AIS MONTHLY NEWSLETTER | Issue Jan 2018
Finding the best staff
From the Executive Principal
Finding the best staff by Dr Roderick Crouch
R
ecently Mr Vella and I returned from Australia
that each group in the class is being challenged at
where we attended a fair for recruiting new
their level. Furthermore, as a school we are committed
staff. This year we have our lowest turnover in the
to professional development and appraisal to ensure
teaching staff, which is further evidence of the
our teachers continue to be the best staff.
growing reputation of the school. I also look for teachers who have high expectations The biggest influence that a school has on students’
for all the students in their class. This means they
learning is via the classroom teacher.
While we
will not only encourage all students to do their best,
might not understand the research, we know what
but also persist with students who might be harder
a difference it makes when we see our children
to teach than others (whether that child happens to
flourish under the guidance of a good teacher.
be brighter, less able or behaviourally challenging).
Fundamentally, as parents we want to know that when our children go to school, they are safe,
At AIS, we look for staff who know how to engage
happy and learning. We want to know that they
his/her students. High levels of engagement lead
have highly professional teachers – suitably qualified
to better learning outcomes, as students will learn
and experienced, and capable in the classroom. But
more when they want to be in the class and enjoy
what makes an excellent teacher? The following is
what they are learning. Engagement comes from
what I look for when I am appointing staff to work
being able to adapt the curriculum to include real
at AIS.
life learning experiences, or by finding ways to break down complex issues into understandable and
I look for someone who has good pedagogy. This is
manageable parts. I am delighted at the way AIS
an old-fashioned word that simply means teaching
staff do this.
strategies. In other words, good teachers have good pedagogy because they know how to adapt what
In using good pedagogy, AIS staff are both experts
they are teaching for the students in their class. To
and facilitators, and know how to move between the
do this, they first need to know their students and
two. In other words, they know at times they need
understand their different learning needs. In any one
to provide the exact knowledge of how something is
class there can be an intellectual age range of up to
done (the expert) while at others, they guide a child
six years, let alone a variety of nationalities and
on a path of self- learning and discovery to deepen
language
and enhance the child’s learning (the facilitator).
abilities.
Therefore
good
pedagogy
requires a teacher to differentiate (or differ) their program to cater for those needs. At AIS this is
The next aspect that I look for is whether a teacher
achieved through a combination of skill, good
knows and understands his/her students. Do they
planning and constant monitoring. We are proud of
know what makes the children in their class ‘tick’?
the way the AIS staff adapt what they do to suit the
At AIS we expect our staff to take the time to get
needs of the students – they often have different
to know their students, and it is delightful to see
programs or questions operating simultaneously so
that they do. AIS teaching staff willingly contribute The Leader ¡ January 2018
22
to the extra-curricular program of the school, either
The final skill I look for is whether the teacher has
by taking activities or by supporting their students.
high levels of emotional intelligence, especially
They know that this is a great way of getting to know
resilience. It is always a challenge to move countries,
their students outside the classroom. In addition,
but it shows a great example to students of how to
they take the time to talk to parents and respond
manage change. We therefore look for staff we
promptly to their requests or concerns. The recent
know will work well with their colleagues, have self-
parent-teacher conferences are examples of this.
awareness and a good understanding of the impact
As a parent it is wonderful to know that your child’s
on others of what they do and say. They manage
teacher will go the extra mile for your child.
well the ups and downs of life, and ensure their teaching remains always of a very high standard.
At AIS, something that may not be immediately obvious to parents is that our teachers are all
As the Executive Principal of AIS, my ultimate
expected to contribute positively to both the
responsibility is to ensure that we have the best staff
professional life and the wider life of the school. In
for the children in the School, for in doing so, I know
other words, they add value. Our staff are committed
I am maximising the students’ opportunities. I am
to life-long learning themselves by undertaking
very pleased with the professional nature and high
ongoing professional development, or further study
quality of our staff. By working closely with parents,
and professional reading. The best teachers are
we can provide good role models, both at home
always interested in improvement and are engaged
and at school, and so help a child to be the best
in conversations about their students and how to
and most successful they can be.
assist them.
