Newsflash: March 18, 2022

Admin News

by Dr. Gwyn Underwood, Superintendent

CIS Students make their long-awaited return back to campus!

After two years of remote learning, it is difficult to describe in words the range of feelings I have had, and have observed from others, from our students being back on campus as we commenced our transition this week following health and safety protocols aligned to those of the IATF/CebuCity-EOS. While there were lingering concerns with safety from some, or how to cope with hybrid learning from others, overall I have observed a sense of relief, happiness, and excitement from students, faculty/staff, and parents. These feelings reflect our belief here at CIS that, while there are aspects of remote learning that have provided various benefits, the opportunity to interact with each other in person still holds a significantly high value to most, as it allows us to communicate and interact with each other with more depth and satisfaction. Everything went relatively smoothly, and we look forward to consolidating our new protocols in the coming week of transition!

Statement on the armed conflict in Ukraine: CIS calls for respect and peace

As the world watches with shock and horror at the Putin regime’s unprovoked and overwhelmingly condemned violent invasion of Ukraine, Cebu International School stands in solidarity with colleagues, friends, students, and communities in Ukraine, as well as those in neighboring countries, including Russia itself, who fear for themselves, their families, their country, and their futures.

The values inherent to Cebu International School are described in the IB Learner Profile Attributes, and infuse all elements of the school program, and therefore, the culture and ethos of the school. The importance of these attributes to the CIS community is clearly communicated in our core beliefs, which state, “as an IB World School, the Learner Profile Attributes and Approaches to Learning are embedded in all that we think, say and do.”

CIS also believes in the ideals of international mindedness. We are committed to actively working towards building a community that can learn together in a diverse, equitable, inclusive, and just environment.

Accordingly, we uphold the responsibility of all people to value and respect the:

collective needs and rights of each community
needs and rights of all individuals to feel safe, protected, and valued, to have a voice and express an opinion, and to have the opportunity to thrive in all aspects of life.

As an international community representing 24 different nations, when conflict occurs we encourage respectful open dialogue that seeks first to understand, and then to think critically to come up with peaceful win-win solutions. The principles outlined above that we hold dear are being violently violated in Ukraine, so we feel the need to reiterate that:

CIS stands against the violent use of force by any individual or country to unilaterally impose their will on other people or independent states. CIS stands for the Learner Profile Attributes that reflect the democratic values that underpin the values evident in the so-called free world. In short, CIS is for respect and peace.

Related Resources

Support Ukraine via Pechersk School International (PSI)
PSI is an international school based in Kyiv, Ukraine. Their website contains a selection of resources and support options (including Art for Peace in Ukraine).

How to talk to kids about the conflict
The following sites offer suggestions about how to talk to your child about events in Ukraine:

How to Talk to Kids About Ukraine (New York times)
Ukraine: 5 Ways To Talk To Children About Conflict (Save the Children)
A School Staff Guide for Supporting Students Impacted by the Crisis in Ukraine (from SeaChange Mentoring – this guide has been developed for teachers, but may be of use to parents as well)

Grade 3 Class

by Ms. Katrina del Mar, Grade 3 Teacher

Ahoy Mateys! Our adventure into our fifth Unit of Inquiry, Where We Are In Place And Time, started this week. We began by unpacking a mystery box. The items included a map, five ships and a journal. Who can possibly own this box?

The Grade 3s believe this box is owned by an explorer. They explained that an explorer uses a map and a ship to discover the unknown. Explorers keep track of everything in their journal while they are at sea.

Taking charge of their own ships, the Grade 3 Captains sailed their ships to our new unit. Like explorers, they wrote down their very first entry in their Captain’s Log.

We invite you to write your very own journal. Think about your day. What were the best moments? What were the hardest ones? What did you do to get through them? Who made your day special?

Grade 7: Individuals & Societies

by Ms. Joy Pierra, Individuals & Societies Teacher

Research and analysis are essential aspects of Individuals and Societies. These aim to develop the students’ inquiry and investigating skills. One of the tasks that the students need to complete in I&S class is the research action plan. The research action plan template is designed in a way that students meet the objectives of the subject which are reflected in the MYP I&S learning criteria, particularly focusing on criterion B.

The I&S 7 class completed a research action plan for the topic, “The Impact of American Civil War on the Americans and the world.” Students chose an area to be the focus of their investigation; political, economic, social, and the impact on slaves.

Here are some of the Grade 7 students’ thoughts about completing a research action plan.

My struggle is adding the properties of the website resource, like who is the author of the website and when was this article published. And my success is to find the thing about the civil war on the internet.

