Moshi Campus News – 14 Feb 2016

There will be no classes in school on Monday, 22nd February as ISM takes our mid-quarter long weekend break. Classes will resume as usual on Tuesday, 23rd February. Boarders may remain in school over this long weekend or may choose to travel home. Please note that classes continue as usual until 12:35pm on Friday, 19th February, and students should not plan to leave school before this time. Those travelling away for the weekend are expected to return by 6pm on Monday.
Primary and M1 to M3 boarders who are not travelling home for the weekend will be expected to join the boarding trip to Pangani leaving on Saturday morning and returning on Monday afternoon. M4 to D2 boarders will have a choice of whether to remain in school or go to Pangani.

All parents are invited to a meeting with members of the school and campus leadership to discuss current affairs within the school. The meeting will take place at 6:30pm on Thursday, 25th February. The issues discussed at this meeting will be generated from your questions. We think the productivity of the meeting will be maximised if questions/issues are sent to the Head of Campus beforehand. To that end, if you have a question that you would like answered, please send the question or subject to before 17th February, and we will prepare the necessary information and material to adequately address the issue. If we receive too many different questions for discussion, we will select the most frequently requested topics and discuss others at a subsequent meeting.

The M1 classes from both campuses will be undertaking field study at Manyara from this Wednesday, 17th February to Friday, 19th February.

Eighteen students (mostly diploma and a few MYP) will be travelling to Nairobi next Sunday, 21st February to take part in the East African Model United Nations. This week-long activity engages our students in discussion and debate of the top political, economic, social and environmental issues of the day as they join hundreds of others at the United Nations (UNEP) complex in the city and experience what life can be like as a delegate to the United Nations. We wish them well in this challeging and highly rewarding pursuit.

We look forward to welcoming a visitor from the admissions office of the University of Alberta in Canada on Wednesday, 17th February This will be a great opportunity for our M5 and D1 students to learn more about the possibilities for future study in Canada.
And on Monday, 22nd February, there will be a presentation in school by the admissions office of Memorial University in Newfoundland, Canada. Memorial has proved a very popular destination for ISM students as it has a good reputation and lower than average fees. There are currently about 10 ex-ISM students studying at Memorial.
If you are based in Dar es Salaam, you may also wish to attend a unversities fair on Saturday, 20th February at the New Africa Hotel which is due to be atteded by universities from the UK, Mauritius, South Africa, Malaysia and elsewhere. Further details of this event are available from .

ISA tests continue this week for P4, P5, P6, M1 and M3 students. Read last week’s newsletter for further details.

Unfortunately the number of students registering for the Uhuru Peak trip at the begining of March has been below our minimum number, and this trip will not now take place. We expect to offer another Uhuru Peak trip in the first semester of 2016-17. Our next OP trip will be Little Meru next quarter. Those students who had already paid for the Uhuru Peak trip will have their charges refunded.

We look forward to welcoming many visitors from the United World Colleges national committees across Africa as they meet in Moshi this coming weekend for their Africa-hub meeting. As ISM continues to work towards becoming the second United World College in Africa over the next couple of years, we eagerly anticipate this opportunity to introduce others to our school.

This is the Valentine’s weekend! Among activities planned for the weekend was a Valentine’s dance in the dining hall. This was organized by the student council, and day students were welcomed to join the dance.
Some boarders left for an OP trip to Hanang on Saturday 13th and are out the whole weekend.
Monday, 22nd February will be an ISM holiday and there will be no classes on that day. Being a long weekend, there will be a boarding trip to Pangani. Boarders leave on Saturday 20th in the morning and return on Monday 22nd February. The trip is compulsory for Primary boarders, and M1 to M3 students who will not have gone home for the long weekend. M4 to D2 boarders are free to join the trip. Boarding will meet all expenses for the trip. We appreciate that some parents may want their children to travel home that weekend. If this is the case, then please let us know the arrangements in good time.
In the past, we have allowed the M4 boarders to go for a town trip on Friday afternoons unsupervised, yet we do not allow them to sign out on any other day. This has not always worked out smoothly as some are still too young to make their own decisions. We have therefore decided that in future, M4 boarders will be supervised during the town trip. Only M5 to D2 students will be allowed to go to town unsupervised, if they have parental consent to do so.
We are advertising for tenders for the running of the school duka. Any interested party may pick a tender document from the school office, or may contact the Head of Boarding on for more details. The new partnership period will commence on 1st April 2016.

