Tanglin Talk

TANGLIN WINS BIG AT SEC’S SCHOOL GREEN AWARDS

Tanglin Trust School is once again the proud recipient of Singapore Environment Council’s School Green Awards. This year, it won the Best 3R Award and the Yellow Flame Award, and our Head Team representatives Matthew and Hannah were honoured to receive them on behalf of Tanglin from the Minister for Education, Mr Chan Chun Sing.

These awards recognise our school commitment to sustainability and student-led initiatives around recycling, upcycling, reducing waste and encouraging biodiversity on campus for the past two academic years. One excellent example is the series of biodiversity projects undertaken by CAS students around the campus. This included repurposing discarded Infant School water trays as vegetable planters, creating vegepods, setting up a garden plot in the OneNorth community garden and even protecting small areas that are well suited for growing wildflowers and other insect ‘attractors’.

John Ridley, Director of Learning, said: “These awards are another reflection of Team Tanglin coming together for a common cause. The urgent issue of climate change has ignited passions in students and staff, across departments and across the age range. Together we are determined to create a more sustainable campus and, ultimately, a better world.” »

WEAR RED FOR NEURODIVERSITY

Neurodiversity is a term that refers to the variation of the human brain, and the idea that we are all different and work in different ways. Some recognised differences include dyslexia, ADHD, dyscalculia and ASD. To celebrate our unique brains, Sixth Form’s Charlotte and Year 11’s Harriet organised a Mufti Day on 29 October when senior students were invited to wear red and donate $2 in support of The Dyslexia Association of Singapore (DAS). As dyslexics themselves, they felt that it was important to raise more awareness and support others with learning differences.

Gillian Sams, Head of Learning Support in the Senior School, said: “It’s so exciting that Harriet and Charlotte want to raise awareness of neurodiversity via the Mufti Day. The Senior School is inclusive and as students transition through school, they learn to recognise each other’s strengths as well as respect and value the diversity around them. Neurodiversity is high on the Senior School’s agenda this year. Training on strategies to help support neurodiverse thinking is ongoing, and teachers are sharing good practices and their experience of using students’ strengths to support areas of challenge. We look forward to celebrating all differences within our community and building on each other’s strengths!”

TANGLIN INTRODUCES VIRTUAL SWIM TRAINER

Did you know that Tanglin is the first school in Singapore to use “VIRTUAL TRAINER”? It’s a state-of-the art system where LED lighting strips are installed at the bottom of the pool to optimise training. The lights can be timed and used as reference points that coaches can modulate, so swimmers are able to use the lights based on their sets as pacers to optimise their training – be it with coaches, or on their own.

Andrew Hailey, Director of Aquatics, said: “The aim of this system is to provide an external stimulus to aid training. Swimmers will benefit from support in training at desired paces and at the same time, use the pacer lights to “self-organise” their movements and strokes to develop more skilful and efficient swimming. The concept of self-organising is one I deeply believe in as it supports implicit learning. Self-organising using the lights unconsciously forces swimmers to make decisions to overcome the key principles of water, decrease drag and increase propulsion. By kicking harder or pulling with more power or even streamlining more, swimmers find individual ways to optimise movement in the water.” VIRTUAL TRAINER offers unique functionality and features but the baseline aim is to provide a stimulus for swimmers to chase, pace or beat. The light pacing system differs from conventional coaching because the swimmers now have a change of focus to improve their techniques. Coaches can set the light and modulate it to a desired pace, which helps swimmers reduce stroke counts and make behavioural changes through implicit learning opportunities.

Andrew explained: “By using this system, I can spend more time observing my swimmers and direct questioning to get athlete feedback. This is important because usually in traditional coaching settings, feedback and knowledge is directed from the coach. By standing back and allowing the swimmers to find strategies, I can use questioning to get feedback from them and open more effective feedback loops. These interactions help influence how I coach and design practice to achieve my swimmers’ goals.”

KEYS OF VICTORY

Congratulations to Year 4’s Chloe for winning her first ever piano competition during Aureus Academy’s Summer Music Festival 2021! Chloe competed against 120 other participants in the Intermediate category and clinched one of the top 2 spots with distinction. The young pianist also went on to win a bronze medal in the Grade 2 & 3 Category during the Joyeuz Music International Competition for Young Pianists 2021 where there were 200 competitors from 22 countries. Chloe, who had been playing the piano since the age of six, joined Tanglin in early 2021. Her mother Cheryl said: “Although Chloe was still new, the music team encouraged her to audition for the Junior Young Musicians in Concert on 27 January. The opportunity boosted Chloe’s confidence and passion to perform on stage. We are very thankful for the support her teachers and various staff members had given Chloe to help her perform confidently on stage. She learned a lot from the experience and has already started to think about preparing for this event next year.”

Chloe chipped in: “I’m excited and proud of my performances. I feel like I’m getting better every day and I’d love to perform more in future!”

“I feel like I’m getting better every day and I’d love to perform more in the future!“

TEDXTANGLIN TRUST SCHOOL

Now in its sixth year at Tanglin, the TEDxTanglin Trust School is an annual project that’s entirely student run and executed. Open to all Year 12s and 13s as a co-curriculum, the organisers will select, organise, oversee all planning, choose and invite the speakers as well as market and produce the event itself. This year’s theme was ‘Back to the Drawing Board’ and a variety of speakers from different backgrounds shared how they adapt and learn from experience during challenging times like the pandemic via a livestream on YouTube on 16 November at 4.30pm.

Oskar Kinder, a Year 13 student who is also the event’s marketing director, explained why they chose the theme: “I think it’s important to know how to deal with situations that force us to go back to the fundamentals and change how we do things. For example, COVID-19 is a great example where frontline workers are forced to change their work patterns, procedures and training within a short amount of time.”

The speakers included paediatricians, computer science specialists, artists and even student speakers. One such example was Anjali Gupta, an emergency paediatrician who has firsthand experience with COVID patients, and Steve Lam, who specialises in cyber security and threat management for financial centres, government agencies and telecommunication centres.

Oskar said: “It was very exciting to host another TEDx event this year especially given COVID restrictions and I think that the theme of ‘Back to the Drawing Board’ while timeless in my opinion has also become salient recently. We hope that our viewers who tuned in to see what the speakers had to say about going back to the drawing board found it interesting!” ■