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Over and under, over and
under sixteen thousand times
The line of children playing
tunnel ball stretches to the horizon.
Andrew Ingram, Primary School Teacher
Over and under, over and under sixteen thousand times. This was the
Regent’s Primary School’s attempt at securing a place in the Guinness Book
of World Records.
On Thursday May 3rd, 2012, 125 primary school children ranging in age from 8
to 11 attempted to break the Guinness World Record for the world’s largest
game of Tunnel Ball.
Tunnel ball “athletes”
anxiously watch as the ball makes it way towards them.
The record attempt day was only a small part of the whole
process. 23 children from a number of different age groups took
responsibility for the organising of the event, which included contacting
media outlets, promoting the event around school and preparing the location
for the event.
Mind, a year 5 student who took part and helped organise the attempt said,
“I never knew how much hard work it took to organise an event on this scale;
everyone involved should be very proud.”
No, it’s not Songkran; it’s a
teacher making sure the students don’t overheat.
Regent’s Primary were attempting to beat the previous
record, set in 2008 by St Columba School in Australia, of 120 children.
The school reached out to local businesses and companies to help make the
event a success. The Pullman Hotel, Pattaya, continued to support the area’s
local children with a very generous donation of drinks in order to help
combat the heat and ensure that the children were hydrated throughout their
attempt, which lasted well over 6 hours.
The whole event was a part of the Regent’s Primary’s ‘Round Square Week’,
where children throughout the school have an opportunity to challenge
themselves and develop life skills linked to the 6 Round Square IDEALS.
Once it reaches the end, a
youngster makes a mad dash back to the front of the line.
One of the teachers involved in leading the event, Colm
Rowan, claimed the event was not only beneficial to the children organising
it but everyone who was connected with the school: “Adults and children must
have high expectations of what they can achieve within life and within
school. Challenging the children to break a World Record, whether they are
successful or not, will show that with a combination of determination and
hard work any goal can be attained. Only those who reach for the stars will
eventually become one.”
Although the game is a playground favourite, to enter the Guinness Book of
World Records a strict procedure must be followed to prove the event was
successful. The school also needed to have individuals from the local
community present to verify the attempt had been successful. The pupils and
staff at the Regent’s will have to wait for up to 8 weeks until they find
out whether or not the attempt has been successful and whether they can
claim their place in the history of World Records.
Hip, hip, hooray! We did it!
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Super-talented musicians impress at Garden’s Spring Concert
Students excitingly joining in
the Scottish dance being accompanied by the school Ceilidh Band.
Mark Beales
Garden’s super-talented musicians impressed a packed audience with
their Spring Concert.
The GIS Spring Concert and Ceilidh was held in the main hall and began with
the school choir singing HM’s the King’s Anthem, followed by a performance
by the Yr 10 IGCSE Music group of ‘Soul Limbo’ (better known as the BBC’s
cricket theme). After the orchestra performed a Basse Dance and Gopak, the
flute group staged an intricate jazz medley.
The popular ukulele band plays
an impressive three-chord megamix of songs from different decades.
Several Yr 7s then played ‘Water Come To Me Eye’, and
then the school’s jazz band made their debut with ‘Town With an Ocean View’.
The popular ukulele band played an impressive three-chord megamix of songs
from different decades, and then the Yr 8 group reminded everyone of the
school’s sell-out musical Mama Mia, with their version of Super Trouper,
which was sung by Praw.
The first half ended with the choir returning to the stage for two more
songs - Lullaby and Cee Lo Green’s hit Forget You.
Mr. Andrew Gordon leads the
Scottish dance.
After the break, the hall was transformed into a dance
room. The Ceilidh Band then led several traditional dances, with senior
students stepping in with several performances to give dancers a well-earned
rest.
Well done to the Music Department, the performers and everyone who helped
make the evening such a success.
The splendid rendition of HM’s
the King’s Anthem by the school choir.
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Growing, tasting and learning all about food at St Andrews School
Alex learns to plant rice in
our Thai lesson.
Jane Thompson, Early Years Coordinator, St Andrews
International School
The children in Reception (5 year olds) are really enjoying their
unit: ‘Food’. In the classroom there are some new exciting role-play areas.
There is a European-style restaurant and a Thai beach restaurant with mats
and a variety of local Thai cooking pots.
The children have answered questions in the ‘Entry Interview’, demonstrating
a good understanding about what are healthy foods and unhealthy foods. Our
next steps will be to learn more about the different foods groups and find
out where food comes from. We will be inviting our parents into class to
help us share knowledge and taste some favourite foods from our different
home countries.
The children are enjoying being ‘risk-takers’, tasting different foods and
saying which they like best. They have recorded their preferences on whole
class and individual charts which is developing their ability to represent
and record information in a variety of ways.
In their Thai lesson the children were very excited to plant rice which
after only one week has already begun to sprout!
