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It is hard to believe that 12 years have passed since Mike Carvalho
and I decided to produce a quarterly magazine, Independent Education.
The theme of the annual conference of Heads of Southern African
independent schools, held this year in Swaziland in September, was
Kinship in diversity, with a sub-theme, Linking laterally. As always,
the collegiality of participants was very apparent; school leaders
draw strong emotional support one from another, and find the sharing
of best practice uplifting.
Dr Jane Hofmeyr writes of access, quality, equity, efficiency
and choice.
Mark Henning stands tall in education circles in South Africa and
abroad. He is respected by all who have had the privilege of knowing
and working with him. At the end of this year he retires as the
founding editor of Independent Education. It is fitting that we
pay tribute to a man who has had a positive impact on so many lives.
Recent images of municipal workers marauding through the streets
and shopping malls in our cities were as unexpected as they were
disgraceful; angry mobs trashing bins, signs and lights that their
fellows had erected on our behalf, with our tax money.
Studies have shown that although women represent about half of
the workforce, women account for only one-third of South African
retirement savings. This is especially sobering when one considers
that women outlive men by about seven years on average and thus
need to save more during their working life-times.
Angela Stevens explains how to use music to put a school on the
map.
The Consumer Price Index languishes around 6,5%, but worse, the
Education Price Index hits 10,5%. The economic recession is now
well entrenched in South Africa and people in this country are generally
battling to make ends meet. Education has not escaped. Independent
school fees for 2010 again look to be in excess of CPI by a not
insignificant amount.
I grew up on the KwaZulu-Natal south coast where my sister and
I spent hours on the beach collecting shells for our beauty salon.
Many of our friends recall building forts and dens in their back
gardens, but our garden ended on the beach so our play days were
spent there. We climbed all over the rocks, which each got their
own names, and the big “cave rock” served as our salon. We would
line up the shells on the makeshift shelves and administer beauty
treatments to our make-believe customers for hours on end.
We have all (at one time or another) experienced difficulties with
the legal firms that we hand our debtors over to. The most frequent
complaint is the lack of communication on the progress of the cases.
One of the rights of children, according to UNICEF, is: “Teach
us to read and write and grow and teach us well so we can grow up
to be the best we can at whatever we wish to do.”
Tracy Todd, who has a Bachelor of Primary Education from the University
of the Witwatersrand, taught for six years before being paralysed
from the neck down in a car accident in 1998.
Mark Chaperon, Head of Treverton Preparatory School, supports
the school’s fieldwork programmes.
2009 has been another milestone in the history of SAHETI School,
with Modern Greek being written for the first time as a designated
FET subject. This positive development will see 39 of the school’s
64 matrics and four learners from other schools writing the subject
for the IEB 2009 National Senior Certificate.
Every school has its distinct identity or brand. Imagine, for example,
two schools in the same town. One school is seen by the community
as being excellent, the other as being of a poor standard.
King’s College School is situated on the edge of Wimbledon Common,
some seven miles from the heart of London, but only a couple from
Southfields, which has become known as “Little South Africa”.
It is seven years since Nicholas Negroponte, a professor at Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, had the vision of providing a rugged, low-cost,
low-power, connected laptop, to be used with content and software
designed for collaborative, joyful, self-powered learning to lift
the education of children. One Laptop Per Child was the title he
gave it.
Someone (that nameless moving thing that could be a parent, a teacher,
a friend or an author) once told me that knowledge on its own is
worthless, but knowledge used well creates wisdom and that’s what
we all want more of.
How can a teacher engage with every child in a class? In a world
where technology abounds, is it the equipment or is its implementation
which will engage a pupil in their own learning? Each child is an
individual and every child matters, but how can a teacher attend
to every single child individually and continue to meet the needs
of the rest of the class as well as meeting the day-to-day learning
objectives?
Barbara Malllinson founded Obami, a social networking programme,
at St Mary’s School for Girls, Waverley.
On the evening of 9 September 2009, twenty St Alban’s College boys,
under the leadership of Daniel Kimber, a Form 2 student, were part
of an outcomes-based programme that is developed by the Challenger
Learning Centre in Washington, USA. This evening formed part of
the yearly Maths Week at St Alban’s College.
When selecting products to support the e-learning project, we wanted
to go with a tier-one vendor that had the skills and technology
to support us. Oracle’s functional capabilities also gave it an
edge over its competitors when delivering enterprise resource planning
functionality such as financials.” – Bevan Doyle, Chief Information
Officer, Western Australian Department of Education and Training.
Don Duffield of St Alban’s College, believes that teaching with
passion and purpose is the key.
I have a shameful confession to make. In 18 years of English teaching,
I have failed Shakespeare. I have spoken for him all these years,
suffered through all his tomorrows, laughed myself into stitches,
died a thousand deaths and breathed life into stones, but all along
I’ve been a blinking idiot.
I know of no precedents for the future of mankind in what some
scientists believe is just one of myriad universes. I know of none
for survival in the world which is evolving as our Earth is now.
I teach in these circumstances. In times of such uncertainty, I
(hoping to help produce year groups of innovative leaders and not
just survivors) must not only teach children how to communicate
effectively, socialise productively and think rationally, but also
how to grow their brains emotionally. In fact, they need to be helped
to be better at many things that cannot easily be quantified.
Ron Beyers of Young Engineers and Scientists of South Africa presents
challenges and solutions.
Gillian Leggatt writes of Write Away, a writers’ conference at
St Andrew’s School for Girls.
Joyce Broadhead Pre-Primary School, situated in the heart of the
Berea in Durban, was established in 1976 and named in honour of
Joyce Broadhead, a pioneer in nursery education in Natal in the
1950s. We have continued the values and ideals set by our founder
in our philosophy. |
