I am writing as a parent who has recently relocated to Singapore with two children — our son, 7 years old, and daughter, 4 years old — from Tokyo. Our son has struggled to navigate both the academic and social challenges — due to his low muscle tone, he has fine and gross motor challenges that can also affect his spatial reasoning. This leads to frustration, a lack of confidence and/or motivation that our son largely bottled up and kept to himself.
The support he received before our move to Singapore consisted of a one-on-one tutor and separate sessions with a play therapist and speech pathologist, for which he was taken out of class. What was especially challenging for us as parents was overseeing and coordinating his interventions, since we often lacked the adequate training or understanding that would allow us to advocate for our son, navigate, let alone strike the right balance between supporting him when he needed it, and encouraging independence and autonomy when he didn’t.
We found Winstedt through several recommendations, all of which seemed nearly too good to be true. But throughout the application and interview process, our expectations for a school with an integrated, comprehensive approach to supporting its students were consistently met by Winstedt. Beyond that, we were especially impressed by the emphasis on meeting each student’s needs through an individualized, tailored curriculum, as well as on teaching social emotional learning as part of the curriculum — it was this that ultimately convinced us to enrol our younger daughter in Winstedt as well.
The impact of Winstedt’s comprehensive approach has been immediate: from the very first day onward, our son’s disposition has been brighter, more positive, and engaged. Academically, he very quickly broke out of negative patterns when it came to confronting challenging school- or homework, and he now regularly uses vocabulary and strategies from his Social Emotional Learning classes to help him overcome his hesitation when faced with challenging assignments. He has gained a strong voice of his own, and doesn’t shy away from asking for help, at school and at home.
He and my daughter both receive consistent personal attention from their teachers, specialist teachers, and counselors who coordinate and collaborate closely and are also constantly in communication with us to share details about the challenges and achievements of our children. From what we see in our children’s weekly homework packets, it’s also clear that lessons and homework are specifically tailored to encourage their strengths and help them confront and overcome their weaknesses, without compromising on the academic expectations that are completely in line with their respective year groups.
Through our children, we have been getting to know and benefitting from the Winstedt approach every day — and it is in fact far from being too good to be true: backed by the latest evidence and research, it is thoroughly planned, then carefully and caringly implemented by specially trained teachers and staff. The results are astounding: our children are not just happier students – they are happier all around!