The Oasis Magazine Vol. 3 March 2021

Artwork by: Lara Acikgoz - Grade 11

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Letter From The Editor Interview With Mr Monaghan

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MUN Sports Day Covid Chemistry The Classrooms Of The Future Will Theatre Ever Be The Same?

Music To Quiet The Mind A Letter To My Daughter

The US Election Just Another Normal Covid Day The Ups And Downs Of Quarantine A World Like Never Before We Are Living In A Dystopia Lockdown Art Keto Cooking Out And About In The UAE Blogs

THE OASIS

VOLUME 3

MARC H 2021 3

Letter from the

EDITOR

Mandy Monaghan

In deciding the theme for this edition of the Oasis Magazine, I had two choices: The first was to entirely ignore Covid and the effect it was having on school.This would, inevitably, mean a more upbeat, positive publication.The second was to address the pandemic head on. This had its dangers; would it lead to an issue that was full of doom and of sadness? Having made the more controversial decision to produce A Covid Special Edition, I can safely say that it has not.

We cannot escape the fact that Covid has affected every area of school life. From the day-to-day teaching, to the enormous structural decisions that have been made by Governmental organisations to keep us safe, there is no part of school where we cannot see the impacts of the virus. We have had many students, teachers and families who have been ill themselves, and some who have sadly lost family members. We have mourned our noisy, busy school and adapted to its quiet, safe corridors.

We have longed to see people’s faces and shake people’s hands and gather our community together as we used to.

But it not all been doom and gloom and it looks like we may be nearing the end. NLCS Dubai has not sat around just longing and mourning; we have risen to the challenges and adjusted, changed and modified to ensure that we are all learning and busy.

So, this issue will, hopefully, be the one and only ever Covid edition. It is a celebration of our students’ and teachers’ creativity, subject passion and humanity. I hope we can, one day, look back on this as a record of a time in history where we all learnt something and all came together to make NLCS Dubai an even more special place to be.

Photo credit: Mandy Monaghan 4 | THE OASIS | VOL 3 | MARCH 2021

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Interview with

Mr. Monaghan Alhena Alibhai (Grade 12) - Lina Hamani (Grade 6) and Gina Liderth (Grade 6)

think is that Principals spend lots of time wandering around, not doing real work, turning up at events and smiling and saying hello, and of course there is a part of that. But actually, I think one of the things that I’ve found that I’ve had to do too much is sit in front of a computer in my office.

3. How do you feel about running the school in the current state of the world?

Well, it’s definitely a challenge and it’s definitely been very different. When I took over, I obviously didn’t anticipate anything like this happening. So, how do I feel about running the school? Well, I am glad I am running the school. I’m glad that I’m here and I’ve been in the school since we opened, and I know all of the staff and the families of the school and all the parents. My overriding feeling about running the school currently is that I’m looking forward to it all going back to normal.

I hope - fingers crossed!

4. How was managing the school when there wasn’t the coronavirus?

I could focus on being a true kind of North London Collegiate School and that was very crucial. What I think I miss the most now is all those things we can’t do, like the House Competitions, and assemblies, and lectures, and all our ECAs. So when I was running the school before, it was much more enjoyable for me but also for the students as well I think. But I must say, I suppose that we have learned quite a lot during the pandemic that maybe we will keep.

With the current stress of being back in school, despite a pandemic, as students, we tend to overlook the ones that have been putting in more work than we think. We interviewed Mr. Monaghan in the hope of gauging his thoughts about being a Principal, now and prior to the coronavirus. Thank you to Mr. Monaghan for participating in this interview.

1. What drove you to become a principal?

So, first and foremost, the first thing I wanted to be was a teacher. I don’t think I ever wanted to necessarily be a principal when I started teaching. That grew later, when I started doing other jobs in schools, and one of the things that was most exciting about becoming a Principal was working with the North London Collegiate School family of schools. When I went to South Korea, to Jeju, to open our school there, I wasn’t the Principal at that time. But while I was working there, Mrs. McCabe, who used to be the Headmistress in London, asked me if I had ever thought about being a Principal. She talked about opening other International Schools, so I’d say, that was probably the first time.

2.What is something that people generally think about Principals that is not true?

That’s a good question! I think one of the things people often 6 | THE OASIS | VOL 3 | MARCH 2021

we’re constantly talking to each other. So, in terms of the interaction between schools, you feel a part of something special. I hope the students, teachers and the parents feel that too. I did come from a very similar school when I worked in London and I do run the School here with lots of things that I took from my previous schools that I really enjoyed. They’re not exactly the same, obviously NLCS is better!

5. How have you coped with the stress of being a Principal during the pandemic?

More than ever, I like to do lots of exercise. I love cycling and swimming, and that having that routine is really important. Swimming in the morning at school three times a week, going out on my bike on a Friday morning, I think those things really, really help. Some people say to me: “Isn’t it really boring swimming 100 lengths in the pool?” and I say, “No, it’s great,” because you can zone out and think about the world and everything that’s going on, so probably that’s been the best for coping with my stress. At home, Mrs. Monaghan is very good at absorbing my frustrations and stress, and also we have two cats. Our cats are great stress relievers. I have a cat called Arthur and Mrs. Monaghan has a cat called Colin, although Colin is a girl; they are brother and sister. Arthur likes to sit on top of me while I’m watching television, so that’s quite nice.

6. Do you think there is a great amount of responsibility on you that has come about due to the pandemic?

Yes, I think there’s lots of things that I wouldn’t normally

9. What differences do you see from being a Vice Principal to being a Principal?

be responsible for. I don’t know whether I’m responsible for them entirely, but I feel responsible and I suppose when you lead a community, you need to know what your parents are doing, what your staff are doing and how everybody views you. During COVID, I write to the parents and the staff suggesting things that they should and shouldn’t do, and normally I wouldn’t be responsible for that. Ultimately when things go wrong in a school, the Principal is the person that has to answer, even if it’s not their fault. What my mum always says to me is: “When you’re in charge, it’s always your fault.” So you have to absorb all of those responsibilities for everybody else. I think there are lots of responsibilities that come with that, particularly with how people behave and how they contribute to the community.