Book Week: 29th February to 4th March Our annual book week is fast approaching. We will be celebrating the wonderful world of books by Dropping Everything And Reading (D.E.A.R.) as well as holding our traditional book door competition.
Monday, 29th February will see the ‘Dress as a character from a book’ parade in Karibu Hall in our assembly. Please chat with your child about what character they would like to dress up as and help them put a costume together for this whole school spirit day.

Our PYP musicians have been hard at work this quarter working on new skills, learning new things, and creating new pieces of art.
In EC music lessons, students are investigating the idea of change as it relates to sounds. The children are finding out about different tempo, dynamics and pitch through singing songs and rhymes.
P1/2 students have learnt some new songs and continue to work on rhythm and keeping a steady beat. The unit involving communities is inspiring us to think of ourselves as a community within the music class and group ourselves according to our tastes in music, saying why we liked a particular piece of music.
The P2/3 class is finding out about the hand signs used to accompany the solfa scale (do, re, me) to help develop their musical skills.
P4 musicians have continued working with the previous unit of inquiry on the arts being an avenue for expression. They are working with expressing music in their movements and have created their own choreography to Camille Saint-Saens’ Introduction to Carnival of the Animals.
P5 students have taken their knowledge of digital media and are using it in Music class to ‘modernize’ the traditional Kilimanjaro song that primary sings every year. They are currently creating a digital track to use in the performance of this song, while everyone sings the melody.
The P6 class is wrapping up work with cross-cultural music, in relation to a previous unit on migration. They have taken unique elements of traditional music from the cultures of students in the class and combined it into making one big class composition. They are looking forward to performing it soon! Musically yours, Susan Kellerman, ISM Music Teacher and Program Coordinator

The Kilimanjaro Marathon will this year take place on Sunday, 28th February. Instead of presenting a full school team this year, ISM is entering a number of different groups. Our M5 students are entering in order to raise funds for their community service project. Our boarders are entering with different teams from different houses. If you too would like to enter the full marathon, half marathon or 5km fun run, an entry form is attached here.
We will be providing bus transport from the school campus to the stadium from early on Sunday morning and this will be available to any ISM community members who are taking part. Many of our students will also be suporting the event by operating a water point to sustain the runners.
More details are available at www.kilimanjaromarathon.com.

MYP Students have been investigating coordinate planes, linear models, probability, and trigonometry! This keeps them engaged and leads to insights into how mathematics is connected to the world we live in.
M1 students communicated to their classmates how to draw items on a coordinate grid, and are now grappling with patterns that exist in geometry. M2 students are investigating how patterns can be seen in tables, rules and on graphs. They are looking at how you can begin with any of these items in order to create the others.
M3 students are looking at creating linear models to find the best deals when given quotes. M4 students used what they know about probability and expected value to create games that their peers could play. M5 students looked at how trigonometry can help model circular motion in ferris wheels and windmills.
The students are working on being able to describe Mathematics and verify what they’ve learned.

