Upcoming Dates

Click to download the 2022-23 Hillside Calendar. You can also access the school calendar via the ESF App.

10-13 October: K1 Parent-Teacher Conferences

17-21 October: Mid-Term Break

26 October: K1 Parent Participation Webinar

28 October: Dress Up Day (not necessarily Halloween related)

28 October: Parent Webinar: Chinese Curriculum

31 Oct - 3 Nov: K2 Parent-Teacher Conferences

2 November: K2 Parent Participation Webinar

Principal's Message

Dear Hillside Families

I hope you had an enjoyable mid-week break yesterday. As we are setting into the school term, we have a few parent webinars and school events coming up. These include the upcoming Parent-Teacher Conferences (PTCs) and also a webinar on parent participation. Some of these are specific to each year group, so please look out for separate App messages for details.

We would also like your input on school events via the Diversity Calendar survey, please take a few minutes to share your thoughts with us in the survey below. 

Warm regards
Audrey

Hillside's Diversity Calendar

At Hillside, we foster an environment where we celebrate individuality and diversity. Hence, awareness and inclusion are daily practices. To honour our commitment to being multicultural and inclusive, we invite you to share any key festivals or celebrations from your culture with us. In partnership with families, we will put together a diversity calendar for Hillside that fosters international-mindedness. 

To support this initiative, please take a moment to complete the 2022-23 Hillside Diversity Calendar survey

Dress-up on Friday, 28 October

Dress-up days are a great opportunity to express ourselves, so we would like to invite all the children to join us for a Dress-up Day (not necessarily Halloween related) on Friday, 28 October. Children can come to school on this day dressed as a character that they enjoy. Costumes do not need to be elaborate or detailed – just something fun (and safe) for the children to wear. The children will be enjoying some fun and games within their own class. However, can we ask families not to send any goodie bags, sweets or treats on this day, please.

Parent Webinars

Open Play & Agency

Thank you to parents that joined us for the webinar today to learn more about our Open Play programme and its key role in fostering children’s agency. We value your thoughts and feedback and would greatly appreciate you giving us some time to fill out this survey. Your input will help us to plan future parent sessions. Many thanks! Here are the session recording and slides.

Upcoming webinars include an introduction to the Parent Participation Experience and the Chinese Curriculum. Please look out for separate messages to sign-up.

A Message from ESF Student Support Services

My name is Dr Rachael Edwards, and I am an Educational and Child Psychologist working within the ESF Student Support Services. We have specialist training in child development, cognition and learning. This enables us to work with children to understand their strengths and stretches so that they can be the best they can be. Many children will meet with one of our team during their time at school.

As we go through the first few weeks of the new school year, it is really important for the children to settle into their new routines. For some of them, this will be their first time entering ESF, and for others, they will be meeting a new teaching team or classmates. This settling process is very important for their well-being and development. It does take time, and feeling a range of emotions is to be expected of children and their parents. Children expressing their emotions to parents and their teachers is healthy and important.

For children in the early years of education, progress and learning across different developmental strands can vary across children. As parents, it is natural to compare your child with other children, but each child will progress and develop at their own pace. 

Over the course of the year, we work closely with the individual ESF schools offering advice and training. This helps to teach teams to continue to tailor their learning experiences to meet children where they are at in their development journey and to ensure they make positive progress at their own level. We will also work with individual students to support their progress and facilitate their transition into primary school. 

I am really excited to spend some time in Hillside Kindergarten this term and am looking forward to joining in with all the fun!