Happiness Hamsters

9th September 2016

September for us is rather like the New Year in January for others where resolutions are made and the thrill of the new academic year is celebrated with discussion in the classroom and in assemblies about expectations and eager anticipation.  ‘Going up’ into a new year is always an exciting event.  The children love to remind me that they are ‘now at the top of the school in Year 2’ or no longer in Nursery ‘ but a big Reception boy!’ The Staff love to see the children that were once so tiny and apprehensive move up with all the confidence gained over their school years and suddenly become ready to confidently speak in public, ring the school bell, add up their own Housepoints or just look after others as they were looked after before.

So much is written about the priorities that schools should uphold but here at St Christopher’s our priorities are to promote happiness, security and education. My heart goes out to parents when they are criticised in the media for placing progress above happiness as priority number one at school or for when they are referred to as ‘Tiger Parents’ for wanting the best for their child.  The whole school community share our targets of happiness, security and education.  Without happiness and security learning is compromised and without the desire to educate we become a very expensively redundant set of super-qualified individuals. Our drive and indeed reason for coming to work each day is the strong ambition is to offer irresistible learning opportunities through the provision of exceptional lessons and experiences.

Our theme this year is the agenda of happiness.  We have some beautiful, laminated ‘Happiness Hamsters’ for children (and staff) who bring happiness to others. Awards have been made already and others are hoping to earn this special award which is going to bring me a huge amount of happiness this term to everybody, especially me!

Annie Thackray