From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Make a Difference - Issue 4 2010

I know we are well into 2010 and already full of enthusiasm and excitement for what the year may bring. However as this is my first editorial I do want to wish you all a happy and successful year and hope the holiday break was everything you wanted, most of all restful.

As is the case for most of us, the only time I have to get any reading done, that isn’t academic, is in these breaks. School is actually never too far from any Principal’s thoughts, even in the holidays, as for me everything I read is always punctuated with, ‘I must remember to tell our parents or students about this’, or ‘I must remember to note this to pass on to the staff’.

Such is the case again, so I want to share with you some of what I read. I chose quite a smorgasbord of genre and subject material and found all to be great reading.

Being a Tennis player Andre Agassi’s ‘Open – An Autobiography’ was an outstanding read. I recall on many occasions watching (on TV) his performance on the Tennis court and being quite shocked at his behaviour, but ‘wowed’ by his skill. But how easy is it to judge someone without any background information? This book is a treat for ardent Tennis fans but will also captivate readers who know nothing about Tennis. Like Agassi’s game it sets a new standard for grace, style, speed and power.

‘Another gripping story and another biography called ‘Someone Knows My Name’ written by Lawrence Hill, made me so appreciate being born in these times. This captivating and somewhat depressing story of one woman’s remarkable experience (abducted from South Africa as a child and enslaved in South Carolina), spans six decades and three continents and brings to life a crucial chapter in world history.

Then there were the women’s ‘mags’ and the newspapers – all the light reading! I did enjoy reading the following and want to share it with you. I hope you enjoy it.

This is the philosophy of Charles Schultz, the creator of the ‘Peanuts’ comic strip. You don’t have to actually answer the questions. Just ponder on them.

1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.
2. Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.
3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America pageant.
4. Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.
5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for best actor and actress.
6. Name the last decade’s worth of World Series winners.

How did you do?

The point is, none of us remember the headliners of yesterday.
These are no second-rate achievers.
They are the best in their fields.
But the applause dies.
Awards tarnish.
Achievements are forgotten.
Accolades and certificates are buried with their owners.

Here’s another quiz. See how you do with this one.

1. List a few teachers who aided your journey through school.
2. Name three friends who have helped you through a difficult time.
3. Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.
4. Think of a few people who have made you feel appreciated and special!
5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.

Easier?

The lesson: The people who make a difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials ... the most money ... or the most awards. They simply are the ones who care the most.

At Kristin our teachers care enough to want to ‘make a difference’. We want to be the teachers our students remember for the rest of their lives; maybe for helping them through a difficult time, or because we taught them something worthwhile, or, maybe we made them feel appreciated and special.

I look forward to another great year at Kristin doing things with a real purpose but having fun along the way as we progress the learning for every one of our students.

From the Desks of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal and Grace Lee, Year 6 student

The Journey - Issue 34 2009

As is the custom I have given this week’s Editorial space to a Year 6 student. However I want to take this opportunity to thank you all for your contribution to Kristin School throughout the year, no matter how big or how small, it has been greatly appreciated.

On behalf of all the students and the staff in the Junior School I wish you a blessed and happy Christmas holiday break with your families.

My Journey through the Junior School

I remember, dimly, seeing Kristin for the first time through the eyes of a five year old. I remember seeing a big ring of parents and children outside the Year 1 classrooms, and a teacher was standing in the middle, calling out the names of the children who were to be in a certain class.

And so it all began. Chapel gave us the virtues we then strove to display; our mascot, perched jauntily on the edge of the stage at Assembly, somehow made us sit straighter than ever with a firmly rooted desire to win it for that week; the Prize-givings and Effort Awards ceremonies made us think ‘one day I’ll be up there’; the Student Led Conferences in which we proudly showed our parents what we’d achieved that year – these were all parts of our journey through Kristin that inspired, encouraged and helped us. At first, a lot of us thought of them as a vague sort of ‘fun’. Now I realise how lucky we were to have so many opportunities to learn more and get involved in so many different activities.

