25 September, 2020 News from NLCS Jeju
North London Collegiate School Jeju
WELCOME TO OUR WEEKLY NEWSLETTER Dear Parents, Students, Staff and Friends of NLCS Jeju At NLCS Jeju we are always striving to improve and to be the best. This applies to both our students and faculty staff. This means that throughout the year we are monitoring what is at the heart of what we do - the teaching and learning in the School. Usually, this would be accompanied by monitoring visits from NLCS in the UK - made up of the international team and senior staff from London. In these difficult times, travel is impossible and so this week we have been doing something different! The Senior Team and Leadership Teams in the Junior and Senior Schools have been visiting the classrooms of every teacher to observe lessons. We are working in collaboration with a team from London and so this means that some lessons are videoed. We also scrutinise assessment and student work and ensure that scanned copies of work including books are seen in London. We have been holding team meetings with London every day and standardising all our judgements! This is part of the quality assurance experience and checks of NLCS Jeju. We will use this monitoring to further inform our development planning and of course to support and provide additional professional development for our teachers. We are also using this week to monitor the pastoral systems in the School and of course our Beyond the Curriculum experiences. Many students have been involved in this process directly too and have had meetings with members of the monitoring teams so that they too can express their opinion and thoughts!
As we break for a week’s holiday at the close of school today I would like to wish all our community a safe, healthy and wonderful break which I know for our students will enable them all to be part of their families‘ celebrations. Yours sincerely, Lynne Oldfield Principal
HAPPY CHUSEOK
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Chuseok Assemblies Almost before we realize it, Autumn is just around the corner. So is Chuseok Holiday! To celebrate one of the biggest Korean holidays together, Junior School students and teachers prepared special assemblies this week. At Wednesday assembly, Year 3 and 4 students sang the “Full Moon song ( 달달무슨달)” with Mr. Lee’s guitar accompaniment. He also explained the true spirit of Chuseok, which is family and gratitude. Also, Mandarin students performed a short play about a traditional Chinese tale, the rabbit and the moon. Well done Daniel, Annie, Emi, Didi, Fancy and Thomas! 5B tutor group students also gave a wonderful and interesting presentation about Chuseok at Thursday assembly. In addition, Mandarin students described the difference between Chuseok and Zhongqiujie, Chinese midterm festival. We all can learn more about Chuseok and how to celebrate and rejoice through these assemblies. We hope all our community members have a safe and memorable holiday!
HAPPY CHUSEOK
North London Collegiate School Jeju
North London Collegiate School Jeju
ANTI-BULLYING WEEK Teachers, students, parents - our whole community are united against bullying in any shape or form. Last week saw a great initiative coordinated by Ms. Kate Somerville in Senior School and Mr. Richard Washington in Junior School. The Senior School Pledge Wall has been replicated in the Junior School so the reminder is now a whole School commitment. Students wore odd socks on Wednesday to celebrate diversity, the SWAG committee presented in the JS assembly, Tutor Times involved discussions and ideas on how to ensure bullying does not take hold in School - these are just some of many different activities going on. We have lots more coming up to really ensure we are completely aware of the issues in the world today. Ms. Katrina Daniels-Samasa is working with the Global Awareness Committee led by Big Eight representative, Catherine Wu to ensure that we have a week to celebrate differences between cultures. Please commit to taking part and to listening to lots of universal and unique stories. More information coming soon!
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Junior School Ink painting Ms. Lailai Luo shared some superb artwork from Ink Painting CCA. Years 1 and 2 students drew the moon and the lovely jade rabbit which lives on the moon according to the Chinese fairy tale. Year 4 - 6 students drew a full moon, lantern and autumn village. How colourful and beautiful they are! All these paintings are to celebrate this special Chuseok day and the harvest season when families reunite and cherish the fruits of the year’s hard work. Thanks for sharing these amazing artwork and well done Viviana, Evie-Ruth, Ella, Dan, Jooha, Lena and Rachel!
STUDENTS
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Junior School Year 6 Maths Seldom do we come across such fulsome praise as the comment on Ellie (Hee Seung) Lee’s Maths homework. Mr Simon Downes calls it “The best piece of homework I have ever marked.” The brief was, using exactly four 4’s, and any operations, to calculate as many of the numbers from 1 to 30 (initially) as they could, and beyond if they did it fairly quickly. It took Mr Downes 30 minutes to check all Ellie’s work but he said “it was worth every second.” Well done Ellie!
Senior School Maths Mr Will Hebbron has shared news of some Year 9 and 10 students who entered the preliminary solo round of the World Mathematics Championships last Saturday .This is normally one of our international trips but it has moved online this year. The main competition takes place over the weekend of October 17 and 18 when the students will be put in teams. The website for the competition is HERE with more background details
Victoria Gyuyeon Park
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Art To Artefact Victoria Park in Year 7 has been awarded first prize in the Junior poetry category for the Artefact to Art competition organised by Leicester University. She chose the Dionysus Cup as her inspiration. She explains “I was searching through the web for an artefact about Dionysus. I always had a particular liking for this wine god and I found this neat artefact called the ‘Dionysus Cup’ (cup in Greek is kylix). I searched for more facts about it, then I found out that the dolphins are supposed to look like they are swimming when water is poured - that just made this artefact even more amazing! I started trying to think about what I could write a poem about and I just decided to describe how beautiful it looks!” Victoria is pictured with Ms. Margaret Baird, Head of Latin.
