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IB Asia Pacific Newsletter

Quarter Two, 2008

China and Mongolia

Sichuan Earthquake Disaster

Guang Ya School

The IB managed to maintain contact with the Head and Coordinator of Guang Ya School, an IB World School which is located in Dujianyan, one of the severely damaged towns in the epicenter.

The situation of the school is as follows: 

  • There were no injuries to its students and teachers.
  • Houses were not damaged except for the dormitory with a crack. All the students had to stay in the tents immediately after the quake.
  • From 26 May, its MYP students and primary school students resumed their studies.
  • The DP course will relocate in a campus in Chengdu from 18 August.

Qing Guangya, the head of the school, expressed gratitude on behalf of the whole school to the concern from Jeff Beard, Director General of the IB and Judith Guy, Regional Director of IB Asia Pacific.

 

Three days of mourning and three minutes silence on

19 May 2008

Flags flew at half-staff and public entertainment was cancelled as China began three days of mourning Monday for the victims of the nation's massive earthquake.

As a mark of respect for the victims of the Sichuan Earthquake disaster, many Chinese IB world schools observed a three-minute silence at 2.28 pm on Monday, 19 May 2008 - exactly one week since the earthquake struck. DP schools have adjusted their IB exam starting time on Monday afternoon so that the students could participate in observing the three minutes silence.

Other IB World Schools’ reaction

Most of the IB World Schools in China are making donations to the Sichuan Earthquake.

Many schools have contacted the China office to express their concern for Guang Ya School. 

 
Network

Trevor Gale, the IBDP Coordinator of BISS Pudong, the school hosted a DT teacher job-alike session on 10 May. It was very successful with the attending teachers sharing ideas.


MYP IBSCM North schools – reporting for 2007-2008

This group consists of the eight Beijing, Tianjin and Ulaanbaatar MYP authorized or candidate schools.  The coordinators meet about every three months.  We are building up a helpful network of support between our schools, both the Chinese and the International ones.  This year the focus has been on organizing job-alike sessions for different subject groups, and an Area of Interaction Festival. We also take the opportunity to discuss and share knowledge about the upcoming new MYP documents, moderation processes…the challenges facing MYP coordinators.  It is great to have this chance to share with each other!

We spread our meetings and the job-alike session around our schools in order to give each other a chance to visit the different schools and ‘feel the MYP atmospheres’!

Job-alike sessions 2007-2008:

    • Language B English at BISS in January
    • AOI leaders at BCIS in February
    • Humanities at Beijing No.55 together with IS Tianjin in March
    • PE at WAB in March
    • Language B Chinese at BCIS in April

The Areas of Interaction Festival

On the 29 February/1 March the Beijing City International School hosted the first Areas of Interaction Festival organized in collaboration with seven MYP schools in the Beijing / Tianjin area.  To know more:

http://what-on-earth-can-i-do.wikispaces.com/ or email lcole@bcis.cn

                The UN millennium goals were explored

                                          via

                             the Areas of Interaction

                                  with the question

                          What on Earth can I do?

       120 students from Grades 6 – 10 from 7 schools

                  speaking both English and Chinese

                              worked on 5 activities

 

The Last Flower – a drama production

Creating Board games

Developing techniques to create ‘Rooftop gardens’

Using Knowledge to create Action

The Voice of the Festival – reporting on the activities

Throughout The Festival, the leaders incorporated opportunities to illustrate learning, balancing investigating important issues with having fun building a ‘Festival community’ under the guidance of Dinos Aristidou, the Festival ‘linkman’. Dinos came specifically to create the ‘community’. He worked with all the students, who were spread over the five MYP years and who came from different types of schools and cultures, using both English and Chinese. He worked on creating a healthy group dynamic so that the diverse individuals gelled into a friendly, enthusiastic, cooperative and curious body of learners who were willing to work together with ease and confidence. As a result of the community atmosphere, the students became, very naturally, enthusiastically involved with the aims of their chosen activity. 

To complete The Festival the students met in the theatre to present their work.  They focused on the learning area, the key question, how the learning happened and the outcome. Different groups presented their work in different ways, from silent mime with placards to film and live performance.  The Learner Profile was evident throughout The Festival, and was celebrated in the final plenary.   

An unexpected bonus to The Festival, it was not only the students who were benefitting from joining together with the other students, it was also the teachers.  The chaperoning teachers were collaborating together in the different activities, or roaming the activities and soaking in the variety of teaching practices occurring!

The MYP IBSCM North schools plan to make this an annual event.

Lotty Cole

Beijing City International School

China

Wang Hong, Regional Representative China and Mongolia

Xia Juan, Personal Assistant

Email: china@ibo.org

 


Snapshots

The Area of Interaction Festival

china1

The Last Flower - a drama production

china2

Creating board games

china3

Creating a community

china4

Developing techniques to create "Rooftop gardens"

myp5

The Voice of the Festival - reporting on the activities