The varsity swim team traveled to Dar es Salaam for the Tallis Invitational Swim Meet recently, putting into competition the work they put into practise on a daily basis. Tallis is considered by most to be Tanzania’s best age-group competition of the year, with the strongest level of competition in each age-group.
The results included: (PB = personal best/ fastest ever personal swim; Meet Record = fastest ever time in history) Fred: 200 IM (2:48.58; 2nd); 50 Back (34.39; 5th); 100 Free (1:08.27; 8th); 100IM (1:17.96; 5th); 100 Back (1:20.14; 6th); 4x50m Relay (1:55.64; 1st) Phoebe: 50 Back (57.24; PB); 50 Breast (1:05.38; 1:05.38; PB); 50 Free (46.40; PB) Maria: 100 Free (1:28.89; 10th; 10 second PB); 100 IM (1:39.78; 7th; 7 sec PB); 50 Fly (49.69; 9th; 2 sec PB); 50 Free (38.65; 10th; 3 sec PB) Shawn: 200 IM (3:03.28; 8th; 11 sec PB); 100 Free (1:07.78; 7th; 13 sec PB); 50 Breast (38.02; 6th; 5 sec PB); 50 Fly (32.68; 5th; 1.5 sec PB); 100 Breast (1:27.58; 3rd; 4 sec PB); 50 Free (30.24; 10th; 1.5 sec PB) Kyle: 200 IM (2:55.50; 4th); 100 Free (1:08.58; 5th; 6 sec PB); 100 Fly (34.07; 4th); 100 Back (1:17.34; 1st; 10 sec PB); 50 Free (31.37; 5th) Chris: 200 IM (3:02.62; 7th); 100 Free (1:08.09; 3rd); 100 IM (1:16.22; 2nd; 6 sec PB); 50 Fly (35.29; 5th; 4 sec PB); 100 Breast (1:27.82; 2nd; 4 sec PB); 4×50 Free Relay (3rd) Aselya: 50 Back (44.81; 10th; 17 sec PB); 100 Free (1:33.32; 15th); 100 IM (1:48.87; 15th; 23 sec PB); 50 Breast (59.12; 10 sec PB); 50 Fly (1:00.44); 50 Free (41.22; 9 sec PB) Alicia: 200 IM; 6th; first ever swim); 50 Back (38.65; 6th); 100 Free (1:15.40; 8th); 100 IM (1:26.51; 8th); 100 Fly (1:36.02; 5th); 100 Back (1:28.72; 7th); 50 Free (33.50; 8th); 4×50 Free Relay (3rd) Emily: 50 Back (50.72; 14th); 50 breast (51.14; 3rd); 50 Fly (46.81; 7th; first ever swim); 50 Free (39.65; 7th) Ashraf: 50 Back (47.69; 7th); 100 IM (1:43.65; 8th); 50 Breast (53.24; 10th); 50 Fly (46.81; 7th); 50 Free (40.26; 13th) Sanne: 200 IM (3:11; 8th; 14 sec PB); 50 Back (37.62; 2nd); 100 Free (1:08.18;2nd; 4 sec PB); 100 Fly (1:25.87; 1st; Meet Record; first ever swim!!); 50 Fly (35.96; 2nd; 1 sec PB); 100 Back (1:24.71; 1st; 4 sec PB); 50 Free (30.31; 2nd; 2 sec PB); 4×50 Free Relay (1st) Alex ‘The Bomber’: 50 back (35.81; 6th; 7 sec PB); 100 Free (1:11.13; 11th; 9 sec PB); 59 Fly (35.24; 8th; 4 sec PB); 100 Back (1:19.81; 5th; 17 sec PB); 50 Free (30.01; 9th) Silipa: 100 Free (1:32.76; 13th; 6 sec PB); 100 IM (1:44.65; 12th); 50 Breast (50.06; 8th; 2 sec PB); 50 Fly (52.18; 12th); 50 Free (41.82; 4 sec PB)

Proposed plans for attending the Kenyan Long Course Championships in Nairobi have been shared with parents, while we are also preparing for the St. Constantine’s meet in Arusha.
We welcome our newest members, Christine, Suzanne, and Pauline, and wish them continued success as they begin to see the payoff from the work they are putting in everyday in the pool.
And finally, a big thanks to all of the swimmers and parents who came to help at the Primary Sports Weekend. It was very apparent that we are a strong, united team that includes swimmers from primary all the way to secondary. There was a great feeling at the pool on Saturday, and that was thanks to your effort.
Yours in the pool, Coach Sabini, Sullivan, Noah, and Mary

On Friday afternoons, our teaching assistants have been taking part in a number of workshops aimed at professional development. Their fifth workshop this year was led by our PYP Coordinator, Kate Schermbrucker, on the subject of Thinking Routines. The next workshop will be held in March. Our TAs always participate enthusiastically and appreciate the opportunity to develop their skills further.

D1 students continue to work on determining the subject of their Extended Essay. Each will submit three options by February 17th. Based on availability of EE supervisors in the subject areas selected, each will be assigned a subject/supervisor. Please collaborate with us in encouraging them on this 9-month long major research project.
This is a hectic time for D2 students. They are focused on finishing coursework assignments such as language orals and the Theory of Knowledge (TOK) essay.
ISM’s monitored evening study hours every school night serve as pivotal concentration and study hours for DP students. DP parents may wish to ask their son/daughter in boarding how their time is used.
D2s continue planning for their May 21st graduation. This week they advanced on the process of selecting songs and a theme for that happy event.
A reminder that Friday March 18th will be the end of quarter 3 parent-teacher meeting and DP parents would do their children a great service by attending. Likewise, kindly plan to NOT remove your DP student prior to the afternoon of March 18th and in this they can take advantage of all the carefully prepared lessons. Be sure your son/daughter in the DP is back for studies on April 11th.
The intensity of the rigorous IB DP program means that with some frequency students develop an unhealthy sleep pattern that inhibits their learning. Parents are encouraged to encourage their children studying in the DP in this regard as highlighted in this article – www.uwcea.org/dip103.
On a weekly basis it seems DP teachers, parents or pupils address the question of the stresses of studying in the IB DP and this article entitled “Relax! You’ll Be More Productive” provides superb advice that will be shared with them – though it too is relevant to adults – www.uwcea.org/dip104. On a related topic, my D1 Life Skills class this week focused on ‘Mindfulness’ – a key topic these days in education circles as teachers aim to help students keep focus – and this TED Talk by a guru in the field spurred some great discussion – www.uwcea.org/dip105.
Several IB DP graduates passed by ISM this week. They finished in 1987 (one is now in Dar, another in Orlando and another in Nairobi), and each described how their friendship has continued though they see one another rarely and the great IB education and diversity of the ISM student body then has served them incredibly well.
The Secondary Swim gala proved to again be a success with comradery, good sportsmanship and fun races highlighted on this different school day as the three photos of DP students on that day show.
Feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns. Rick Fitzpatrick, DP Coordinator

