Newsflash: October 23, 2020

Admin News

CIS Virtual International Day, 2020
Please refer to the email sent to your registered email address for information and links to the activities and videos for this day.

We look forward to a wonderful morning of building community virtually. See you there!

Elementary News

by Mr. Glenn Davies, Elementary School Principal

Dear Elementary Community,

Culture week has been a wonderful opportunity for students to connect with a wide range of teachers in ways that we have not been able to over these past months. Each day this week students have met with different teachers to learn about the cultures, celebrations, and food of the continents of the world. I have had the privilege of assisting Ms. Gloria with the Upper Elementary South America visit. It really was such a pleasure to see the students’ excitement and interest when exploring such a colorful and diverse part of the world.  This Saturday is our CIS International day and again we will witness students taking active part in the CIS International Day Activities that will include the Parade of Nations.

International Day is such a significant part of the CIS Calendar, and part of all IB World Schools Calendars. The reason for this significance is that International Day is an opportunity for CIS to put the IB Learner Profile into action. The IB Learner Profile is a central component of the IB Curriculum framework and is put into action every day within every IB school, but International Day is time to showcase the Learner Profile.

The IB Learner Profile represents 10 attributes valued by IB World Schools. We Believe these attributes, and others like them can help individuals and groups become responsible members of local, national, and global communities. The aim of the IB programmes is to develop internationally minded people who, recognizing their comment to humanity and shared guardianship of the planet, help to create a better and more peaceful world (International Baccalaureate Organisational, 2017).

At CIS, Culture Week and International Day is a way to step back for a moment and place a little more focus on the attributes and values we build into our lives every day as part of an IB World School community. We have valued your input over this week and look forward to your participation tomorrow as we celebrate CIS International Day.

What is an IB Education Video

EY2 and 3
Our youngest students have been learning songs, playing musical games and dancing to frog inspired music. They have explored how frogs move and sound, and have had the opportunity to create their own verses in the little frog song and act out 5 little speckled frogs.

Kinder/Grade 1
Kinder and grade 1 students are exploring how to organise their own home concert. They have started to think about where they could perform in their homes and what they could perform. They have also watched an inspirational video, and discussed ideas from this provocation.

Grade 2 and 3
Grade 2 and 3 students have been exploring ways of changing music, looking through the lens of “The elements of Music”. They created posters to represent dynamic levels, and help them remember Italian terms and shortened terms for dynamic levels.

Grade 4 and 5
Grade 4 and Grade 5 students have been exploring form in music and how to identify simple structures such as question/answer phrases. They have also been learning how to play songs that exhibit these structures. In addition to form, the students have been learning how to use a music technology app called Noteflight. This is helping them to become more proficient at reading and writing music using music technology.

Library/Media Center Class 

Over the past weeks of Remote Learning, students have been learning about book organization. They have been introduced to ways on how we organize our books in the library as well as at home. Our students’ self-management skills have been put in practice in organizing their books at home. Here are some of our learning engagements in the Library/Media Center. 

Students shared their mini library at home. They also shared how they organize their books at home. Some of them organized their books by sizes , authors , publications and type of books.

I put my books on a shelf where I can reach them. It is organized this way because it is easy for me to find where my books are. – Fiona

We have a library in the playroom. The board books go at the bottom so they’re easy for the babies to get. My mom also sorts the language books: English , Spanish and Dutch. We also separate reading books and picture books. – Sierra    

I organize my own books and all of them go from big to small. Why do I organize them that way? You can’t make them stack them and then put something different on top you need to like to make a mini library in that space. There’s a time and place for everything. This is my mini library and I don’t want it to get mixed up with other things. – Ariya

Students were also  introduced to call numbers. They explored what call numbers are and how these are used in organizing the books. Students made their own call numbers using the books that they have at home. They also sort the books according to their call numbers and put them in the correct section/shelves. 

Students also explored the Dewey Decimal System. They responded to a variety of learning engagements for the Dewey Decimal. Grade 4 and 5 did a scavenger hunt using the library catalog. Grade 3s did a sorting activity  wherein they needed to put the popcorn with the topics to the correct popcorn bucket that has the dewey decimal category in it. For grade 2s, they identified what dewey decimal category for the topics given. 

Middle and High School News

by Mr. Dale Wood, Middle and High School Principal

This week we are highlighting some of the learning engagements our Grade 10 students have recently been enjoying. Grade 10 is the culminating year for the MYP program and our students are immersed in learning that both serves as a capstone for their current program and also serves as a launching pad for their experience and success in the DP courses to come next year. One of the unique aspects of our Grade 10 curriculum is that our students are able to sample all three Group 3 (Individuals and Societies) and Group 4 (Sciences) subjects for a semester, creating a foundation and understanding of the parameters of each discipline within the group, thereby helping to guide the selection of their IBDP courses for the following year.

MYP Psychology 10

Our students in Grade 10 Psychology class have been exploring various research methods that are used to study human behavior and mental processes. Students in grade 10 have been tasked with evaluating a common psychological myth, perceptions that are generally accepted by the public as truths about human behavior but may not be accurate or supported by the evidence (such as the idea that “opposites attract”). Students compared previous studies in the areas relevant to their chosen “myth” and collaborated to reach conclusions and then shared their findings with their classmates through virtual presentations. The exciting part of this project is that students have also been tasked to create their own hypotheses and design their own experiments exploring the basic components of the experiments tackled in class. Students are able to apply concepts they have learned in class, specifically research methods, in order to evaluate those ideas in light of the evidence they discovered. This project also mirrors, on a reduced scale, the kind of learning engagement and product they will encounter should they continue to study Psychology in the IB Diploma.