About three years had passed since the first day. I was sitting in front of my Year 4 teacher and listening as she described the various joys that our last three years in the Junior School would bring.
We eventually experienced the joys. Our first camp, in Year 4, was an amazing experience, from archery and abseiling to charades and chess.

Year 5 camp seemed really special since we were the first to go to Camp Bentzon on Kawau Island. We got used to the sounds of the sea, a few seconds walk away, and being the last thing we heard every night.
In 2009, Exhibition stretched our brains to the limit; Exhibition Week seemed just too short compared to the 12 weeks leading up to it. We were offered leadership opportunities such as being a House Captain or a Peer Mediator, to being a leader at camp.

We’d heard many times that Year 6 was a year to remember. We finally realised throughout this year how true it was.

But it’s not just Year 6 that you remember. The whole six year journey through the Junior School at Kristin is something you will always remember. The feeling before the curtains open in a production; the excitement when you stand on a stage facing the audience; the tight tension before the Cross-Country starts; the ‘just-before-lights-out’ chattering at camp; the anticipation on the first day back at school for a new year.

And the moments that are just your own: that conversation that you started with your friend that had some mysteriously important content; that time you did that ‘oh-so-terrifying’ activity at camp and lived to talk about it – you’ll remember all of that too.

You’ll remember all your time at Kristin Junior School. The teachers who never seemed to give up on you – you’ll realise how much patience it would have taken. The friends who helped you out and encouraged you – what would you have done without them? That teacher or guest speaker who really inspired you to try something new – you’ll realise that thanks to them, you can really make a difference. That’s how things happen at Kristin.

There are only a few more weeks left until the end of the school year. All the Year 6 students will be sad to leave the Junior School behind. We all learned a lot from our time here and will use the valuable skills and learning we have gained for the rest of our journey through Kristin School.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Unlocking Potential – Issue 30 2009

Unlocking potential is one of the great joys of being a teacher. Nothing is more important than planning programmes that adequately prepare children for the world they will inherit. The teachers at Kristin willingly accept this challenge with excitement and passion.

How do we discover the potential of our students? What do we look for and what do we do with it after this is uncovered? The wonderful thing about working with young children is that they have not yet begun to realise what they are capable of doing. It is our job to find it and to teach and encourage them to be the very best they can be.

Every young child comes to us with a wide variety of early childhood experiences, knowledge and skills. Some can read and some have yet to pick up a book. Some are tactile and others love to learn visually or are audio learners; all a huge mix of learning styles and abilities. Although development usually occurs in recognizable and predictable directions, it is unique in each child; occurring at varying rates.

John R Frew writes in his book, Emotional Consideration of Curriculum, “The secret in achieving good educational outcomes is not only in more efficient delivery, more outcomes, more assessment, but a focus on the very point where learning takes place. It is the moment when a teacher and a student address a problem, the human interface when a positive relationship and connectedness is established. It is a personal moment and the success or failure of each student can depend more on the expertise of the teacher than it does on any curriculum. This is most evident in early learning where a sense of security and safety has to happen before any authentic academic learning can take place. The valuable learning that takes place in the early years lays the foundations for all future learning. Research indicates that the rapid rate of development that occurs in the physical, social, emotional, intellectual and aesthetic domains is particularly significant”.

It is our responsibility as educators of younger children to recognise and maximise this crucial stage of learning. This is one of the major reasons we focus so heavily on teacher-pupil relationships at Kristin. They give the one-on-one attention that advances early learning in students and provides them with a sound learning base across all the domains. In the Junior School we give every student specialist Physical Education classes; they enjoy specialist Performing Arts experience, Religious Education and Philosophy, and learn a second language that helps to develop both sides of the brain.

These are 21st Century skills, but they are not new. Critical thinking, problem-solving, collaboration, information literacy, global awareness, mastery of facts as well as complex analysis has always been taught in effective schools. What is new is how critical these skills are to achieving success in the rapidly changing years ahead, meaning we have to teach them more intentionally and effectively than ever.

