Patana News Volume 19 Issue 23 by Bangkok Patana School

Patana

NEWS

What Can We Learn from Drama? Page 2 Youngâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Double Slit Experiment

FOBISIA Sailing Champions

Bangkok Patana is an IB World School, accredited by CIS and NEASC

MUN

ast week I went to see the Senior Play, Shadow Girl, written and directed by one of our Secondary Drama teachers, Mr Paul Gatiss. I was amazed by the quality of the writing, and thrilled to see some of the younger Secondary students involved in this production – faces that were in Primary not too long ago. As I watched I could not help but think of all the skills that these students have learnt as a result of being involved in the production, which reminded me just how important Drama and role play are to our children’s learning.

themes; providing context and purpose for skills in Connected Learning. We have used drama techniques such as teacher in role, freeze frames, soundscapes and ‘mantle of the expert’ to help the students think analytically and engage with their learning on a deeper level.” Ms Emma Gardner, Leader of Learning and Curriculum, Year 3 “Drama has been used as an immersive tool creating meaningful and memorable themes across units of learning. It has made learning more relevant, engaging and led to deeper understanding.” Mr Matt Smith, Leader of Learning and Curriculum, Year 4 “We regularly use role-play in PSHE (Personal, Social, Health Education) to provide opportunities for the students to act out different scenarios, which helps them to empathise with others and to experience situations from different perspectives.” Ms Bryony Wilson, Leader of Learning and Curriculum, Year 5 “We have used ‘Text Maps” to encourage the students to act out a paragraph of text they have written, which really helps to bring their writing to life.” Ms Sarah Carritt, Leader of Learning and Curriculum, Year 6

Through Drama, we have the opportunity to develop real-world skills such as working collaboratively and empathy for others, as well as encouraging our students to improvise and problem solve. In the Primary School, we don’t see Drama as a distinct subject, but rather use it as a vehicle to enhance the learning in all subjects. In Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1, we use role-play on a daily basis to facilitate the exploration of our learning themes. Here are some of the ways we utilise Drama in Key Stage 2: “We have developed the use of our shared learning spaces to create a role play area to enhance our literacy and to drive the narrative of our learning

On March 15th and 16th next week, we will present our Primary Play, CreaTed. This will be a wonderful opportunity for some of our students to share their love of theatrical performance while expressing themselves and showing their confidence and public speaking skills, as well as their use of physical movement as a form of communication. I hope to see many of you at the performances in the Black Box next week.

ascinating updates are coming in regularly from Ms Thew and Year 10 student Rebecca as they participate in the International Antarctic Expedition with 2041 and Robert Swan. They have now crossed the tumultuous Drakeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Passage and have stepped foot onto the Antarctic Peninsular! There are lots of ways to see what theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re up to and follow their journey, simply click on the links below:

BangkokPatana2041.com

Firefly

BangkokPatana2041

@BPS2041

@Bps2041

Robert Swan

ately, the Student Environmental Committee’s ‘Energy’ group have been focusing on reminding people that we don’t need to constantly use lights and air conditioning throughout the day. Furthermore, during lunch and break times, we have been begun to check some of the Primary classrooms to make sure that each class has turned off their lights and air conditioning. Next week, we will distribute some ‘mini posters’ around classes and other rooms in the Primary and Secondary Schools reminding us all to switch off the lights and AC whenever it is unnecessary. Moreover, these posters will remind us all about how the electricity we use (which mostly comes from burning fossil fuels) affects the world’s climate, including Antarctica where wildlife suffers with climate change. We believe that while Rebecca and Ms Thew are visiting Antarctica, we should all be doing our bit to take action here at school. If we all take the small steps to switch off electricity when it isn’t needed, we can greatly reduce the energy the school uses each day. Consequently, this will help the school with one big, greener and cleaner step to the future. Please join us by taking small steps to help our school become more sustainable.

he increasingly popular sport of Sailing took centre stage last week as the FOBISIA Sailing Championships took place at Royal Varuna Yacht Club in Pattaya. This year’s event saw teams entered from Bangkok Patana, Shrewsbury and Harrow. Despite being fewer schools competing this year than last, the competition has certainly developed and improved, which lead to an entertaining and challenging competition for all sailors. Sailing is a sport that holds a lower profile for many students compared to other sporting activities so here’s a little a competition guide for those of you wondering how it works… The competition is made up of three different events; Individual Optimist Sailing, Helm and Crew RS Vision Sailing and RS Quba Team Sailing. Each event has overall winners and the placing in each event then contributes to the overall scores to see who is crowned FOBISIA champions. Optimist boats are small, single-handed sailing dinghies with one sail. In this event sailors between 8 and 15 years of age compete against each other. Each placing counts as points and the aim is to have the lowest points at the end of ten races. For example, finishing first in all races has an overall score of 10—this would be the lowest score possible and therefore the sailor would finish in first overall. In this year’s Optimist sailing category, the Tigers’ fielded three students from very different Year groups: M.L. Weka Bhanubandh (Year 5), Christopher Marsh (Year 6) and Jade Gavin (9W). All of the Bangkok Patana sailors were very competitive and in the final few races of the event it became a close fight between our sailors for first, second and third placings. In the end, experience came through with Jade taking first overall in

