NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS

St Hi lda’s Pr imary School Establ ished in 1934

A dynamic learning communi ty that nurtures loyal c i t izens with g lobal out look and Godly character .

CCA Achieve : Student Leaders’ Investiture 2016

2

Chinese New Year Celebrations 2016

4

Talent Fiesta 5

Visit by Singchia Elementary School

7

Anubaan Chiang Mai School visit

8

Dr. Seuss Week @ the Library

9

Inside this issue:

Dear Parents,

As an educator, I've always

enjoyed sharing this favorite

story of mine with my stu-

dents.

“A boy found a cocoon of a

butterfly. After a few days, a

small opening appeared. He

sat and watched the butterfly

for several hours as it strug-

gled to force its body through

that little hole. Then it seemed

to stop making any progress.

It appeared as if it had gotten

as far as it could, and it could

go no further. So the boy de-

cided to help the butterfly. He

took a pair of scissors and

snipped off the remaining bit

of the cocoon. The butterfly

then emerged easily. But the

boy noticed it had a swollen

body and small, shriveled

wings. The boy continued to

watch the butterfly because he

expected that, at any mo-

ment, the wings would en-

large and expand to be able to

support the body, which would

contract in time. Neither hap-

pened! In fact, the butterfly

spent the rest of its life crawl-

ing around

with a swol-

len body

and shriv-

eled wings.

It never was

able to fly.

What the boy, in his kindness

and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were God’s way of forc-ing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings. It would be ready for flight once it man-aged to get out from the cocoon.

The struggle was part of what the butterfly needed to do in order to fly. Without the strug-gle, the butterfly was destined to crawl around on its belly and eventually die an early death. As human beings, sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. If God allowed us to go through our lives with-out any obstacles, it would ‘cripple’ us. We would not be as strong or resilient as what we could have been. As parents, we sometimes be-come overly anxious with the day-to-day hustle and bustle of our children’s lives. Many a times, such struggles are exactly what our children need in their growing years.

As your child goes through school and life, do keep in mind that facing and coping with chal-lenges faced in the academic and social-emotional domains is an important part of a student’s experience. In fact, these are the struggles that will enable your child to develop the ability and tenacity to fly and soar through the storms of adult life. A child-hood without challenges may soothe our parenting minds but stunt the child's ability to cope, persist, and persevere.

As parents, how many of us do things for our children which

they are capable of doing or learning on their own? How many of us tell our children what to do instead of providing them the space and opportunity to figure out issues them-selves? We expect them to be self-reliant, mature, confident and capable individuals, yet we may not give them the time and opportunity to do so.

Proverbs 22:6 tells us ‘Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.’ I am happy to note that many of our parents have inculcated in their children the need to be responsible for their own actions and decisions such as being punctual for school, showing respect to all school staff, including our clean-ing staff, security officers, ad-ministrative staff and teachers; picking up after themselves (eg: clearing litter; returning the dishes after meals) and being responsible in completing and handing up their school work on time.

May we as parents (and teach-ers) continue to inculcate the right values in our children from young - values of, respect, re-sponsibility, resilience, integrity, harmony and care.

As parents, do work hand-in-hand with my teachers and let us also constantly role-model the desired values and behav-iours to our children. Let us con-tinue to work in partnership and consistency in teaching, in-structing and training them in the fear and knowledge of the Lord.

With warm regards,

Mr Jeremy Ang Vice-Principal

Term 2/2016

Key Events / Term 2

24 Mar 82nd Founder’s

Day Celebrations

7 Apr International

Friendship Day

12 May Honours Day

(Part 1)

27 May Meet-the-Parent

Session

PAGE 2 TERM 2 / 2016 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS

STUDENT LEADERS’ INVESTITURE 2016

Student Leaders’ Pledge

“As councillors of St. Hilda’s Primary

School, we promise to serve God and our

school, cheerfully, faithfully and to the best

of our ability.”