Angqing

My struggles where that I wasn’t sure of what to do with most of the things in the research action plan, and my successes where that I could understand all of the things in the document at the end, and complete it on time.

Sarah

My struggle during the research action plan was formulating inquiry questions. It was difficult because I had to formulate questions that are clearly focused and relevant to the topic. My inquiry questions often got too narrow or too broad to answer. My success in the research action plan was evaluating my investigation. I was able to reflect and evaluate my investigation decently.

Hana

My struggle in the action plan was “self-management.” I always forget the time and am not able to manage it. This problem got better from grade 7, but it still needs to be fixed. My success was researching because I’m already used to researching the correct topic and finding reliable sources.

Jeonghoo

When I was creating the research action plan I encountered a few struggles. Firstly, it was challenging at first to state why my question was worth bringing up. This was because my question involved economy, and before the research action plan, I wasn’t very familiar with the economy. Secondly, I also struggled in answering a few questions since some of my sources wouldn’t give any supporting details… Even though I had a few struggles I still had a few successes. Firstly, I was able to find plenty of reliable sources because the topic revolved around the civil war. Secondly, it was easy to gather all the information I needed to have to evaluate the reliability of my source.

Niño

The battles whilst accomplishing my work were primarily around the area where I had to evaluate the diverse types of sources since it suggested that I had to go into additional research about the author, the site, the article.… Generating questions concurrent with answering them in a proper manner, is a major strength I had when completing my research action plan… This is because there was a variety of sources that provided significant information that I could obtain from the site and apply onto my own.

M Swank

My main struggle in doing the research action plan was trying to find a credible source that was updated and had an author that has credits to give the correct information. Finding a credible source is very important so you don’t spread false or inaccurate information. With this in mind, one of my successes in the research action plan is finding sources that ended with .edu or .org. That’s an important skill that most people need to use when doing a research plan since it’s a big giveaway to check if the source is credible.

Chloe

The struggles were some parts were confusing, and takes a while to complete and some questions were difficult to find sources. My successes were that in my action plan, the inquiry question was easy to research, including the factual, conceptual and debatable questions. It’s also that I got some teacher’s feedback during the research action plan, so then I used them to be successful.

Hinata

I had trouble with the first strand when we had to make a research question and coming up with one that was neither too broad nor too narrow was hard and there was also the problem that almost all the questions had been used by someone but I think I was able to overcome that by going into an area of research that none had touched yet and I feel as that was a big success.

Rebecca

The struggle I had throughout completing the action plan was having to answer the questions I asked, it was challenging for me because I had to look on different websites to check the information and check for proof that it is reliable information. But afterward, the other strands were not really difficult and I was able to do it just fine. The one part I thought I did the best was analyzing one of my resources because I think I chose a good resource that was reliable.

Nathalia

Here are the different sections of a research action plan and their their corresponding learning criteria.

College/Careers Counselor Corner

by Ms. Jenny Basa, College/Careers Counselor

Upcoming Virtual Events and Fairs: (students & parents are welcome)

DATE

March 24
Thursday
4:00pm
Link to register

EVENT

Do Facts Mean Truth?
In a world overwhelmed by misinformation and falsehood, does knowing the facts always present truth and reality? This talk will introduce students to fact-checking through some fun examples and point out that our own biases play a part in our understanding of truth and reality. (Webinar by Hong Kong Baptist University, with a short presentation about admissions at the end of the webinar)

March 25 & 26
1:00 – 7:00PM

Study Abroad Virtual Fair

March 29
Tuesday
6:00PM PHT
Link to register

Scholarship Opportunities in Canada: Studying abroad can be an expensive undertaking. Hence, schools in Canada offer scholarships to international students in order to attract more students.

If you are interested in learning more about Scholarship Opportunities for international students in Canada, we invite you to attend this webinar.

SAT UPDATE

To register for the SAT, you may click on this link. If you need assistance or have any questions, please feel free to email Ms. Jenny Basa at jbasa@cis.edu.ph.

2021-2022 TEST DATES*	Registration Deadline
March 12, 2022 (will push through	February 11, 2022
May 7, 2022	April 8, 2022
*The Optional SAT Essay and Subject Tests have been discontinued.

Dragon’s Print

During the past few months, the seniors have been busy as they devoted time to preparing for their IB mock-exams, a series of tests that cover their DP subjects. It is designed like the final IB exams with similar questions and aims to prepare students for the final stretch of the IB program. Read more about their packed week of mocks at https://dragonsprint.cis.edu.ph/

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