26 February 2021

Jockey Club Sarah Roe School’s latest newsletter is available to read now. Find out the latest news around the school and upcoming events.

Principal’s Message

Parent Information Session – What’s Available After Graduation?

Curriculum – Deep Learning Art Project

Reminders About Staying Safe Online

Total Communication at JCSRS

Congratulations to Our 50 km Challenge Winners – Raising Awareness

JCSRS Alumni – Where Are They Now?

Dear Parents,

We are very pleased to see students returning to school every day this week. We know that coming to school for half a day is not enough and that it brings its own set of challenges. We all want our students to be at school for a whole day but for now, we are grateful that we can enjoy this bit of normality.

The desired outcome for us all, the staff at school and parents at home, is to have students at school as much as possible so they can benefit from the face to face learning. This year has been immensely challenging for everyone. The ever-changing epidemiological situation means that every few weeks we have to re-adjust the way we work. It also needs to be acknowledged that we are all faced with many personal challenges caused or exacerbated by the current situation.

I would like to pay tribute to all people that enabled us to provide the service for our students and for the positive energy and ‘can do’ attitude that they bring to the school every day.

I would like to thank our staff that have embraced the challenge of redesigning the learning many times overnight, that continue providing exciting and stimulating learning activities either at home or at school and for doing it with enthusiasm. They are balancing their responsibilities to our students with their own personal responsibilities, for example having their own children learning at home, but it has never prevented them from doing their best.

I want to say a special thanks to our admin and support staff – the unsung heroes. They are at the school every day, providing admin support, making sure that everything is organised and running smoothly so students can come into school; most importantly ensuring that the school site is safe for everyone. Their job was never more challenging, but at the same time more important, than now. They kept the school going.

As parents, you also keep us going and I would like to thank you all for everything that you do for the school. We are grateful for your support which was expressed by you in many ways. Sometimes a kind word is all that is needed to get us through a difficult day. Thank you for doing your best.

ESF Parent Survey – Learning Provision

Thank you to nine families who responded to the ESF parent survey around learning provision. Your feedback will help us to support our students’ learning and wellbeing.

The result shows that the number of parents that strongly agree and agree with the below survey statements were:

• 66% (6) My child’s well being has been appropriately supported.
• 66% (6) My child has found the learning engaging.
• 55% (5) My child has made progress in their learning.
• 44% (4) My child has received useful feedback that has helped them to make progress.
• 55% (5) My child has found the learning appropriately challenging.
• 77% (7) My child has usually been able to manage the amount of learning set.
• 89% (8) School digital systems and processes support my child’s learning during periods of distance learning.
• 55% (5) ESF app has made it easier to access information from the school.
• 100% (9) Communication from the school has been effective and timely.

As expected, there were mixed responses to the survey. Based on the comments, I am reaffirmed in my view that we all want the same. We want all students to be at school and learning. I want to reassure you that we will do everything in our power to continue to make it happen.

I am very pleased to hear that all parents feel that the communication from the school has been effective and we will continue to work on areas that need improvement.

Class timetables

You said to us that you find it very useful to know what learning takes place at school. In response to this, we are making some small changes to the ESF App by adding the class timetables. From next week you can click on the Timetable icon on the app to access your child’s class timetable. In addition to this, teachers will continue to send weekly planners which will also include information about lessons and activities at home and at school.

HKPSSA Cross Country Challenge update

I would like to say a special thank you to our amazing PE teacher, Mike Watson, for getting our school community involved in the Cross Country Challenge. We all know that being physically active is a key to maintaining our health and wellbeing but sometimes we struggle to stay motivated. Anyone that met Mike can vouch for his high level of energy and by getting us involved in this challenge he has injected us with some of his enthusiasm for staying active.

Well done to everyone who took part in the UK Cross Country Challenge. For such a small school community we have achieved some amazing results. There is a bit of excitement around our school’s involvement!

The next one called Hong Kong Challenge starts on Monday, March 1st. Please check this video for full details on the great efforts so far by our community and it is still not too late to join.

Assembly

Please don’t forget to watch our assembly video, if you did not do so already. You can find the link to it in the class weekly planners. I would like to thank our teachers Sally and Kelly for preparing this week’s assembly, creating a very uplifting ‘’Welcome Back’’ video and for involving all staff and students in the process.