To be able to think critically, students need to have good knowledge of how to access content knowledge that is central to all subject areas. Our job as educators is to decide which skills are most important to prepare them well for the future and to teach them systematically and well.

The rewards are many and great in the world of an educator. We greet a new class of students into our classrooms at the beginning of every year, empower, encourage and support them to be the very best they can be and then pass them on to start the process all over again, always with renewed vision, the following year. It is this time of the year that teachers see the results of their hard work and the exciting progress and achievement that each of their students has made. I am sure there is no other profession that can provide this kind of job satisfaction.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

The Virtue of Honesty - Issue 24 2009

One of the things I find difficult to deal with in life is someone not telling the truth or being dishonest. I am sure every one of us has experienced the feeling of being misled or lied to, which can often leave lifetime scars in people.
One of the most important values that we work hard on with our students is honesty. We try very hard to encourage them to speak the truth and to take responsibility for the things they do and say to each other.

We hear enough ‘stretching’ of the truth in the media, practically on a daily basis; so much so that one never knows what is the truth and what isn’t. Left to our own devices we need to have the skills to be able to ‘spot’ a liar.

The word truth, according to Wikipedia, has a variety of meanings, from honesty, good faith, and sincerity in general, to no agreement with fact or reality in particular. The term has no single definition about which a majority of professional philosophers and scholars agree, and various theories and views of truth continue to be debated; very academic!

On the other hand, Wikipedia describes honesty as speaking the truth and creating trust in the minds of others. This involves all kinds of communication, both verbal and non-verbal. Honesty implies a lack of deceit. A statement can be strictly true but still be dishonest if the intention of the statement is to deceive its audience. Similarly, a falsehood can be spoken honestly if the speaker actually believes it to be true. Conversely, dishonesty can be defined simply as behaviour that is performed with intent to deceive. Lying by commission, lying by omission, fraud, and plagiarism are all examples of this sort of behaviour; this makes more sense.

However, I am really only wanting to discuss truth and honesty in our daily lives, especially teaching children about the valuable value of ‘integrity’.

We can all become very upset when children don’t tell the truth, whether at home or at school. The best reaction to a ‘lie teller’ is to find out why they told a lie because there are very often many different reasons for not telling the truth.

Very young children think their parents can see exactly what they are thinking, so telling the truth or telling lies is not an issue for them. They are at that lovely stage when they think their parents know everything!
However by the age of three, children discover people don’t actually know what they are thinking. They will test this new knowledge by ‘telling whoppers’ or will try to blame someone else when things go wrong, or they will even make up a story rather than own up!

As they begin school, children quickly learn that it is good to please their parents and their teachers. They will tell ‘fibs’ as a matter of course in the interests of pleasing their parents and to avoid blame. It is pointless to get into long interrogations at this stage so it is good advice to try a different approach and lead by example; but still to make them aware that telling a lie is not acceptable.

By the age of around eight, children are developing their understanding of right and wrong and can separate truth from fantasy. As they enter their teens children will often lie to protect their thoughts and privacy from their parents.

There are many reasons why children lie. They do it to avoid punishment, to keep their parents’ love, to make themselves look better, to impress their peers, to imitate adult behaviour and of course to get what they want!

From our point of view as parents and teachers it is valuable to build relationships with children, from a very young age, based on trust and respect. It is important to praise them when they tell the truth but avoid giving rewards. Honesty should be its own reward. It is important to give older children their privacy and avoid prying. If they know you trust and respect them, they are unlikely to be doing much wrong.

So the point of my editorial is to say that as adults it is important for us to model the virtue of honesty to children, in it’s entire meaning, for them to become great world citizens who have a happy life. I am sure we are all very aware of the destruction dishonesty brings to many lives.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Effort – Issue 20 2009

As it is the ‘season’ for rewarding students for their effort throughout the first half of the year, I thought it timely to discuss this in my editorial this week.
Awarding Effort Awards to students has always been a topic of debate as it can be seen to be quite subjective on the part of the teacher. However research sees the application of effort as being the ‘key to success’ and if clear criteria is set for the students to understand and follow then these awards certainly serve their purpose.