Grade 10 Art 

The Grade 10 Art students have been entirely responsible for creating and developing their own unit for Quarter Two this school year. Driven by the statement of inquiry, the process of artistic creation provides opportunities for self-discovery, students worked collaboratively to select the key concept, the related concepts, and global context they deemed most appropriate for this unit. The students also developed the inquiry questions and initial ideas for the summative assessment for this unit. It is exciting to see our students thinking independently, yet responsibly, and also taking ownership of their learning.

One of the areas of focus for us as a faculty as we implement MYP has been to diversify the variety and level of questions we use to facilitate stronger student inquiry. We are seeking to incorporate questions that go beyond factual recall (though these are still important questions to answer in terms of building content knowledge) to include ones that are more conceptual and debatable in order to activate higher levels of student cognitive engagement (such as analysis, application, and evaluation). Generating high-quality questions requires a commendable level of critical thinking on the teacher’s part, and in this case it was the students who took on this challenge. Some of the inquiry questions that our students generated for this unit are as follows, including the category of question for each (whether factual, conceptual, or debatable):

• What is the process of artistic creation? (factual)
• How are artists influenced by their surroundings? (factual)
• How do artists incorporate their own identity in the art they create? (factual)
• What is self-identity? (conceptual)
• How can self-discovery be obtained through the creation of art? (conceptual)
• What is the purpose of expression in art? (conceptual)
• What is identity based on? (debatable) 
• Which art form promotes self discovery best? (debatable)
• To what extent does artistic creation provide opportunities for self-discovery? (debatable)

You are invited to take a moment and visit our class virtual gallery.

MYP Physics 10

Students in Physics have been engaged in designing their own experiments to explore and test concepts they studied in class, combined with utilizing the design cycle to envision, create, and implement their procedures. Our science teachers are inspiring innovation and creativity, as well as facilitating student agency, as they engineer safe and relevant science explorations for students to conduct in their homes.

This is Thomas and Joo Ha’s group design for MYP Physics. Their investigation tested the effect of different forces on the acceleration of an object down an inclined plane.

This is Victoria and Kat’s design for MYP Physics. They investigated and tested the effect of mass on speed.

Grade 11 CIS Student now a published reporter

While our students may have been inhibited from leaving their homes since last March, including over their summer break, they certainly weren’t prevented from learning, or even serving the community while they were under quarantine. I have heard stories of MHS students who started learning a new language over the summer, began playing a musical instrument, and even found creative ways of participating in virtual service learning. Soo-A Hong, one of our 11th graders and an aspiring screenwriter, was able to explore this interest and meet with professional screenwriters in Seoul over the summer. Her first article, focusing on these scriptwriters, was published in July in the Herald Insight, a Seoul-based publication, and her relationship with this news outlet has continued to develop over the following months. Please find the link for Soo-A’s third article, The Leggings War, focusing on one of the latest fashion trends, which was recently published on the Herald Insight website. Congratulations to Soo-A, for her hard work, risk-taking, and accomplishment. We are very proud of her and look forward to reading more articles in the future.

Dragon’s Print

As a yearly tradition at CIS, it is time that we celebrate the amazing variety of nationalities and representation we have at our school. Even if we are currently not in an ideal situation to celebrate, the CIS Dragons are still going to find a spectacular way to show pride for our nations! Learn more about the International Week celebration at http://dragonsprint.cis.edu.ph/.

College/Careers Counselor Corner

by Ms. Jenny Basa, College/Careers Counselor

Tip for the Week:

Studying in Germany:
If you are interested in studying in Germany, you may check this website: https://www.study-in-germany.de/en/. There are hundreds of universities that offer programs in English. Germany accepts the IB Diploma as a university admission requirement.

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

Date

Until end
of October

October 26 – Monday
11:00 PM

October 28
Wednesday
2:00 PM

October 28
Wednesday
5:30 PM

October 29 – Thursday
6:00 PM

November 8 – Sunday
8:00 PM

November 13
Friday
2:00 – 5:00PM

Event

Hong Kong Polytechnic University (Hong Kong) – Register here: HK Poly
(for personal consultations or faculty-specific webinars)

Columbia University (USA)
International Student Panel – Click here to register.

Waseda University (Japan) – Zoom Link to join
Meeting ID: 969 7519 2704
Passcode: 31603

Chinese University of Hong Kong (Hong Kong)
Live Talk:  Innovation through Engineering
Click here to register

University of St. Andrews (UK)
Link – to follow

Binghamton University (State University of New York, USA)
Link to register

Study in Japan Virtual Fair
Participating universities: University of Tsukuba, Kyushu, University, Temple University Japan, Hiroshima University, Nagoya University of Commerce & Business, iCLA Yamanashi Gakuin University, Nagoya University and Kyoto University of Advanced Science – Link to Virtual Fair: Study in Japan Fair

SAT Update

Please note that most universities have gone test-optional. This means they do not require test scores for students to be eligible for admission.

November 7 and December 5 have been cancelled by the College Board. Test-takers registered on these dates will receive an email with instructions.

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.