Character Building & Social Emotional Learning for Children

Located in Kennedy Town, Mighty Oaks is a trilingual nursery and kindergarten that emphasizes character building in children. The class activities at Mighty Oaks are designed around the nine moral values of the “fruit of the spirit” concept on which the school’s curriculum is based. “We are not a religious school, but we believe that these moral values are something that everyone should have. We want our children to conceptualize and apply the values of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control throughout their lives” says Livia Tang, principal of Mighty Oaks.

Livia was born in Hong Kong and raised in Canada. Prior to becoming principal of Mighty Oaks, Livia was a teacher at a well-known kindergarten in Hong Kong and the owner of a learning center. “My first job after graduation was actually not education-related. I first started teaching children when I was a teacher in a learning center in Kowloon Tong.” With her passion for teaching, Livia opened her own learning center and started to design the curriculum based on her belief that learning should be fun. “I always try to teach children in a more fun way so that it is not like something they do on a normal school day.”

Mighty Oaks’ curriculum is based on the United Kingdom’s Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) and the Canadian Full-Day Kindergarten Curriculum. “We first chose EYFS as the core curriculum to follow, not only because it is known as one of the world’s best paradigms for early years education, but also because it is a very solid curriculum that a lot of Hong Kong primary schools can support. We want our students to be well prepared for primary schools. Secondly, we chose the Canadian Full-Day Kindergarten Curriculum as we believe in their concept of how we start as an individual, then expand to the classroom, to the community, and eventually to society as a whole. Both the EYFS and Canadian Full-Day Kindergarten Curriculum fit our educational philosophy” says Livia.

On top of the core curriculum which provide the academic foundation, what sets the Mighty Oaks curriculum apart from others is the focus placed on character education and social emotional learning. Mighty Oaks is currently the only school in Hong Kong that runs the PATHS program, a social and emotional learning (SEL) curriculum from the United States.

“We truly believe that character education and social emotional learning are manifested academically as well. With a solid character education foundation, students will have better self-discipline and self-control, as well as the patience to learn. We want our students to be well-rounded so that they are able to control their emotions and be strong academically,” says Kimberly Kwok, director of Mighty Oaks.

By including character education and the SEL program as key components of the curriculum, Mighty Oaks teaches students how to manage their emotions and enhance social awareness, in addition to developing their critical thinking and problem-solving skills during the course of their daily learning. Though Mighty Oaks’ students have yet to graduate the kindergarten, feedback received from parents has been extremely positive and indicates that their curriculum is succeeding in allowing children to learn in a fun and happy way. Parents said that our whole team is very caring and support the children in different ways. Children feel very secured in our school and would like to come every day, even during holiday!

As a trilingual school, Mighty Oaks aims to provide students with a solid foundation in English and Chinese (both Mandarin and Cantonese). There are always two teachers, one Chinese teacher and one English teacher, in class at the same time. The teachers design class activities together to cover various subject areas such as language, math, and science – all based on a monthly theme.

A small teacher-student ratio is another key part of the Mighty Oaks learning environment. The maximum class size is 14 students, which allows teachers and students to build very close relationships. “Because we are not a big school, our teachers know every student. The smaller class size allows teachers to monitor each student’s learning progress and to identify their best way of learning” says Livia. She also stresses the importance of working in partnership with parents. “Our teachers work closely with parents too. We have high transparency for parents so that they know what is happening at school and get updates on their children’s learning process. We also give advice to parents on what they can do at home to make children’s learning consistent.” The consistency that comes from this home-school engagement ensures that children learn more effectively.

Mighty Oaks is currently the only private kindergarten in Hong Kong that offers scholarships to students. “We offer full scholarships for students from playgroup all the way to kindergarten. Every student can apply if they come from financially disadvantaged backgrounds. We want to offer help to lower income families and promote character education to every child,” says Livia. The school allocates 2 scholarships for every school year and have so far awarded scholarships to 3 students.

Throughout the academic year, Mighty Oaks offers professional training to teachers every month. Livia points out that professional development for teachers is essential, and ultimately beneficial to the children. Once teachers are trained, they are inspired and bring new elements to their daily teaching. In addition, regular curriculum meetings are held to ensure that the programme is up to date and improved continuously.

In order to cater to an increasing number of students, Mighty Oaks is planning to open their new playgroup campus next month. “Our school is expanding and we definitely need more space and classrooms to accommodate our growing student body. In the long term, we hope to open our primary school to promote character education and social emotional learning. However, at this stage, we would like more parents to come and try our classes to understand our curriculum and its effectiveness.” Parents are welcome to visit the Mighty Oaks campus and meet the teachers on the upcoming open day on Saturday May 12^th, 2018.

Mighty Oaks Summer Camp is now available! Purchase on Whizpa e-shop now: 2 Weeks Camp / 3 Weeks Camp / 4 Weeks Camp / 5 Weeks Camp

Give it a try for Mighty Oaks Sensory Acorn Class. Exclusive offer from Whizpa: Special Trial Class Packages at $200 for 2 classes

Find out what other parents say about Mighty Oaks