Curriculum

Over the next few weeks, all students will be taking part in the deep learning project as part of our Unit work. Students will be learning how to be responsible for our environment and exploring how creative arts can be used to convey a message. Please read in the curriculum section what this will look like and how you can support your children in their learning.

Warm regards,

Anna

What’s available for my son/daughter in Hong Kong after graduation from JCSRS?

We are extending our invitation for the forthcoming parent information session. All invited families will have received an e-notice this week. The online event will be held on Thursday March 11th from 5.30pm. We will have a total of six external agencies sharing an overview of their programs and services to our community. Any questions, please contact Belinda McLaughlin.

We are all looking forward to the forthcoming art exhibition next term and hopefully – let’s keep our fingers crossed – students will be able to display their artwork in the Visual Art Gallery located in Central. The Visual Art Gallery is a beautiful event space open to the Hong Kong public and we have been very fortunate to secure a date in May to showcase the artwork that students have created during the past year.

Each class has started to research, discuss and plan for their art assignments in school this week and all projects will be linked with our current unit “We Are the World”. Last term, students began exploring living things, i.e. different species, life cycles and what we all can do to take care of and respect our environment. In class we learnt that humans can make a positive or negative impact on the environment through their actions.

This term we have used the deep learning framework to shape the way we approached the art project. Each class was given a fact linked to the negative impact of humans on the environment and teachers collaboratively planned ways that students could engage with and explore these facts to learn about and become familiar with our responsibilities. Each student will share their understanding of the problem through the creation of an artwork that gives a powerful message.

Teachers are particularly focused on aspects of critical thinking and the ways that we can develop thinking skills with our students through learning about the environment and developing their art and design skills.

We are excited to share our deep learning art journey with you in the near future and I will ensure to contact parents with more details about the art exhibition. We are pleased to announce that the Nesbitt Centre will also be joining us.

If you would like to support our art project, teachers need recycled items and would be grateful if suitable items could be sent to school. We need recycled plastic bags, plastic rubbish (that has been cleaned), magazines and polystyrene (in any size). Please speak to your class teacher first before sending any materials to the school. Thank you in advance for your help and cooperation.

Sally Fryer

Art Coordinator

As a parent you play a key role in helping your child to stay safe online. Here are some resources to help your child stay safe online.

Set up parental controls to enable web filtering. This can be done in several ways, including subscribing to the Cyber Security Service from the internet service provider. They protect against phishing, malicious sites and block potential botnet connections.

Set up parental controls on Google Chrome and Firefox. Parental control extensions/add-ons are available free of charge, and allow you to protect your kids from unworthy and inappropriate content on the Internet. It also provides a safe search free of unwanted content.

• For Google Chrome Parental Control extension, click here for details.
• For Firefox Family Friendly Browser Protection add-on, click here for details.

Teach your child that information shared on the internet is not private. Review information that should not be shared (personal details, passwords, credit card numbers).

Make it public. Keep computers in shared places where it’s easy for you to monitor online behaviour.

Safe search engines for kids. Here are two of the most popular safe and kid friendly search engines based on Google that you can use at home:

Kiddle Wacky Safe

If you have any questions or need further information, please do not hesitate to contact Carol Li. (carol.li(at)jcsrs.edu.hk)

AAC Top Tips – Pausing

AAC tip of the week! Pausing: here is a short video explaining how to use “pausing” when helping your child with AAC.

Pausing means waiting for approximately 10 seconds after a question or a word has been modelled. This allows time for your child to process the information and form a response. After a long pause, if your child hasn’t responded you can repeat the question, model again or give another prompt.

Congratulations to our JCSRS team: Mike, Pia, Earl, Belinda and Harvey who successfully completed the collective 50km challenge in 14 days.

Their participation helped raise awareness for CareER – a Hong Kong based NGO supporting the vocational opportunities of young people with disabilities.

Ella Morris and her family have relocated to Western Australia where Ella has started in her new school.

We look forward to hearing more updates from Ella as she settles into her new school and makes choices regarding her vocational pathways in the future.

Harvey Clifford has relocated to the United Kingdom and is awaiting confirmation of a school placement in the coming months.

Harvey enjoying the wide open spaces in his new home in Cornwall UK.