Friday 7th May, 2021 Volume 2, Issue 31

CONTENTS

Whole School NewsFrom the Head of SchoolFrom the Elementary PrincipalPYP Learning FocusFrom the Secondary PrincipalSecondary Learning FocusFrom the PTA

IMPORTANT DATES

Monday 10th May - PYP Virtual Art ExhibitionFriday 14th May - PTA Teacher Appreciation DayWednesday 19th May - Staff Training Day (School Closed)Thursday 20th May - Annual General MeetingTuesday 25th May - Graduation DayWednesday 26th May - Parent Workshop (PYP Assessment)Thursday 3rd June - Grade 5 Transition Celebration

Featured Story

Grade 5 Beach Clean-Up

Last Friday, Grade 5 students visited Ilgwang Beach, just north of the school, to pick up trash from thebeach. This trip was organised by Hani, one of our Grade 5 students who learned about how plastic endsup in the ocean during her PYP Exhibition inquiry. Part of her action was to organise the field trip, notjust to clean up the beach but also to record the types of trash that was found. Students used anapplication called Litterati to take photos of the trash to document what they found. They found itemsincluding beach toys, pieces of ropes, coloured incense sticks, styrofoam and plastic coffee cups. Somestudents recorded hundreds of photos on the Litterati app. Students could see how easily small pieces ofplastic and trash can go into the ocean and then affect the ocean ecosystems. Great work Grade 5!

Whole School News

2021 Annual General Meeting

This year’s AGM meeting will be held on Thursday 20th May at 6:30 pm in the School Gymnasium. Ahealth and travel declaration form will be sent out next week for you to complete to register yourattendance, should you wish to attend this meeting.

In addition to providing parents with the opportunity to see how the Board of Governors operates andto learn what activities the Board has been involved in over the past year, the AGM gives parents achance to see where the school is headed in the future. An important part of ensuring that the schoolcontinues to develop and improve is the election of members of the Board of Governors at the AGM.

The ballots for this year’s Board of Governorselection were sent home with students this weekand information about the candidates was sent inan email. Please vote for one candidate from eachcategory on the ballot (Parent Member andNon-Parent Member). Parents are able to cast onevote per family for each student enrolled at thatschool. Parents with more than one child shouldcomplete a separate form for each child. Pleaseensure you complete the ballot before the start ofthe AGM Meeting on Thursday the 20th May anddeposit it in the AGM Ballot Box at the SecurityOffice at the front of school.

AGM Ballot Box located at the front gate

From the Head of School

Children’s Day Mystery Gift BoxesI would like to thank the members of our PTA for all of their hard work preparingchildren’s day gift boxes that were distributed on Tuesday. Our usual communityevents have been limited this year due to Covid restrictions, but this has notprevented the PTA coming up with innovative ways to build community andpromote school spirit. The gift boxes were greatly appreciated by our students.The funds that were raised will be spent on purchasing a life-size ISB Bear mascot!

Teachers v Students FootballWe have been unable to have competitive football matches with other schools thisyear. To get some game time, our High School Girls Team played a match againstISB teachers after school this week. It was a closely fought contest - and great fun.The students played well and have clearly improved during the course of theseason. Thanks to Mr. Byrne for organizing this fixture.

Simon McCloskey

Welcome to Jeni LeeOn Monday 10th May we welcome JeniLee to our school community. Jenni willbe taking over from Marie Eksteen as theGrade 5 Homeroom Teacher for the lastfew weeks of term. Jeni will workalongside Marie next week for atransition period before Marie takesmaternity leave for the rest of theacademic year. Jeni is from Australia. Sheis a qualified teacher with a Bachelor ofArts Diploma of Education (Primary) fromMacquarie University in Sydney. She hastaught at schools in Australia and haspreviously worked at Dulwich College inSeoul.

Child Protection and SafeguardingWe believe that schools fill a special institutional role in society as protectors of children. Schools need toensure that all children in their care are afforded a safe and secure environment in which to grow anddevelop. ISB has a comprehensive Child Protection Policy in place and all staff receive formal training. Atthe start of this academic year, all ISB employees completed the ECIS Child Protection CertificationCourse.