North London Collegiate School Jeju
The Dionysus Kylix Sailing but not moving, rowing still in small place, The great Dionysus in a kylix marooned for thousands of eras and aeons, Yet its essential character endures — its grace; He holds his head up high, Proud of himself, of his power, Sailing through the lonely kylix. Oh, what a long time it had been! When was the last time water or wine poured? An empty kylix it is now, and forever it will be, Waiting and waiting to be filled! When will the dolphins swim again, When will Dionysus row again? And what is the mighty Dionysus doing? Has he just defeated the Etruscan pirates, Having turned them into jovial dolphins, Smiling in victory? What was Exekias’s grand design? The dolphins silent wait for water, While Dionysus, unmoved, sits in peace Would that the apricot cup should change, Change into a bright orange sea of water! Then the dolphins will start swimming; Swimming, swimming, swimming. The god of feast and wine, For once, does not prance and shout But remain enclosed, silent, Although silence and feast are never met, This time silence, the holy feast — Silence paints the beauty. Gentle curves complete the kylix’s beauty, Curves on the stretching grape vines, Curves on the sail, Curves on the boat, Curves on the dolphins, These create a gentle and soft beauty. Can beauty itself emanate from a small kylix? How can one portray the way A god’s eyes make fire ablaze, How water makes illusory dolphins swim, How a god’s hands make grape vines grow? All in vain potters and artists tried, Tried to portray the tranquil beauty of the panther-god in small space, But Exekias succeeded: The Dionysus Kylix
AWARD
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Champion Debater - Warrick (Dongwook) Kwon We are in awe of all the extra things our students manage to participate in - despite a packed School schedule. Warrick Kwon in Year 9 tells us about his recent success in the national YTN/HUFS Debating Competition (the biggest Middle School competition in Korea) where he took Second place in a team from Seoul - narrowly missing out on first place. Warrick spoke on many subjects including “We regret a social narrative in which human impulse is restricted, not encouraged.” Warrick cites the rigorous academic standards at NLCS Jeju as one reason why he has been able to do so well. “Many lessons at school involve discussion on a wide variety of subjects. I feel I have a better insight into questions which may come up.” At the moment Warrick has ambitions to go to Oxford to do PPE. and he very much wants to continue debating and to encourage younger children to do so. “To debate you need to broaden your perspectives; read many different sources and enjoy the challenge!”
North London Collegiate School Jeju
AWARD Government National Writing Award - Top Prize - Jason Jongsuh Park
Year 12 student, Jason Park has achieved the Highest Level in a national, Government sponsored writing competition. Jason answered the question “How Can Korea Further Develop?” He wrote about Korea’s position relative to China and Japan and how Korea can maximise its potential. The idea came from studies in a Korean History class. Jason entered the competition to challenge himself and it was a huge personal achievement. It was particularly important to him as he received the award from the Minister of Education at the Jeju PoE. Jason hopes to continue with writing and will eventually go to the US to study World Politics or Business Management. Congratulations, Jason! Another real example of going beyond the curriculum.
Sean Seonghyun Yoon - Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award Well done to Sean Yoon, Year 12, who has received the Duke of Edinburgh Award Gold Prize - this is the first Gold Award to be won in NLCS Jeju. This is no easy task! To earn the award, students must show long-term commitment to three fields for two years. Sean studied Deep Learning Algorithms, trained to complete a 10km small marathon, and has translated Korean traditional children's books for Cambodian children from Year 10. This demonstrates perfectly the NLCS Jeju ethos - a commitment to academic excellence, to excelling outside the curriculum and to service and pastoral care. Sean completed his D of E Award outside School - on top of a full NLCS Jeju study and extra curricular programme! Furthermore, his D of E portfolio became used by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family as a model example of the D of E Gold prize.
WEEKEND FUN
North London Collegiate School Jeju
And what happens on weekends? Some might say that weekends are non stop fun! Last weekend our boarders had their Bryants and then lots of different House activities. Geomun students enjoyed a tea party, Noro students had Noro In The Park and Halla East and Halla North fought it out at sunset on the netball court.
ALUMNI
North London Collegiate School Jeju
How To Study Chinese by Raphael Dillon It is always difficult to decide which language to study. We offer you a very smart and succinct piece on why you should choose Chinese by Class of 2020 graduate - Raphael Dillon. Raphael joined NLCS Jeju in Year 11 and studied Japanese for IGCSE. He then picked up Mandarin ab initio as a beginner from Year 12 and got the highest grade 7 as a result. He first became interested in learning Chinese from living in Hong Kong. Raphael is currently doing an intensive course in Korean at Jeju National University and hopes to study International Relations at the Australian National University from 2021. This piece is well worth a read HERE
SOCIETIES What are Our NLCS Jeju Academic Societies? Mr Neil Tamlyn - AVP - Academic is the champion of the academic societies in the Senior School. He says “We are proud to publish our comprehensive list of academic societies for 2020/21 HERE. These societies are a product of passionate students and staff who wish to support and enrich the broader academic life of NLCS Jeju and many have been in existence for over 5 years. Students have also been sent this list and they receive almost daily updates on society activity (the Psychology society has been particularly busy this week). If your child would like to learn more about each society and perhaps join, they are encouraged to respond to the recruitment emails that are sent out by students and also to speak to the link teacher.�
North London Collegiate School Jeju
Soroptimist Society Clothing Drive - Till October 10 We are delighted to share that the Soroptimists are holding another CLOTHING DRIVE for a charity helping single mothers and their babies! The team will accept clean, usable clothes, toys and shoes. Please put your donations in the boxes which will be distributed to each of your Houses and around the school buildings. Please label your donations with a post-it note giving your name, so that Katie Min, Ginger Kim and their team can come and give you a small token of their gratitude - some sweets! The drive is open until October 10th. If you have any inquiries, please contact Katie Min or Ginger Kim.
LITERATURE IS FUN
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North London Collegiate School Jeju
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North London Collegiate School Jeju
North London Collegiate School Jeju
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HAPPY CHUSEOK!
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