7. How do you feel about the coronavirus? Do you think there are little wins from it?

I think, aside from the negative things, which are obvious and not very nice, I think it has given us all a lot of perspective, and that is something that I think is really important. It has made us all reflect on how lucky we are.

I feel at NLCS Dubai, and maybe just living in Dubai, we are extraordinarily lucky, especially when I look at my family back in the UK, and people in poorer parts of the world. It’s important to have that perspective on how lucky we are. When we do go back to normal, whatever that is, hopefully everyone will remember. There have also been little wins in terms of how we operate as well. Zoom calling and conference calling. We have all learnt to use new technologies and been able to meet all people from all over the world. But, reading about companies that have said that all their workers can stay online forever, I would hate to be online forever. I think a school needs to be faceto-face, with people here.

8. How has being in this role at NLCS differed to being in other schools?

I started working for NLCS 10 years ago, and the difference for me is that family community. I talk to the other Principals in the other NLCS schools - we have regular meetings and

That is a really good question, and the answer is, probably a lot more differences than I thought. When I was a Vice Principal, I was very much involved with the day-to-day running of the school so I was out and about, teaching a bit more. I was in classrooms; I was having meetings with lots of teachers; I saw a lot more of the students. I think as the Principal, the danger is that it can be quite a lonely, solitary job; you can end up in my office, with different people coming in and out all day and my PA telling me exactly who’s coming when. I definitely don’t have as much control over my day as I used to have. But, although I might be a bit further away, I also have a more external perspective because you’re also thinking about prospective parents, and the global community.

10.What is something you look forward to everyday as part of your job?

Well, I think for me, it’s things like this interview. It is interacting with the students, which is why I became a teacher in the first place. I think it’s always really lovely to go and teach some lessons. The other day, I went to teach the grade 11s their Theory of Knowledge, and I teach a little bit of Geography; I look forward to when the students come for commendations on a Tuesday break time and when I go and get to see the really small students in Pre-KG. Sometimes I go and read to them, which is always fantastic. The other day I went to a KG2 class; the teachers had told the students that I had written a letter saying that I was going to ban playtime, (which I hadn’t done at all). The students had to write a letter back to me to persuade me to bring it back; I went to their class and they all read the letters to me and it was so sweet. I don’t always have that interaction but I would definitely like it to be a part of my everyday.

11. Is there anything you would like the senior students to know?

I think that the thing that I’d like to say to students is always: enjoy being at school and take every opportunity that you have. Don’t take any day for granted and make those choices. NLCS is such a vibrant community; there’s so many things that you can get involved in and my advice is to always take those opportunities, don’t come up with an excuse to not do something, always do the things that are on offer.

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MUN Model United Nations

Model United Nations has always played a huge role in helping NLCS Dubai students engage with delegates from around the UAE and the world, discussing and debating world issues.This year, COVID was not going to stop our young politicians from taking part.

Here, three of our MUN delegates talk about their experience: Ananya Salecha

Grade 11

THIMUN 2021 was held as an online conference from January 1st to 29th. NLCS Dubai was assigned to be the delegates of Spain and Eritrea. There were various committees, such as the Economic Committee, Environmental Committee, Political Committee, and many more. I was assigned to be the Delegate of Eritrea for the Economic Committee.

Lily Leung wrote: “When in doubt, choose to accept change.” This is how I decided to perceive The Hague Model United Nations Conference.The epochal changes that we have been experiencing globally made me a little dubious about the online conference: The main question that arose for me was how will the participation be affected when it comes to the success of social interactions? One of the main challenges I faced was that my committee (HRC) consisted of twice the amount of delegates than it would have had if it was face-to-face. This was hindrance in my ability to engage when debating for resolutions, because the probability of getting recognized by the chairs was reduced.

However, those five days allowed me to see how, despite the fact that the outbreak posed several unprecedented challenges, the team at The Hague took responsibility and altered the conference to make it as enjoyable and efficient as they could.

The effort made by the team at The Hague was reflected by the performance of students. I personally could see how I needed to make adaptations to get recognized in my committee. I developed new social skills as interaction with other delegates was not the same. The main alteration I made was to use social media positively, as it was the best way to obtain valuable collaboration from my fellow delegates.

By the end of the conference, I realized that with human society facing a major pandemic, collaboration has never been more important and this conference was the best way to understand and adapt to the new ‘normal’.This is because MUN illustrated how vital communication is and how being heard is part of our daily lives; it is of utmost importance to ensure successful communication. MUN has created a new opportunity for young students to still be able to connect with international students, despite the restrictions caused by the pandemic . This is why I believe attending this conference allowed me to obtain a new experience that is beneficial for me when it come to accepting change.

Youjin Sohn

Grade 8

It was the first online MUN conference for THIMUN, and it was my first ever MUN conference. On the first day, I was extremely nervous and worried. However, through the help of the chairs and other delegates of my committee, I felt very welcomed. They encouraged me and other delegates who are new to MUN, so that we could make a speech or ask POIs. I also contributed as much as I could when our group was making a resolution. I could feel the joy and achievement when our resolution passed.

THIMUN 2021 was a great experience for me, because I could learn more about the current world issues and obtain skills to cooperate with others in order to make the best resolution. I believe this experience will definitely help me in whatever career I choose to do later in my life. I will never forget this experience, and I am very thankful to NLCS Dubai for giving me this amazing opportunity. I will definitely join future MUNs if I have a chance, and I would encourage other students to participate in future MUNs as well!

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Marta Todd

Grade 11

Having been a participant in the 2021 THIMUN conference, I found this conference to be more interactive and engaging than conferences prior to Covid19. As the conference was initiated over Zoom, I found it required more focus and attention to detail than previous MUN conferences.While there was evidently less face-to-face interaction, immersing yourself in a digital Model United Nations, allows you to spend time meeting new people and you are able to learn more about their background and where they are currently studying.

In addition to the increase in contact with other people, I feel that it was a productive, efficient and successful MUN. While normally in conferences, it would take days to pass resolutions as well as looking through amendments and debate time, I found that everyone was engaging, and able to debate and amend resolutions well. We were given a few hours to create resolutions, and while they were not perfect, collaboratively we were able to write, pass, and amend resolutions more successfully than previous conferences.

