HOTAZEL COLLEGE NEWSLETTER 1.1/2014 2013 – 01 – 23 P.O. Box 14 Hotazel 8490  053 741 1287  053 741 1442 E-mail: [email protected] Dear parents Welcome back after a delightful summer holiday. We are grateful that all our learners, parents and children have returned home safely from their holiday destinations. We believe that you have rested well and that you have spent some quality time with you families. We are privileged to welcome more than thirty new learners and their families at Hotazel College. We hope that you will experience a happy and fulfilling time with us. It is important for our new learners and their parents to become involved in all activities and attend all functions from the very beginning in order to welcome and make themselves at home. Our school curriculum has been extended to Grade 11 this year and at present there are 351 learners in our school. We also would like to welcome the following new staff members: Mrs Hester Schoeman came from Eligwa Primary school in Vanderbijl Park and will be teaching Afrikaans Huistaal (Home Language) and Afrikaans Eerste Additionele Taal (First Additional Language) from Grade 9 to 11. She is a qualified music teacher and will become actively involved in music teaching at our school. Mrs Gracia Ferris lives in Hotazel and has been teaching at Hotazel Combined School. She is the class teacher of the Grade R English class Ms Samantha Walker has been employed by us on a part time basis since last year. She was employed teacher’s diploma last year. She will be teaching grade 4 – Grade 8 English. Mrs Nomsa Nyati will be involved in relieve teaching in Mrs Rossi Polly’s post who are on long leave at present. Mrs Jane Schubert is helping out in Mrs Marthani Martin’s post. Mrs Martins is on maternity leave. The pass rate of our school from Grade 1 to Grade 10 last year was 98%. This includes those learners who have passed as a result of slacked promotion requirements and those who had been progressed as result of their ages. We want to structure our teaching and learning this year in such a way that learners will discover their passion for specific subjects so that they would become more actively involved in the learning process. We believe that our learners would want to learn and that we could thus improve our pass rate. We have decided to revise the excessive focus on assessment. There is an English proverb that says: “Weighing a pig doesn’t make it fatter”. We intend to spend more time and energy on learning and teaching than on assessment. This might result in the Grade 4 – Grade 11-learners not writing tests every week anymore, but that they would complete a formal assessment task as been set by the curriculum prescriptions in the test period. Assessment will then mainly be done to steer teaching and learning, rather than to accumulate marks for the report card. In future we will follow a zero tolerance policy regarding learners who are downright too lazy to do homework or to learn their work. Find attached hereto the homework policy for your record. It is very important that you should take note of the indicated time that children in different phases should spend on doing homework. If a learner’s homework is incomplete and there has been no written communication from the parents to the school as to the circumstances surrounding the situation, the learner will, without exception, be placed on detention. Everyone has an obligation to contribute to make our school a world class school. Poor school attendance is the biggest contributory factor to the poor academic performance of our learners. There are learners who already have been absent this term or who simply just stayed on holiday longer. We seriously urge parents to keep their children out of school only for events of crucial importance in order to ensure that the academic progress of the learners is not compromised. Parents will receive a sms if their children are absent without apologies. This is in the interest of our children’s safety. The extra-mural programme is already steaming ahead in full force with the focus on athletics and swimming. Our Inter Schools’ Athletic Meeting will take place on 30 January 2014 and the galas on 6 and 13 March. Dancing lessons and music teaching after school will commence next week. Please take note of the following changes on the extra-mural time table regarding music tutoring. Mondays – Tuesdays – Wednesdays – Thursdays – – Piano teaching Mrs Hester Schoeman Choir Recorder Mrs Petronellé Hindley Piano teaching Mrs Hester Schoeman Guitar Mrs Petronelle Hindley We are looking forward to a splendid year and know that when learners, parents and teachers work together as a team, learners will be able to achieve the excellence they aim for in 2014. We wish you all a happy and prosperous 2014. Enjoy your child. JJ WESTRAAD PRINCIPAL