We have now purchased additional online training modules developed by an organisation calledChildSafeGuarding.Com. They have produced training specifically for support staff in internationalschools. The course has been translated into Korean. From August we will be using this trainingprogramme with all outsourced support staff including bus drivers, bus monitors, cleaners, maintenanceand security staff. We hope by raising awareness and by offering regular formal training to all membersof our community we will help to keep all children at ISB safe.

From the Elementary Principal

On Wednesday, all PYP teachers spent the day focusing on planning thecurriculum for the next school year. Every year the PYP team takes time tocarefully review the PYP Programme of Inquiry to ensure a balanced andcomprehensive program for each grade level as they move through theschool.

Teachers check that the learning planned is relevant, appropriate andengaging so that students develop the knowledge, conceptual understandingsand skills necessary to progress in their learning journey. Ms Roland, our PYPCoordinator, led teachers in the review which will directly benefit our PYPstudents.

Kevin Smith

PYP Learning Focus

Grade 4 Korean Language AcquisitionThe students are excited about finishing their eco-bags. They have been working hard to researchKorean traditional designs and colours, find out meanings of the symbols and create their ideas on theeco-bags in conjunction with ‘Where we are in place and time’. They are very proud of their project andare busy preparing google slides for the Student-led conferences. They are looking forward to presentingthis process during virtual student-led conferences.

Kindergarten Garden CenterSeeds are now for sale in the Kindy Garden Center! We have been learning about the needs of plants andtheir different parts. This center has been such a fun way to explore those topics as well as numeracy,writing, and communication skills!

The students gathered flowers in the garden, set up floral arrangements, and delivered these along withmessages to teachers in our school! Recently, we have started noticing and finding seeds everywhere: inour snacks, on nature walks, floating in the air, and even in our art supplies! We have started gatheringthese seeds and are adding them to seed packets to sell in the center. The children have worked so hardto build and add to this space.

Grade 1 AssemblyOn Tuesday we were treated to a special video presentation by Grade 1, demonstrating the scientificprocedures that they followed in their recent ‘How the World Works’ Unit of Inquiry. The Grade 1scientists demonstrated experiments and asked probing questions, coming up with predictions andfinally conclusions. Well done Mr Kim and Grade 1!

Anchored for Life FundraiserThe A4L Crew held a successful fundraiser today for the ISB24 event by selling home-made fruit juicepopsicles and stress balls. The sale was very popular and all items were sold very quickly, raising a totalof 140,000 Won! Well done to the A4L Crew.

Finding Balance in the Yoga & Mindfulness ElectiveOur yoga and mindfulness elective students have been taking charge of their learning by working ontheir individual development. Together, we've focused on connecting to our anchor and utilizing it in ourpractice, and now these skills are being transferred to our own personal practice.

Pictured here is Anais working on ‘Tree Pose’ and Olivia developing her headstand skills. Well done forbeing patient with your development and giving yourselves time, space and energy to grow at your ownpace!

From the Secondary Principal

Every Monday afternoon and for this week, Wednesday as well, the teachersat ISB gather for weekly Professional Development or PD as we call it! Thefocus each week shifts between the Middle Years Programme Curriculum (Gr6-10) and the DP Programme Curriculum (Gr 11 & 12). The sessions are verywell run by both the MYP Coordinator, Ms Jenny Montague and the DPCoordinator, Ms Merriss Shenstone. On Monday Ms Shenstone ran a sessionon the importance of reporting in the DP. On Children’s Day, Ms Shenstoneran sessions on the importance of student engagement in the classroom,while Ms Montague’s sessions focussed on a number of areas, but specificallythe up and coming E- Assessments to be completed by the students in Grade10. As teachers we had to actually work on the E- Assessments for an hour togive all of us a taste of what soon lay ahead for the students.

Al Roland

Secondary Learning Focus

In the Shadows of the New Theme ParkWhat has been discussed for some time now is actually taking shape across the river from us! The EastBusan Tourism Complex, or the Osiria Tourism Complex is nearing completion.

