|
|
Ambleside school is
centrally situated in the beautiful Hout Bay valley, 20
minutes from the Cape Town CBD, and offers a
Christ-centred education to a diverse student body, from
pre-school to Grade 9. Our fees are lower than most
other private schools, and we are committed to offering
the most affordable private education in the Southern
suburbs.
We offer small classes, enthusiastic teachers, minimal
homework in the junior grades and a varied extra-mural
program. Ambleside provides a broad and life-enriching
curriculum of inspirational and disciplinary subjects -
students are presented daily with idea-rich material
through direct encounter with literary living books and
living art, music, science, mathematics, geography,
history, language, nature and handwork. We strive to
offer our students the richest materials along with our
highest expectations of what they can accomplish.
Mission:
It is the mission of
Ambleside School of Hout Bay to provide a living
education, where each child is guided and empowered to
author a full and free life, a life rich in relationship
to God, self, others, ideas, and all of creation. Thus,
our primary concern is the kind of student each child is
becoming, not the mastery of particular data or
technique, for we are confident that the student who
masters the art of learning will attain his/her full
potential for mastering data and technique. Students who
master the art of relating well to God, self, others,
ideas, and creation will attain the fullness of life for
which they were created.
Our Faith
Ambleside School of Hout
Bay is affiliated to Hout Bay Church International
(which recognises the apostolic leadership of the New
Covenant Ministries International team). However, the
school as an institution is not committed to any
particular religious denomination. Ambleside School of
Hout Bay is committed to bearing witness to the person
and principles of Jesus Christ (as expressed in the New
Testament, the Nicene Creed, the Ambleside Charter, and
the Ambleside Code of Personal Conduct). School Board
members, staff and faculty are expected to affirm the
doctrine and live according to the norms of conduct
expressed therein.
While Ambleside School of Hout Bay has a definite
commitment to the person and principles of Jesus Christ,
it is not required that all Ambleside families fully
share these beliefs, only that they agree to be
respectful of the institutional commitment to them.
Parents should expect that their children will be taught
in accordance with these beliefs and teachings. Further,
Ambleside does not seek to suppress the theological
differences of her member families. Rather, we seek to
cultivate an atmosphere where mutual understanding and
agreeable disagreement are cultivated, respectfully
recognising that the primary responsibility for the
spiritual education of children lies with their parents.
Our Educational
Philosophy
In order to fulfil our
mission, Ambleside School of Hout Bay seeks the
consistent application of the pedagogical insights of
the British educator, Charlotte Mason (1840-1923).
Charlotte Mason did not claim to be an innovator, but
rather a compiler of the timeless, practical insights
into the nature of children and education, which have
guided the practice of great teachers throughout the
ages. Through the teacher training college she founded,
the hundreds of schools which adopted her methods, and
the voluminous publications of the Parents National
Education Union, thousands of students were shaped by
her ideas.
Charlotte Mason understood education to be an
atmosphere, a discipline (the training in habit), and a
life (the feeding upon living ideas). At Ambleside our
approach to education is guided by these fundamental
convictions.
|
