I want to begin this newslet ter by offering public thanks to a number of individuals whose ongoing support has been at the forefront of my mind in recent weeks.
Firstly, I would like to give a very public thanks to Emilia Vidot, the school Chairperson for the last 5 years and Secretary for 7 years before that. Emilia is stood down at the recent AGM as her association membership concludes. Emilia was a major driving force in setting up the school and has offered amazing support to the school manage ment team throughout her tenure. The whole school community should be very grateful to her for all she has done. Our school is a better place thanks to her.
You will have also read in both the Nation and Today Newspapers a recent message of thanks from the school to Mr Vijay Patel. As most people know, Vijay Construc tion faces uncertainties at present and we wished to show our solidarity and support to Mr Patel and Vijay Construction at this time.
In spite of the difficulties he faces, Mr Patel recently supported the school with a sizeable donation and continues to offer intfrastructural support with recent retiling of the Year 5 classroom and the laying of a new power cable to the sports hall. We continue to be grateful for all the hard work of Vijay Construction.
VISP students continue to perform very well in the Australian Mathmatics Competition and this year secured the school’s best ever results.
The AMC is an international contest held annually each September which stu dents opt to participate in. On average, 600,000 students globally take part each year.
26 students from VISP took part this year, with 10 of them receiving the highest grade, a Distinction, which is only given to students who come in the top 20% for their age group. Well done to Amber Labuschagne, Grace Weaver, Ved, Slok and Stuti Vithani, Berachah Porpatham, Lishad Morgan and Phin Samraj who all scored this highest grade. In particular, well done to Grace and Ved, both of whom came in the top 10% for their age globally.
Look out for entry forms for the 2021 event, which will be sent home shortly before the long holiday in July. The competition is a great way to improve maths skills and compete with students around the world.
In homage to our status as global citizens, Signpost Club aims to celebrate our truly international school with a physical monument displaying all the countries represented by both staff and students. What started off as a year 7 Geography lesson last year – using atleses to work out scale distances grew into a maths project working out the 3 figure-bearings in relation to Praslin. We are now in the exciting stage of bringing our signpost designs to life, with a view to assemble the final piece in 2021. We have extended the club to all of KS3 and, at the rate we are going, will be calling upon KS4 students to offer their expertise and a chance to contribute to a piece of VISP history
As October has come and gone, the imminent excitement for the annual Halloween Non-Uniform day could be felt throughout the school for the former part of the month. Whether it was the hushed plotting of Hallow een outfits, or the moulding of pros thetics to cause spine-chilling frights, it could not be denied that students across Vijay were anxiously awaiting the day to fully express their creativity.
In spite of the absence of a fair this year, due to COVID restrictions the anticipation and excitement for the non-uniform day rippled throughout the school, with each student counting down the days and anticipating the creative costumes their fellow friends would show up in. Although this Halloween is different from previous ones, it did not stop Vijay Students from having a great time full of scares on October 30th.
Toddlers were running at an all time fast speed, playing ecstatically with their friends in their attire with the atmosphere undoubtedly filled with euphoric cheers and a sense of familial bliss. All of this fun was topped off with a sugar filled bake sale at the end of the day, putting the cherry on top, to end a tremendously pleasureable day amongst our Vijay family. Members of the PTA along with some students were more than happy to lend a helping hand in bringing a joyus end to our restricted festivities.
It’s not often you get asked to “Fly by the seat of your pants”.
However, for Calvin, Nelza, Shajini and Thierry in Year 11, that’s exactly what they were invited to do. Our four students, accompanied by Mr House, went to the Vallée de Mai to do a presentation about “What life is like in the Seychelles” to sev eral schools in America and Canada via a ZOOM call. They discussed the geography and climate of the Seychelles, the culture and the sites of interests and what it’s like to live on an island. They were followed by students from Grande Anse Secondary School who spoke about the Vallée de Mai, our UNESCO world heritage site.