this category. A special mention to both Christopher and Weka who, even being youngest competitors of the races, managed third and second placings. These two are definitely ones to watch for the future! This larger boat is designed for two adult sailors, a Helm and one crewmember. Due to the size of this boat, teams were made of four students; one helm and three crewmembers. These teams were made up of our older sailors and the event was open to students up to the age of 18. Again, in this event each team competed against each other. Each placing counting as points with the aim to have the lowest points at the end of ten races. In this year’s RS Vision sailing category we fielded two teams; Team 1 made up of Joanne Gavin (Year 11), Alessandro Miotto (Year 11), Alexander Han (Year 12), Gabe McCartan (Year 6) and Team 2 with Far Vernon (Year 9), Philippe Ledoit (Year 12), Peter Pakdeejit (Year 7) and Aim Lisahapanya (Year 8). Both boats competed extremely well over the 10 races with Team 1 taking first place and a third place finish for Team 2. Team racing is probably the most exciting of all sailing events due to the tactics that teams can use to win a race. At FOBISIA each team had three boats that compete in a race against three boats from another school. The idea is that your team’s three boats finish in a better combination of positions that the other teams. It sounds simple…sail fast get to the finish line first, but in this race if you have one boat in first place and another two in fifth and sixth that is a losing combination. The racing gets exciting when the sailor occupying first place uses tactics to slow down boats from the other team to bring the fifth and sixth place boats back into the race.

Over the three days, the Tigers’ took part in 20 races against the other schools with Bangkok Patana finishing second overall in the round robin series. In the final (a best of three races event) against Shrewsbury, Patana won 2-1 to claim first place in the team racing. A special mention goes to the mixed Bangkok Patana and Shrewsbury team who managed to take a fantastic third position overall. After such success across all events, the Tigers took first place overall and were crowned this year’s FOBISIA champions drawing to an end this academic years’ sailing schedule. The team are always looking for more sailors, whether you have sailed or not before, keep your eyes open for notices next year about the 2017/18 season of sailing events.

abitat For Humanity’s campaign days, held last week, centered around the core principles of its cause - community, collaboration, and fun! Students from all Year groups came to the Lounge to participate in the activities offered by one of Bangkok Patana’s biggest clubs. One of the games at the stall was to build a house out of Jenga blocks under time pressure. It served as a small simulation of the annual Habitat Build trip, where volunteers build a home in three days for an underprivileged family. Participants were rewarded with one of Habitat’s new stickers, designed by a member of the club.

Students visiting the stall were also encouraged to share their responses to the prompt: “What does HOME mean to you?” Many expressed their love for their family, gratefulness for a roof over their heads, and described the feeling of being in a familiar environment. A house symbolises warmth, family, and safety. Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a home, something most of us take for granted. Habitat for Humanity's campaigns aim to fund the annual trip, during which a house is built for underprivileged people. If community, kindness and service are values you uphold, support Habitat For Humanity at our various events, or join the club and be a part of our family! Chavisa Boonpiti, 12P

I would like to thank all of the CATs for their contributions to Fun Day 2017. The stalls looked amazing and the activities were entertaining and fun. Well done to Habitat for Humanity, Hand 2 Heart, Patana Animal Welfare Society, Project Star, Spectrum, The Mercy Centre, Playing 4 Change, Patana Marine Conservation Group, STOP, Amnesty, World Food Project, Lets Erase The Stigma and the SEC for all of your dedication and hard work.

welve intrepid delegates have just spent three days in heated debate at the International School of Yangon. The SEASAC Model United Nations (MUN) conference was a great success and all of the delegates from Bangkok Patana acquitted themselves excellently. Topics ranged from LGBT rights and automation as the cause of unemployment to the Boxer rebellion in China and modern day slavery.

ear 12 Physics students were again utilising the excellent blackout facility that all of our five Physics labs are equipped with, to conduct an experiment to determine the wavelength of laser light. In the experiment a laser is aimed at a black slide which has two adjacent and very narrow slits (the â&#x20AC;&#x153;Youngâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Double Slitâ&#x20AC;? experiment). The light that passes through one slit interferes with light from the other slit and a characteristic interference pattern of bright fringes separated by dark bands is produced on the whiteboard. You can see students taking measurements of the fringe spacing from these patterns. The slit spacing and the distance from the slits to the whiteboard also need to be measured so that the wavelength of the laser light can be calculated. Students then experimented with how using red, green and violet lasers changes the results.

University / College

Representative

Location

EDHEC Business School

Senior Studies, Second Floor

13.03.17

12:15

Les Roches and Glion International School of Hotel Management

Simon Phillips

Senior Studies, Second Floor

14.03.17

12:15

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology -

Senior Studies, Second Floor

14.03.17

12:15

The University of Manchester

Fran Haliwell

Senior Studies, Second Floor

14.03.17

12:15

UK Universities Application Day

Pathumwan Princess Hotel, Bangkok 15.03.17