Who wouldn’t want their children to be successful? We all want that for them but for that to happen there is a long journey of effort, failure and risk and as a young student in the Junior School, as our school song says, “our journey’s just beginning”.

Effort takes many forms. Just getting out of bed in the morning and showing up takes effort. Knowing ‘stuff’ – being smart might be the luck of the draw, but knowing ‘stuff’ is the result of effort.
Effort is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as; “the use of physical or mental energy, a determined attempt or the result of an attempt; something accomplished.” The Web’s definition reads; “an earnest and conscientious attempt intended to do or accomplish something.”

Using this as a criteria for awarding an Effort Award to students has to make a lot of sense.

It is valuable and important for us as teachers to recognise effort or hard work, which is the same thing, from our students. Valuable and important, because it will teach them and encourage them that hard work is rewarded and that it is the number one factor in the creation of success.

The difference between being OK and being very successful is often small. Anyone can go from being OK to very successful by setting goals and then realising that effort and hard work will be needed to achieve them. Effort is the most important thing. More important than talent because if students rely on their talent, their brains or their skills alone, they will always be second to their classmates who may have less talent but make more of an effort.

Educators find that rewarding students for effort rather than valuing only results, gets a better result from all students individually. Less capable students can get discouraged, frustrated and unmotivated in exploring their potential if rewarding results is the only criteria used by teachers. It is important to remember that rewarding students for their effort, even though they failed to produce desired outcomes, is not tantamount to lowering their standards. Instead, recognising effort can and invariably gets results. Students learn to take risks and to persevere the moment they succeed at something they have failed at before. It is interesting to note that students who learn to accept failure without associating it with defeat also learn the art of leadership.

We don’t want our students to be ‘safe’ learners. Instead we want to encourage them to take risks and to fail occasionally. Learning to fail, with grace, is a very valuable lesson and one we over-protect our children from experiencing. There are many lessons to be learned from failure. In fact failing at something is our chance to have another go, this time with the benefit of experience. Because we seldom have only one chance, a failure can be part of our development, a positive step towards becoming successful. There is no disgrace in falling over as long as we pick ourselves up and start again, unafraid to have another attempt. This builds resilience.

Aristotle said that happiness comes from activity, both physical and mental. We are happy when we take pride in what we can do well. If we miss out on the joy of work we miss out on an important part of life. Believe it or not, doing a job well, cheerfully, willingly and with pride is one of the greatest pleasures we can enjoy.

Life, happiness, prosperity and success all take effort. The best secret in life is that if you decide what you want and then work hard to achieve it, the odds are excellent that you will be successful. There are no shortcuts and in the end we will value the prize more deeply if we have made the effort, fought the fight and achieved our goals.

So what do you think is the secret to success? I know what it is for me!

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Celebrating Tasha's Success - Issue 15 2009

Good news is always a thrill and something we need as often as we can get it. Celebrating success is something we do well at Kristin and this time it is a staff member, Miss Tasha Gover, Year 6 teacher, whom we are celebrating.

After many years of not nominating a teacher for the New Zealand Independent Schools’ Excellence in Teaching Awards for Exceptional Professional Performance, because I have always felt that I have always worked with the best, I, along with my leadership team, decided that we did have a staff member this year who had worked incredibly hard both professionally and personally over the past five years and whose outstanding professional growth met all the criteria of this award.

This NZIS Excellence in Teaching Award is presented to teachers in Independent Schools who demonstrate exceptional service and commitment to student learning and welfare. Miss Gover’s performance had to be measured against the criteria of outstanding accomplishments in academic and/or sporting and/or cultural and/or other student-related activities. Criteria had to be assessed in teaching and learning in the classroom, professional contribution, contribution to the wider life of the school and contribution to education at the national level.

