Primary Principals' Newsletter

Welcome back to a new school year and a new year of monthly newsletters. It has been a pleasure to see our campuses filled with the energy and enthusiasm of our students, both new and returning. As we embark on this exciting 2024-2025 journey together, we are filled with anticipation for the learning, growth, and memorable experiences that await us. Our dedicated staff continue to plan engaging lessons and activities that will inspire our students to explore, inquire, and thrive. This is going to be another great year of collaboration, creativity, and community spirit!

Below, you will read reflections on just a portion of the recent engagements across Kingston Primary.

The Mid-Autumn Festival was a time for families to come together under the full moon. Kingston organized various activities to celebrate the occasion, including lantern making, riddle guessing with prizes, and enjoying festive foods. Everyone gathered to share in the joy of the season.

Y3.2: Hailey Wong, Hayden Tang

Y4.1: Agnes Wu,Thea Rydin

Y4.2: Kimmy Wong, Anna Lam

Y5.2: Elizabeth Man, Isaac Wong

Y6.2 Edwina Lau and Ethan Chong

We nurture our curiosity, developing skills for inquiry and research. We know how to learn independently and with others. We learn with enthusiasm and sustain our love of learning throughout life

We develop and use conceptual understanding, exploring knowledge across a range of disciplines. We engage with issues and ideas that have local and global significance.

We use critical and creative thinking skills to analyse and take responsible action on complex problems. We exercise initiative in making reasoned, ethical decisions.

We express ourselves confidently and creatively in more than one language and in many ways. We collaborate effectively, listening carefully to the perspectives of other individuals and groups.

We act with integrity and honesty, with a strong sense of fairness, and with respect for the dignity and rights of people everywhere. We take responsibility for our actions and their consequences.

We critically appreciate our own cultures and personal histories, as well as the values and traditions of others. We seek and evaluate a range of points of view, and we are willing to grow from the experience.

We show empathy, compassion and respect. We have a commitment to service, and we act to make a positive difference in the lives of others and in the world around us.

We approach uncertainty with forethought and determination; we work independently and cooperatively to explore new ideas and innovative strategies. We are resourceful and resilient in the face of challenges and change.

We understand the importance of balancing different aspects of our lives - intellectual, physical, and emotional - to achieve well-being for ourselves and others. We recognize our interdependence with other people and with the world in which we live.

We thoughtfully consider the world and our own ideas and experience. We work to understand our strengths and weaknesses in order to support our learning and personal development.

Why is the IB Learner Profile so important?

The main goal of all IB programmes is to help students become internationally minded individuals who understand our shared humanity and the responsibility we all have to care for our planet. We aim to develop children who strive to make the world a better and more peaceful place.

At the heart of this mission is the IB Learner Profile, which includes ten important attributes that we highly value. These attributes help shape our students into responsible members of their local, national, and global communities.

By fostering these qualities, we are building a strong foundation for international-mindedness in our students—a key objective of the IB programmes.

The Learner Profile in the Classroom

In each unit every grade level focuses on two to three specific Learner Profile attributes. Students learn about the attributes and what they can do to demonstrate these attributes. As students grow and progress through the different stages of the IB programme, they demonstrate the attributes of the IB Learner Profile in unique and evolving ways. For example: Younger students will demonstrate being an Inquirer by asking many questions but as they get older they will become more independent and conduct their own research into questions.

Home Connection:

At the beginning of each unit you will receive a unit letter. In the letter you will find the learner profile attributes being focused on. If your child is exhibiting the attributes at home or using the words this is fantastic and we encourage families to support this and share their observations with the classroom teachers.

Stay tuned for more spotlights next month and for upcoming PYP parent workshops.

On September 13, Kingston’s Y5/Y6 Girls Football Team traveled to Hong Lok Yuen to play in 4 friendly matches against ICHK-HLY. The teams were very evenly matched with our girls capturing a win off of a goal by Amelia Chu. The competitive experience was followed by an enthusiastic request from some of the players to provide them with some opportunities for practicing their skills in preparation for possible future matches. Given the girls’ request is in pursuit of building a skilled team and in consideration of the self-management skills shown by each of the girls, we have scheduled informal practice sessions on every Monday and Thursday morning at Upper Primary with the practices being planned by Y6.1 students Lok Yan, Yasmine and Yoyo.

On the morning of September 10, 2024, Y6 students from KIS, HLYIS, and JIS were invited to visit ICHK to experience a half-day of Secondary School. During the trip, the Y6 students had the opportunity to see the school, attend classes, and speak with secondary students and teachers about how things worked in the next phase of their education.

The day included a schedule of lessons, including Science, Human Technologies, Art, and Drama. The aim was to provide the graduating class with an exciting snapshot of secondary school.

For those students applying to ICHK, it was an opportunity to look around and get familiar with the people, premises, and potential future classmates. Even for those not applying, it still provided a chance to see a secondary school in action and gave them a glimpse of life in a secondary school. They had the opportunity to ask Kingston graduates about life in secondary school while also being able to pose questions to the ICHK Head of School and teachers.

An exciting event took place on September 24, as our Y4 students explored a variety of pig organs, sourced from the Wet Market, which closely resembled those of the human body. This hands-on experience connected with the first line of inquiry into the interconnectedness of body systems.

All Y4 students were equipped with plastic gloves, lab coats, and goggles as protective gear during this engaging learning activity.

The purpose of this provocation was to activate students’ prior knowledge about various body systems and their interconnections. It provided them with the unique opportunity to examine and handle these organs up close, investigating their features in detail. This experience was reflected upon and will be referred to throughout the ongoing unit of inquiry.

Throughout the activity, students handled the organs with empathy and care, deepening their understanding of the subject.

Our heartfelt congratulations to Kingston 2024 Graduate Ronny Chu! As a member of the Kingston English Debate Club, Ronny entered the AIM Cup and was awarded the Gr. 5/6 Championship Trophy on July 13, 2024. To win the Cup, Ronny created a mind map for his ideas and wrote a speech on the Importance of Sportsmanship.

This victory led to an opportunity for Ronny to interview Olympic Bronze Medallist Minnie Soo onstage at the SCMUN conference at CityU! We are so proud!

Recently, Ronny also achieved success in Piano. Read about it in the ICHK Newsletter HERE.

On Friday August 23, 2024, Kingston Class of 2016 Alumni Max Mak, coming off of a gap year during which he played semi-professional football and helped with coaching Kingston Football teams, dropped by to wish us farewell. The following day, Max departed for Toronto, Canada, where he will be attending the University of Toronto. Max is studying Kinesiology. We are looking forward to updates from him when he returns to Hong Kong for holidays!