Elementaruy School News
Gosh - what a busy week! With a focus on student safety ISS has established 5 km/h is a safe speed for cars. This is about a person's walking pace. Please check your speed as you enter and leave the campus. Young lives depend on it! Last Friday we were fortunate to enjoy coffee with Mr Marvyn Lim Seng from his start up company, Go Space Singaporean into Space who will be travelling to Australia in April to launch the first SIngaporean astronaut into space. Marvyn has kindly offered to speak to our Middle and High School students about his journey into the space industry and how he, as a Scientist and entrepreneur, has co-opted similar thinking people to put the first Singaporean into Space. We are very proud of our Under 11 Football Team who have performed really well during the season. LV Manglani, Archie Proulx, Saadullah Albitar and Aditya Dinukumar certainly enjoyed representing the school and were fine ambassadors for ISS. The school is looking forward to our Literacy Week. Please keep yourself informed of all the activities through your class teacher and thank you for all your contributions to the Book Swap. Please be reminded that 3 Way Conferences will be held at school on Friday 1 March. You should have received a sign up sheet. This is not a normal school day. I will be around the school if you wish to talk to me. The Family Fun Fair is on April 5. I am collecting donations for the Silent Auction. If you can donate a Spa Voucher, Dinner voucher, Body Shop basket or anything that is new and could be auctioned please drop it in to the office. We are collecting for Clean Water toilet systems for those families who the Grade 5s will be supporting through their camp experience. Next academic year Kindergarten will start at 3 years old. You will have the opportunity to choose between a 2, 3 or 5 day programme with longer hours if required. The Kindergarten will run the Early Years Programme of the PYP. More details are available on the website and through admissions or myself. Middle School News Greetings and welcome to the Middle School news update. With a focus on student safety ISS has established 5 km/h is a safe speed for cars. This is about a person's walking pace. Please check your speed as you enter and leave the campus. Young lives depend on it! ISA reports Having now completed the ISA for the year, we can feedback they have again been a great opportunity to to judge their progress in literacy and also benchmark themselves against a wider community. The individual ISA reports will go into ManageBac around the end of April. ACSIS sports ISS U14 boys basketball started their campaign against Chatsworth. Early in the season the boys show plenty of potential. It was a solid start to the season according to Coach Orgee. Plenty of potential for the season ahead. Three Way Conferences (3WC) On Friday 1st March the Three Way Conferences are being held in Serangoon Hall. These will run for Middle School students from 08.00am- 4.00pm. All parents and guardians are encouraged, with their student(s) to be a part of 3WC. Signup via the links: Looking forward to seeing you on the day. Have a great weekend MT Elementary School News
Spring Into Music On March 12th, 2019, all students K1 - Grade 5 will take part in the ISS Elementary School Spring Concert, Spring Into Music. The concert will be held after school at 6:30pm at the Singapore Conference Hall located at 7 Shenton Way. As each grade level has been preparing for this performance throughout the year, all students will be expected to attend and take part in the concert. Spring Into Music will feature student performances in vocal ensembles and instrumental groups, in which students will display their skills on the xylophone, ukulele, recorder, and a variety of other instruments they've learned within performing arts classes. You will hear repertoire which ranges across multiple genres and generations, including pieces such as Vivaldi's Four Seasons, Bobby McFerrin's Don't Worry, Be Happy, and more popular songs from around the world. Additionally, K1 and K2 will collaboratively perform a musical play titled The Season Wizard. The opportunity for students to participate in a public performance is of such great value as they grow and develop as risk-takers and communicators. The dedication which goes into preparing for this event is a true display of our student's commitment to learning and well-rounded, balanced nature. Seeing our Elementary School students flourish throughout the year in Performing Arts has been immensely rewarding as a music educator, and we at ISS are excited to share the result of their work with our school community. Tickets for Spring Into Music are available in the Paterson Campus Admin Office for the price of $20 each. Thank you for supporting your child’s involvement in performing arts, and we look forward to seeing you at the performance. The ISS teachers enjoyed two days of professional development at our ISS Conference and section PD days on 7 & 8 February. All our staff were highly engaged and shared their knowledge through workshops and presentations. We all participated in a wonderful community lunch hosted by our CEO Mrs. Chan which made our Chinese New Year Celebrations really special. Last Tuesday we were enthralled