that children benefit from mixing with a range of peers over the course of their primary school education. At QBS class groupings will be reallocated at the end of Year 2 and Year 4. This means new class groups are formed for students moving from Year 2 into Year 3 and also from Year 4 into Year 5. When reallocating classes, a range of staff work very carefully to consider the academic and social needs of the children. The aim is to create classes of mixed ability, gender, individual needs and interests.

Please understand that requests for a specific teacher cannot be considered.

PTA Chair 2016/2017

Michelle Saad will step away from the PTA Chair’s role at the end of this term as her son will move onto to secondary school. Michelle has been an outstanding PTA Chair and advocate for QBS. We will formally thank Michelle later this term for her hard work and contribution.

I am pleased to inform you that Nicola Perkins will take on the PTA Chair role for 2016/2017. Please click here to read an introductory message from Nicola.

Regards,

Parents as Partners Coffee Morning

New Class, New Year Group Next Year: How Can I Support my Child?

As the weeks go by this term, our students become excited about moving up to their new year group in August, with a different teacher and a chance to make new friends. It is an exciting time full of new opportunities. It can also be a little unsettling and can make some children feel insecure and anxious. How can you help prepare your child to feel positive, organised and ready for their next step?

Come along to our Coffee Morning to discuss how you can best support your child through this transition. There will be a short presentation and also a chance to chat with other parents about strategies which they have used and had success with.

Tuesday 24th May 2016, 8.30 to 9.30 am in the Amphitheatre, Learning Centre

Celebration of Learning Day – Friday 10th June 2016

Booking to open on Thursday the 26th May at 12pm

In the near future we will be inviting parents to the Celebration of Learning Day at QBS, which will take place on Friday the 10th of June. This is an important day in our school calendar where your child will guide you through a range of learning engagements to showcase his or her progress this year. In the classrooms there will be a selection of activities which promote and celebrate the learning of the children. The event is entirely student led and is very enjoyable for parents and students. It is an expectation that all students participate in the student led Celebration of Learning Day.

On the day, lessons as usual will not take place. Instead, students and parents should attend school for one of five hour-long sessions across the day. The sessions can be booked on the Gateway, with bookings opening on Thursday the 26th May at 12pm, and closing on Monday the 6th June at 8:30am. The sessions will take place at the following times: 8:15-9:15, 9:30-10:30, 10:50-11:50, 12:00-13:00, 13:40-14:40.

Areas of the curriculum taught by specialist teachers will also be part of the day with prompts for sharing and examples of student learning available. Specialist teachers will be available at the following locations and you are welcome to drop in to see the specialists at any point in the day, no appointments are needed.

• Physical Education: Gym – Y1 and 2, Outdoor Areas – Y3, 4, 5 and 6
• Mandarin: Hall
• Expressive Arts: Expressive Arts Rooms
• Information Technology: IT Suite (Y1,2,3) and classrooms (Y4, 5, 6)

The Learning Centre will also be open on the day to allow summer book borrowing to take place for the Year 1 and Year 2 students. Years 3, 4, 5 and 6 will borrow for summer at a later date.

On the day, students should wear their PE kit so they can share some of their PE learning experiences.

We look forward to welcoming you into school on 10th June. Please watch for Gateway booking details in the near future.

Expressive Arts News – Music celebration concert

To celebrate the hard work of the music clubs, QBS are proud to announce a Music Celebration Concert on Friday 17th June at 9:00am in the school hall. Parents are invited and encouraged to attend this concert. The approximate duration of the concert is 40 mins to an hour.

The concert will consist of children from a wide variety of music clubs such as: Junior choir, Recorder club, Chinese drumming club, Orchestra, Rock band and Senior choir.

The children will then have the opportunity to perform to the rest of the school in the assembly later that day. All the children are looking forward to the concert and have been working hard on their performance pieces.

In regard to what the children should wear on Friday 17th June:

• Orchestra – Black top and bottoms
• Rock Band – Casual clothes
• Chinese drummers – White t-shirt and jeans
• Senior and Junior choir – Plain (no logos) coloured t-shirt of their choice and jeans
• Recorder club – Plain black t-shirt and jeans

If your child is in multiple clubs then they can choose which of the outfits they wear.

