From the Principal Week 2 Term 2 2014

Dear Parents, Caregivers and Friends of the School,

Mālō e lelei!

Last week in assembly we spoke about our feelings.

It is easy for children to get the impression when young that their parents, their teachers, and God want them to be happy all the time, and that feelings of sadness, hurt or anger are bad or wrong or that they are signs of weakness. This is so far from the truth.

Feelings are important, and learning to notice them with kindness and to experience and communicate them well is an important part of growing up, even for us as adults. Jesus was disappointed and angry at times, and filled with grief at others, and the Bible does nothing to give us any impression other than that he was prepared to accept those feelings as legitimate. As the senior class studies Psalms this term, we realise that King David, known as a man after God’s heart, felt and expressed the whole range of negative feelings, and then managed to complete most of his poetic ‘rants’ with “And yet Lord I trust you”, “And yet Lord, you are good”, “And yet Lord, you can teach me…”

This week we have several people in our school community who have every reason to feel sad, hurt or angry. The Kimber children’s grandfather has been ill, and died last week. Mrs Armiger’s husband had his lower leg amputated last week. Mrs Holdsworth struggled with migraines last week. One of our mums needs another operation to remove a cancerous growth. Some of us have mums and dads who are feeling sick or hurt or angry and are not able to look after us as well as they would like to at the moment and so we live with foster parents or other members of our family so that we can be safer and happier.

It is OK in our school to feel hurt or sad or angry. And we are learning to be understanding of, and patient with, people who feel these feelings, and to talk about God about our feelings.

It is really great to see many of our learners beginning to realise that if someone is angry at them, it might not always be their fault. That person might be struggling with anger for a completely different reason. It is also great to see learners developing empathy and compassion. Finally, it is a joy to see previously defensive children beginning to acknowledge their inappropriate feelings and apologise to their friends and have a fresh start.

Two learner-directed initiatives this week:

1. They are organising to have a day each week in which they play games at lunchtime that allow their friends with disabilities to join in.

2. They are organising a mufti day to raise money for an organisation (that was started by two of our parents) that facilitates children in crisis to find supportive foster homes.

These ideas were completely student-initiated, and I think are cause for celebration at growing empathy, compassion, and an ability to realise that we can make a positive difference in the world.

We have two school-initiated learning opportunities this term:

1.  the Seasons course, in which a well-trained group of women from the Anglican church are, once again, providing activities and discussions to help children who have reason to feel loss or grief to understand and process some of their feelings.

2. Mr Watt reads “Gem of the First Water” to Year 5-8 learners each week and follows this with discussion about values arising from this excellent book.

Have a great week. We hope that you, too, as parents, feel part of a supportive community as you face the ups and downs of life.

Helen Pearson