The ISL Headlines - December 2014

s e n i l d a e H The ISL From the Head of School : Mr. Martin Gough “Striving for

December 2014

We have reached the end of term and the holidays are upon us. I know both students and teachers are looking forward to a break and the chance to recharge their batteries. Thank you to all parents for your support of ISL this school year.

Excellence” Important Dates 12th Dec 2014

Last day of school

12th Jan 2015

School reopens

19th Jan 2015

IGCSE /IB Trial exams begin

Contents Head of School

1

Primary Principal/Early years

2

Upper Primary

3

Primary Production

4

Poems

5

Lower Secondary

6

Wild Tracks

7

The last few weeks have been very busy with two excellent school performances by Secondary and Primary School respectively. I would like to thank Abbie Petit, Jen Greensmith and all the other supporting teachers for their work with the secondary student cast of ‘Arsenic and Old Lace’. The two shows they gave were great fun, with excellent performances by the students in front of audiences who laughed in all the right places.

The following weekend was a memorable all-star performance by every student in Early Years and Primary School, assisted by every teacher and teacher assistant, in the ‘The Magic Storybook’. It seemed as though every Primary School parent was there to watch as children sang, danced and acted out the stories of a range of celebrations that span the world and our school community at this time of year. The overall theme was a great illustration of our common humanity and similarities. Huge thanks go to teachers Luo Zacks and Gerald Chibwana for taking the lead in direction and writing, but also to every single member of the Primary School staff for helping with this massive undertaking. (By the way, if you were in the MPC on Friday, you will understand why we need to look at improving the infrastructure of this building with its poor quality finish, seating, toilets, floor, ceiling, audioquality and non-existent ventilation system – it was hot!).

The ISL Board of Governors held an EGM on Saturday 6th December to review the audited accounts for the previous school year 2013-14. The accounts have been signed by the board and the proposal to adopt the audited accounts was passed by the meeting. During the meeting we discussed the issue of low attendance by parents at the EGMs and AGMs. I have since sent out a survey asking parents for their views on which day works best and how we might increase the numbers attending – please click on this survey link and assist us by answering the questions if you have not already done so.

School reopens on Monday January 12th 2015. Year 11 and IB2 students will be straight into their trial exams for IGCSE and IBDP respectively. It is expected that they spend a significant amount of their holiday revising for those exams – work done now will pay off in May when they do the final examinations.

Please do read the rest of this newsletter for write-ups and pictures of the events of the last few weeks.

I would like to wish you and your children a restful break from school and the school run, even if you are not able to take some leave over this time.

IGCSE/IB

8

Secondary Production

9

Best wishes

ry

Prima

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Message from the Primary Principal: Mr. Bowen

On Friday evening we attempted something that we had not tried before and that was to bring the whole of the Primary School together to perform on stage for you, the parents. There are always aspects of any production that one can improve upon and I am very open to ideas about how to improve things next time. In our eyes however the show was a huge success. Don‟t forget that we have been party to the rehearsals during the week preceding the show and during that time it was fantastic to see the littlest toddlers in school interactiong with our older students. The sense of togetherness and teamwork was typical of ISL and that in itself made the decision to do a whole school production worthwhile.

The Magic Story Book was written by two of our teachers, Mrs Zacks and Mr Chibwana, and the sentiment of the story could not have been more timely. Our planet is trying to cope with interfaith and intercultural conflict on almost every continent and these conflicts show little sign of satisfactory abatement. Unfortunately I think with certain disputes, we can predict that we will not see a resolution in our lifetimes. With that in mind, let‟s pray that one or two open minded individuals, who performed on our stage on Friday night, arm themselves with their superior understanding of international mindedness and become the authors of a move to genuine world peace. The harmony, love and enjoyment generated amongst children of different beliefs by our performance is testament to the fact that it can be done. If that happens, then the success of Friday‟s performance will be immeasurable.

By the way, the DVDs of the Magic Story Book are in and on sale from the Primary Office @ K100 each. If you wish to obtain yours directly from Mr Japhet Banda during the holidays, he may be contacted on 0977842876.