by the Lion Dance; every student in the school from K to 12 was present to take part in this celebration. Our Grade 3,4 and 5 students have been participating in the ISA as part of our ongoing assessment practices. By all accounts, the students reported that they felt comfortable with the questions in the assessment. The staff has been meeting to discuss the Grade 5 Exhibition which will take place on 23 and 24 April. A number of teachers will be helping the students as ‘mentors’. It will be an opportunity for all our staff to be part of the students educational journey. Middle School News Greetings and happy Week 24 of the school year! With a little over a third of the school year remaining things are really picking up pace. Rest assured the health and well being of our students is foremost in the minds of everyone at ISS. This week to finish off the International Schools Assessment (ISA), students went on a mindful walk. The chance to breathe deeply in and out; to look up at the sky; and to mix with their friends. All whilst getting some exercise. Following on from this we held a ‘Silent Reading Party’. Spread out of the basketball courts students read a book by themselves for 40 mins. What a wonderful way to to meander into the weekend International Schools Assessment (ISA) ISA is done for another year. We are hopeful of having results by mid-April. These assessments will assist in guiding the development of the curriculum in the next academic year and help guide teachers in personalising learning for students for the remainder of this year. Students managed the ISAs very well. It is always good preparation for further external assessments that students will be exposed later in their educational life. Each individual ISA report will be placed into every student who has sat the ISA. This will happen toward the end of April this year. WIDA ISS is very excited about hosting the WIDA Conference at Paterson Campus from 21-24 February. Over 40 educators from all over South-East Asia will descend on ISS for four days of intense review, learnings and experiences that will support the learning of English using the WIDA framework. More updates in our next blog. ISS supporting the community Building on the WIDA conference theme, just updating everyone on the role ISS is taking in the community. Last weekend Paterson Campus hosted a well being conference for parents and educators. Focusing on self-awareness, it was by all reports very successful. On Tuesday night a further parent support session ‘Now and Here’ was held in Changi hall and focused on supporting well being. Next weekend the Global Mothers Network will host a full Changi Hall where parents will discuss parenting, students and living life abroad. Have a great weekend MT The students in Elementary enjoyed a fabulous assembly performed by students in Mandarin - celebrating the Year of the Pig. Students all over the school are getting excited as they and their families prepare for this auspicious event. When we come back to school after the Lunar New Year break our founder, Mrs Chan, has organised a Lion Dance for our students which promises to be spectacular.
As Mr Taylor has mentioned in his blog, students from Grade 3 to 5 have been preparing for their ISA. Not all students will be taking this as it is dependant on their level of English language acquisition, but those students who are not participating will have the opportunity to work on test samples to familiarise them with ISA going forward. The students are working very hard on the ES ‘Spring into Music’ on March 12. Don’t forget to book your tickets soon! May I ask that if you stay after school to play in the ES play area that you encourage your children to put all the blue blocks away, keep the sand in the sandpit (and don’t add water to it) and place all the footballs in the cage. We do expect our students to clear up after themselves, and after school is no exception. This semester we are offering Mindfulness sessions for Parents and Guardians on Thursdays from 2:35-3:30 in Room 26. Do come and join us from 14th February. We all wish you a Happy Lunar New Year and look forward to seeing you on Monday 11 February. The school office will be open from 7 February as the teachers will be participating in two days of Professional Development. Middle School News Wow! What a week we just had. Between International School Assessment (ISA) Coffee Morning and a visit from the Zhengheng Secondary School from China, it was go go go. In between times, the dedicated staff started preparing themselves for the delivery of the ISA, to ensure a smooth and stress free assessment. As well staff are reviewing data sets from Semester One as they start to work with students to build towards strong but challenging goals. The students for their part are continuing the work begun in Sambutan last week. Reviewing their Semester One report and developing goals that either build on a strength or turn an area of development into a strength. It’s all about individualising learning! Year of the Pig Some do and don’ts for the upcoming year of the pig (adapted from smh.com.au) Do these things
Lucky numbers: 2, 5, 8 Have a great lunar new year and see you in the year of the pig. MT |
Susan Tilney
Paterson Principal Archives
April 2020
Categories |