March 2012 Volume 3 Issue 3
SFS Today Details of daily distinction found at Seoul Foreign School
Seoul Foreign School, centered in Christ, inspires educational excellence & promotes Christian values, personal integrity & responsible global citizenship through a dynamic international experience.
SFS ES Student Awarded IFLAC Poem of the Month!
Proud Winners of the IFLAC Poetry Contest From Le : Rachel Lee, Grace Kwak, Mercy Milliken, Christina Cho and Chloe Choi Last November, SFS students submi ed poetry to the International Forum for the Literature and Culture of Peace (IFLAC), a voluntary Association that strives for peace by building bridges of understanding and peace through culture, literature and communication. Students were invited to submit peace poems answering the question ‘What is peace to me?’
In the 9-10 year old age group, our ES 5B student Chloe Kim’s poem “Winter’s Harmony” placed first and was also chosen as the Poem of the Month in December 2011. We also had Mercy Milliken, 5B receive 3rd place and two special mentions for Christina Cho, 5B and Grace Kwak, 5B. In the 10-11 year old age group, Rachel Lee, 7R in the MS, won third
prize. First, second, and third place winners in each language (English and Spanish) received an IFLAC Honorary Diploma signed by the IFLAC Commi ee and a special gi . Huge congratulations to Chloe and the others who took part in the poetry contest. We are so proud of you! To read more about the contest and the poems please visit h p:// iflac.wordpress.com/ www.seoulforeign.org
2012 APAC Forensics Team Shines Through with 2nd Place
2012 SFS Forensics Team
For the last 5 years, SFS has competed in the APAC Forensics Competition where students compete in a range of Debate and Speech events. This year, the competition was hosted by Hong Kong International School.
with their host families enjoying both the beautiful sights and the excellent food that is to be found in the city. A er 3 days of intense competition, 4 of our team members made it into the final rounds in 5 events.
A er calming their nerves, each SFS Our team of 10, relatively new com- finalist gave the performance of their petitors were nervously excited about lives and each and every one of them competing this year. During our stay received a medal. The greatest excitement for the team came when it was in Hong Kong, students spent time
announced that SFS had come second overall, a result that was beyond our expectations. The result was a credit to the team who had worked hard, supported each other, showed a willingness to be coached and had a keen desire to improve their public speaking skills. We are already looking forward to next year’s APAC competition to be held in Manila. FORENSICS RESULTS Solo Acting Andrew Kim, 1st Place Christina Hahn, 2nd Place Impromptu Leon Jun, 2nd Place Extemp Speaking Leon Jun, 3rd Place Original Interpretation Seng‐Min Youn, 2nd Place
BS Y6/ES Gr. 5 Make Strides with 1:1 Laptop Program
Emmalyn Sinclair and Annabelle Park, Y6S
The Year 6/Grade 5 1:1 Laptop program is part of a larger initiative across Seoul Foreign School. Students are specifically taught a myriad of tech skills one of which is online collaboration, to prepare them for their futures. Here are some student thoughts six months into the program.
“This year, I learned how to use the snipping tool, screen shot and how to post stuff on the wiki. So, I think I learned a lot of amazing technology skills. The edu20 site helped me a lot because when I got stuck on homework or when I had a question, the people on edu20 answered my questions and gave me advice.“ Jonathan Kim, Y6S
“I am good at using Windows 7 on my Xnote and Mac OS X Lion on my mac. Iʹm proud that I know how to use both of them. One really good thing about Year 6 is that you can get your own laptops and can use them in class rather than do lots and lots of bookwork. Also the teachers are really nice... :)“ Jennifer Lee, Y6H
“Listen to the teachers if they are talking about tech, because it is a very serious and important subject and if you forget a certain skill, you will be in great trouble. My tech skill in Year 5 wasn`t that good but because I learnt a lot this year my ʺtech skillʺ has boosted up.” Annabelle Park, Y6S Maya Lycett and Aayushi Swadia, Y6S
Visit to the 7th Grade Ancient China Exhibition The grade seven Humanities classes held an Ancient China Exhibition at the “Relyea Art Institute” and the “Skidmore Metropolitan Center” during the morning of Monday, December 12, 2011. All students presented invented artifacts and original artwork of China which demonstrated their responses
to the questions “How do historians know about what happened in the past?” and “What events and turning points are important in history and why?” A wide variety of topics such as history, inventions, art and culture were exhibited and detailed explanations were provided by each of the students. Tea and biscuits were also served to all visitors.