Meeting new people from international schools situated in Germany, Holland, Belgium, the UK, and France mainly, I found that it was one of the most diverse conferences that I have attended. Not only did I meet people from my own home country, England, but I found mutual friends with some of the people in the conference. We were able to debate very interesting topics, many of which allowed for fruitful debate.

I believe that the THIMUN online conference was a very positive experience, in which I was able to grow as an ‘MUN-er’, as well as share my passion for debating and coming up with resolutions that provided solutions to problems that arise from domestic abuse, the negative effect of covid-19 on education, and supporting minority religions.

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SPORTS DAY

It’s not just MUN that we have been able to continue. Here, Imaad writes about how we have also managed to keep a very important date in the NLCS Dubai calendar – Sports Day. Imaad Bandali - Grade 8, Junior Sports Captain of Yibir

Sports Day During a Pandemic The competition between Houses brings great rivalry to this school. During a pandemic, this is much harder to achieve.

Houses haven’t been able to chant their slogans with pride, or run out on the field and kick a ball around. But they were allowed to run on the sports field, and they were allowed to let all the energy out on Sports Day. Since Grades were not allowed to merge on any occasion, the P.E. staff, led by Mr. Mosley, chose to have separate Sports Days for each Grade. This obviously reduced the rivalry, but with the support of the Heads of House throughout the day, it was a chance to show the other Houses who was the best. Being in Grade 8, I was only able to watch my Grade’s sports day. There was a bitter and fierce rivalry between all the four Houses. Javi dominated the field events, but after break, Yibir took the lead, winning the track events, and eventually winning the day.

During Sport’s Week, there were separate Sports Days for each Grade. On Sunday the 7th of February, Grade 6 started off with a Yibir win. Javi stole grade 7, while Yibir dominated grade 8. It was then moved on to the Grade 9-10 category, where Javi secured their second win. And finally, the Jais Grade 11-12’s won the final heat of what was an intense, passionate Sports Week. It was amazing to hear, via Mr Monaghan’s address, that Yibir had been given the overall win and were Sports Day Champions for 2021.

Considering we are in the middle of a pandemic, everyone felt privileged to represent their House, and gather as many points possible in order to win. This resulted in lots of amounts of joy, as well as a large amount of competitive spirit. Many schools have not been able to have a Sports Day this year, however we were fortunate to have an opportunity to complete various track and field events with pride. Every single student played a part in what was a unique, but enjoyable, Sports Day. 10 | THE OASIS | VOL 3 | MARCH 2021

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CHEMISTRY How has Covid affected our teaching? For the teaching staff, this has been a time of huge adaptation. Subject passion is at the heart of an NLCS experience, so what changes have students and teachers seen?

Amber Rassaq and Humaira Moola - Grade 9

Covid style Chemistry Prior to the outbreak of Covid-19, all students had their lessons in the science labs, not only for Chemistry, but for all the sciences. For us, in Chemistry lessons, there was always a 50:50 chance of getting a practical; if it was a practical, we all silently jumped for joy. For our grade in particular, as we’ve had Miss Shah as our Chemistry teacher every year since the opening of the school in 2017, I can confidently say that these lessons have been enriching, engaging, enjoyable (the list goes on), and am so sorry for those who have not yet experienced a chemistry lesson at this school. During Dubai’s National lockdown, it was mandatory for all schools to be closed, resulting in school to be done ‘online’ instead. As this was a new experience for both students and teachers, many of us did not know what to expect. Personally,Amber and I thoroughly enjoyed doing Chemistry during the online period, despite all the changes. As mentioned before, school pre-corona, allowed us to do both practicals that were relevant to the topic, as well as general schoolwork and Ms. Shah amazingly managed to incorporate similarly styled lessons while we were online.

One of the highlights of chemistry during online school was undertaking the fascinating (and safe) practical involving baking soda and vinegar whilst learning about ‘rates of reaction’. It was a good opportunity for us to get our younger siblings involved at home too. Although we had never experienced an occasion quite like online school, as we settled in and became familiar with the ‘new normal’, our Chemistry lessons became a delight to attend. We speak on behalf of, not only our grade, but surely all Chemistry students, in saying that Chemistry lessons during online school were very different and unusual but also very enjoyable and a new experience for all of us!

When we returned to school in September, Science lessons had to again meander down an alien pathway into unknown territory, testing every Science teacher who thought they’d never have to stop telling students to wear their safety goggles.

Chemistry is a subject that, fortunately for us, frequently involves lots of wild and wonderful experiments; take those away and what’s left? To begin with, our experience involved lots of equations and the maths, oh the maths! However, things soon took a turn for the better when we reached the, oh so, glorious topic of structure and bonding. This involved learning about the properties of ionic and covalent structures, and what better way to do this than making a life-sized giant lattices – socially distanced, of course. This was preceded by online simulations when learning about titrations featuring a class favourite Dr. Jay Patel, who lead us through an unforgettable educational journey, allowing us to experience a titration in a classroom! We still remember Ethan and Mehdi's frustration as they were constantly going only slightly over the meniscus and had to start their practicals again to produce reliable results.

Just as we would in the lab!

These adventurous, new means of learning have helped us further our understanding in Chemistry this year, even without the excitement of practical work.

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COMPUTER S

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Matthew Dunn - Head of Computer Science

After a year of ed-tech growth, what will the classroom of the future look like?

If 2020 was the year of the Teams lesson, what will lessons look like in the year 2030? If some schools, researchers, governments, and ed-tech companies are to be believed, then the future of education is rooted very firmly in the realm of cyber space. To be honest, it is easy to see why they have reached this conclusion: over the last 12 months, digital technology has proven its worth as a means to enable near instantaneous, mass communication on a global scale; without it, millions of children around the world would have gone without an education for a significant portion of the last year. In our own community, here at NLCS Dubai, we were able to rise above the challenges of school closures and take part in live lessons during each day of the lockdown. We captured our learning using Class Notebook, interacted with teachers through video calls, tested our knowledge on Kahoot, and presented our efforts using Sway and Flipgrid.

Throughout the pandemic, large companies like Google and Microsoft have worked hard to update and enhance their virtual learning environments to achieve the goal of moving the traditional classroom online.

