ISY Elementary Blog
A proud and humble school
Mike Simpson, Elementary School Principal
2 October 2020
Next week, we have a committee from WASC working with us online. WASC stands for The Western Association of Schools and Colleges. It is an organization that works with many top international schools as part of their continuous improvement efforts.
We have spent the last two years involved in a very detailed self-study that focused on all parts of our school – from curriculum to traffic control, from ASAs to the business office. The WASC committee is working with us next week to help us to reflect on what we have studied and to confirm our action plan for the future. Students, families, staff, and faculty all played a role in our self-study. Our new ISY Learner Outcomes and Attributes is one product of our collaborative efforts as outlined below.
As I have prepared documents, schedules, and meetings in preparation for this online visit, I could not help but reflect on how we have evolved as a school since we adopted our compassionate Mission and Vision. I am not sure I have worked (or ever will work) in a school and for a community that lives its Mission and Vision as much as ISY does. This commitment to our Mission and Vision really shines through in our self-study.
As a community, we are positive and proud of what we do for our students and what they in turn are able to achieve. But we also know we can improve. It is this humility that will always enable us to keep improving for the sake of our students and the world which is crying out for compassionate global citizens, lifelong learners, and agents for positive change.
In keeping with our continuous improvement efforts, today you will receive an email with a link to our fortnightly survey in relation to online learning. Thank you for taking the time to provide us with feedback. You can also contact me directly at msimpson@isyedu.org.
Kind regards,
Mike
AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH TO LEARNING: What should students learn for the 21st century?
This video is from Curriculum Redesign, an organization that inspired some of our self-study work around the ISY Learner Attributes. It is definitely worth a watch if you are interested in why we continue to develop an interdisciplinary approach to learning at ISY. A detailed explanation of Interdisciplinary Learning at ISY can be read here.
VIRTUAL RECESS WITH MS. PATTY!
Virtual Recess will be offered again this week from 1:00-1:30 PM. Students should use the All Grade Specialist Link to join on their assigned day. All activities will be student driven but will include fun and games.
ONLINE LEARNING TIP: How was school today?
It can be difficult at the best of times to get our children to talk about their school day. But it is important to understand how they are experiencing learning online so we can support and motivate them. Each Friday for the next few weeks, we will post five different questions that might help your child open up about their experience online. Here are this week’s questions:
- What was the best thing that happened today?
- Did you help anyone today?
- Did you say “thank you” to anyone?
- What made you laugh?
- Did you learn something you didn’t understand?
ISY LEARNER OUTCOMES & ATTRIBUTES
ISY purposefully waited until our Mission and Vision had taken root in our school before reviewing and confirming what we have termed the ISY Learner Outcomes. In line with our community’s understanding and awareness of the school’s Mission and Vision, we want every ISY student to develop into:
- Compassionate Global Citizens
- Lifelong Learners
- Agents for Positive Change
You will recognize the language of the Mission and Vision in these ISY Learner Outcomes. It is important that there is direct alignment between ISY’s Mission, Vision, and Lifelong Learner Outcomes.
The review and confirmation of the ISY Learner Outcomes began back in November as part of our WASC Focus on Learning Accreditation Self-Study. We asked our ourselves these questions:
- What does it mean to be educated?
- What are the current and future learning needs of our students?
From that initial session and after a series of dialogues, we settled on the following attributes as being key to our students being able to fulfil their potential and realize ISY’s Vision for them :
- Compassion
- Collaboration
- Communication
- Courage
- Creativity
- Critical Thinking
- Reflection
Click here for a more detailed explanation of what these ISY Learner Attributes mean and how we settled upon them.
Previous Elementary School Posts
Elementary Update – 10th October
Thank you to all the parents who helped some of our classes celebrate the Thadingyut Light Festival. This post has news of upcoming events after the holiday
ES October 4th 2019
Dear all, Another busy week here in the Elementary School. This week Grade 5 went on a field trip, we had a Math evening for parents and PreK parents organized a celebration for the upcoming special Thidingyut Celebration.
Elementary Update September 27
The teachers enjoyed the Compassion Conference on Friday. They were able to learn not only new ideas but be inspired by our keynote speaker, Wilma Derksen. I hope that many of you were also able to attend Wilma’s parent talk this week.
Elementary Update September 20
This week on Wednesday I visited the ISY Nay Pyi Taw campus where there are lots of fabulous things happening.
At ISY we continue enjoying our learning.
Elementary School Blog- Sept 13
It seemed that the rain this week purposely chose to come down at break and dismissal times. The rain never hampers our fun here at ISY though and in between the rain we had lots of creative fun outdoors this week (see pictures below).
Elementary School Blog – Sept 6
Dear Parents, It has been another fantastic week at ISY. We have really settled into the school year and we look forward to sharing with you all the wonderful things that are happening in our classrooms over the coming weeks.
The International School Yangon
20 Shwe Taungyar Street
Bahan Township
Yangon, Myanmar
+95 (0) 9 880 441 040