If you have any further questions at this stage, please do not hesitate to contact me via email ceri.hill@qbs.edu.hk

Miss Ceri Hill

New furniture at QBS

We are in the process of refurnishing the classroom with new furniture which is ergonomically designed for our classrooms.We have sourced the furniture from FURNWARE and have supplied nine classrooms with new tables and chairs.This trial period is so that we are able to see how the furniture impacts on the classroom environments and teaching and learning.There has been overwhelming positive feedback from children and staff and we are planning to extend the refurbishments for the start of the next academic year.

Winners of the Year Book Cover

It has been wonderful to see all the entries for the Year Book Cover competition this year and so many were bright and colourful.It was very difficult to decide as so many would have looked great as the cover however after a lots of deliberation I am pleased to announce the designs from Maxine and Felix Hekster from Year 5 and Larissa Chan from 1H have been chosen.

Congratulations to them all and we will look forward to seeing their designs on the cover of the QBS Year Book 2016.

Well done to everyone who joined the competition!

Charity News

The charity group have been busy behind the scenes this year and have continued to raise money and awareness of people who are less fortunate than us. They have run some dress casual days, continued to sponsor a young student from Burundi and have worked closely with Li Sing Primary School, Chai Wan Elderly Home and Christian Action.

It is also fantastic to see when children take their own action and try and help out others as well.

In 2K recently, Hannah Price, decided she would like to help out the Crossroads Foundation, a Hong Kong charity organisation. Hannah went home one day and made the decision to bake some cupcakes and sell some to her friends at school. Hannah raised some money and the QBS Charity committee added more to her total to send a cheque off to the Crossroads Foundation.

Well done and thank you Hannah.

If you would like to know more about the Crossroads Foundation and what they do, click on the following link: https://www.crossroads.org.hk/

Personal action

Charles Gautier Joly is keen to take some personal action which will support a charity that recycles bottle caps.

The charity ” Bouchons d’amour” is based in France and Charles is willing to take all the bottle caps back to France this summer, to pass on to the charity, so that they can be used for a good purpose. The charity recycles plastic bottle caps and then turns them into equipment that supports the old and disabled. Charles would like it if all children could read his message below, access the website and take some action by bringing in some bottles tops.

Dear Students,

Please bring in as many plastic bottle caps as you can before Friday 27th May. The plastic bottle caps will be donated to a charity that will recycle them to make things to help disabled and old people.

The bottles caps that are acceptable are:

• Food caps : water, drinks
• household caps : dish washing liquid, cleaning products, laundry softeners, aerosols
• cosmetics caps : deodorants, hairspray, perfume …
• caps hygiene products : toothpaste, shampoo, shower products
• plastic covers : chocolate and coffee powder, mustard
• Miscellaneous : boxes of film photos, Kinder eggs

For further information about this charity please look at the website or speak to Charles Joly in 6J .http://www.bouchonsdamour.com/l-association/objectifs

Thank you Charles Gautier Joly

P.E Dress Code

We appreciate your help in reminding your children of the following points regarding P.E dress code. This will help to ensure the safety of all children in P.E.

Jewellery;

A reminder to all parents that on P.E days, students should not be wearing any jewellery (earrings, necklaces or bracelets etc). If you can help to remind your children to leave these items at home when dressing in P.E kit that would be very helpful.

Watches;

The best option is not to wear a watch on P.E kit days or for students to leave them in their school bag before coming to the P.E class.

Hair Accessories;

All year groups have begun a Term 3 Movement Composition (Gymnastics based) Unit. It therefore important that students with longer hair have their hair tied back and all hair ties are of the soft type to ensure no risk of injury when performing certain movements such as rolling or balancing. Hair ties must be black or blue.

QBS Sports Performance Kits;

QBS Sports Performance Kits should only be worn on days when children have a QBS after school club or special event such as an external sports tournament. On normal P.E days, standard QBS P.E kit should be worn.

P.E Shoes and socks;

P.E Shoes and socks should be all white.

Hong Kong Soccer 7’s

This weekend the International Hong Kong Soccer 7’s is taking place at the HK Football Club. The tournament attracts a number of clubs from around the world.