Smaller tech companies have come up with innovative ideas to help teachers distribute and collect work, assess and test students’ learning, and to allow teachers to use the hardware features in your smartphones to enhance lessons. It is no longer unusual for students to use their advanced camera-phones to document and present work, to use virtual and augmented reality technologies to visualise historical and geographical content, or to use video games as a way to learn and revise mathematical topics. If this is the current reality, what will schools of the future really look like? Will schools still have buildings, or will they have evolved in to a more intangible and distributed existence? Is it inevitable that pencil cases, exercise books, and geography lessons spent colouring-in are all going to be resigned to the great academic recycling bin?

Does anybody get the same feeling of excitement from finishing an e-book as when you turn over the last page of a gripping paper-printed novel?

Do you ever look back at a Word document and feel the same sense of pride that you get when you review a neatly presented, hand-written piece of work? Especially if your masterpiece receives high praise from your peers and teacher.

What about that feeling of joy when you get a test paper back with the grade written in the top corner? It just is not the same feeling when you see a number on the screen of your laptop.

Technology’s biggest issue is that it has a habit of doing tasks for us. In some instances it makes the impossible possible, but more often than not it simply helps us to cut a corner or accomplish something a little faster.

There are so many examples of tech being shoehorned in to education that they overwhelm the few instances of technology that excel at enhancing a student’s learning experience. Many schools that provide all-encompassing technology extravaganzas in classrooms are simply providing students with a series of showpiece experiences and not allowing them to develop core skills that will help them to tackle adult life.

At the end of these lessons, have the students really learned something new? Or have they simply enjoyed using a gadget that they don’t have at home?

This brings me back to my initial question – what will the classrooms of tomorrow actually look like? In my opinion, they will not look much different than they do today. Not because of stunted growth, lack of funding, anti-tech movements, or plain old ignorance; traditional teaching provides students with a core set of life skills that tablets, laptops, and smartphones simply cannot replace.The traditional learning techniques that we value so dearly at NLCS Dubai are not outdated or archaic, they are tried and tested methods of helping young people to reach their maximum potential.

One of the most contentious issues that I regularly discuss with parents is the role of digital technology in schools. In my experience, a great number of parents want more digital assimilation in lessons; they would like their children to spend their days integrating technology in to all facets of their education. A typical line of reasoning to support these requests is the extent to which technology is integrated in to their working lives and how they have spent years developing the skillset to support this work. “Why,” I am asked, “can’t you teach them these digital skills earlier in life?”. My response is to remind parents of all of the soft skills that they learned at school, how they have built on these foundations and learned to integrate new skills and technologies in to their working lives. They were given opportunities to develop core skills as a school child, building their careers forwards from this starting point and honing more specialised skillsets only when they were required. It is in this fashion that pilots spend the majority of their training learning how to fly an aircraft, not how to programme an auto-pilot, and surgeons spend years honing their skills in ‘traditional’ surgical techniques, they don’t jump straight in to operating using robotic equipment. To use a cliché – we all learned to walk before we started running.

Video calls may help to alleviate that cold trickle of dread that runs down your spine when it is your turn to present to the whole class, especially when you can turn off your webcam. However, do you really feel the same sense of accomplishment or increased confidence when you finish presenting your hard work and there is nobody in the room to applaud your efforts?

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Jennifer Durston - Head of Drama

Will Theatre Ever Be The Same?.....Hopefully Not. The theatre industry has arguably been one of the worst hit industries during the global pandemic. Theatres across the globe have closed their doors, placing performers, directors, producers, technicians, choreographers, designers, administration, box office, marketing staff and countless other job roles out of work. The situation is dire, with UNESCO declaring “a cultural emergency” globally. There is no doubt that the Arts sector has a battle ahead. Creative people however, do not take kindly to being told that they must stop. Could the very fact that the creative arts industry is full of creative people be its saving grace? Renowned theatres such as The National Theatre in London have aired their shows to thousands of online audiences in a bid to keep the passion alive. Numerous companies have started to look to technology to allow for the devising of theatre to take place from home.

Kneehigh Theatre Company devised a show called ‘The Neon Shadow’ using Hans Christian Anderson’s “The Shadow” for inspiration. This tale looks at isolation and technology, all filmed from the actor’s home using a mobile phone, lots of white paper and a black poster pen to cleverly immerse the viewer in the mind of the protagonist as he struggles with loneliness.

Could online streaming allow for a more diverse audience moving forward? With the cost of Theatre tickets making it inaccessible to a large part of society, Erin Sullivan from the Arts Council UK argues that “Streaming does appear to attract younger, less wealthy and more ethnically diverse members of the population”.

Theatre makers are re-evaluating performance locations. With social distancing in place, small theatre venues suddenly become very restrictive. Zoom performances are growing in popularity.This shift to zoom performances has seen performers interacting with audience members through the chat function allowing for the 4th wall to be well and truly destroyed.

Outdoor venues are becoming a popular solution too, allowing for audience members to enjoy shows in a site specific location. The reemergence of Radio Drama showcases how simply utilising your voice can be the most engaging form of storytelling. As fear grows for people’s mental health during the current pandemic, it is important that ‘the show must go on’. “Bringing people together, inspiring, soothing and sharing: these are the powers of art, the importance of which has been made emphatically obvious during the COVID-19 pandemic’’ (UN News, 2020). There is a wealth of online performances available to watch from home. At NLCS Dubai, you can access two platforms showcasing thousands of plays. www.digitaltheatreplus.com Username: student@nlcsdubai.ae Password: student12 www.dramaonlinelibrary.com Username: nlcsdubai Password: English

This exposure to new audiences could allow for future generations of theatre makers to immerge from this pandemic.

Pantomime season in the UK allows for families to come together to shout “He’s behind you” and “Oh no he’s not……oh yes he is!” A tradition that sees the eldest generation laugh alongside the youngest generation.

In typical stoic tradition, casts refused to remove their make-up and wigs and delivered outstanding performances that were streamed into millions of family’s homes. Bringing much needed laughter during a season where many families were separated.

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Magdalena Wajdzik - Piano Teacher

How music in COVID-era has quieted down the noise in my mind.

It has now been three years since I became interested in the neuroscience of the plasticity of the human brain. I strongly believe in a not-so-miraculous impact the music has on this organ.

