STEAM Day by Mr Tovell

It has been a week since our 4th Annual St. Helen’s College STEAM day last Friday and the last week has afforded me time to reflect upon a day to be truly proud of.

In her first assembly of the year, Mrs. Drummond challenged the children to ‘be their very best selves’ and this could not have been more evident during the activities that staff, many parent helpers and  Susan O’Connor - author of the wonderful book Creative Genius Journal, which I highly recommend to parents of children of all ages - put on. Indeed, it is only due to the hard work, creativity and highly supportive and collaborative nature of the St Helen’s community that the children are given opportunities to excel and be their very best selves in days such as these. Activities in both the Lower and Upper school were engaging as well as challenging and included a Year 2 and 3 Nile crossing challenge and a Systems Thinking Workshop in Upper School; Kaleidoscopes and the spectacular Rocket Mice in Lower School.  Furthermore, it is the creative nature of our day to day curriculum that provides your children with the tools to excel when such challenges are posed to them. 

The children’s behaviour was exemplary, demonstrating wonderful collaboration skills, creativity, resilience and resourcefulness to overcome learning challenges. They were able to reflect upon their successes and targets to help them to tackle similar learning challenges in the future - and most importantly, they had FUN. I cannot stress enough how brilliant they were; they really are a credit to you all.

As Josh Valman, author of last week’s blog, stated ‘it is people working together who solve problems’ and based on what the staff witnessed, we may have some future changers of the world amongst us.

With outstanding learning taking place all over the school and the sun shining, it was wonderful to welcome our Prime Minister to our school as he got to see the very best of St. Helen’s College. He is a man of great importance and the children were thrilled that he took a genuine interest in their learning that day.

In the morning, I began my speech to the Upper School children with ‘I love this school’, and after a day of such spectacular success in both Lower and Upper School where the children really were their very best selves, those words ring all the more true today. 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Creative-Genius-Journal-resilient-differently/dp/1916497918