SHPS’ 6th Student Council was installed on 11 Feb 2016 with an Investiture Ceremony that com-menced grandly to the familiar tune of ‘Ode To Joy’. The Head Councilors led the student leaders into the Indoor Sports Hall, holding up the cross and the student council bannerette. It was a moment of pride for our 227 student leaders who received their ties, lanyards and badges from our Guest-of-Honour, Venerable Wong Tak Meng. During his exhortation, Ven. Wong impressed upon the student leaders that true leadership has to be leadership by example, as best exemplified in the form of a serv-ant leader in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Head Councillors Vice Head Councillors Senior Councillors

Wee Thaddeus El’yez Mu’arif Benjamin Goh

Timothy Goy Esther Wah Grace Chew

Lazary Lok Janelle Tan

Saravanan Deepika Tay Kai Li

Megan Sierra Chan Daniel Ng

Our Junior Councillors and Councillors

reciting the Student Leaders’ Pledge.

Ven. Wong giving out ties to the newly-elected Senior Councillors.

Ven. Wong putting the councillor’s

tie over Timothy Goy, one of our

Head Councillors

PAGE 3 TERM 2 / 2016 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS

Head & Vice-Head Councillors

Election Campaign (Term 1 Week 3)

All nominated candidates were given opportunities to introduce

themselves and what they intended to do for the school during

morning assembly and recess slots. The candidates had also

formed their own campaign teams with enthusiastic supporters to

reach out to the student population. The

campaigns were conducted in good

spirit and had managed to reach out to

the students well.

The candidates were given various plat-

forms to reach out to the students who

were the ones who cast their votes

through the ASKNLEARN portal. Be-

sides students, teachers were also giv-

en the chance to vote and finally, the

candidates were also interviewed by the

school leaders before they were official-

ly appointed at the Investiture Ceremony.

Megan Sierra Chan, Head Councilor for

Communications (P6 Trust)

I will continue to seek ways

to serve those around me all

my life. The lessons learned

in these formative years are

but a foundation on which to

build a life that impacts oth-

ers, a life that is enriched by

giving, and a life that, above

all, honours the ultimate

servant leader, God himself.”

Vice Head Councillor candidate

Janelle Tan delivering her

speech in the hall at a morning

assembly.

Vice Head Councillor candidate Grace Chew with

her enthusiastic campaign team.

Our newly-elected Head Councillors and Vice-Head

Councillors of 2016

Our CCA Leaders reciting the Student Leaders’ Pledge

PAGE 4 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS TERM 2 / 2016

Chinese New Year Celebration ~ 5 February 2016

The lively CNY celebration in the Hildan Ark on 5 February was hosted by Mrs Marilyn Koh and Ms Yap Sujun with our student emcees (Sarah Foo & Ivan Low from P5/7 and Charity & Yong Hao from P3/7). The celebration included sing-along sessions, Chinese calligraphy demonstration by our parent volunteer, best-dressed competition, Gu Zheng performance and quizzes. The various performances by our students were highly commendable, resulting in the audience being engaged throughout the entire session. We had the privilege of having our parent volunteer, Mr Shi to join us in the celebrations. Thereafter he demonstrated calligraphy writing on stage and also wrote festive couplets for the school. Some of our non-Chinese teachers and students, including Mr Nizam, Mr Zakie, Haris (P5-Truth) and Shayna (P6-Praise) joined him in the calligraphy writing session. We also launched the commemoration of Total Defence Week by sharing the importance of Total Defence and the 5 pillars of Total Defence, focussing on the theme of Total Defence Day 2016 “Together We Keep Singapore Strong”.

Talent Fiesta 2016

The school organised our Talent Fiesta on 11 Mar 2016 with the objectives of mass participation and helping our students learn how to work in teams through Sports, Music and Art. The students prepared hard over 8 weeks and teams worked out their strate-gies at each training session. From the Sports’ teams to the Music and Art programmes, students from different classes came to-gether to participate and work towards helping their House win the Champion House Trophy.

On the roof of the Indoor Sports Hall (ISH), the hockey pitch ac-commodated our soccer teams while at the sports hall, the hand-ball game was keenly contested. Back in our Hildan Ark, floorball players battled for the first placing while Captain’s Ball was played at the deck of the ISH.