Please have a very safe and restful holiday and please bring back all our children safe and sound on Monday 12 th January .

From the Early Years Coordinator: Mrs Karen Hedstrom It has been a hectic few weeks in the Early Years but worth all the hard work! A big thank you to all parents, teachers and of course children for their hard work in putting costumes together, learning lines and supporting us on the night for 'The Magic Storybook.' It was a wonderful show celebrating different religions and The Early Years did an excellent job at presenting The Nativity! Well done everybody.

Reception were lucky to have Barefeet come and tell them fairy tales as part of their unit on 'reading texts for many reasons,' all the children had a good giggle. Year Two have been carrying out lots of interesting experiments using ice, water chocolate and even jelly as part of their unit on 'changing materials.' Preschool are all qualified drivers now with their own ISL driving licences and Year One had an interesting six weeks learning about the countries they come from. Finally, thank you to Santa for kindly bringing in books as presents for all our Early Years children.

As school comes to an end, may I take this opportunity to wish you all a well deserved holiday, a Happy New Year and we look forward to seeing you back at school on Monday 12th January 2015.

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UPPER PRIMARY: Mrs. Grace Kambeu Children in Year Six have been working hard since August to come up with their Exhibition topic. After much collaboration and deliberation, they have chosen to investigate “Poverty.” Their central idea is “For many generations, worldwide poverty has been a big problem but our actions and decisions can change the future.” This falls under our transdiciplinary theme, “How We Organise Ourselves.” This central idea will guide them through their exhibition process. Currently, they have started the process of determining how they will carry out their investigations by coming up with lines of inquiry. Through these, they will conduct their research using various sources: from newspapers and internet to fieldtrips and community experts. If you have any expertise on this subject and would like to assist the Year Six‟s inquiry process by sharing your knowledge, please contact the Year 6 teachers Mrs. Kambeu and Ms. Lantink. More details will continually come your way as the children continue to make progress.

Year Six Team

And finally house points:

27th November was “hot” as the three houses battled for a first place in their relay festivals and mini-volleyball.

Overall – Total House Points: In 3rd place we have Luangwa with 714 points; Kafue in 2 nd place with 721 and in the lead is Zambezi with 731 points.

Go Zambezi!!!!!!

Happy Holidays!

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PRIMARY PRODUCTION: The Magic Story Book On Friday 5th December, the primary students presented a fantastic show „The Magic Story Book!â€&#x; ISL Primary in action, telling it all through song, poetry, mime and dance. The theme was: ` celebrating our strength within diversity in religion. ` Indeed it was magical as children from Nursery to Year 6 performed. Like always, ISL really has great talent! Well done teachers and our directors Mr. G. Chibwana and Mrs. Zacks, for a superb grand finale!!

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POEMS by Lorien 6.1 and Akhilesh 6.2

Season of fun, season of cheer, Everyone’s excited, when the holidays are near!

All of us have been working very hard and the end of a year gives us time to rest, recoup, reflect and recharge ourselves for 2015!!

I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank all my colleagues for their hard work, thank the students for their upbeat enthusiasm and of course our wonderful parents and administration for the constant support and encouragement.

Wishing everyone very happy holidays filled with good health, good spirit and good cheer!

See you back safely in January!!!

Mrs Sunita Nair, PYP Co-ordinator

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Secondary From Junior Secondary School : Mrs.Dodd ~ Parents as Partners ~ You have more opportunities than any secondary teacher to serve as a resource for your child to help him/her learn, develop positive habits and improve achievement. I really believe in organisation as being a key part of success. Talking and sharing experiences with my Junior Secondary students, I realise how needful they still are. We might believe that once our child has left Primary school they do not need our help anymore. On the contrary the need for more structure and organisation is greater once they reach Y7.

The Junior Secondary team would really appreciate if parents could use some of these suggestions at home to offer valuable support to your childâ€&#x;s education.

Challenge 1: Organising materials for the next day Suggestions: Make sure they: -Pack backpacks and gather needed materials before bedtime.

-Put their timetable handy to make it easy to pack their bag.