Let’s explore how a human brain learns. This fascinating machine is built from billions of neurons that during the course of life, create pathways that are organized in a very flexible way. If we stimulate our brain with an activity, and we repeatedly engage in it, our brain will build necessary neural connections to strengthen the pathways so that activity is easier to accomplish. The brain organizes itself. Brain plasticity is a crucial phrase to truly understand what happens.

How do I keep myself inspired and motivated to continue develop my musical skills and therefore my brain? There is so much ‘noise’ around and within us. It is gradually more difficult to collect our thoughts. For any human brain to grow connections, the explored activity has to be performed with a great deal of attention and focus. How about mindful music listening? Let’s switch off that TV that has been on for half of the day. Let’s put on headphones and commit to a 10min activity of classical music listening. Believe it or not, 10minutes is a dreadfully long time. It has been proven that in 2020 an average human brain can focus for about 8seconds! Do you know what the focus span of a goldfish is? It’s a second longer... (!) I guess 10min will be just enough.

Your mind will wonder away anyway. If needed - set a timer. In the search bar of YouTube type – J.S.Bach. Press play, close your eyes and listen. Listening is a very complex activity that doesn’t have to come easily at first. Let your brain adjust and absorb what happens. This will help to target your focus onto one activity, therefore to reduce the noise of random thoughts in your mind. I would definitely compare this to meditation.

Our mind learns better when it’s rewarded, or expects a reward. I decided to take on a new piece. What’s my reward?

I loved the way this piece sounded and the reward would be to be able to play it myself. The beginnings are not always easy. The power of habit is really what keeps me going. I set a particular time of the day devoted just to that activity.

Learning should happen from every angle; theory, aural approach, sight-reading, singing.The more I involve in my learning, the more my brain recognizes it, evaluates its performance, and the learning finally happens! Suddenly, I am able to play the first few phrases! Much to my surprise, my brain is also ‘surprised’ with the outcome as something unexpected happened and the learning is reinforced. Through piano learning, my brain has created a path wired-system that helps me master music. This is a long and ongoing process.

This process also helps me to organize my thoughts and ‘calm’ my mind to a blissful state.The noise of random thoughts is being constantly reduced. I am able to target learning, not only music, but anything I do in life. No matter how the learning happens, do it mindfully.With a positive approach and change, we can all become the better versions of ourselves.

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While Covid took over our news feeds and dominated our lives, in the US, two momentous moments in history were taking place.

The Black Lives Matter protests happened while we were still all in lockdown, but they served to remind us about what freedom really meant; not just the freedom to walk outside your door, but to be free from discrimination.

Here, Hayat Alibhai, in Grade 11, gives her creative and emotive response to the BLM Movement:

A letter to my daughter.

It is a rainy evening and I’m putting you down for your daily nap. You’re cradled in my arms and your sweet eyes are staring back at me .

“Baby girl , ” I’ll say, just in case our efforts are redundant, and the conversations have come to a halt, you need to promise me , us, that you will never let this conversation die .

“Dear Baby girl ,” I’ll say.

A conversation that we have dedicated our whole lives to, and you need to ensure that our efforts have not gone in vain . We have promised you a better future , a better tomorrow and now it is your duty to make sure change happens with you.

Tell me about your day! I want to know what made you smile , what made you laugh , what made you cry or even what made you angry. I’ll go first.

Writing this letter today made me smile .

Trump’s tweets made me laugh .

Covid made me cry.

BLM made me angry.

“Baby girl ,” I’ll say, sighing. Looking out the window, shadowing the disappointment from my face before uttering the words we have already being saying for far too long: There’s something you should know. The world we live in today is one that is cruel , hard and unjust. It is dictated by unimportant things, like the color of your skin .

“But baby girl ,” I’ll say, trembling as the words are about to so desperately fall out of my mouth : We are fighting. Fighting any way we can , helping any way we can and praying any way we can .

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“Baby girl ,” I’ll say, stroking your thin , golden brown hair: Let me remind you of the privilege it is to only know this discrimination , not to have to experience it every day of your life . And no, you will never understand but you need to know that words are power, your words have power. I have put into you all you need from the day you were born - use it.

“Baby girl ,” I’ll say, tears streaming down my face: One last thing. I hope you only know what is happening because of old literature and history textbooks but if not, you have already suffered enough and for that we are all truly sorry - we could not give you a better tomorrow.

I ache for the day you understand the words I’m saying.

Goodnight baby girl , I love you so much .

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The US election in Covid Times

The other momentous moment that took our minds, temporarily, away from Covid, was the US election.

It was incredible to see our students, from Grade 6 to Grade 12, so engaged in world-wide politics. In every class, students were checking the numbers coming in and there was open discussion about the outcome.

Here, Shaza Khan, in Grade 8, gives her response to the election.

These are just a few cases of him downplaying COVID. I believe the response affected how many people then supported him and respected him as a President.These cases of downplaying and trying to pass the blame may have affected his integrity and chance of being reelected. Then COVID went on to effect the rallies that both parties held. Trump’s campaign team decided to not hold socially distanced events and not require masks at them.

Donald Trump’s rallies in Fayetteville Regional Airport.

Biden’s method of holding a rally consisted of being social distanced and having people wearing masks.

The US election - a very prominent and exciting time in the US. However, this year, it was even more exciting due to the two candidates: Donald.J.Trump, representing the Republican Party, going for another 4 years, and Joe Biden, representing the Democratic Party, after being Vice President for 8 years under Former President Barack Obama. This year for America had been a very scary and shocking year.With nearly 500,000 deaths in America alone, Covid had hit America hard. Due to Covid, the Stock market crashed, triggering a recession. And, to add insult to injury, former President Donald Trump got Covid after down playing its seriousness. It is safe to say the Covid has hit America very hard, but how has it effected the election?

Covid has shown us how our world leaders lead in a global pandemic and how they respond to crisis. For example here in the UAE, we immediately went into lockdown as the cases started to rise; we closed our borders and stopped flights in and out of the country. Australia and New Zealand nearly eradicted Covid from their countries, but as a Global Hub, we have responded very well.

