The Week Ahead
Senior School Matters
Study Skills
Many of our pupils will be sitting examinations to measure and assess their learning and academic achievement during January. Younger pupils will be set exams during regular lessons, but older pupils will sit their exams formally in controlled conditions in the Sports Hall. It will be the first time for many pupils to experience written exams like this, and it will be a little daunting for some. However, we know how nerve-wracking it can be and strive to provide ample opportunity for pupils to experience formal exam conditions to lessen the potential shock before the high stakes GCSE exams at the end of Year 11.
Examinations fall into the category of summative assessment, the set of tools that teachers use to evaluate learning at the end of a unit, term, or year. Summative assessment is usually compared against a benchmarked standard such as exam board exemplars. It gives us a single point of academic success across a range of content and skills learning to help us assess pupil achievement. This contrasts with formative assessment, the ongoing work throughout the year in class and via homework, which gives teachers an accurate and continuous picture of what pupils have learnt and understood in real-time. Our second academic report of the year will be published shortly before the Chinese New Year. The grade that pupils receive for their “Current Grade” in Report 2 for all year groups will be consolidated using teacher judgement from both types of assessment.
Before any exam, we expect all pupils to prepare and revise, to maximise their chances of success. Exams are a necessary part of school life, but I feel they hide a greater purpose. To me, a fundamental goal of exams is to help pupils enhance and develop their study skills. These are the skills that enable a pupil to learn efficiently, they are not subject-specific, but they are generic and transferrable to any life situation. As a school, we teach pupils how to grow and refine their study skills and offer access to resources such as GCSE Pod to offer further support. The world of work as we know it is evolving and changing, so ensuring our pupils are equipped to continue to learn beyond their school years is a vital part of our world-class offering here at Wellington College International Hangzhou. I wish the very best of luck to all our pupils sitting exams in January 2022.
Stewart Brown
Head of Senior School
Primary School Matters
Diverse teams
Matthew Syed describes a lack of diversity within a team as being “collectively blind”. As a society, if we intend to solve problems, we must create teams who think differently from one another.
We know the importance of pupils working with different partners and in different groups and purposefully guiding pupils into working with other peers in our classrooms. I have recently seen this in full flow as we have moved into a blended e-learning model. It has been a pleasure to see how fluidly our pupils in school engage with and involve pupils working from their homes, many of the times excited to work with pupils they haven’t had the chance to work with yet.
So, why is working in diverse teams so critical to pupils’ growth and development? Observations on learning are that it can reduce anxiety and build confidence.
Because pupils have less anxiety, they take more active team roles—including in other classes. People who work in diverse teams tend to do a better job considering multiple stakeholder perspectives and using a broader lens when solving problems. They are more mindful of their own biases and willing to consider other perspectives. As a result, they may reach better outcomes by developing more informed, thoughtful, and innovative solutions.
Working as part of a diverse group does not come naturally. We tend to feel more comfortable interacting with people from a similar background to our own—who think alike, look alike, and laugh at the same jokes. Similar people who see things the same way tend to reach alignment easily. Diverse teams often need to go through multiple loops to figure out how to work with each other.
For this reason, we are modelling and teaching our pupils how to listen and negotiate in teams as part of our explicit curriculum and our implicit teaching practice.
Matthew Coleman
Head of Primary School
Sport Matters
Pupils participated in the combined Hiba Academy Hangzhou and Wellington College International Hangzhou House sports competition. During our School Activities sessions, pupils combined with practising the sports of touch rugby, basketball, badminton and football. This fantastic event gave children the opportunity to show off their skills in their house teams. Even though the house names were different, the colours rang true. In an epic battle of sheer willpower, the pupils showed incredible skills, making both schools proud.
Timothy Schulze
Head of PE
We are looking forward to celebrating the Christmas season with our Winter concerts. Although we face challenging times, we firmly believe that “the show must go on”. Pupils and staff are working hard to offer our school community a fabulous spectacle.
Unfortunately, parents and families will not attend the concert in person this year. However, the marketing team will record the shows and share the videos with our parents and families in the future.
All pupils at Wellington College International Hangzhou will take part in these performances. We are eternally grateful to count on your support, continuous understanding, and flexibility.
Winter Concert
Year 4 - Year 10
1:30pm - 2:30pm
Wednesday 22 December
Carol Concert
Year 1 - Year 3
8:30am - 9:30am
Thursday 23 December
Alejandro Montoya
Director of Performing Arts
Dukebox Matters
Please click here to tune into our Dukebox radio throughout the week to enjoy various shows, including “Marty James breakfast show”, “The big yellow bus show”, “Motown/Rock shows” among others.
Don’t worry if you missed any of the live shows as you can access them on our exclusive “Listen again ” service.
Please click here to have a look at some of the wonderful content available in our podcast section:
Here are the most recent podcasts created by our pupils and staff:
Martin Bailey
Dukebox Presenter
Upcoming Events
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