Click here for the link to the website which also has some promotional video (video section).

There is always a great atmosphere at the event and there are normally lots of fun/ sporting activities on the adjacent pitch to keep children busy after they have watched some matches and been autograph hunting.

We have a number of children playing in the exhibition matches, which is often the highlight of their football season. Best of luck to all involved.

#Fearless Foxes Dress Blue Day

We hope the students enjoyed the #Fearless day last Friday. Thank you for supporting this initiative. The students (and Mr. Schroder!) enjoyed the day. We now have a small display outside the P.E classroom.

Second Hand Uniforms

The Summer second hand uniforms is on sale outside the medical. There are many sizes, so please come have have a browse.

ALSO PLEASE NOTE THAT WE CAN NO LONGER TAKE ANY DONATIONS AT THE MOMENT. WE DO NOT HAVE ANY MORE SPACE TO STORE THEM.

“Parenting from the Inside Out”

Special Needs Network Hong Kong (SNNHK) has planned one final talk before the summer holiday break. We are excited to let you know Kim Barthel, an Occupational Therapist with over 30 years of experience, will be speaking on “Parenting from the Inside Out,” on Thursday, 16 June 2016 at Bridge Academy. Please click here for more.

RTHK ETV audition advertisement

This is an audition call from Radio Television Hong Kong. We are looking for talented children artists for their appearance on education television programmes Here are the requirements:

• Age 7 – 12 ,boys and girls,all nationality are welcomed
• English native speaker
• Experienced in stage performance ,TV/film or commercial (not necessary)
• Interested in TV production
• Willing to take challenge ,patient enough to taking orders and good team player
• Available to filming in late June-July 2016

Interested party may send your personal details including name, date of birth, height, contact no., e-mail address, performing experiences( if any), etc. and attach recent photos to loyip0615@hotmail.com with an e-mail subject: ETV talents.

We will invite the suitable candidates to our audition (audition period : Mid May – First June 2016) ”

PTA News

Events

2016/2017: PTA Events Committee

Your PTA looks forward to planning and organising more fun-filled, and exciting events in the new academic year. If you would like to join our Event Organising Team in the upcoming year, then please send an email to mona.diwan@qbs.edu.hk expressing your interest NOW!

Paddyfield’s Spring BookClub

All orders are due to be delivered before the end of this academic year.

PTA School Buses

Bus Application details and form for the upcoming academic year have been distributed this week. Please complete and submit on or before the deadline date of 27th May 2016 to the PTA Office, No.6 Hau Yuen Path, Braemar Hill, North Point, Hong Kong.

PTA SUBSCRIPTION FEES 2016/2017

Since the inception of the ESF Ordinance (2008) – all parents have been required to join and become members of their child’s School PTA.

To facilitate ease of payment of the PTA subscription fees, parents can now pay this fees together with the bus fees as stated on the bus application form. This fee is a one fee per family annual payment.

In the event that you do not subscribe to the school bus service you will be required to send a cheque to ESF centre directly, upon receiving their invoice in June.

We will liaise closely with ESF to avoid duplicate receipt of payment. All duplicate payments will be refunded back to the parents.

PTA Shop

New QBS Sports Performance Kits (Year 4, 5, & 6 students only)
The kits have arrived and available for purchase now.
[All cheques issued in payment for the kits will be banked in next week – please ensure you have sufficient funds to cover your payments. All returned cheques are subject to HK$100 admin charge.]

Feedback or Suggestions

If you have any feedback or suggestions you would like to give on our event or services provided, please email directly to: ptasuggestions@qbs.edu.hk. Your email will directly be received by our Chairman who will reply you at the earliest available moment.

HELP US – IN OUR DRIVE FOR A GREENER ENVIRONMENT

We request all parents to support a greener environment by BYOB “bring your own bag” when you come to purchase items from the shop.

[With immediate effect the PTA Shop will no longer provide any shopping bags].

Please contact us on 2566 4242 (ask to transfer to PTA), or 2887 1004 for further queries, or by email to pta@qbs.edu.hk, during operation hours.

“Click here for PTA Office and Shop Operation”