But, we can’t say the same for the US and how the Trump Administation responded. On January 22nd, Trump made his first public comment on the coronavirus, downplaying the risk in comments to CNBC and CBS News correspondent Paula Reid.

To CNBC: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It’s — going to be just fine.” To CBS: “We do have a plan and we think it’s going to be handled very well.We’ve already handled it very well … We’re in very good shape and I think China’s in very good shape also.” Then on January 31st, Trump suspends entry to the US for many — but not all — categories of people traveling from China, a move which some epidemiologists warned at the time was “more of an emotional or political reaction” than a public health decision. The Department of Health and Human Services declares the coronavirus a public health emergency.

Then we jump to February 6th, the first death in the US from a confirmed case of Covid-19 is retroactively confirmed to have occurred in early February by the Santa Clara County medical examiner following an autopsy of the victim.Then Europe follows suit on the 15th of February, the first death in Europe from a confirmed case of Covid-19 is reported in France. And then on the 25th of February, he downplays it again; Trump appoints Pence to lead the coronavirus task force; during the same press conference, he again downplays the virus: “And again, when you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done.” Then on the 28th of February at a rally in South Carolina he states: “The Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus… One of my people came up to me and said ‘Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia, that didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax that was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything, they tried it over and over, they’ve been doing it since you got in… And this is their new hoax.”

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Biden’s Campaign in a backyard of a house in Detroit Finally, it came down to the actual election. This took place on November 4th and went on in the week. It was a very high pressure time, not only in America but around the world, with many people from many different countries watching - it was a high stakes game. This election had the most mail in ballots due to COVID, with 46% of voters voting with mail in ballots (58% of Bidens votes were mail in compared to Trump’s 38% - he stated in his rally that his followers should vote in person).

There were multiple allegations of voter fraud thrown around, but at the end of the day there was no solid proof and the case was thrown out of supreme court.

I know in my class we were watching the election very closely, making predictions and giving our opinions on who though was best. (It was a very unanamous agreement-something we don’t do very often!)

And at the end of the day the 46th President of the United States is Joe Biden!

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What has Covid been like for our students? Here some of our students creatively explore what Covid and Lockdown has meant to them.

Artwork by: Isabelle Seow Grade 11

Kyra Francis - Grade 6

JUST ANOTHER NORMAL

Covid Day Covid. I can vaguely remember the times when there seemed to be absolutely no way out of this tragedy, back in 2020.

The sound of silence was deafening. Once busy roads had been bustling with traffic, and now there was nothing but the sound of my brother’s shrieks; at least I could actually smell the fresh foliage around me – my nose finally wasn’t clogged with the smell of fuel. The air felt lighter. And at last, I can have the opportunity to spend quality time with my family. As time went by during lockdown, I learned so many skills like learning how to play basketball, which is an amazing sport, and I even learned how to sew some amazing patterns.

But I also felt my senses falling apart, it was time for a break. My eyes were sick and tired of staring at a blank screen all day, I felt like I was a prisoner locked up in its own home. I wanted to see my friends, but not on some app, I wanted to see them properly so that I could actually give them a hug. And these masks were suffocating me, now I finally knew how the Ninja turtles felt.

Life has now changed again and the public has moved on; life is slowly reaching its way back to us, we just need to do our part.

I can nearly see the end of the tunnel, but I can’t do it alone.

The vaccine has emerged out of Madame Curie’s lab, prepared just for us, made to prevent this harmful virus entering our body. Who needs superman anymore, when we have our frontline workers there to take the brave step ahead, leading us throughout the right path every step of the way?

This is an adventure we have all never had and no one said it’s going to be easy, but we just need to work together- we are stronger as a team, do your part and we will win as a team.

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Maria Rodriguez - Grade 8

THE UPS AND DOWNS OF

QUARANTINE Quarantine was a change for all of us, it was something new. Most of the time we don’t like change, it frightens us, it makes us uncertain for the road ahead, but only a few see the treasures it comes with it.

During quarantine, there were many days that were bright, but the sun doesn’t shine all the time. I went through new experiences, exciting ones, tough ones and sad ones. As I looked around, people were coping with extreme circumstances.

Therefore, I decided to make the best of what I had: I studied hard, exercised hard, but most importantly spent time with my family. Every day, I played football with my dad, walked my dog with my mom, and helped the lady that works with us with the chores, and tried to focus on the important things in life.

One of my best experiences during quarantine was going out for the first time to get groceries; everything was so new to me. People wore masks, gloves, shields to cover their faces and I even saw a man with an oxygen tank. Everything was a risk.

It felt different; the world around me had changed.

One of the worst moments was when I found out I wasn’t going to visit my family this year. I couldn’t believe it; I see my family every year! I was in denial. I had planned out my whole trip from January and the month before we go, I get the news that we are not going to be travelling to the USA, this year! Everything was moving so fast, and I had to move with it, whether I liked it or not.

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A World like never before

Khadija Salem - Grade 6

Today, we live in a frightening world, That’s different to what it was before.

No more hugs now, Our pleasure has vanished Like never before.

The virus has swept away our loved ones; Suffering households, Fear of the unfamiliar has arrived

Artwork by: Line Sato Bouziri - Grade 12 (arms round each other)

Like never before.

The anxiety about what’s going to happen To you and to me tomorrow, Coronavirus heavy on our minds Like never before.

Everywhere Coronavirus, Our endangered lives We practice social distancing every day Like never before.

Shielding our faces with masks Holding the virus at bay Told to remain at home, Like never before.

How will this virus end?

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Nadine Mehanna - Grade 7

We are Living in a Dystopia and Are Yet to Admit It

I sat idly in my car, on the way to school. My face rested on my fist, as I looked out of the window. Cars swooshed past, the greenery became blurry and the buildings dominated the sides of the streets. My older sister pulled out her phone agitatedly.

In the corner of my eye, I saw her go through the apps on her phone and open one that had become immensely popular. A pink musical note over a blue background: TikTok. This app, for the people who are not aware of it, is software that is based around lip-syncing and posting short 15 - 60 second clips of content. My sister pressed on the square-shaped app and was greeted with a page of videos posted by other people all around the globe. She made her way to her profile by using the toolbar at the bottom, clicked on “Drafts” and chose a sound to make a video with. Once she found a song that she liked, she began filming. Making sure that she was in the right lighting, the right position, and the right filter was chosen, she pressed lightly on the red circle at the bottom of the screen. The music began to play, as she lip-synced the lyrics to the song. The lighting made her eyes look lighter, which she considered to be more attractive. The position that she was in meant that any sign of fat or imperfection needed to be hidden away.

