Mr Riddelsdell took 8 Students from Year 10 & 11 to the TISAC Table Tennis Competition held at Heathfield’s school on Thursday 24th, September. There was a boys and Girls Competition. Lita, Cookie, Sonam and Tilly represented the girls. JS, Woo, Tyler and Ryan represented the boys.
There was good competition from the likes of Charter, Ascot, BCIS, Concordian, KIS, Heathfield, St Andrew’s and of course The Regent’s. Everybody enjoyed their pool games but Cookie was the only one to come through to the semi-final which she won. So The Regent’s was represented in one of the finals which was contested over three games. It was very close but unfortunately Cookie lost in the third game 11-8 but still came away with the silver medal.
On Wednesday the children took part in our first Health Day. The children enjoyed activities during their lunch time break which focused on keeping fit and increasing concentration. Prizes were won by children in an art competition and the organisers praised the quality of the colouring and shading. Mrs Perkins was proud to present the winners with their prizes during line up the next day.
On Tuesday 9 children from the Primary school were invited to attend a press conference at the new EM playground. The children were escorted by Mrs Perkins and Miss Star and thoroughly enjoyed the experience.
The children were perfectly behaved and represented the school very well indeed. When the children returned to school they spoke out the visit in line up so they could share their experience with their classmates.
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All families are welcome to join the Grand Opening on the 30th of September at 4pm.
We have had a busy time in the boarding house recently. On Wednesday nights, secondary and primary teachers have
continued to come into the house to run activities for the boarders. They have enjoyed pizza making, baking, jewellery making, painting, bench-ball, learning about Ancient Egypt and Pictionary. We would like to thank all the teachers for their hard work preparing these fun activities for everyone to take part in.
We have also been celebrating some birthdays. We all enjoyed some delicious cake with Phoom, Davit, Kuenze and Bell and sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to them.
The Boarding house also had cause to celebrate when the boys drew with Ascot 5-5 in a football match last week. We were pleased with their performance but hope that they can beat the teaching staff when the boarders take them on in October. Not only do we want to be football champions on October 9th but we are also hoping that we can beat the teachers at rounders and basketball too!
Ten boarders are going to Koh Si Chang with Mr and Mrs Harrison for the long weekend and they can’t wait to relax on the beach, visit the Rama V Palace and Buddha’s Footprint and take a skylab tour of the island. We are also hoping to eat some amazing Thai food and watch a sunset over the sea.
We were lucky enough to be invited by the University of Tohoku for their annual future global leaders program. The five days in Sendai, Japan, was an unforgettable experience for the both of us. Not only did we get an insight of the university, but we also had the opportunity to explore the beautiful city of Sendai and it’s culture.
University Of Tohoku
Tohoku University is one of the top 100 university in the world. Recently, they began the Future Global Leadership Program which is taught in English and focuses on engineering, chemistry and marine biology.
On our first day, we had a fantastic welcoming reception and experienced Japanese flower arranging and got to meet some of the students at the University. On the second day, we visited laboratories where the professors gave us lectures. Both laboratories have various machinery that are more advanced than anything we’ve seen before. Furthemore, we had the opportunity to hear about the projects that the senior students were working on.
Moving on to the department of chemistry, this was the most interesting course for us and the lecture about DNA replication was something to remember. On the final day, we went to the marine biology laboratories which focuses on marine life and oceanography. The marine biology course is unique to the other two as students are required to work on the field by going deep sea diving every couple of weeks. They also taught us how to measure the age of fish which is very interesting.
Life in Sendai
Sendai translate to “the city of trees” and lives up to its name. We came at the right time, as there was a festival going on and fireworks display lit up the city on our second day. Sendai is quite a small city and you can get around easily with a bike or even by walking. With our free time we went around exploring the city with the university students we’ve met. We learned more about Japanese culture and on our last day we went to a temple for meditation. Sight seeing was definitely the main highlight of the trip as Sendai was a very peaceful city with lots of places to visit and rich in Japanese culture. People were very humble and friendly this is one reason why we love Japan. All in all, it has been an unforgettable experience and it was a privilege to be part of the FGL program. We would like to thank everyone who has made this experience possible for us and highly recommend that everyone should participate in similar events.