“We got to learn about different topics of China. While working on the project, we found new facts and also learnt a lot from our own research. It was a bit stressful trying to find artifacts but it was a worthwhile project.”
“It was fun preparing for this project. By sharing our learning and findings with each other we got to learn a wide variety of topics and history on China.”
Jasmine Chu 7S
Julia Mun 7A
MS/ BS KS3 AMC8 Math Test: On Top of the World Year 9 and Nicholas Kim, 8th grade Last Fall, Middle School and British took 3rd place at SFS. School KS3 students participated in the American Math Contest 8 (AMC8). AMC8 is a 25 question 40 minute exam given around the world on Tuesday November 15, 2011. The problems are designed to challenge students and offer problem -solving opportunities beyond a typical classroom curriculum. This year we had 40 students participate in the exam. We had 2 sixth graders on the achievement role for Outstanding Performance as a 6th Grader, Linda Wang and David Lee. The remaining winners all made the Honor Roll, scoring in the top 5% of participants world-wide. Linda Wang, 6th Grade, YooJoon Lee, 7th Grade and Michael Yoon, 8th Grade scored 1st place. Andy Jeong, 7th Grade took 2nd place. Brian Lee,
Sean Choi and Julia Mun
HS Student Recipient of Scholastic Art & Writing Award
Janice Kim, Grade 11
The Scholastic Art and Writing Awards represent an international competition with many thousands of entries. Janice Kim, a SFS junior, won both second place and honorable mention with two of her art pieces, now on display outWe are proud to announce the 7 win- side the high school art room. Janice is an IB 1 student who is using the subject ners from SFS. of Childhood in her studio work, and Picture Top Row: Linda Wang & will be mounting a one man show of David Lee Bo om Row: Nicholas her work as part of her final exam in IB Kim, Andy Jeong & Yoo Joon Lee Not pictured: Michael Yoon and Bri- Visual Arts next year. Come by the art room and see the prize winning pieces. an Lee
SFBS Student Nominated As Ambassador for World Maths Day The UNICEF/ World Education Games is an event for all schools and students around the world. It runs from 6-8 March (in three areas: Spelling, Maths and Science), involving 5.5 million students from over 200 countries and territories. This is a global challenge to get all students (4-18 years of age) excited about learning, and to give the top students in each school an opportunity to see how they measure up against the best. Bo‐Min Ryu from Year 6 has been chosen to be the Ambassador for
Please go to h p:// www.worldmathsday.com/ for more details on the World Education Games and click on Ambassadors to see Bo-Min’s profile.
“I am truly grateful to have been chosen as the representative for my entire school. I feel I am not the strongest in Math World Maths Day (March 7) of South but I think I am a great speaker Korea. Bo-Min will have a number of official duties to complete and will be and leader. I am very excited to be representing the school and I hope working on a blog to share with the I can have fun.” other 5.5 million children who take part in the day.
Bo‐Min Ryu, Y6H
BS KS1 Production “Stella the Starfish” “Stella the Starfish” is a magical underwater tale with an important message about being helpful. Stella has lost her family and two children, Sophie and Stephen, help to reunite Stella with her family. One of the children expressed how she felt during the play:
supported the younger students in the school as they prepared to perform on stage. The children have enjoyed preparing for Stella the Starfish and have worked collaboratively together on the songs, words, actions, dances, and
“Stella the Starfish has lost her family so I was kind of sad even though it was not real!” Ines Lee, Y2P
“I felt fantastic being a rainbow fish and doing my dance and singing all the songs.” Alla Almutoteh Y1B
This yearʹs KS1 production has been an incredible team effort as members of the staff and parents across the British School shared their talents and
“Being a jellyfish was great fun. My stage directions. This is what some of the children had to say…
“I was excited about the show because I couldn’t wait to be on the stage!” Roman Smith, RW
costume was violet and I had dark purple leggings. I liked all the songs and the actions. I thought they were very creative. I saw my mum and dad in the audience. They were si ing near the front.” Charlo e Wood, Y2C
Lego Robotics: Stimulating Creative Technology for ES/MS Students Over the Christmas Holidays Mr. Eric Baland ES Grade 5 teacher purchased four Lego Mindstorms kits for his students. The unit of study was on artificial limbs and their goal was to build a prototype of a human limb. For their final build, they built a robot called the Snatcher. It can grab objects and stack and move them based on size or color. The students have really responded well to them.