The filter meant that her little specks of acne were covered. She stopped filming. After replaying what she had just filmed, she deleted the clip. Her hand moved towards her hair, as her fingers interlaced with the strands of her golden-brown hair.

She pushed them to the other side of her head and looked at herself in the phone screen. She began filming again. More lip-syncing. She stopped and deleted the clip. After a few seconds of waiting to make sure that the light was hitting her eyes in the correct manner, she began filming again. The lyrics of the song had been carved into my mind by then. I turned and looked at her. Engrossed in her appearance, she did not look at me nor did she realize that I was looking at her. And the cycle continued. Film. Delete. Film. Delete. Until she was satisfied. In the end, she decided that she was going to delete the clip and move on to doing something else.

All that effort, but for what? Does this sound healthy to you? This idea that one has to look a certain way to be perfect or attractive in such an unattainable manner simply puts me in a state of awe. Yet, on most days, I don’t think much of it. It is simply my sister enjoying herself, after all… Right? Clearly not. When I stopped as thought for a fraction of a second, I realized the strange behavior that we are now accustomed to. What does this say about our society?

I don’t usually have a fraction of a second to think, hence why I realized this when I made way for some thoughts to be processed. When I surf the internet, I am bombarded with propaganda, misinformation, and temptation - to the point where I don’t even have enough time to process the inhumane and impossible standards that people my age have to meet. One second. Just one second of thought. What could I do with more time to think?

After that event in the car, I began to truly ponder. COVID-19 hit us all with a wave of unexpected rules and regulations; how did this affect use of social media? One would have expected a decrease in usage, as more children had more time to do different things at home. However, the opposite happened. More people used social media as they were getting gradually more bored. And with this increase, mental health decreased exponentially. This beauty standard has simply been pushed forward now more than ever. What can we do to solve this dilemma? In my opinion, we have to educate people about the unhealthy standard that has been created to profit of insecurities of young adults.We can do this through documentaries and articles – simple, yet persuasive, manners to grasp their attention. The issue is that these platforms are addictive, meaning that removing them would be difficult, but reducing the amount of time spent on them could be beneficial when it comes to their mental well-being.

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Being part of the NLCS Community means embracing being busy. During lockdown and now, as we all avoid crowded places to stay safe, both students and teachers are finding creative ways to carry on learning and keep their minds and bodies active.

Christianna Trinity Oduneye-Braniff - Grade 8 “Where words are restrained, the eyes often talk a great deal.” – Samuel Richardson.

I have always believed that no matter what a person’s face looked like as a whole, their eyes would always be beautiful. We heavily rely on our eyes to associate things with the other senses. Especially in this time we are in, where our masks cover our faces and the only feature we can see are each other’s eyes. Eyes aid in non-verbal communication.

I don’t think any of us anticipated Covid would last this long. I first heard about it from my mum, when I was in grade seven, telling me about this supposed new virus and telling me to be careful.Then a week later, half of my class was wearing masks, and eventually we were online learning. Then around nine months later, I found out I was moving to Dubai. Now after moving, I find myself spending a lot of time at home. School, home, school, home, and sometimes maybe the business center downstairs at my residences, but that is it.

I had started to realize I was slowly losing touch with my friends back in Singapore, and it was something I definitely wanted to avoid. One day, after coming back from the business center, I opened Instagram and wanted to add something to my story. Then I realized there was a drawing feature, something I’d never noticed till then. And of course I jumped right into drawing. That night I drew more and more, some of myself and some of my cousin, and then I noticed I could do these drawings of my friends and tag them. I drew one of my best friends, then gradually people started asking me to draw them and then it became a daily activity.

Generally, these eyes would take up to 20 minutes, depending on the detail; it starts with the picture I choose and the selection of the tones and colours and gradually I use dots lines and thick brush strokes to develop them. I’m not completely sure what about these eye drawings made me feel so connected to my friends - it could be the fact that I was “looking into their eyes” while drawing them, or maybe that I was scrolling through my camera roll and the different memories we had built while scavenging for pictures.

Drawing my friends so far has been a lot of fun, and it has become the foremost cure to my boredom. Media and online communication has been an essential and valuable resource in this time, from letting us know what’s going on around the world, to allowing us to communicate with our friends and family. These drawings have become a form of communication between my friends and I, and has allowed me to converse with some of the new friends I’ve met here in Dubai.

In the future, I would like to continue to draw my friends and eventually develop from eyes to whole faces or even inanimate objects. Using the platform of Instagram, I would like to use these drawings to communicate with an audience of a wider range, to share my art and spread word about certain issues that I hold close to my heart. Social media has its pros and cons, but when it comes to communication between peers during this time, it has been extremely useful.

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Totally

Keto Cooking my lockdown baking adventure Michelle Edden - Secondary Teacher of English My love of baking began at a tender, young age. My stay-at-home mum made our house smell delicious with her first-principles approach to cooking fresh meals.

Every plate incorporated handpicked vegetables from the garden. (My younger brother and I would often hide in the veg plot popping fresh peas from the pod and pulling up orange, muddy carrots that we would wipe on our trousers and then crunch through, raw.) These vegetables accompanied perfectly roasted joints of meat or golden pies topped with homemade pastry lids with carved leaves encircling a central steam hole from which amazing aromas wafted.

However, it is the weekends that stick in my mind the most.

Saturday was baking day.

Stacked, creamy, sponge cakes; rich, dark fruit cakes with Glacé cherries that glittered like ruby jewels, and boxes of butterfly cupcakes with fresh cream piped in the middle like expanding foam. We had fresh baked goods every week and the concept of shop bought cakes was alien. This is a notion that I carried with me into my own family life as an adult.

Fast forward several decades to 2020 and we find ourselves in Dubai, in lockdown, and in a self-imposed health-drive to eradicate sugar and carbs from our diet. Needless to say, my childhood induction to baking had not prepared me for this. Enter the Keto diet!