-Select clothes the night before to reduce morning decisions Challenge 2: Homework completion Suggestions: Make sure they: -Use their home-work journal in class and then at home. Tick off all tasks that are done.

-Find a quiet place for homework completion.

You should also: -Monitor distractions during homework time (phone, TV, computer) -Encourage brief breaks when your child is frustrated.

-Review your childâ€&#x;s journal nightly to be sure that all assignments are completed.

Challenge 3: Long Term projects Suggestions Make sure they: -Chunk the project into manageable steps.

-Create a calendar/timetable listing all steps that need to be completed.

-Check in with your child to make sure he/she is keeping up with the deadline(s).

Challenge 4: Test Nights Suggestions -Remind your child to begin studying in advance.

-Suggest chunking the study material into small, manageable parts -Be a study partner. Offer to quiz your child on class notes/review sheets.

Many thanks for your continuous support.

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Yr 10 Trip to Lower Zambezi—Wild Tracks ISL‟S Year 10 students had a great experience at Wild Tracks, Lower Zambezi from 6 th – 10th October, 2014. Students participated in various activities that helped them balance between different aspects of their lives, both intellectual and physical and were exposed to activities that helped them work both independently and with others. Students were able to think critically and have courage to take-risks such as the baobab tree-climbing!

Velenasi Mwale Munsanje and Claudious Mwale

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From the IGCSE coordinator: Mr R Van de Velde

A long and interesting term came to an end. School trips in this section are over, and the Year 11s already had their first taste of some of the Trial exams. These exams (some orals and all the written ones) will continue over the first 3 school weeks of January 2015. So there won‟t be much of a holiday for the Year 11 students, but instead they will have ample time to get solidly prepared for these important exams.

Year 10 students got their first reports and this might inspire them to also use some time during the four weeks of the holiday to catch up/polish up wherever necessary.

For the teachers and the parents it hopefully will be a proper holiday with all the seasonal wishes and New Year‟s resolutions it enthuses.

Have a good time and see you in 2015 !

IB Corner! From Mr. Hearsum For the IB2‟s deadlines are coming thick and fast. The Extended Essay has been completed. The ToK essays are currently being drafted. Trial examinations start on the 19 th January for two weeks. Below are some effective revision tips.

Exam preparation hours are usually limited. Your workload is usually considerable. Strategy is therefore essential if you are to be as effective as possible.

Planning out revision time is a key element to gaining confidence with a strong sense of being fully prepared. When planning, it is good to be as specific as possible with allocation of time to task. For example, rather than assign “all day Monday” to “Maths”, divide up the day into 40-45 minute blocks and assign blocks of time to specific topics within Maths. If you‟re good with maintaining concentration, then you may be able to push your focus to being effective for two consecutive time blocks before taking a short break. However, human concentration span tends to start to peter out after 40 minutes – and there‟s no point in sitting there reading the same material three times without actually absorbing it. Give yourself a short (five to ten minute) break where you re-hydrate (water is fine) and think about things other than algorithms or vectors.

If you start this process sufficiently early, you‟ll also have the ability to vary subject material throughout the day – perhaps Maths in the morning and Biology in the afternoon. Brains love variety for refreshment purposes. Draw up a study schedule with all of this detail and display it in full view. It will also assure you that you‟ll cover all the material as you will have clearly assigned time to each topic, and help to reduce your stress levels as you will have broken up that huge, looming “whole subject” into manageable parts.

After you‟ve completed each of your topics within your time blocks, tick them off on your schedule to emphasise that sense of achievement. Remember, at the end of each day, to relax and unwind effectively – you‟ll need to be fully recovered to be top of your game to get back into it tomorrow.

Adapted from: http://www.examconfidence.co.uk (5th November 2014) Good luck.

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Secondary Production-Arsenic and the Old Lace

CONTACT US

http://www.cois.org/

http://www.ibo.org/

The International School of Lusaka 6945 Nangwenya Road Lusaka, Zambia Phone: +260 211 252291 Fax: +260 211 252865 E-mail: info@islzambia.org www.islzambia.org

http://www.pamojaeducation.com/

http://www.cie.org.uk/

http://www.neasc.org/