There have also been many creative art opportunities as the children studied
the different beautiful shapes and patterns found on the fruits and
vegetables of Thailand. The unit will culminate with the children’s
creativity being shown off to parents and other students at the Early Years
Art Exhibition.
Justin explores the oven
gloves in the pretend kitchen.
Calliope works out how to use
the role-play till.
Children investigate fruit
shapes and record ideas.
Jenny counts and records her
set of fruits.
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Dusit Thani College finds
success in Pattaya
A school chef prepares to show
off the cooking demonstration room.
Manoon Makpol
With nearly 800 hotels and guesthouses within its boundaries, Pattaya has
proven to be a successful location for Dusit Thani College.
Nearly a year after opening on Sukhumvit Road near Mini Siam, the
hotel-management school opened in June 2011 by hotel operator Dusit
International now has dozens of students in each of its three degree-level
programs.
At a May 3 open house, college administrators showed off its three
buildings, which include lecture classrooms, a demonstration kitchen,
practical kitchen, bakery, bartending room, practical restaurant, student
canteen, library, and language laboratory. Reporters also baked cookies.
A satellite of Bangkok’s Dusit Thani College, the Pattaya branch offers
three degree programs: Bachelor of Business Administration in Hotel and
Resort Management, Bachelor of Business Administration in Culinary Arts, and
Bachelor of Business Administration in MICE and Events Management.
The college has 30-40 in each of its programs, hailing from Thailand as well
as China, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, the Philippines, South Korea and
the United States.
At the branch’s opening last year, Dusit International CEO Chanin Donavanik
said the company chose Pattaya, “Because of the existence of many
international hotel chains, including our two properties located here, Dusit
Thani Pattaya and dusitD2 baraquda. This is a distinct advantage that will
provide our students with great opportunity for training and working in the
field.”
A modern classroom where
student chefs learn the tricks of the trade.
Students gain their textbook
knowledge in modern classrooms.
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Our CAS Project and Organic Farming
Regent’s visitors at Adams
Organic farm.
Hugh Jenkins
At the start of Year 12 a few of us decided that we would like to become
involved in the Gold Fish Garden that was just starting up. Myself, Boss
Sutheeissariyakun and Harry Mun thought we could make our participation in
the garden an after-school activity; our CAS project for the year as the
garden offered us opportunities to be Creative, do Action and also be of
Service.
We started in the first term and have learnt a lot about setting up a
vegetable garden in school! We have found that it’s rather hard work being a
gardener and that there are quite a lot of vegetables that are very
delicious to the numerous bugs and pests that infiltrate the garden.
We’ve had some success with herbs such as dill and basil and our first crop
of tomatoes was also plentiful. Our chilli plants are going well but the
garlic and eggplant are not. It’s important that we try and stay organic as
we believe that food which is grown without having been sprayed with
pesticides, or even ‘organic’ pesticides, is better for us.
We heard through Regent’s Eco Committee of an organic farm in Nakhon
Ratchasima province that was supplying vegetables to an international school
in Bangkok. A visit was planned and Boss and I, along with two teachers and
three Thai admin staff, left early last Saturday for the five hour journey
to the farm.
The business is called Adams Organic and we were fortunate to be able to
meet with one of the managers, Tim Chung, whose family owns the business. We
met Tim and his wife at a restaurant about 11km from the farm where we were
told the history of the farm.
Adams Organic has been established for 2 years though the farm has been
around for over 10 years growing organic vegetable seeds prior to fresh
vegetable production. The parent company, Adams Enterprises Ltd., has been
operating in Thailand as a vegetable seeds producer since the 1980s. It was
started by Tim’s grandfather, and now is looked after by Tim’s uncle.
The mission of Adams Organic is to promote the organic lifestyle to the
public as well as promoting organic/sustainable farming practice to local
farmers. The farm we visited is about 70 rai in total but we were told that
at the moment they may only be utilizing half of the fields for production.
We set off in our minibus with Tim and his wife to the farm and were met by
Khun Sopon who is the local manager of the farm. He gave us a very extensive
tour of the farm, showing us the processes they use to grow the seedlings in
their greenhouses as well as composting and measures and tips on how to keep
insects and other pests away from the plants.
There were about 10-15 workers doing the field work and another 10 or so
helping with the cleaning and packing of vegetables. At this farm they were
growing butternut squash, varieties of tomatoes and lettuces. We also saw
the workers packing cabbages that had been brought from one of their farms
in Laos.
Adams Organic vegetables are sold in Pattaya at Foodland but also in other
supermarkets in Bangkok. We had a very enjoyable and interesting day and
hope we can implement some of the ideas we learnt and the advice we were
given at Adams Organic, in the Gold Fish Garden. On our way home we were
able to stop at Chokchai Farm for some delicious ice cream!
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