Secondary Term 2 Drop Down Day 2023

PSHE forms an important part of the Secondary learning, touching upon areas not usually covered in regular lessons, such as strengthening the knowledge, skills, and connections to keep children and young people healthy and safe. Learning opportunities are spread across three core themes: Health and Wellbeing, Relationships and Living in the Wider World.

Our aims for the day, across the Secondary Key Stages, were to deepen into our understanding of inclusion - at the heart of our mission, as well as engage in STEAM activities, linked to the challenges set by MIT, through our NAE collaboration. The campus was buzzing with activity, and we were very excited to host many external partners on the day, including guest speakers from Space Faculty Asia, who led an assembly for our Years 8, 9 and 12. We were also delighted to welcome representatives from Special Olympics Singapore and coaches from Singapore Disability Sports Council to speak to our students in Years 10 and 11.

Our students had an amazing opportunity to:

• try a ‘unified sport’ of their choice such as Boccia and Goalball,
• hear from representatives from the Special Olympics Singapore movement, discover more about neurodiversity from our in-school experts,
• explore what inclusion means to them and research volunteering opportunities around Singapore.

This is a wonderful chance for our students to live and breathe our mission and values and to demonstrate just how deeply committed we all are to inclusion.

Gaining student feedback on experiences like these is always important to us in our pursuit of always striving for ‘better’, and we have been able to gather some great feedback and ideas for future days.

Some feedback from the students when asked what they most enjoyed:

“I enjoyed working with people in older year groups”.

“I enjoyed learning about Special Olympics, how I can volunteer for different causes, and I enjoyed learning a new sport (Goalball)”.

“I loved building the model reflecting on the plans and making them better. I also liked working with my group.”

But even more importantly, when asked what they learned we heard:

“I learned that Everyone in a specific community should belong”.

“I learned more about my peers and got to know them better than I did before.”

“About how inspirational these athletes in the Special Olympics are”.

“I learned about the importance of human connection and its benefit to people.”

“I learned how neuro-diverse people view the world and how we can understand and include them”.

“That inclusion matters!”

“For a school that values diversity, kindness and creativity, we couldn’t have hoped for better feedback! And are working our way through student ideas too.” said Carla Hyland and Jacqueline Glazerman, Deputy Heads of Secondary.