Trips&Expeditions
By: Mr. Cal, G8 WWW 2016 Team Leader During the third week of November, all MYP students engaged in a Week Without Walls. We took the grade eights to Hua Hin, and what an amazing trip it was. The purpose of this trip was to engage students in service learning, specifically for the Community Project and to have a week that focused on physical activity. Our first stop was to Wang Klai Kang Won School to learn how they broadcast to over seven thousand schools in Thailand. We got to experience a music class and some students and teachers got to sing on national TV! We checked into our hotel and very quickly headed to the beach for some fun team building games. On Tuesday and Wednesday, we split into two groups. One group went on a Hua Hin beach bike tour. This was a beautiful bike ride along the coastal road followed by a walk around the beach cove. The second group went to The WFFT wildlife rescue center, located in Cha Am. This is a center for injured, confiscated and neglected wild animals. The wildlife rescue center operates a fully equipped wildlife hospital, and the staff there care for monkeys, gibbons, wild cats, bears, birds, reptiles and even an elephant. We had the privilege of volunteering for the center and learning about how to protect animals in Thailand. It was hard to say which tour was more enjoyable, but I think the volunteering work at the WWF was harder work! On Thursday, we chose team building activities at Cha Am market which we challenged students to buy team costumes for under five hundred baht before we enjoyed the day at Black Mountain Water Park. All students were risk-takers as they battled the obstacle course and swam in the giant wave pool.
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With such an enjoyable week, our students chose to have a themed talent party. We all danced, performed and laughed endlessly. We had one final stop on Friday at Khao Luang Cave. As always, the monkeys we saw were ready to steal our food and cameras! It is difficult to say what part of the trip was the students’ favourite, but it could just be down to the new friendships that were made and how we truly did have an amazing time.
Trips&Expeditions
By: Best and Andra, Grade 8 Throughout the Grade 8’s Week Without Walls trip to Hua Hin during the 21st to 25th of November 2016, the most enjoyable and memorable moment was taking part in team building activities at Black Mountain Water Park. There were a total of five activities which required the skills “Collaboration and Communication”, which were essential in completing all the challenges successfully as a group. Finishing a task individually is one thing, but including everyone in the team and completing a task together is a whole different challenging situation. It was just more difficult to accomplish. These ATL skills are constantly repeated at Concordian to emphasize their importance. After experiencing these team building activities, students started to realise that these skills play an important role in our lives in school projects, sports or even simple everyday activities. These valuable experiences can only be gained through these sort of activities. Despite all the obstacles to overcome, no one let the challenges get in the way of their fun. Everyone had wide smiles and were bursting with cheery laughter from all the activities; taking it all lightly with not a hint of stress. Everyone felt knackered by the end of the day, and it was a moment worth remembering.
The WWW was fun. It was very interesting. Getting together with my friends for a week to do activities in order to get closer to each other was great fun. I learned that even if you are the best of friends, this would still benefit your friendship. The water park was also fun. The water was refreshing. Au (G8D) The most interesting part of the trip was when we did the activities on the last day because it’s very fun to see my classmates present. I learned about the monkeys at the animal rescue center. I think the waterpark was the most enjoyable. Non (G8D)
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For this year’s Week Without Walls, we went to Hua Hin to enjoy the beautiful beach scenery. We went to the beach on the first few days and did lots of exciting activities. On the last night of WWW, we got to buy something’s from the market and used it to participate in our group activities. It was fun!! Prince (G8D)
Trips&Expeditions
It was interesting how fast time flies when we are doing activities with our friends. I think that I enjoyed the waterpark and the team building activities the most because we had to work together to complete each task. I learned that teamwork is very important in some activities. I also learned that some wild animals from WWFT can be very cute and it kind of remind me of my dogs and chickens that can fly! Tangkwar (G8D) For WWW, we went to Hua Hin. We did a lot of fun activities and we learned many things from the trip. The most interesting and fun thing that we did was bike riding. The weather was very good and the view was very beautiful, perfect for bike riding. Gring (G8D) WWW helped me to get to know my friends more, especially when were at the water park. At the water park, we were able to help each other and communicate. We had a lot of fun there. Tootee (G8D)
I went to an animal foundation, and I learned a lot of fun things about the animals’ life and food. I have to help prepare the food for the animals, which I’ve learned a bit about on previous occasions. I also went to the beach and helped clean the beach. I saw lots of jellyfish along the shores. The last night was the most fun because there were lots of games and parties. I had a lot of fun. Gungging (G8D) Over the course of the WWW trip, I learned and noticed learning is so much more than memorization and classroom learning. The WWW trip was all about gaining experience from biking and learning about animal abuse. WWW was interesting since the trip was really flexible; we were adjusting certain things to our biking. Overall, it was a really pleasant experience. Oki (G8D) 42 CONCORDIAN
Trips&Expeditions
During the Week Without Walls, there were many fun and interesting things I observed. What I found to be the most interesting would be the time when we went to meet the fishermen and asked them several questions. I learned that most of the fisherman in these areas suffered from the pollution in the sea due to the waste from industrial factories around the ocean that killed huge amount of sea animals. This pollution also turns the seawater to a brown and murky color. The combination of these pollutions make it a lot more difficult for them to fish and make money. We are very fortunate to not need to be concerned about whether we’ll have a meal to eat today or not. Fahsai (G8D)
CONCORDIAN
During the WWW trip, one of the most interesting activities was the activities portion itself. We conducted these activities ourselves on the day before our WWW trip ended. We played charades. participated in mannequin challenges, musical chairs and all those other activities that make your heart skip a beat. The activities were all so exciting and thrilling since they were created by us, the 43 G8s. I can feel the effort put into the activities from all the Grade 8s when playing those games. Jet’aime (G8D)