Ashley Won, 5B with NXT
They like building with Legos, but more importantly, they are learning
In the MS, Mr. Peter Shaffer has introduced the Lego Robotics to the MS students. Lego Robots are very popular among many schools today where students learn to be creative, collaborate and share their ideas. This is a field where possibilities are unlimited. The program not only well represents the 21st Centu‐ ry learning skills but also offers introduction to computer sci‐ • ence and graphics which can be con‐ tinuously developed in the High School. This is only the beginning • and with further training and programming lessons Mr. Shaffer would • like to further develop the Lego Robotics program at SFS. •
These are some of the things that students in the MS Lego class would do to make a “Bumper Car” work. •
Adding a functional “bumper” to the robot
how to program the robot to do certain things. They are seeing the relationship between building and programming a robot and that they both must work together – and that programming is o en the most difficult part. They can then relate this information to their study of human artificial limbs and how we are using cu ing edge technology to help human lead more productive lives.
this, I’m learning to be more creative and collaborate with my partner.” Bailey Pra , Gr. 7SK
Bailey Pratt and Sean Kim, Gr. 7
creating a program with a loop following the example and using the touch sensor try and create some movements, using some other sensor create a new program , where the robot will react if either sensor is activated modify, be creative, and have it do some other reaction.
“It’s really fun working on the Lego Robotics but it’s also challenging and hard. By working on
“Programing Robots in class is fun! Building the robots, programing and making it do what it should do is exciting but it’s challenging when it doesn’t do the job that it should be doing.” Ariel Zhou, Gr. 8K
Ariel Zhou, Gr. 8K
Strong Finish for our APAC Swimmers Hosted by Brent International School Manila, Philippines February 2‐4, 2012 The Seoul Foreign School 2012 APAC Swim Team put it all in the water at this year’s APAC Championships. Held at Brent International School in Manila, each swimmer displayed positive sportsmanship and competed with spirited enthusiasm to the best of their ability. Even as a 24-hour flu bug hit swimmers hard, the Crusaders cut through the water as fast as they could. In preparation this year, the APAC team experienced greater emphasis on dry-land conditioning with continued competitive swim training. The Crusader team finished fourth overall in both the boy and girl’s final standings.
Luke, Chris Kim, Joonil Lee, Michael Yi, Sae-Won Kim, Benedict Printz, Glenn Kim, Aramie Sohn, Rachel Woo, Leah Chong, Yage Song, Lily Ha, Ellen Surdeau, Maxime Percheron, Angela Yoon, Eunnie Lee, Erin Kim, and coaches Jason Van Galder and Jeff Oakes. The following SFS results provide a snapshot of individual and team accomplishments:
5 Silver medals, 14 Bronze medals, 14 Ribbons, 6 SFS School Records, and 60 Personal Bests.
Considering the power of swimming programs such as International School of Beijing, Shanghai American School Puxi, andShanghai American School PuThis year’s APAC team consisted dong, the Seoul Foreign School of: Crusaders did extremely well and are to be commended for Daniel Lou y, Erich Kim, Alex competing at such a high level. Min, Alex Song, Eric Joo, Chris
June 11—August 3 2012
Seoul Foreign School will again have Summer Seoulstice from June 11– August 3, 2012. This summer program will include Camp SFS, Sport Camp, Academic Enrichment Camp, and Specialty Camp for a variety of ages.
This day-camp will be offered for all of the summer school sessions for students entering Senior Kindergarten/Year 1 through students finishing Grade 5/Year 6.
Camp SFS will feature: Instructional Swimming lessons Recreational Swimming Nature Exploration and Adventure Arts & Cra s Music Organized Sports Story Time
Students will be grouped by age and assigned qualified SFS Counselors. Summer Seoulstice personnel will include qualified SFS Teachers, Specialists, Camp Counselors, Camp Nurse, American Red Cross Certified Lifeguards and WSI Certified Swim Instructors, Summer Programs Director and Assistant Director. Watch Edline, Backpack mail, and parent e-mails for registration information. Please contact summerprograms@seoulforeign.org for more information.
APAC Swim Team