Monday, May 30, 2011

The youth of today

Here's an observation for you. How often do we tend to sit and judge young people today? We think that their impetuousness, rudeness and failure to follow rules is unique to our generation. Were we any better? Apparently not. Look at these quotes and then check out the date:

"I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on the frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words. When I was a boy, we were taught to be discrete and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise and impatient of restraint.” Hesiod 700BC

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers." Socrates 460BC

"The world is passing through troublous times. The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they knew everything, and what passes for wisdom with us is foolishness with them. As for the girls, they are forward, immodest and unladylike in speech, behavior and dress."

Who wrote that, and when do you think it was written?... it is an extract from a sermon preached by Peter the Hermit in A.D. 1274!

I have a lot of faith in the youth of today and take for example the group of students that coordinated 2,000 fellow students within 24 hours to help with the Christchurch Earthquake. They had to cordinate and arrange luches for these students and they did it in a 24 hour time span, pretty amazing really.




Boys in maths


Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Rugby shirt designs

These are some of the winning designs for Sundays design competition.
Note some of the earthquake and tsunami designs.







Sunday, May 22, 2011

Boys on a wet Sunday

These photos were taken within 10minutes of each other.







Dayboy Service

It was lovely to have so many day boy parents at the service this morning.

I hope everyone enjoyed the sermon about dealing with difficult times in our lives and having faith. I used Eric Clapton's song about losing his four year old son to illustrate how he used faith to heal himself.  Tears in heaven is the song.



Friday, May 20, 2011

Scootering at Huntley Term 2 2011

As you can see the boys have been having a ball on their scooters!

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Basic Facts

How fast are you? Here is a typical speed test. As a parent you should be able to do it in less than 4 minutes. My time was 2.29. The best boy in my class was 2.10 so I have a little work to do.


SHOE cleaning competition

Today in assembly we had a shoe cleaning competition as a fun way of getting boys to clean their shoes. The competition was won by the Polish Polishers.

Max buffs like mad for the Brittish Buffers
The boys are in Mufti today to support Hawke's Bay flood victims

Thursday, May 12, 2011

Shooting Club Starts

Eight boys came to smallbore rifle club. Constable Alan Wright took them for a safety briefing with the help of Mr Gower. The boys were amazed at how small the targets were. They are all trying to beat my 96.3 score.




Sunday, May 8, 2011

Huntley Cycling!


Huntley cycling marketing team!! Team came third out of 26 teams in 160km Manawatu Classic. Old boys Bryce Hirschberg, Jamie Gillespie(Not Andrew Gillespie, he's still young. Current boy Darren Hirschberg.

Jack Kinder in the NZ Polo cross team in Albury Austrailia

Welcome back to term 2

Welcome back to term 2. We are looking forward to having the boys back on Sunday evening.  On Friday we had a very successful staff development day. Two significant initiatives have been planned for on this day. The first is the development of a peer mathematics programme developmented by Mr McAlley called Buddy Maths. As parents will be aware we have been conscious of improving the basic core numeracy concepts within the school. Something the numeracy project seems not to be helping boys with.
We also had Carol Lynch from Tim White and Associates come and do a session on effective teacher observations. This is to help stregthen our school professional development model based on teacher inquiry. This year our key focus is on comprehension strategies and follows on well from last years focus on vocabulary.

This term a number of boys will be looking forward to our tour to Hamilton to play Southwell School.

Year 7 plays will be another highlight to look forward to.

Remember that the Open Day is on next Sunday and as such all boys are expected on this day. It is a non leave weekend for boarders until after the Open Day when they can have a free leave for the afternoon.

I wish all the mums a happy mothers day as I sit in my duck hide contemplating a lack of ducks. Amazing thing mobile technology.

Warm regards,
Brad Gay