Over at the Aesthetics domain, our Primary 5 Hildans were busy performing in various categories under the music element of the fiesta. The Art category for P3s saw them creating some beautiful clay work. The Primary 3 students also played hosts to the elder-ly residents from Kheng Chiu Lodge and Jamiyah Home. The winning performances were showcased for the entire school as we gathered all 6 levels into the halls of our Sports Complex for a finale.

In the end, the Graham-White (Red) House was awarded the overall Championship based on total points for all categories. The whole event was a success mainly due to the hard work put in by every teacher involved in the fiesta. All in all, we thank God for the smooth running of the event and we look forward to organising the next Talent Fiesta for our students.

NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS PAGE 5 TERM 2 / 2016

Your talent is God’s gift

to you. What you

do with it, is your gift to

God.

TERM 2 / 2016

PAGE 6 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS

SCDF Junior Civil Defence (CD) Lion-

hearter Challenge

On 17 February, four students Tay Kai Li, Daniel Ng, Benjamin Goh and Janelle Tan represent-ed the school in the Junior CD Lionhearter Challenge organized by SCDF. The Challenge was a hands-on competitive event where Junior CD Lionhearters across Singapore pit their emergency preparedness knowledge and quick wit against other teams to claim the Junior CD Lionhearter Challenge Gold, Silver and Bronze awards. The Challenge was held at the Singapore Discovery Centre and there were many activities they had to do as a team. The jigsaw puzzle was the hardest chal-lenge for our student team but nonetheless, they emerged as Second Runner-up! Our congratulations to the students and their teachers!

P3 Inter-class Miniature Garden Competition All Primary 3 classes were each assigned a planter box to grow and create a miniature garden for an Inter-class Miniature Garden Competition from mid January to late February this year. Parent Class Representatives (PCRs) and the students in each class planned the theme for the gar-

den and created tiny creatures of plants and animals with colourful clay. They

also used recycled materials to make tree houses, boats, bridges, or even bird

nest to be placed in their garden according to their assigned theme. The 7

gardens were amazingly created, each

with its own merits and beauty, encap-

sulated with a theme or a story in the

creation of the garden. Students from

each class shared what they and their

parents had done in the planning and

creation of their garden to the rest of

their classmates.

Kudos to all parents and children who participated tirelessly in

setting up these miniature gardens, and adding more greenery

to the school environment.

The second & third prizes were awarded to P3/3 & P3/5 respectively

The first prize was awarded to P3/7

Clinching a 2nd Runner Up award - Our 4 Junior CD Lion-

hearters posing with SCDF mascots, their teachers-in-

charge and the VIPs (BG(RET) Lawrence Chua, Executive

Director of S’pore Discovery Centre; SCDF Comissioner Eric

Yap, and GOH Mr Amrin Amin)

Our school hosted a group of Taiwanese visitors on 18 and 19 January 2016. The Taiwanese

students and teachers joined our P5 mainstream and GEP classes for lessons and this provided

an opportunity for our P5 Hildans to interact with our Taiwanese friends and to experience the

Singapore school curriculum. Apart from academic lessons, the visitors also had an opportunity

to participate in some of our co-curricular activities such as Table-tennis, Hockey and Netball.

During the sessions, the teachers and coaches taught basic skills of the various sports to our

Taiwanese friends and provided them a glimpse of how co-curricular activities are carried out as

part of our total curriculum for students’ all round development.

Our Parent Support Group played an important role in hosting the Taiwanese parents. They

shared with the Taiwanese parents on how parents in the PSG and Fathers’ Group support the

school in the various areas.

The visit, though short, was a meaningful exchange programme for both schools. It was an

enjoyable time of interaction as well as knowing more about each other’s culture and the learn-

ing environment at SHPS. Staff and students from both schools have certainly gained

knowledge of one another and forged new friendships through this meaningful school exchange

and we look forward to more opportunities to connect with our Taiwanese friends.