Congratulations go to Miss Gover who had to compete against New Zealand’s best teachers for this award. She had to have written references from parents and teachers, whose words absolutely affi rmed her nomination. I felt extremely proud when I watched her being presented with this award at the Independent Schools’ Conference in Wellington last weekend. Here is what Miss Gover had to say in her acceptance speech:

“My professional journey began in a small rural school in Northland and has taken me to the big city of Auckland, where I have been teaching Year 6 at Kristin for the past six and a half years. I have always loved learning and as a teacher I try to instil this same love of learning in my students.

For me, teaching is about motivating, engaging and challenging my students in their learning so that they can achieve to the best of their ability. I aim to teach programmes of work that are exciting and intellectually stimulating, incorporating best pedagogical practise. I aim to be creative and innovative in my approach to teaching, using ideas, resources and technologies that I know will enrich my classroom programmes and enhance my students’ learning. I aim to create an atmosphere of mutual respect and caring, where each student’s strengths are celebrated and their learning needs are recognised. I aim to create a classroom environment that is stimulating and fun. I aim to make school a great experience for each and every one of my students.

It is so rewarding as a teacher to see my students motivated and engaged in their learning, applying incredible effort and working through tasks that stimulate and challenge them to achieve great success. It is amazing to see the progress my students make throughout the year and to know that I helped them achieve their goals. It is fantastic to have former students visit my classroom to reminisce about their time in Year 6, sharing their memories of fun, exciting learning and experiences that they will remember always. Each student remembers their year as being the ‘best ever’, when this happens; I know that I have succeeded.

I have always believed that if something is worth doing, it’s worth doing well. I believe that teaching is one of the most worthwhile jobs in the world and I aim to do the absolute best I can.”

Her students had this to say:

“Every day is exciting in 6G. Miss Gover has the ability to make every lesson fun and enjoyable for everyone. I love the way we always learn about things in different ways and think outside the box. Whether we’re making models, watching videos or experimenting by sling- shotting pens across the room to learn about energy, learning is fun and interesting. We do lots of ICT and use the mimio, it makes work fun and interactive. Miss Gover makes learning fun so you’re learning but having too much fun to notice.”

That is exactly why she has been awarded this high honour.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

The Strength of Community – Issue 12 2009

What an exciting and interesting month April turned out to be. I am not sure what it was like for you but for me there seemed to be a great deal happening to keep me busy and motivated all of its 30 days, and for a lot of it I wasn’t even at school!

It was lovely to hear the students’ enthusiastic (or not!) rendition of their experiences over the holiday break as they returned to school to start the term. April always starts with a prankster, or a fun loving, risk taking, student realising the 1st is April Fool’s Day. We didn’t manage to escape the fun of the morning and we all enjoyed, and went along with, the tricks played upon us.

The end of term followed very quickly after and then of course, the traditional celebrations of Easter shared with family, friends and ‘chocolate’, and later in the month leading into Anzac Day celebrations of Remembrance; two important celebrations.

However the most valuable experience for me during April was to have the privilege of visiting a village on a remote island in unsettled Fiji. Wow, what a humbling experience to drink tea sitting on a woven mat with the Chief and the families living in the village. We were surrounded by huts they call home, animals, and beautiful, happy and well-mannered children. I learned the correct protocol of such a visit and after spending a very interesting and valuable two hours, mostly with the women and the children, I came away wanting to do so much more for them all.

I saw living proof of the contents of the Christmas Boxes that our students so lovingly purchase gifts for and pack each year. That was thrilling to see, affirming their delivery. I was impressed by how happy they all were and how much pride and respect they had for their village, particularly the Kindergarten, the School and their Church. You can imagine the thoughts that were spinning through my head about what I could do to assist, especially with the children.

As we interacted with the children and joined in their games the gap between our worlds became smaller. They were so beautiful and spirited I could have easily packed a couple in my bag and brought them home!

However, the reality of such thoughts has had to be manifested in more innovative and appropriate ways of providing assistance. Being in an IB World School that supports not only our local community but our global community gives us a wonderful opportunity to do this.