We have watched in awe as the various rides take shape - none more impressive than the amazing rollercoaster you can see in the image. It will be interesting to see and hear the level of noise that willdefinitely emanate from the park. I can feel a few end of year adventures coming!

Please Help Out Local Flower Farmers

To help local Flower Farmers, on Friday of April 30th, James and William sold 50 bouquets ofAlstroemeria flowers for 5000 won per bunch. Their request to please help out our local flower farmerswas heard by our community. All flowers were sold by 4.00pm last Friday afternoon. They plan to do thesame this week and hopefully until the end of the year. All proceeds go towards ISB24 and the support ofDIRAMS. Thank you James and William for a wonderful initiative.

Grade 6 Beach Clean-up“We collected trash because we need to knowmore about the environment and why it hasbeen so polluted”.“I am fascinated by how much hard plastic wehad here is the table that shows how much ofeach”.“Although I go to SongJong beach almost everySaturday and Sunday I never realized theamount of trash that had been left there.Please try and pick up trash you see on thebeach. This is the data of the trash wecollected as you can see there is a hugeamount of Plastic”.

“I thought that the amount of trash we were able to find was a lot. I'm happy that we were able to pick thetrash up”.

MYP Language SelectionStudents entering Middle School at theInternational School of Busan mustchoose an additional language. The MYPrequires students to have a sustainedlanguage experience. The Google Formto choose your child’s additionallanguage has been sent out to grade 5parents today.

To assist you with making an informeddecision regarding language selection,please check out this video on the ISBYouTube Channel. There is also a writtendocument that will assist you withmaking the best decision.

Children’s Day BoxesA huge thank you to the PTA for organising the surprise Children’s Day Boxes. There was greatexcitement when they were delivered to the students, particularly those in Grade 6.

Staff versus High School Girls Soccer SquadThe teachers at ISB work hard and get involved in a variety of PD activities as illustrated above, but wealso know how to have fun! On Tuesday afternoon, despite the rain and wind and the many years ofexperience, the teachers took on the girls soccer squad. When we say experience, we mean age!

We battled for over two hours against much younger players and certainly more agile than the Staffgoalkeeper! But in the end it didn't actually matter what the score was, it was all about having fun. Thankyou to Mr. Byrne for organising the event and for the wonderful spirit that was shown on the pitch byboth teachers and students. We will definitely do this again.

Diploma Exam UpdateThe Grade 12s are in the middle of the IB World Exams. The whiteboard in the DP Room is covered incomplex Maths and Physics solutions and conversations revolve around topics like functions andderivatives or the role of the amygdala in the perception of emotion. Many students come into school towork in study groups and to get last minute advice from their teachers. They are calm, focused and verywell prepared for the final hurdle of the Diploma Programme.

In spite of the restrictions caused by Covid19, this is the third set of exams that our students have sat.They are very used to the procedures in undertaking exams and the experience of responding toquestions under the pressure of time. We wish them luck for each exam but know that their success isactually a result of the effort they, and their teachers, have put in throughout the two year course.

The exams finish on May 20th and then attention will turn to the Graduation ceremony on May 25th.

International CooperationA number of months ago we were approached bytwo schools - Tashkent International School and theInternational School of Beijing who had studentswho were unable to return to their schools for theirexams.

We provided a space for their students to continuewith their studies, and enjoyed playing host to ourfellow global citizens.

Secondary School Yard Sale

The social advocacy club is planning to host a yard sale type fundraiser for ISB24. Students and teachersare asked to donate items they no longer want (still in decent condition) during the week of May 10th toMr Wilson's room, these items then being sold Tuesday, May 18th during lunch.

From the PTA

Children’s Day Gift Boxes

The PTA would like to thank all the students thatparticipated in the ‘Mystery Box’ fundraiser for ourMascot! It was a great success and the order hasnow been placed for a brand new ISB Mascot! Wereally can’t wait to see it! We hope all the studentsenjoyed their boxes! The pictures certainly showedlots of delighted ISB bears! Thank you as always foryour support of our events!

The ISB Bear Mascot will be arriving soon!Gift box delivery to happy students