Council of International Schools (CIS) accreditation visit 20-25 January 2018
T
he final stage of the three-year process that leads to CIS accreditation will occur this month when we are visited by a team of nine educators from across the world to look at all we do. AIS filed its initial application in 2015, had the first inspection visit in March 2016 (at which time we became a CIS member school). To become fully accredited a school must then undertake a parent survey and a self-study. This is a year-long process focusing on school quality and improvement. We finished our self-study in December with the submission of a 600 page report on all aspects of the school. Parents will have the opportunity to meet the visiting team on Monday 22 January at 9am in the Multi Purpose Room at Thu Thiem. I invite you all to attend.
The Leader ÂĄ January 2018
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From the Primary & Kindergarten Principal
How can I help my child sleep well at night? by Rachel Perkins Do you often find yourself asking… how can my child get more sleep? Sleep is an important time for your children to rest their body and mind. It gives them time to grow physically and helps with brain development and function. A good night’s sleep will also improve their positive mindset and make them feel ready to learn in the morning when they come to school. Sleep needs vary with age, but generally speaking, young children need around 11 to 12 hours each night, teens need between 8.5 and 9.25 hours and the average adult needs only between 7 and 9 hours per night. Of course, getting your child to enjoy the recommended hours of sleep each evening is often difficult. We have observed that many children are going to bed too late to enjoy a full night’s rest. This is reflected in how they perform at school the following day. Research shows that children who go to bed after 9:00 p.m. take longer to fall asleep, wake more often at night and get less overall sleep. A few simple changes can make a huge difference in how well a child sleeps. Please find below some recommendations on how to help your child get a good night’s rest. 1. Avoid feeding your child big meals close to bedtime, and don’t give him/her anything containing caffeine less than six hours before bedtime. 2. After dinner, avoid all stimulating activities. Rather promote relaxing activities such as completing puzzles, colouring pictures, listening to music or reading. 3. Establish a consistent and relaxing bedtime routine that lasts between 20 and 30 minutes and ends in your child’s bedroom. Avoid scary stories or TV shows. It’s better to read a favourite book every night than a new one because it’s familiar. 4. Make sure your child is comfortable. Clothes and blankets should not restrict movement, and the bedroom temperature shouldn’t be too warm or too cold. 5. Give your child tools to overcome his/her worries. These can include a flashlight or a large stuffed animal to cuddle. 6. Keep the use of IT to a minimum at bedtime as they can easily over stimulate a child. 7. Set up a reward system. Each night your child goes to bed on time and stays there all night, they get a star. After three stars, they receive a small prize. Parenting is never easy and bed times can be a battleground, so I hope this advice helps - sweet dreams!
The Leader ¡ January 2018
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Looking forward to the Year of the DOG in Vietnamese culture lessons By Nguyen Pham - VLC Teacher
W
ith Tet Nguyen Dan soon to
We are looking forward to celebrating
arrive, Vietnamese culture
this year’s spectacular Tet Fair on
the
Friday 9th February 2018 at Thu
customs and traditions associated
Thiem and Thao Dien with all of our
with this important festival.
students, parents and teachers. The
lessons
have
focused
on
fair promises a wonderful experience Students have been inquiring into a
of Tet with 15 unique stalls, which
range of subjects including how Tet
will offer traditional activities, games
is celebrated in different parts of
and Vietnamese foods.
Vietnam (Year 2s), traditional stories (Kindergarten), Vietnamese Zodiac
Through these activities and festival
Animals (Year 1s), Tet songs and Tet
focus in and out of the classroom,
wishes (Year 3s), traditional foods
the understanding of the Vietnamese
(Year 4 and Year 5s) and new year
culture is strengthened with both our
customs (Year 6s). Students also
local
made red lanterns, created Tet
enabling
cards, and decorated hoa dao and
appreciate the cultural experience
hoa mai trees ready for the new year.
on offer whilst living here in Viet Nam.
and
expatriate them
to
students, enjoy
and
Artwork of the Month Huy Tran: ‘'Dalina'’
pencil and watercolour on paper.
