Primary Newsletter
IN THIS ISSUE: •
News from the Classroom
•
Welcome back to Years 2-6
•
Birthdays
Dear Parents and Caregivers, Renowned educational reformer and philosopher, John Dewey, once said that “If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow.” This challenge is with us each day in the Primary School, as we remain constantly aware of the need to prepare students for an ever-shifting future. If there is one thing which the pandemic has revealed it is that we have very little control over how some events will play themselves out in our lives – but we most certainly have the choice of how we will respond to them. This is an invaluable lesson which we can help our children to learn. Inevitably, there will be times of challenge for them while at school. They will also have to learn how to manage their time, how to select which activities they would like to participate in, and how to deal with the rewards (and challenges) of relationships. One important way in which children are able to work their way through these sometimes-difficult aspects of their lives is through play. Although play might be regarded as something that happens mainly in an early learning environment, it is no less important in a Primary School. While there might be more of a focus on the academic, sporting and cultural activities which make up a typical day in the Primary School, one only has to leave a group of children alone for a while to see how quickly they organise themselves into some form of play. This is no less true for an individual than it is for a group of children. In a world which seems to revolve around instant gratification – more often than not involving some digital device or another – sometimes the best instigator of learning and adventure is boredom. We use the term Kindergarten so frequently that we forget its actual meaning: children’s garden. When German teacher Friedrich Froebel started the first Kindergarten in 1837, his focus was on ‘selfactivity’, in which the interests and inquisitive The Reddam House Primary School Newsletter
Volume 24 Issue 29 Friday 29th October 2021
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