IGB International School Newsletter, Issue 43, Week 3, June 2015

IGB International School’s Weekly Newsletter - Issue 43, Week 3, June 2015

Parent Volunteer Organization’s Class Representatives receiving their thank you gift.

Inside this week’s Newsletter Message from Head of School Mrs. Anne Fowles, Head of School

News from Elementary School Mrs. Claire McLeod, Elementary School Principal

News from Secondary School Mr. Lennox Meldrum, Secondary School Principal

Upcoming Events 20th - 24th July 2015 Summer School Programme 27th - 31st July 2015 Summer School Programme Friday, 14th August 2015 Student Registration and Orientation Monday, 17th August 2015 First Day of School

Office hours during school holidays: 8.00am - 4.00pm Monday - Friday

Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives

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Message from Head of School Mrs. Anne Fowles Head of School Dear IGBIS Parents and Community Members, What a fantastic end to a fabulous school year. The end of year assemblies and awards were wonderful culminating events. Congratulations to all of the students who received awards.

One of the harder things about the last days of school are farewells. A few of our students are moving on to other places as are three of our staff. Thank you very much, Bronwyn Thorburn, our Admissions and Marketing Director, who has worked tirelessly to develop systems and procedures as well as meeting over 200 new families. Bronwyn is now moving on to Singapore. Thank you Ms Seehaus who has been the Grade 11 home room teacher as well as teaching Psychology, Economics, Business Studies and Design.

Ms Seehaus is now returning to Germany. Thank you Ms Abena, who has been teaching English and is now moving to Vietnam. We appreciate all that you have done.

I hope that our IGBIS community all have a relaxing holiday over the summer. We look forward to seeing you again on 14th August for the student orientation sessions then again on 17th August for the first day of the 2015-2016 school year!

News from Elementary School Mrs. Claire McLeod Elementary School Principal What a wonderful final week we have just experienced. I would like to thank our parents who provided us with an array of tasty treats during the Staff Appreciation luncheon on Monday. All staff, including administration and support staff had the chance to select from a fabulous range of savoury and sweet dishes.

On Tuesday afternoon, our students enjoyed the interaction with Secondary School students during the Grade 8 Spirit activities.

Painting murals, playing games in the Gym and on Level 1 brought a lot of laughter and very special moments. What was especially lovely was the way our senior students spoke to our youngest Early Years students and how they really got into the spirit and played around. From these activities, sprung a heart warming buddy reading session as you can see with the KG and Grade 10 photos.

Grade 3 students held an art and poetry showcase for their parents on Wednesday where they shared their colourful paintings of plants and wildlife and read their creative and descriptive poems. Their preparations ensured success and the students, parents, Ms Ostiguy and Ms Huei Yin were all very proud.

I have received very positive feedback about our Final Elementary Assembly on Thursday from students, parents and staff. A mixture of performances from across the school and Certificates of Recognition for our Student Council and our Grade 5 students helped bring to all of us the reality of the last day.

Our Chinese teacher, Ms Xiaoping will take maternity leave from August as she prepares for the birth of her second child. Ms Huei Yin will cover Ms Xiaoping’s class during her leave. Ms Huei Yin is our Grades 2 & 3 teaching assistant who has capably replaced Ms Xiaoping during leave throughout this year. Ms Huei Yin is fluent in Mandarin. We wish Ms Xiaoping all the best for the safe arrival of her new baby.

On Thursday we said farewell to Neve and Lachie and Ga Eun from Elementary School; we wish them good luck in their new schools and hope they won’t forget us.

The Inaugural Yearbook is a wonderful way to reflect on the amazing journey of IGBIS that started well before August 2014. Please take the time to enjoy this with your family, as it will help rekindle some inspiring memories.

After an exhilarating year full of achievements, I am well and truly ready for a long holiday. I hope all our families have a relaxing break and l look forward to seeing you back here in August.

Until next year.

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Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives

Classroom teachers and single subjects working collaboratively One of the features of the PYP that I really love is that some units involve classroom teacher and single subject teacher collaboration.

One of the great units to achieve this is the ‘How We Express Ourselves’ unit.

Recently, we have had Friday assemblies with a collaborative aspect to them. The Early Years 2’s performed a movement story which featured different music that they interpreted to show different emotions. In class, they had been working on developing their understanding and vocabulary about emotions. Moving away from sad and happy to feeling angry, frustrated and excited to name a few emotions.

The Early Years 1 assembly incorporated a Chinese component as students sang the ‘Ni Hao’ (Hello song). The students had been working on how to sing to a large group and express their feelings of joy. The ‘buzz’ and excitement leading up to the performance was present for all to hear and feel in the EY area.

The Grade 3’s have been inquiring into the central idea of ‘Nature can inspire people to express their creativity’. In both art and in class, students have been looking at the work of Georgia O’Keefe. The Grade 3 students went on a field trip to The KL bird park and the botanical gardens to take photos of nature and be inspired to create their own. In art class they were taught the skills of creating colour contrast between the background and the foreground as well as how to shade in order to create 3D depth. In class the students used their own creativity to produce an artistic piece of their choice.