E
ach month we will be featuring a piece of artwork created by one of our current students to celebrate their
skill and creative vision. Sometimes the work will be accompanied by an artist’s statement which will help explain the work. This month we feature Huy Tran’s portrait of Dalina. Here Huy successfully explores a theme of ‘double exposure’. In order to create this artwork, Huy produced a number of portrait sketches and used Adobe Photoshop to blend photography and his drawing. He then used the result of that process to create the drawing and watercolour you see here. By Nigel Hall The Leader ¡ January 2018
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PYP Exhibition T
he PYP Exhibition is a requirement for all the IBPYP students in the final year of their primary education. It provides an opportunity for students to
carry out independent research in what they are passionate about, under a specific Transdisciplinary Theme, in order to take action in the community. Year 6 students have been collaborating across campuses to work on this project every Wednesday. Using the Transdisciplinary theme of ‘How we organise ourselves’, the students developed their own central idea: ‘Communities make a difference when they contribute to a common sustainable goal’. This is an exciting central idea which will allow students to follow their passions and build the skills and organisation required in order to finesse their ideas for taking action. The work will continue until May 15 – 16, when students present and reflect on their projects.
Students’ ideas are always diverse and we are seeking help and support from our community to act as ‘experts’ who are willing to be involved in students’ research process. Some of the ideas include animal welfare, performing arts, healthy lifestyle, helping war victims, promoting sports, children’s right to education, to name a few. It is such an incredible process to be a part of and we are excited to see where the students’ inquiries will take them. Your involvement could mean taking part in the interview process or enabling students to observe a particular field of work, providing a resource to use, and so on. We hope you will be able to support us. Please contact mida.abdul@aisvietnam.com for more details in helping some of our students. By Shanna Comeford and Mida Abdul Year 6 teacher and PYP Coordinator
O
ur second PYP Parent Workshop took place on 23rd November 2017. The PYP Coordinator presented a topic on ‘Inquiry based learning and its misconceptions’
to help parents better understand what it is. The workshop was presented in an interactive way that enabled parents to take part in a brief inquiry learning process that was related to different curriculum areas. Parents reflected on their experiences at the end, in order to construct their own understanding and, through a question and answer session, the PYP coordinator was able to clarify any misconceptions related to ‘Inquiry based learning’. It was, once again, a great learning experience for all and I look forward to welcoming parents for the next workshop in Term 3. By Mida Abdul- PYP Coordinator The Leader ¡ January 2018
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Secondary Sports day 2017 2017 went out with a bang with our annual Secondary School sports day on the last day of term. There was some great sportsmanship displayed throughout the day in a variety of sports.
Students seemed to really enjoy
themselves, participating with others in their year group. There were some great results throughout the day before Pegasus finished on top to take the cup! Well done everyone. By Joanna Denny
Touch Rugby Tournament
O teams in a tournament organised by the Saigon Rugby
n Saturday 9 December AIS entered two touch rugby
Club. It was a great day out at RMIT in District 7 with the highlight of the day being a win for the AIS students over the
AIS staff in the last game of the day. Touch rugby continues to grow at AIS and it was fantastic to see so many students and staff enjoying the day with some friendly competition. By Brandon Dewes
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s r a c s O e h t t a t h A Nig
s e t a r b e l e AIS C
A
By Suzette Bradfield
t AIS we celebrate music all year round! This was again evident in the outstanding performances of both our Primary School campuses on Thursday 30th November and
Friday 1st December in the auditorium at TT. This year we celebrated ‘A Night at the Oscars’. Students entertained us with songs and dances that won Oscar awards over the last fifty years. After an inspirational opening by all the students from Y1 – Y6, singing ‘Let the river run’ in four parts, Kindergarten entertained the audience singing and dancing ‘Three Blind Mice’. The Y1 students transformed into little ‘Olivers’ singing and dancing ‘I’ll do anything for you’. The Y2s performed a medley from the movie ‘Mary Poppins’ and had the audience in awe for being able to
sing
‘supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’. The Y3s performed ‘Raindrops keep falling on my head’ from the award winning movie ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’. The TT Y4 students touched our hearts with a beautiful performance; playing and singing the theme song from the movie ‘Titanic’. The TD Y4 students were singing and playing songs from one of the most famous movies of all times, ‘The Sound of Music’. The Y5 and Y6 students gave outstanding performances with songs and dances from ‘West Side Story’, ‘Once’ and ‘Jai Ho’. The finale, ‘Another Day of Sun’, was certainly a highlight and sent the audience home tapping their feet. Thank you to all who made the show such a success.
