DESS Newsletter - 40

DESS Newsletter 40 - A Creative Silver Lining…

Whenever it comes round to my newsletter article, I appreciate that it makes me pause for a moment and think, as I decide what I’d like to write to you all about. It means I reflect on what’s been happening not just at DESS but also in the world around us. Given what’s going on in the world right now and the challenges many families are facing, I would like to start by sending our continued best wishes, support and love from everyone in the DESS community to any families who find themselves being adversely affected by recent events.

However, in this newsletter, I want to continue to pursue the silver linings and find the positives still out there for all of us. Right at the beginning of our Remote Learning journey together and when lockdown restrictions were much tighter than they are now, we were all urged to look for the ‘silver linings’ in amongst the confusion and worry about the pandemic that was unfolding. People identified: the additional time spent together as a family, the reduced time spent in cars or traffic, how the earth was beginning to heal a little or how people were finding additional time to read, exercise or try a new hobby as examples of positives emerging from challenging times. And as this period has continued new silver  linings have continued to emerge and we have all called upon traits such as humour, resilience, perspective and gratitude to help us work through. Plus, we have all constantly been calling upon this week’s character strength of creativity to stay positive, to manage, to survive!

Parents you have been constantly finding new ways to excite and engage your children without them accessing their friends, parks, beaches and swimming pools that we all know they need to release their seemingly endless levels of energy. Weekends have taken on whole new activities and ideas, from indoor camping, Homefests and baking to den building, junk modelling and paddling pools. Believe me, I’ve experienced them all with you!

Our teachers have been truly creative. Constantly finding new and innovative ways of delivering learning via videos and live sessions that have kept the children engaged, keen to learn and making progress. All whilst being at home, juggling the demands of their own families and unable to access all the resources that would be available to them at school.

Then of course there’s the children. Their creativity has shone throughout this period of Remote Learning as they’ve once again showed what amazing individuals they all are. Their writing, performances, songs, poetry, artwork… this list could go on and on… has seen their creativity shine through. They have been able to take tasks, interpret them and then submit work in their own unique and exciting ways. With, on more than one occasion, parents joining in and being part of the creative learning process!  

So with only two weeks left of this academic year, I hope your newly honed creative skills continue to flourish and you and your families have a great end to the term. Then when you look back on Term 3 2020 at DESS you will see it as the time that your creativity not only helped you manage but also unlocked ideas and activities that you and your family will continue to enjoy in the future.

Enjoy the rest of this week’s newsletter, take care and stay safe

Mr Clarkson
Deputy Headteacher

Staff Stars of the Week

Mr Tolan	Mr De Mendonca

Message from our Student Advisor

Mrs. West reminds all our children at school that ‘inside every child is an artist.’ This self-belief is essential for children; to cultivate the perception of the worthiness to be creativity, and consequently, to access their strength in creativity to apply in their learning. Research shows that creative thinking involves making new connections between different regions of the brain, which is accomplished by cultivating divergent thinking skills and deliberately exposing oneself to new experiences and to learning. As a result of this divergent thinking, more simply, the VIA Institute 0n Character describes creativity as the strength to bring something new into existence as a product, a process, or a thought.

Sometimes we are quick to categorise ourselves and our children, as “not having the eye for being creative”. Indeed, some will find creativity easier than others. Motivation and intelligence support creativity. Fortunately, however, creativity can be acquired and honed at any age or experience level. According to psychologist Teresa Amabile, PhD, of Harvard University (developer of Componential Theory of Creativity), environmental factors such as freedom, support and positive challenges also play a key role in fostering creativity.

Creativity, and innovation, are the skills required to apply knowledge in new and exciting ways. These require children to change one’s normal routine, stepping outside of typical comfort zones, and paying attention to the present moment. No better test of this, than home-schooling.

It is in everyone’s interest to nurture creative impulses. How can we, as parents and teachers, go about shaking up the way children think? How will you help the children to think adaptively and originally? How can we ignite our children’s imagination this summer and watch their creativity flourish – in LEGO, in coding, in play – in any way possible?

“To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.” Joseph Chilton Pearce.

 Mitch Resnick ,a professor of learning research, states that children need an environment that encourages them to experience five processes: 1) imagine what they want to do, 2) create projects through  3) playing with tools and materials, 4) share ideas and creations with others, and 5) reflect on their experiences.

Cultivating Creativity in your Kids

References:

• Amabile, T. M. (2012). Componential theory of creativity. Harvard Business School, 12(96), 1-10.
• Brown-Martin, G. (2014). Learning {re} imagined: How the connected society is transforming learning. Bloomsbury Publishing. 
• Ebert, E. S. (1994). The cognitive spiral: Creative thinking and cognitive processing. The Journal of Creative Behavior, 28(4), 275-290.
• Schmidt, J. P., Resnick, M., & Ito, J. (2016). Creative learning and the future of work. Disrupting unemployment, 147-155.
• Xerri, D. (2013, Autumn). The value of creativity: Language teachers as creative practitioners. Teaching English, 3, 23-25.
• Zausner, T. (2007). Artist and audience: Everyday creativity and visual art.

Meet the Teacher

What is your full name?
Mark Edward Webster

What do you teach?
Physical Education

What is your top tip to dealing with the stay at home policy?
It’s important to keep the body and mind healthy. I find that going for daily runs/cycles is the key for me.