The Grade 3’s invited their parents into school to share in their artistic masterpieces.

Mr. Simon Millward, Primary Years Curriculum Coordinator

News from Secondary School Mr. Lennox Meldrum Secondary School Principal What a year! In the yearbook and at our final assembly, along with this newsletter across the year, we have reflected on the amazing achievements and multitude of activities in which we have been involved during the year. Every single member of our whole school community should be proud of our inaugural year. Well done!

From Ms Usha Rani Krishnan, Secondary School Administrator, and myself, we would like to thank all of the students for making each day so special. Our students have always demonstrated respect, patience, and understanding when they have visited the office. We look forward to them being the leaders for our new students next year and helping them understand what it means to be an IGBIS student.

Thank you to everyone in our community - parents, aunties and uncles, grandparents, siblings, friends and supporters - who have helped us promote IGBIS across Kuala Lumpur and, indeed, the globe! Thank you to the amazing teaching and administrative staff we have at IGBIS that have been flexible, understanding, and amazing. Thank you to the Secondary School leadership team of Mr Peter Fowles, Head of Student Services, Mr Phil Clark, MYP coordinator, and Mr Matthew Marshall, DP Coordinator, as well as Ms Usha Rani Krishnan for their tireless efforts every minute of every day to support and extend our teachers and students. And thank you to the Senior Management Team of Mrs Anne Fowles, Head of School, Mrs Claire McLeod, Elementary School Principal, Mr Peter Syme, Director of Academic and Support Services, and Mrs Gigi Lim, Business Manager, for their guidance, support, and vision.

Have a wonderful and safe summer.

Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives

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News from the DP Coordinator Its been a great first year for IGBIS and also for our Grade 11 students. The IB Diploma Programme (IBDP) is very challenging, and our students have adjusted well to the rigour of the IB, and should be commended for working hard this year and completing year one of the two-year IBDP. I hope the Grade 11s have a great summer holiday, and spend time with family and friends before they start Grade 12 in August.

However, it is recommended that they also spend some time working on important IB assignments, such as the Extended Essay (EE).

The EE is a demanding research style essay paper, that is student led. This assignments requires strong time management skills and student initiative in order to complete the assignment on time and with care. It is advisable that students spend some time working on their EE this summer so that it will not create a stressful situation for them in Grade 12. The EE draft deadline is on 26th till 30th October, 2015. The EE supervisors will give feedback to the students based on the EE draft, which will allow the students to make changes to their EE’s in order to prepare them for the EE final deadline, which is on 22nd till 26th February, 2016.

There are many academic deadlines scheduled for the Grade 12 students in 2015 - 2016. The Academic Deadlines document was emailed to the Grade 11 parents earlier this year, and can also be found on ManageBac. In order to make Grade 12 less stressful, its advisable that students work on their EE’s this summer.

Congratulations to the Grade 11 students for working hard this year and completing the first year of the two-year IBDP. We hope they have a great summer holiday.

If there are any questions regarding the IBDP at IGBIS, please email me at matthew.marshall@igbis.edu.my.

Mr. Matthew Marshall, Diploma Programme Coordinator

IGBIS in the KL Interschool Junior Mathematics Competition 2015 On Saturday, 13th June, a group of 6 IGBIS students had the opportunity to participate in the KL Interschool Junior Mathematics Competition held at the International School at ParkCity. The competition consisted of both individual and team rounds with awards given at the end of the day for both categories. The IGBIS Grade 6 team included Ryan Lim, Hong Bin Lim and Marvin Chong. The Grade 7 team included Yon Mi Ri, Sidnee Lim and Justus Boehncke.

It was fun and challenging day for the students as they got to test their mathematics and teamwork skills against several other International Schools. There were also some mix it up activities so the IGBIS students had the opportunity to meet some students from other local international schools.

The day ended with the awards ceremony and the Grade 6 team took home the 3rd place overall award for their age group!

Great work by all the participants and it was a really fun day of mathematics. We look forward to next year’s contest!

Mr. Paul Skadsen, Mathematics Teacher

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Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives

Celebrating Successes It is hard to believe that we have completed our first academic year at IGBIS. The time seems to have passed so quickly, yet we have accomplished so many things along the way.

Although it was only ten months ago that we opened the IGBIS doors for the first time, and only three and a half months ago that we officially became a candidate school for the IB Middle Years Programme, we have seen so many examples of the MYP in practice over that past couple of weeks that you could be forgiven for thinking that IGBIS has been an MYP school for years.

PYP-MYP-DP Transition Programmes Last week, we organised transition programmes for Grade 5 and Grade 10 students who will be moving from the Primary Years Programme (PYP) into the Middle Years Programme (MYP) and from MYP into the Diploma Programme (DP) in August. It was inspiring to hear the conversations between Grade 5 and Grade 6 students as they freely used IB terminology to discuss their achievements at IGBIS this year and the things that the Grade 5 students can look forward to in Grade 6 and in the Middle Years Programme.

IB Learner Profile Report Reflections Every Secondary School student wrote a formal reflection on the first year at IGBIS which was included in Semester Achievement Reports. Students used the attributes of the IB Learner Profile to consider their own strengths and areas for further improvement.