After their fantastic presentations, with the help of Mr House, Maria Brioche and her team in the Vallée de Mai, they fielded question after question from the curious American and Canadian students covering topics such a “How was the Seychelles formed?”, “What is a coral reef” and “What are the native species of birds and plants in the Seychelles?”.
It was a great experience, and the students enjoyed the opportunity to engage with students from the other side of the world.
This term, Early Childhood has had great fun learning the story ‘We’re Going On A Bear Hunt’. They have followed and joined in the family’s excitement as they waded through the grass, splashed through the river and squelched through the mud in search of a bear! The children have enjoyed learning about different bears, going on a bear hunt around the school and they especially loved creating their bear hats for our Teddy Bear’s Picnic!
In art we have been looking at the work of Henri Rousseau who painted jungles (even though he never visted one). In one of his paintings, he featured a tiger in the forefront. In a guided drawing session we learnt how to draw tigers.
As part of a topic on Rainforests, children from Year 3 visted the Vallee de Mai for the day. In the morning they engaged with a presentation where they learnt about the different layers of a rainforest and used their prediction skills to decide what layer different animals would live in and why. The children then went on a walk around the Vallee where they were asked to record the many different types of animals and plants that they saw. In the the afternoon, they went to a different part of the Vallee to do some bird watching where they learnt how to use binoculars to see things that are far away.
Year 5 student Aneshka Venkara, recently placed 2nd in the world in an online short story competition. The story, titled ‘A Lesson Learnt’ was published on www.kidsworldfun.com It is so good, we wanted to include it in full in this newsletter, well done Aneshka!
A Lesson Learnt
Once, there was a small, unkept and rather poor village. Houses there were made out of stone, and wood. They were very worn down, and could collapse at any second. People had to work hard to feed themselves, and no money could be wasted. In this tiny village, was a young teenager, named Harriet. She lived in a wooden hut, with her old grandma. Harriet had dreamed to move to a bigger city, where there was much cooler stuff, but, atlas, she never even visited those cities even for a brief moment.
It was now the summer holidays and all of Harriet’s friends have left off for a long vacation in the big cities. Last summer, her friends told her some heart racing stories of their expedition, in those cities. Then, there was Harriet, who was bored all summer long, and couldn’t even go to the nearest city for a moment.
Harriet gloomily walked into the hut, and collapsed onto the muddy brown couch. “Are you okay, dear?” Her grandma finally asked. “No!’ Harriet burst out. “My friends are all taking trips to other cities, even countries, and I’m stuck in this place!” Har riet’s Grandma was startled. “Harriet,” She began. Immediately, Harriet interrupted. “I’m going to my room!” she then bolted towards her room.
This argument had carried on for weeks, until one day, Harriet woke up. She padded outside to look at the golden, glistening sun raising over the horizon, to stand firm and tall against the ocean blue sky.
Soon after, her grandma came outside. She went over to stand near Harriet, “Listen, Harriet.” She announced. “See look at the sky,” she began. “Isn’t it beautiful? When you’re in the big cities, you won’t see that. Look at the beach, isn’t it marvelous? You won’t find that in a city, would you?” just then, a few wolf cubs could be spotted at the end of the village. “See those wolf cubs? Aren’t they just so magnificent? I don’t think you would find them crawling around a big city, would you?” her gran explained, before going
The Year 9 students were inspired by Impressionist artist, Vincent Van Gough for their half term assessment. They were first introduced to his works of art as part of the unit covering Impressionism art. They dissected two of his more popular pieces “Boats on the Beach” and “Starry Night” focusing on three important elements: The brush strokes, mood of the work and colour choices.
They went out to the beach by the school to sketch out the initial concepts of the boats out on the water. They then proceeded to do their draft pieces at home, which had to include local boats, sunsets or skyscapes and seascapes of Praslin and recreate Van Gough’s pieces in their own styles.
Their final pieces were done in a controlled exam; where they chose their own media and materials to create beautiful masterpieces inspired by not only Van Gough but by the picturesque sky and seascapes of Seychelles.