ACCS will launch the 2009 Communio series on Friday, 20 February with a presentation on "Character Education in Catholic Schools."It is timely for schools to reflect on this theme. The present realities challenge Catholic educators, and the larger Catholic community, to reflect on the quality of the character education we provide to help our students live and work better in today's world.
This is open to all school leaders and educators in Catholic schools and Catholic teachers in government schools.
The presenters will be Mrs Regina Lee, Principal, CHIJ Secondary (Toa Payoh) and Mr Charles Surin, Principal, Hai Sing Catholic, and their staff.
The venue will be at CHIJ Secondary (Toa Payoh). The presentation and discussion will be from 2 to 5pm. Kindly contact Mr Louis Oo at louis_tin_maung_oo@catholic.org.sg or 68587085 to confirm your attendance.
Picture courtesy of CHIJ OLN
3 comments:
The presentation of how catholic schools have evolved, managed to sustain and enhanced the catholic faith against a growing challenge of an environment marked by growing materialism and technological influence is impressive. My colleagues and I were particularly impressed at how Hai Sing Catholic placed 'values based thinking behaviour' at the core of all T & L processes, and translated such values across curriculum and co-curricular programmes through the Habits of Mind approach. More so by the fact that meaningful understanding by students was seen from their reflections & records in their project work, NYAA logs, morning reflection diaries that emphasised the school's core values. Providing structures for teacher in values teaching through the SOWs, etc was particularly important. Another point I think to note is the way Hai Sing Catholic used technology to capture the interest and likes of the 'Gen Y' students (as the speaker from Hai Sing Catholic had mentioned). This is something of importance as we tend to overlook such means of assessing our students appreciation on values taught. By the same token, I liked the values cascaded along the 'Women of Distinction' moto that was upheld by CHIJ. The manner in which the values transcanded across curriculum and co-curriculum programmes in both CHIJ and Hai Sing Catholic was very impactful. Accoloades to both Hai Sing Catholic and CHIJ (Toa Payoh) on an impressive and meaningful presentation that all of us have learned from.
I definately agree with you. Infact, the similarity between CHIJ and Hai Sing Catholic in using the 'Know-Do-Be' vs 'Harvest-Sow-Cultivate' framework enabled values to eventually be translated through actions and works of students. What I like about one of the schools is the 'Crop Circle' concept or 'process driven integrated learning' as it was put. This allowed Values to be cascaded on the ground by teachers through a simplistic but yet effective manner - which I believe is done in all schools but now made succient. Also, the manner in which CHIJ and Hai Sing Catholic incorporated student leaders in values propagation is commendable. Good structures and guidance seen. All in all, it was a very good session.
Overall it was an enlightening session. Good insights particularly on how schools can sustain a Catholic values based culture despite the dwindling numbers of catholic students (and teachers). Thanks for the great session, Regina [CHIJ (Toa Payoh)] and Charles [Hai Sing Catholic].
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