In early August I accompanied two year 12 students, Daffa and Mint, to Tohoku University in Sendai for their Future Global Leaders summer school. While there, we experienced the famous Japanese hospitality as we visited the University campus, facilities and student accommodation, and attended lectures and presentations about the Future Global Leaders science and engineering courses.
Sendai City, situated in central Miyagi Prefecture, is the largest city in the Tohoku region. Sendai is known as the “City of Trees.” The main avenues, Aoba-dori and Jozenji-dori, are lined with rows of beautiful zelkova trees. Trees can even be found in the covered shopping area, Ichibancho Arcade. The impressive university campus is equally green, and is laid out on the hillside above the town.
For me, the highlight of the trip had to be our visit to a Japanese Buddhist temple and gardens. After an enthralling Buddhist prayer ceremony, we entered the main garden where stepping stone pathways and bridges circle central ponds filled with colourful Japanese Koi carp. Partially obscured in the distance is a three storied pagoda. A tea house, Buddhist cemetery, and tombs of relatives of the Date clan are also at the temple. We enjoyed a stroll through the gardens, stopping for plenty of photographs.
Something else which made the trip particularly memorable was the overwhelming noise of cicada insects everywhere. Tanna japonensis, also called the evening cicada is a species of cicada, a family of insects distributed throughout East Asia, and is most common in Japan. Its shrill call can be heard most often in the morning and evening. The incredible volume and range of sound emanating from these insects has to be heard to be believed.
We were fortunate to be present for the Tanabata Festival, held every summer in Sendai. This Buddhist festival is one of the three greatest festivals in the Tohoku region, attracting crowds of over 2 million every year. Gorgeous decorations made with bamboo and Japanese paper, are put up in the shopping arcades in front of Sendai Station and in the shopping malls.
Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed our all-too-brief visit to Japan. The Future Global Leaders summer school is an annual event, so hopefully I will go back next year with more Regent’s students.
This week the students were as shocked as I was to hear that already we had passed the 12% mark of the year! It seems like only yesterday that we returned from the long summer holiday ready to begin another academic year. Tempus fugit.
Our current focus is on absence and lateness- both factors which can seriously damage the progress made and ultimate level of achievement made by our young people, so I urge all parents to help us help your children by getting them to school on time, every day. I shall be sending every family a letter outlining our new procedures and sanctions, in Secondary, for our persistent offenders.
Thursday was our annual Wai Kru ceremony a very humbling event and one of the highlights of the academic year.
Friday this week is a long weekend. Students are back in school on Monday 28th September.
Have a learning filled week.
Brian
From Mrs. Rachel Perkins, Head of Primary
Dear Parent, as we come to the end of yet another busy week in Early Years and Primary we celebrated our teachers and teaching assistants in our annual Wai Kru ceremony.
It was a very humbling experience to receive such lovely flowers and good wishes from the children. Many of the staff particularly from the UK have never experienced this ceremony and they all told me what a wonderful event it was and how pleased they are to teach in such a wonderful and thoughtful school environment.
Please let me take this opportunity to wish you a lovely long weekend with your family.
Students who do not come to school are, not surprisingly, not very successful at school. That is why in countries throughout the world it is a serious problem if children do not go to school. In England, at the moment, an attendance of less than 85% will see your child referred to the authority in charge of education. If a parent is found to be supporting their child in not going to school, then it is against the law. And there are only two ways in which a child is allowed to miss school. They are if the child is too ill to attend or if the parents have got permission from the school beforehand.
Lateness is a similar problem. Though we are sympathetic at the school to those students who have to get up very early in the morning to get to school, we cannot support it. By being late, a student not only misses the essential part of a lesson (the beginning), they also disrupt the other students when they go into class.
I have heard some comments from parents that they are happy for their children to be late for school or even miss school if it makes their children happy. I’m afraid this is a rather short-term view of happiness. I might choose to stay in bed tomorrow, which might make me feel very happy… but I won’t be happy when I get into work and realise the amount of work that I have to catch up. Students can very quickly get into a situation where they have lost control of their learning.
The school cares about your child. We want to give them the best possible chance in life – to achieve their potential and to realise their dreams. That is why we are going to get tougher on absence and lateness. Those who are late are going to be in detention more often. Those who are absent for more than 10% of the school year will be subject to review. If their absence has affected their education seriously, they may be asked to repeat the year.
Regent's International School, Bangkok 
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