Students have been developing their reflection skills throughout the year as this empowers them to become increasingly responsible, independent learners.

MYP Global Contexts Day In the MYP, we explore concepts within a context. MYP Global Contexts help answer questions like: Why am I learning about this?

Why are these concepts important? Why is it important for me to understand? Why do people care about this? On Monday this week, all Grades 6 to 9 students participated in a MYP Global Contexts Day. Students worked in mixed grade-level teams to learn more about the Global Contexts and considered examples of how and when we used them this year. Each team produced either a display board or a short movie to teach others about their chosen Global Context.

MYP Community Projects Throughout the second semester the Grade 8 students have been working in small groups on their MYP Community Projects and over the past couple of weeks we have seen each of their projects come to fruition. Each group identified a way that they would like to enhance our newly established IGBIS school community. One group surveyed the community about our school cafeteria and presented a proposal to Mr Syme with some suggestions on how the cafeteria could be improved next academic year. Another group organised a series of lunchtime sporting tournaments to encourage greater participation by Secondary School students in lunchtime activities. A third group organised a whole-school activity afternoon on Tuesday this week. It involved every single student, from youngest elementary to oldest secondary, participating in a series of fun activities and was a tremendous success. Another group surveyed the school community about ideas for an IGBIS school mascot. They created sample designs, sought feedback, refined their designs and this week presented their proposal to the school leadership team. The final group organised a Talent Show on Wednesday afternoon which was enjoyed by Elementary and Secondary School students alike. All of our Grade 8 students worked extremely hard on their Community Projects and should be congratulated for their successes in enhancing our IGBIS community.

Awards Assembly On Thursday morning, we formally acknowledged some of our student achievements at the end-of-year assembly. At each grade-level, Academic Awards were presented to students who consistently achieved at the highest possible levels this year and Improvement Awards were presented to students who made significant improvement between Semesters 1 and 2. IGBIS Spirit Awards, nominated by students and agreed by teachers, were presented to one student in each grade-level who clearly and consistently embodied the IGBIS Motto of “Igniting Minds-Impacting Lives”. The IGBIS Learner Profile Award was presented to one student in Secondary School who the teachers and the Principal agreed has epitomised the attributes of the IB Learner Profile this year. All our students should be proud of their personal achievements this year and it was nice to formally recognise those who have excelled in different ways.

This has been a truly amazing first year at IGBIS, and a year of laying strong academic foundations for our IB Middle Years Programme.

Next year, we will build on these foundations, increase the range of opportunities for our students, focus on developing Approaches to Learning skills, expand the opportunities for action and service, and introduce the MYP Personal Project in Grade 10.

After a very busy year for teachers and students, we can now enjoy a well-deserved vacation to rest and relax. If you have not yet had time, please take a couple of minutes to drop your child’s teachers an email to thank them for what has been a truly amazing year.

Thank you for your continuing support of our school and the MYP. I look forward to another great year ahead.

Phil Clark, Middle Years Programme Coordinator

Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives

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School Holiday Guide - Everything in Moderation The holidays are here and our kids seem to have a lot more time for playing, reading, movies, visits to malls and of course more time on their electronic devices. At this time of year, I always like to remind the kids one of Grandmother’s sayings “everything in moderation” which fits in nicely with the IB Learner Profile - Balanced, the IB defines being balanced as: Balanced: We understand the importance of balancing different aspects of our lives—intellectual, physical and emotional—to achieve well-being for ourselves and others. We recognize our interdependence with other people and with the world in which we live.

It can often be hard to get kids off computers, phones and iPads and get them doing other things (get them being balanced). It is important for kids to do lots of different things and it is important as parents to remember that you are the parents and therefore you are in control. You are the person who decides when (and if) your kids can use electronic devices.

I believe there is benefit to kids using electronic devices (in moderation) during their summer holidays. Maybe though, we need to challenge our kids to use their devices wisely and show them ways to use them more productively.

Here are some of things kids like to do on their electronic devices and some alternatives that have a more educational focus.

Kids love to play computer games Rather than playing computer games all summer get your kids to use Scratch, GameMaker or go to code. org and encourage them to create their own computer games. There are heaps of websites with tutorials and how to guides. The kids will have fun and will even learn some useful skills. Perhaps for every hour they play a game they have to spend an hour making a game.

Kids love watching movies Just like computer games, rather than just watching movies all holidays, get the kids to create their own feature length film. They can write a script, create special effects and even involve family and friends.

Students can even recreate their favourite scenes from movies using Stop Motion. Think of all the skills they will learn including persistence and teamwork while physically doing something.

Kids love connecting and socialising Kids love chatting online, sending text messages etc. Rather than just randomly chatting perhaps the kids can do a project via chat with their friends (recreate a scene from their favourite book via a series of short videos). Best of all would be to have a text free or tech free time for several hours during the day. Kids can then actually talk to their friends or siblings in person.

Most of all remember what my grandmother used to say, “Everything in moderation. Eat mostly healthy stuff and be nice to people.”

Geoff Derry, Technology Integration Specialist

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Igniting Minds

Impacting Lives