E
ach year in November, Kindergarten celebrates Nursery Rhyme Week. This is the time when students focus on rhyme in the Literacy area. Students
participated in sequencing activities, creating a nursery rhyme song book, and acting and singing a different nursery rhyme each day. At Xi Campus, their favourite nursery rhyme was ‘Hickory Dickory Dock’ and they made a huge clock covered with mice that each child had made. Lotus campus students enjoyed ‘Miss Polly had a Dolly’, and dressing up as doctors! To conclude, Kindergarten students had a picnic with their teddy bears to celebrate Nursery Rhyme Week! All the children brought their favourite teddy from home and
By Patricia Robson
they enjoyed Teddy Bear biscuits all the way from Australia. At Thu Thiem campus, we had popcorn as well and had fun on the slippery dip with our teddies. The Leader ¡ January 2018
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AIS TECH: Calling all Makers, Inventors, and Designers By Ryan Haines
T
he AIS STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) Lab/Makerspace is open for business in the library. The STEM
lab is a multi-literacy design space that can help students explore
World Map Challenge
Y
ear 8 Humanities have competed in a ‘World Map Challenge’. Their task was to make a world
map from scratch that was at least 1m x 1m. Extra
21st century skills such as communication, collaboration, critical
points were awarded for creativity, accuracy, beauty
thinking and creativity. STEM Labs (Makerspaces, Fab Labs)
and for being thought-provoking. The entrants are on
provide hands-on, creative ways to encourage students to design,
display in the D2 corridors. By Tess Maloney
experiment, build and invent as they deeply engage in science, engineering and tinkering. Students go beyond being passive consumers of technology and become creators and innovators. Students can work on projects related to their Unit of Inquiry as well as in other related subjects. The room provides opportunities for students to explore
• Cardboard construction
• Prototyping
• Lego
• Electronics
• Robotics
• Digital fabrication
• Coding
Year 1 Raise Awareness for Endangered Animals
At AIS, we are committed to preparing our students to face the
Y
challenges of an ever changing and developing technological
children made several useful items including a 2018
world. The STEM lab at AIS is just one of the many initiatives that
calendar, a reindeer frame and bauble decorations.
we are providing our students to help them be successful and
With fabulous support from Year 1 families, the
discerning citizens in the world of tomorrow.
children raised 3,770,000 Vietnamese Dong. All
ear 1 demonstrated their growing understanding of global issues by holding a Winter Market to
raise funds for endangered Vietnamese animals. The
proceeds will go to Cat Tien National Park for the support of endangered animals including the Goldencheeked gibbon. Year 1 would like to say a big thank you to all families who took the time to celebrate this wonderful event. By Taylor Oughton
The Leader ¡ January 2018
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MUSIC NOTES T
By Andrew Sweeney
he Music department had a brilliant lead up to the Winter break in December. All classes and year groups are working on their academic music theory curriculum to prepare them for choices to do
IGCSE and IB Music. Our curriculum is based on a series of eight criteria with rubrics to determine the learning outcomes. The academic curriculum is designed to improve knowledge about the structure of music and how it is written by using pitch, tempo, dynamics and timbre. Students are learning new knowledge and broadening their understanding of how printed and written music is structured to be a truly international language that is used across all countries in the world. The Senior Winter Dance was on Friday 8th December. It was at the Park Hyatt and this venue was perfect as a performance opportunity for our Year 11 and 12 students. Throughout the evening we had four performances from various groups. They were all fantastic and provided a high standard of professional performances.
