Beliefs in Action Issue 4: Balanced Lives

Developing Minds

Developing Character Developing Community

Issue 04.

Balanced Lives

To Educate for International Understanding

ISA Run Into Summer What better way to live a balanced life than by keeping active? To celebrate the end of another year at ISA, the PTA made sure that we broke for summer on a high with the ISA Family Fun Run! The run took place on 11 June and gave students, parents and staff alike the opportunity to be active, make social connections and overcome a challenge with a run through the school building. With a warm-up from our very own Rodrigo, runners received a bib number and professional timing chip to raise the stakes and keep all the runners motivated during their run through the 'Pink Castle.'

The challenge was a mixture of a run and scavenger hunt, with an ice cream reward for those participants who found all the hidden items. Of course, everyone rose to the challenge!

The day truly was a chance for the whole family to come together and enjoy the summer sunshine, with other activities including a Bouncy Castle, Dodgeball, Obstacle Course and various carnival-like activity booths set up by ISA CAS students, as well as a raffle of themed baskets.

The PTA made sure that we broke for summer on a high with the ISA Family Fun Run!

Well-being in Thought-Full Schools Projects Well-being and balance are prevalent topics in today's post-pandemic world and, perhaps unsurprisingly, a running theme of many of this year's Thought-full Schools project topics.

Thought-full Schools is a professional development initiative introduced to the ISA's teaching faculty in 2014. At its heart, Thought-full Schools is a peer development programme that provides an open platform for educators to support and learn from each other in creative ways. Through classroom observations, discussions, collaborative planning sessions and conversations, teachers engage authentically with their colleagues in ways that inform and enhance their teaching practice, exploring and investigating topics which spark their passion. This opportunity empowers many teachers to delve into their practice in ways that extend beyond what might be possible within the confines of a conventional professional appraisal.

In May, this year's Thought-full Schools Project participants hosted an All Staff meeting to allow their colleagues to come together, celebrate and engage in professional dialogue around the inquiries completed this year. Student and staff wellness was the main focus of several projects, including 'Tools for Building Well-Being', 'Can School Make You Happier?' and 'A Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body in a Healthy School.'

Colleagues then had the opportunity to share their insights, questions and wonderings via a google form as the result of the discussions. Engagement in these thoughtful discussions around balanced lives and well-being will allow us to continue to hold them in our minds as we enter the next school year.

Balanced Lives and the After School Care Programme Student well-being has been a priority of the After School Care Programme since its development. Rosa Middendorf, the Programme Coordinator, began with a vision to create a safe, nurturing and healthy environment that makes students feel at home and promotes their well-being. For Rosa, recruiting a team of passionate and caring staff to help create this environment was an essential first step to realising this vision.

The Programme also promotes student well-being through student voice and agency.

Students are always included in planning the Programme’s themes and activities and regularly give feedback on what they enjoy. For example, students and educators collaborated to create seasonal, themed events such as the ‘Winter Olympics’ and ‘Summer Splash’, allowing space for balanced, fun and experiential learning opportunities. Students in grades 3-5 were also recently asked what they need to feel as though they have dedicated space in the Programme, giving them ownership over their own learning experiences and the feeling they are being heard.

While the Programme gives students the same authentic learning experiences as the rest of the school day, the true strength of the Programme lies in promoting student well-being by providing students with the opportunity to learn and develop through social connections.

NECIS Spring Athletics Round Up Many Upper School students choose to balance the academic demands of the IB curriculum out on the sports field. ISA is proud of its comprehensive Athletics programme, which allows students to develop sportsmanship, teamwork and self-confidence through healthy competition in annual events such as NECIS tournaments.

The NECIS Sports Council aims to provide opportunities for international schools in North Western Europe to compete in specified tournament activities. After being unable to compete for some time during the Covid-19 pandemic, students and coaches were delighted to be able to participate in the NECIS Spring Athletics season once more. Although spring is the shortest sporting season, it offers a variety of sports and many participating student-athletes: this year, 182! Students competed in sports such as soccer, track and field, softball, tennis and golf.

Athletics Director Marianne de Haan said, "it was a great feeling to be able to play sports and games once more and be able to travel again. Even though the weather was unpredictable and not always cooperative, the athletes and coaches worked hard and enjoyed their time during the practice season. The excitement, joy, and new friendship at the various NECIS tournaments, scattered around Nothern Europe, were again a reminder of what NECIS is all about".

Lower School Sports Day Balancing regular in-classroom academic learning with opportunities to learn outdoors and be active is a core part of the ISA experience. Annual sports days at ISA give students the chance to have fun, enjoy being outdoors and gain confidence through overcoming challenges.

Sports day for Grades 2-5 this year included five events, with students practising sports such as kickball, playing team games, stratego and challenging themselves in an inflatable obstacle course. Students also danced at an Ibiza-style dance party with DJs Rodrigo and Jordy!

The end of this fun and memorable day was celebrated by students sharing ice cream in the Lower School gym. In addition, ISA’s youngest students, from Nursery-Grade One, participated in their own sports day. With both indoor and outdoor games and activities, including disco, swings, ‘bouncy ball mania’ and ‘the floor is lava’, students relished the chance to get outside of the classroom, be active and enjoy everything on offer, as well as their ice cream at the end of the day!

'Quarantine Qualms and More' Processing and expressing the full spectrum of emotions in a healthy way is vital to leading a balanced life. Art allows us to feel and experience our emotions in a safe space, enabling us to process them.

The Middle School Theatre Ensemble (MITE) allowed the ISA community to do just that in April this year when they staged their 'Quarantine Qualms and More' play, a hybrid vignette comedic play primarily rehearsed online under Covid-19 restrictions and later adapted for the stage. It was the first in-person, on-stage production in three years, exploring what life was like for young teenagers during a global pandemic.

The play posed questions such as what happened to students' lives when they were forced to become a digital community. This exploration allowed both the ensemble members and their audience to consider, reflect upon and process the reality of the pandemic and the unprecedented circumstances in which we have all lived over the past couple of years.