How are you staying active?
I run every day and cycle once or twice a week too. Twice a week I spend early mornings at the beach before school starts with my two boys.

What is your favorite food?
My favourite food is Thai Red Curry.

How do you relax in the evenings? 
I’ll often go for a walk on the beach. I enjoy cooking a nice meal and relaxing at home. Now that the Premier League Football has restarted I enjoy watching that too!

What is your full name?
Kirsty Cassidy

What do you teach?
I feel very lucky as I teach Dance to all the children in the school at some point throughout the school year.

What is your top tip to dealing with the stay at home policy? 
A big one for me has been appreciating the little things. It’s been hard not being able to get out and about as much as we normally would, especially as I have a very active 5 year old daughter! As a family we have worked hard to create a positive and fun environment at home. Also, lots of baking (I think I have mastered banana bread), gardening, puzzles and taking regular breaks from the screen.

How are you staying active?
I try to exercise for around 30-40 minutes by myself 4-5 days a week. My favourite types of exercise are yoga, pilates or some dance cardio workouts. My little girl has learned to ride her bike without stablisers, this has allowed us to go out for a bike ride as a family every evening in our local community.

What is your favorite food?
This is a tricky question because I love cooking and eating all different types of food. As a family we love travelling and trying new foods from different countries, so I have been trying to recreate some of these dishes at home. I think my favourite at the moment is a homemade bowl of Ramen.

How do you relax in the evenings?
I am a bit of a bookworm, therefore in the evenings I love relaxing by reading my newest book on my kindle. My favourite types of books are definitely thrillers, although sometimes that doesn’t help me get to sleep!

DESS Homefest 2020

For the last few weeks DESS children have been attending some very exciting Music Festivals. Now, while this might seem impossible given that all the festivals have been cancelled, our children switched on their imaginations and created their very own at home music festival.

Now, music festivals don’t just happen. They take a lot of work and pre preparation so the children firstly had to think about a poster for advertising, tickets, wristbands, a festival map – what rooms are going to have what, a stage plan – what acts are going to perform and when, playlists and food stations. Once all the preparations were complete the fun could really begin. We saw some amazing acts on the “New Acts Stage”, famous faces on the “Main Stage”, delicious food at the “Food Stands”, yoga and chilled out music at the “Chill-out Zone” and amazing dancing to the “DJ Set”. Everything was very well organised and everyone attending had to produce their tickets in exchange for wristbands. Hand sanitizer and temperature checks were performed, and “Security” were on hand to keep everyone in line.

We loved seeing whole families getting involved and going to the festivals to cheer on all the new acts. Well done to all the boys and girls from FS1 all the way to Year 6 for making DESS Homefest 2020 such a success and we can’t wait to see you next year for DESS Not at Home Fest 2021!

2019/2020 ESK Junior Team Champions

DESSC have officially been crowned 2019/2020 ESKC Junior Team Champions.

Four years after forming DESS’s first Go-Karting Team; Harry Hannam E7F, Isaac Hadri-Khoussa C7B, Muhammad Durani S7C & Vehann Subramanian 6B have landed the top spot and collectively achieved first place in the Emirates School Karting Championship held at Dubai Autodrome.

All four boys have been truly committed over the last four years and have evolved into the winning team that we have witnessed this year.

Although the end of an era, the boys walk away on top and should be extremely proud of everything they have achieved.

Race to Everest

Have a look and see which staff house is leading the walk from DESS to Mount Everest!

I am SO excited to announce that we have a winner! The LEOPARDS have walked all the way from DESS to Mount Everest!!!! The staff at DESS have heard you all cheering them on and have walked further and further every week with your encouragement. Thank you for your support children.

In second place we have the Jaguars with the Lynx just a few steps behind. The Panthers are getting very close. Hopefully this time next week we will have all the DESS houses together at Mount Everest.

Remote Learning at DESS

This week, our focus was on the character strength, Creativity. There are two essential components to Creativity – originality and adaptiveness. A creative individual generates ideas or behaviours that are novel or unusual and these make a positive contribution to the individual’s life or the lives of others.

Creativity is about bringing something new into existence as a product, a process or a thought. It is characterised by the ability to perceive the world in new ways, make connections and find patterns to generate solutions. 

We focused predominantly on creative thinking – linking ideas to form new ones, generating new ideas, solutions and creating something original from previous experiences. 

The children’s optional tasks included Mind Mapping their thoughts and ideas, writing, creating or changing rules to create a new game, up-cycling ordinary objects at home or anything else that they felt encouraged their sense of creativity! 

The children also looked for things around the house they found creative. Please see below what they found.

Don’t forget there are many ways you can communicate with us:

Parent / Teacher Communication: Parents can communicate with the class teachers using the designated class email.

Parent / School Communication: Parents will continue to contact the school via Jacqui Thurley or Reception for general enquiries.

Social media: Please share your comments on our social media platforms. We love receiving your messages and tweets. Don’t forget to include the following hashtags: #InThisTogether #InThisTogetherDubai #WeHaveGotThis #DESStrongerThanEver #DESSremotelearning #RemoteLearning

Star of the Week

We are proud to announce that the following children each received Star of the Week. Well done to everyone!

Thursday 18th June 2020