The Christmas concert on 13 December at Thao Dien was by far our biggest event. We had performances by five contemporary music groups, the AIS Primary Choir, the AIS Senior Choir and the 55 students in the Senior Concert Band, all of which showed the remarkable depth of talent that we have at AIS. These events take a huge amount of time to prepare our students to perform at such a high standard. Thank you to all of our wonderful students who took the opportunity to perform and to Ms Gaynor, Mrs Bradfield, Ms Dunnett and Mr Sweeney for coordinating each group.
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To finish off such a successful first half of the year, after the sports day on 15 December 2017, we had the annual AIS Has Got Talent. Many students submitted audition videos and from these we selected several successful applicants. All of our contestants performed to a high standard and the judges had the difficult decision of awarding the winning four prizes. Congratulations to everyone who took part on your stellar performances and to our winners: Overall winner
Min Su Seo Creative performer
Bob Mai Rising Star
Jenny Moon Peoples Choice
Han Mai
At the conclusion of the event our Senior Concert Band performed the theme music to the Hollywood movie ‘Shrek’. It was great to see so many students participating in our Senior Concert Band and it continues to grow in size. Students are welcome to participate when they have the necessary skills on their instrument. Students are also welcome to join a range of other music ensembles, such as the new jazz big band, where students will learn to play jazz. We also have a Middle School Concert Band for students who can play their instrument but are not yet ready for the Senior Concert Band. We encourage parents to support the program by encouraging their children to be a participator and not a spectator.
Ho Chi Minh City International Schools Combined Concert Bands - Mekong Delta Honour Band 25 of our Music students have been invited to represent AIS in the prestigious Mekong Delta Honour Band on Sunday 21 January and Monday 22 January. The Mekong Delta Honour Band is a fantastic concert band program for selected students from all of Ho Chi Minh City’s international schools. Students will rehearse their music over the two days and present a concert on the Monday afternoon. This is a significant achievement for our selected students and a wonderful opportunity for students to be part of a combined Concert Band concert.
The Leader ¡ January 2018
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CAFETERIA PERFORMANCES
P
erforming in front of an audience is an important component of both IGCSE and IBDP Music
courses. AIS Senior School students and staff will
R
be entertained over the next 4 weeks in the cafeteria oald Dahl’s scariest book will be brought to life in the
at recess by Year 11 and 12 Music students as
AIS Thu Thiem Auditorium in May this year in a
part of their performance portfolio preparations.
tremendously terrifying treat for the whole family. Witches absolutely detest children and are planning to make them disappear. But one brave young boy and his grandmother have a plan to get rid of the witches for good . . . . . if only they can avoid being turned into mice! Lower Secondary Drama performance of Roald Dahl’s “The WITCHES”, 10 & 11 May. By Jacqui Gaynor
Primary Cross country 2017 APSC
O country carnival was held. This was a great morning
n Tuesday 12 Dec, our annual primary school cross
where students challenged themselves to run either the 1.1km or the 2.2km race. It was fantastic to see the grit and determination shown by many students. As a result of
championships which is being held on Tuesday 6th
V
February.
show appreciation and gratitude to teachers.
Well done to all those athletes who volunteered to run and
Teachers were very spoiled on that morning at Xi, Lotus,
completed the course.
Cherry Blossom and Thu Thiem with an amazing array
the carnival, some students will now be selected to represent AIS at the SISAC inter-schools cross country
ietnamese Teachers’ Day was celebrated on Monday 20 November across the campuses at
AIS. This day is celebrated throughout the country to
of delicious food for either breakfast or morning tea. Teachers were also presented with a lovely gift of appreciation. At Cherry Blossom there was also background music played by students to give the morning that special ambience! We would like to acknowledge the effort of the PFG and all parents and students for making this such a special occasion By Joanna Denny
By Bernadette O’Sullivan
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by the Ho Chi Minh Aquatic Sports Association
SAFE • CLEAN • BEAUTIFUL Best swimming pool for the community in 2017 The Leader ¡ January 2018
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