PAGE 7 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS TERM 2 / 2016

Visit by Singchia Elementary School, Taiwan Chiayi City

Some of our P3 students who were part of the welcoming contin-gent that provided a warm recep-

tion for our Thai visitors.

SHPS and ABCM students posing for a group photo.

Our very enthusiastic and supportive PSG members manning the different station activities.

Anubaan Chiang Mai School Visit on 29 January 2016

SHPS has been partnering Anubaan Chiang Mai (ABCM) School from Thailand since 2013 to enrich our students learning and develop their sense of global awareness, which is one of the 21st century competencies we would like Hildans to have. This year, our Primary 5 students from class P5/6 hosted the visit. Each Hildan was paired with another Thai student and they spent the morning getting to know each other better through the playing of cultural games and taking part in various station activities.

We would like to express our thanks and appreciation to our Parent Support Group (PSG) who were involved in decorating, planning and carrying out the various station activities which provided a range of exciting experiential programmes that fostered a deep sense of bonding between Hildans and their Thai peers, and greater understanding of our uniquely Singapore culture. They even set up food sam-pling stations to give our Thai students and teachers a ‘taste’ of Singapore’s rich and varied food herit-age!

TERM 2 / 2016 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS PAGE 8 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS

Gates Opening Hours after dismissal time Remarks

Main Gate 3 (Tampines Ave 3)

1.45pm – 2.15pm 3.45pm – 4.15pm Cyclists can enter /exit during stipulated hours.

Cyclists are to make use of Main Gate 1 after the stipulat-

ed opening hours.

Turnstile @ Gate 3 1.45pm – 6.00pm Exit Only

Main Gate 4 (Tampines Ave 4)

1.45 pm – 2.15pm

Turnstile @ Gate 4 1.45pm – 6.00pm Exit Only

Turnstile Gates at Gates 3 and 4

For the convenience of our students exiting the school via Gates 3 and 4 after school dismis-sal, we have installed two turnstile gates which are in operations. Please refer to the table below for the stipulated opening hours.

Dr Seuss’ Week @ the Library

(2 – 3 Mar’16)

Better known to most readers as Dr. Seuss, Dr. Theodor Geisel was born over 100 years ago in March. He changed the landscape of children's books with his controlled-vocabulary tales of antic cats (The Cat in the Hat) and colorful meals (Green Eggs and Ham).

To celebrate the anniversary of his birth date, the school librarians

brainstormed for interesting activities for their peers. During recess, students were involved in differ-

ent activities such as going on a trail to count the number of Dr Seuss’ hats hidden in the library or

having fun taking photos with various props. Students were also treated to the movie “Lorax” at the

Screening Room in the Library where they got to see the characters in

their favourite storybook “come alive” on screen.

Students reading the wide range of

Dr Seuss’ books at the school library.

Mrs Lim Tai Foon and her student at

the ‘Dr Seuss’ photo booth’.

Upgraded School Facilities

NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS TERM 2 / 2016 PAGE 9

We bade farewell to Ms Soh Bee Ling, our Vice-Principal who will be attending a leadership course at NIE with effect from Term 2. She has been with the school since 2012 and as a Hildan Family, we would all like to thank her for her con-tributions to the school and wish her the very best in her future endeavours.

I & E Carnival 9 July 2016 (Sat)

8.30am to 3pm Theme: Together We Shine

CHINESE NEW YEAR HONGBAO COLLECTION 2016

Thank you for your generous donation. A total of $4,886.10 was collected which will go towards benefitting our needy students.

Our heartiest Congratulations to the following teachers:

* Mdm Zhang Tao on the arrival of her baby boy

* Mr Yeow Yuen Ten on the arrival of his baby girl.

Our heartiest Congratulations and Best Wishes to the following newly weds:

~ Mr Mohamad Zakie

~ Ms Hanisah Binte Abdul Rahman

~ Ms Nurliyana bte Yahya

PAGE 10 NEWSLETTER FOR PARENTS TERM 2 / 2016