Ketogenic food excludes refined sugars and is very low carb. The idea is to get the energy our bodies need from fat, rather than glucose. Lots of research has been done into whether this is a healthy way of eating or not, and everyone must decide for themselves how they wish to be the healthiest – this was our way. Lockdown was the perfect opportunity to explore Keto baking, because I’m sure you agree that a life without cake is no life at all!

Ventilator’ by Mireille Amro

Substitutions for ingredients were needed. I sourced coconut flour, almond flour, natural sweeteners, and exotic sounding ingredients such as xanthum gum and psyllium husk here in Dubai, and the adventure began. A variety of cakes, tarts and biscuits arrived much to the delight of our sweet-toothed pallets. I utterly relished the challenge of finding a new way of baking, and can attest that when we step out of our familiar ways of being, and try something new, the results are often delicious, satisfying and intensely rewarding. If you are interested in finding out more about Keto baking feel free to ask me if you see me in the corridor, or perhaps embark on your own research adventure!

What a lovely, unexpected benefit of lockdown.

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Making the most of COVID-Out and about in the UAE Nicola Woodroffe - Director of Extra-Curricular Activities Recent times have certainly restricted our international travel. Within our diverse and international NLCS Dubai community, naturally many of us crave our pre-COVID life, where we could jump on a plane to visit family and friends “back home” or simply have the freedom to explore new countries and cultures through our long and treasured school vacations. For now, these times seem firmly in the distant past, perhaps even a different chapter of life, and the reality of returning to normality may be still too far away.

Conversely and more positively, COVID has provided an unexpected pause in our global travel, which has created plenty of time for reflection and perhaps even a rethink of our personal or environmental priorities. Many outsiders would say we are fortunate to spend the pandemic in the safety of the sunny UAE. The UAE is a certainly truly beautiful place to live with a wonderful climate and this chapter of our lives could be seen as an opportunity to further explore where we live. The UAE is an outdoor playground, ready and waiting for us to explore.

BLOGS Another activity that has kept our students busy is that of blogging. Here are two entries from two of our NLCS bloggers. Please follow the links to their blogs at the end to see what else has been capturing their imagination over the last few months: Elyes Mrabet - Grade 6

Hand-writing improves memory and learning

A new study from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim has shown that handwriting, as opposed to typing on a keyboard, develops memory and results in better learning for both children and adults. Several previous studies have also come to this conclusion.

The brain activity of a group of children were monitored, using an electrode-covered hood. As the brain produces electric signals when active, monitoring these signals can determine which areas of the brain are active. The experiment showed that handwriting makes neural areas related to learning more active, which means writing by hand increases the learning capacity. The study also showed that memory is far more active during handwriting. On the other hand, writing on a keyboard did not stimulate as much learning or memory development. The increased brain activity induced by hand-writing, “gives the brain more ‘hooks’ to hang your memories on,” explains the author of the study.

The act of writing helps to encode information in the brain, the motion of the hand also helps to develop short and long terms memory. On the other hand, typing is a repetitive movement with little variation between characters, which impedes the development of memory.

Ask yourself during these COVID times, what new challenges have you embraced? What different opportunities and adventures are you creating for yourself and your Dubai family? How have you tried yourself out?

Adventures such as hiking in the mountains, biking along the canal, camping under the stars, snorkeling or canoeing along the stunning coastline of the UAE, represent just some of the opportunities in our backyard. As an IB community, we are thinkers, risk-takers and we have an open and inquisitive mind, so thinking outside the box is what we do naturally. You do not need to think too hard or look too far to find your next outdoor adventure. Sport provides both reason and purpose to travel.

Make a plan, make some memories, stay safe, stay active and enjoy some micro adventures.

As for notetaking, typing is easier and faster, which allows us to copy information word for word, which may seem an improvement, but this ease makes us blankly copy information without retaining it. If notes are handwritten, we instinctively seek to reduce the length of our notes, making us work harder to find core information, summarise it and ignore non-essential sections. This creates the mental process of collecting the largest quantity of essential information, representing the information in a succinct way, and repeating. This helps to develop speed of notetaking, a crucial skill for university as well as ingraining information into the mind, increasing academic performance.

The handwriting triumphs over computers in note- taking, learning and memorization, but keyboards are more efficient in writing essays or assignments. “I would use a keyboard to write an essay, but I’d take notes by hand during a lecture,” says Van der (the author of study).

To read more articles like these as well as book reviews, please visit my blog: https://bookwormsandlabrats.wordpress.com/

My challenge was to enjoy sports in all 7 the different emirates. 4 down 3 to go..

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BLOGS Sam Lee - Grade 12

Home Run There was once an overweight catcher in University of Alabama’s baseball team named Jeremy Brown. He was used to people laughing at him, and most of the time, he stopped running once he reached first base. But one day, after hitting the ball, he decided to go for it – he ran past first base and towards the second. And then he tripped. His worst nightmare was coming to life. Embarrassed, he slowly crawled back towards first base. But that was when he realised that the ball he had hit had gone 60 feet over the fence. He had hit a homerun and didn’t even realise it.

This story itself, told in a movie titled ‘Moneyball’, seemed like a great metaphor. And it made me think about all the worries I had during lockdown. How long will online learning last? Will this affect my final exams in May? What about my university applications? Perhaps I was worrying too much about the very next step I was about the take that I forgot to look up and see where the ball I hit was flying towards.

Don’t get me wrong – this global pandemic was horrible and it may well be one of the toughest times most of us will ever have to go through. Organising university applications and preparing for my upcoming exams whilst stuck in my room for months is definitely a position I never want to be in again.

But now, I can tell myself, “well, that was one horrible tumble,” and then shake it off. We all know that suffering doesn’t always end up being a 60-feet over-the-fence homerun. But as much as I had my own difficulties during this on-going pandemic, I also was blessed with many people around me supporting all the little steps I took on the way. My parents, my friends, and all the teachers were there to laugh with me and cry with me – together.

So, looking back at my Covid experience so far, it really wasn’t a homerun – but I guess, in a way, it wasn’t a meaningless three strikes out either.

Sam’s blog can be found here: https://samuellee622.wixsite.com/questioneveryday

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