I read recently in the IB World magazine about respecting difference and liked the quote “There’s a difference between tolerance and acceptance. Here we go beyond acceptance, to celebration. However just ‘teaching tolerance’ and ‘celebrating diversity’ miss an essential lesson: to respect difference.” In our daily living it is not enough for us to ‘tolerate’ unfamiliar or irritating things. Instead I think we all need, especially our children, opportunities and strategies for engaging in lifestyles and cultures unlike our own, in which the fundamental assumption is one of respect.

This was very clear to me as we approached the Fijian village and saw and felt the respect within this culture. A little part of me even envied the simple life! I was touched by the sense and strength of community that was so evident. It has been said that the only ‘real’ communities left in the world today are schools. How sad is that? But if you think about it, it is probably true.

We are fortunate to belong to a school that values and nurtures ‘community’, which is both comforting and reassuring in a society that tends to only look out for ‘number one’. I believe it is important for us to keep our eyes on the needs of not only our local community but on our global community as well. After all we are citizens of the globe and with that comes some responsibility on our part.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Happy Thoughts - Issue 8 2009

How many of you drive to work each day, like me, and have 20 to 30 minutes of quiet and peaceful ‘thinking time’, often punctuated by something that catches your eye as you drive, or by something you may hear on the radio?
I love this time in the car, alone, when I can choose complete silence, to have the National Programme telling me about all the doom and gloom out there that I have heard three or four times that day already, or I can choose to listen to some tranquil, peaceful, relaxing music. God Bless choice!

Most of my time spent in the car driving to and from Kristin each day is generally ‘thinking time’ because of the nature of my job. I’m not one to waste time so this compulsory sitting time is to be used productively I tell myself!
Each morning I feel fortunate to be travelling on the side of the motorway that does not have nose to tail traffic from the city side of the bridge to Greville Road, where I turn off, and beyond, so my ‘thinking time’ has to be coupled with keeping my eyes on the road. (Wow, a multi-tasker I hear you say!) I can’t help but see the facial expressions on the faces in the cars opposite me, heading into town, and I wonder what they are thinking about. I can never understand how one can spend so long sitting in the car to get to work, only to have to turn around and do exactly the same thing after work to get home!

However, I guess we all do what is right for us at the time and for me to drive from Parnell to Albany gives me the opportunity to wind up for another exciting and productive day at Kristin and then to wind down again. At least in this time I have planned the day ahead and arrive at school well prepared and in the ‘zone’ by the time I enter Gate 1.

I often think about the current book I am reading and am always so inspired to read about people who have wonderful, exciting, interesting lives and envy the way they can put pen to paper and write so engagingly about it. I try to fit some of this new information I learn into my own life. At present I am reading Parky, the wonderful story of the life and interviews of Michael Parkinson. His TV interviews with the famous and often not so famous, were always outstanding viewing. I wonder if he spent time while driving to and from work thinking about how to formulate questions to ask each person he was about to interview. I am sure he did. Parkinson’s memoir is an inspiring story, particularly for anyone who has hated school and left with few qualifications, because it is one of those stories that proves that dreams do come true.

And then there are the 10,000 hours (that equates to 10 years) we need to spend to become an expert at something, says Malcolm Gladwell in his latest book, Outliers – the story of success. Another interesting read about practice and positive thought. Great reading.

Thought is a vital, living force. Thought builds our character. “As a man thinketh, so he is.” “Man is created by thought; what a man thinks upon, so he becomes.” Think you are strong; strong you become. Think you are weak; weak you become. We can even control our health by our thoughts. Our body is the product of our mind. Interesting isn’t it?

So what we think about has a huge influence over what we do and how successful we can become. Not only that but the ‘trips down memory lane’ thoughts that are often triggered by something we hear or see are wonderful and I often find myself, like you I’m sure, laughing out loud about something I did 20 years ago.

I know the ‘recession’ may not be a happy time at present but let’s all keep thinking positive thoughts and let’s make sure we all look after each other in our families and our communities. Happy thinking everyone.

From the Desk of Judi Paape, Junior School Principal

Goal Setting - Issue 4 2009