Hillside Newsletter 14 September 2018
Hillside Kindergarten’s latest newsletter is available to read now. Find out the latest news from around the school and upcoming events.
Important Dates
Click HERE for the Full Hillside Calendar and instructions to subscribe.
| 1-30 September | Application period for the 2019-20 Year 1 Admissions (current K2s)
Application period for the 2019-20 K1 Admissions (2016 births) |
| 24 September | School Closed – Hillside Staff Professional Development Day |
| 25 September | School Closed – Public Holiday |
| 1 October | School Closed – Public Holiday |
| 15-19 October | Mid-Term Break |
Principal’s Message
Dear Parents
We have had another great two weeks at Hillside since our last Newsletter was issued. It was wonderful to see so many parents at the recent K2 Meet and Greet session and also the Year 1 Admissions presentation held at ESFC. We also had a very good turn-out of K1 parents attending our Introduction to the Primary Years Programme (PYP) parent information session. We appreciated the opportunity to talk to many of you at these events and look forward to your continued support at future Hillside events. Please click HERE to access the presentations from the last two weeks.
A warm reminder, our next parent workshop is scheduled for Monday, 17 September (this workshop may need to be re-scheduled due to the predicted poor weather conditions).
Bringing Active Learning Home
Workshop date: Monday 17 September 2018 TIME: 3:45-4:45 pm
Are the children just playing? Or are they actively learning? This workshop aims to demonstrate what active learning looks like at Hillside, and we hope parents will take away ideas on how to support and extend learning at home.
Our K1 and K2 teachers will each share different learning opportunities with parents and explain the learning intention behind each one (with the aim of enabling parents to reinforce and extend their child’s learning at home). We hope that this parent workshop will provide parents in attendance with a bank of ideas and activities to do with their child at home.
Upcoming Hillside IB PYP Evaluation
As an International Baccalaureate (IB) World School, it is a requirement that each school undertakes a formal yearlong evaluation process – addressing all aspects of the PYP program. During this period of evaluation (which takes place once every five years), evidence will be sought from both internal and external stakeholders to verify that the school is meeting all the requirements of the programme. The emphasis of our IB Evaluation process will come from the school’s self-study process, the school’s IB PYP action plan, as well as the school’s commitment to follow the IB Standards and Practices for the Primary Years Program (PYP). The final stage of this process will involve a team of educators representing the IBO visiting Hillside to conduct an in-depth, three-day school-based, evaluation visit.
Since the start of last academic year, we have been working closely with our staff reviewing the IB Standards and Practices and worked on our ‘IB Self-Study’. Both staff and parent were surveyed through different forums and their input and support play an integral part of this process, and we will continue to keep parents informed throughout this process.
If you wish to learn more about the work we have done last year, please click HERE to access our self-study documentation. If you have any questions about the IB Authorisation, please contact Hillside’s IB PYP coordinator audrey.tang@hillside.edu.hk
ESF Year 1 Admissions for the 2019-20 academic year (K2 only)
A kind reminder to all K2 parents, Year 1 application period is from 1 – 30 September. An auto-acknowledgement email containing your application reference number will be sent upon online submission on http://www.esf.edu.hk/application-form
The deadline to lodge an application for an ESF Year 1 place is the 30 September 2018.
Don’t forget to send all supporting documents requested to ESF Centre by 7 October 2018. Please CLICK HERE to access the Y1 Admissions Talk Presentation.
Please note you will be required to submit a “copy of one of your child’s kindergarten reports.” If you didn’t save it last year, you can still login to Gateway to print or save it as a PDF under the ARR section.
ESF K1 Admissions for the 2019-20 academic year (for children born in 2016)
The ESF K1 application period for the 2019-20 academic year is from 1 – 30 September. To apply you will need to complete the online application via the ESF Kindergarten website. As a place at Hillside is in such high demand, please make sure you APPLY ON-TIME on http://www.esf.edu.hk/kindergartens-application-form/. Late applications are always processed after the on-time applications – and this is also the case for late sibling applications. Please also remind your friends (who may be seeking a K1 place for their child in the 2019/20 academic year) about this important application process. Don’t forget to send all supporting documents to ESF International Kindergarten Hillside by 7 October 2018.
On this note, we will be conducting our play visit/interviews for our 2019/2020 K1 intake on the 25 January 2019. Please note that this will be a school closure day for current Hillside students. The reason for having a school closure day is to enable us to conduct the majority of our K1 play visits / interviews on one day, rather than spreading them over a three-week period as this causes major disruptions to regular classroom programs (as teachers need to be constantly released from teaching duties to conduct the play visits/interviews).
Hillside Learning Hub
We would like to introduce our new families to the “Hillside Learning Hub” (https://hshub.hillside.edu.hk). We hope this will be a more convenient way, for parents and teachers, to share the children’s learning journey. Parents can also access all general school information, such as the school calendar, uniform order forms, admission and fees information. Please keep in mind that parents will still have to access ESF Gateway for student reports, updating student demographics, and eNotices.
We will be using this platform for gathering individual evidence of your child’s progress in the form of an ePortfolio and this will be shared with you privately, in a similar way to our existing reporting system on ESF Gateway. This will replace the traditional hard-copy portfolios. We will be sending home any hard copies of the children’s work on the day, so it’s more relevant for young children when parents talk to them about their work.
We will also use this new platform as a way of sharing our whole class learning (class blogs) and parent communication, including the sharing of policies and procedure, parent resources and parent volunteering. You can sign-up for parent volunteer by clicking on the green “V” icon to access the sign-up forms. The sign-up forms are not open until late September.
You can access this platform via ESF Gateway. Please contact us on kinder@hillside.edu.hk if you any difficulties accessing the websites.
Parking Reminder
Can we please remind parents and care-givers that drive their children to and from Hillside to please be aware of where you are parking and to not park in the grounds of Bradbury School or in front of the Exit gates of either Bradbury School or Hillside Kindergarten. Please do not leave your car parked on Stubbs Road for extended periods when dropping off your child, as we all know there are very limited spaces to drop off or pick up from. Parking is always going to problematic given our location on Stubbs Road and we thank you in advance for your cooperation with this request.
We hope that everyone remains safe and dry over what is predicted to be a wild and wet weekend.!!!!!
Kind Regards
Chris
Principal
Class Blogs
Please click on the links below to visit our class blogs on the Hillside Learning Hub for your child’s latest class news and photo gallery. Please contact kinder@hillside.edu.hk if you cannot access the Learning Hub.
| Dolphin | Dragon |
| Frog | Gecko |
| Monkey | TigerAM TigerPM |
| Panda | Turtle |
| Chinese | |
Inspiring Futures
Data Privacy The information we collect from you is in accordance with the ESF Personal Data Handling Policy and its related Personal Information Collection Statements (“PICS”). Our PICS statement is available online. http://www.esf.edu.hk/privacy