Our primary clubs will run until Tuesday 15 March.
We are now looking forward to next quarter and putting together our programme. We are very grateful to the parents who volunteer their time once a week ensuring that we have a varied programme each quarter. If a parent is willing to give up and hour a week to run a club next quarter please contact me .

Unit of inquiry We had a very successful trip to Janieck’s garden on Thursday at Machame. If you have not been invited to the google+ early childhood community page please let me know and I will invite you again. Gelske has posted lots of wonderful photos of the trip. Many thanks to Gelske for preparing such a range of activities to help the children find out more about life cycles.
We also had a visit from Ms Stephanie’s hen and two day old chick this week. We were able to compare first hand the changes that take place in the life cycle of a chick. Many thanks to Ms Stephanie for arranging this experience.
This week we will continue to inquire into the life cycle of a hen and finish our non-fiction book about the life cycle of a butterfly. Our sunflower seeds are beginning to grow and we are recording the stages and predicting what will happen next.
Literacy Due to being on a trip last week, Valentine’s Day activities and the impromptu visit from the hen and chick we still have lots to finish off from last week in terms of writing our hungry caterpillar books and the Letterland sounds mentioned in last week’s newsletter. The children are also writing their trip reflections. Writing will come into role play in the class flower shop as the children take orders, write out receipts and make cards to accompany the bouquets.
Numeracy We will set up a class flower shop this week and begin to use money to buy and sell flowers and plants. The older EC2 students will be given story problems to solve, involving shopping experiences. Weighing activities will continue. The younger children will focus on heavy and light and the older ones will compare weights using scales.
Art The children have been creating caterpillars and butterflies. They will also work on sunflower pictures this week.

Information for Parents Thank you to the parents who made last week so special. Baba Khari took the whole day to bring us to his village, Mama Kairi and Baba Eliza made sure we had treats for our Valentine’s party, and so many of you helped with popcorn to make a memorable 100th day of school. In the U.S. we have the Super Bowl for football each year. It’s a big game with a lot of action. Last week was definitely the Super Bowl of P1/2. As I plan this week’s activities, it certainly looks a lot calmer.
Language focus for the week This week both groups of children will focus on making story maps. Children will listen to a story that I read; and then they will need to make a map which includes the character, setting, problem, and solution. The children will share their maps with each other.
Maths focus for the week We will finish our measurement unit with a focus on measuring capacity this week. Both groups will investigate capacity by comparing the volume of various containers. The Group One children will then learn about liters, while the Group 2 children will learn about both liters and milliliters.
Unit of Inquiry After last week’s field trips, the children can now create powerpoint presentations which will compare two communities. This will be a beneficial exercise for them as they can show what they have learned about communities while learning how to organize and develop a presentation.
What to bring to school: A hat for playtime and a healthful snack.
Timetable: Monday: Wear PE clothes and shoes. Tuesday: Bring your library bag. Friday: Swimming

We had an exciting time on Wednesday when Alex Morgan, one of our M5 students, came into class and presented his drone. We had seen it the week before when he was presenting his Personal Project in Karibu Hall. We decided we would like to know more about it, especially because it fits so well with our unit about transport. So we invited Alex to come and speak to us about it and its uses. He told us that drones are now a useful way of catching unsuspecting poachers in Tanzania and elsewhere. They fly quietly up to 1.5km high and film what’s going on below.
Alex first showed us a film he had made all about the drone. It included scenes he had shot of school and the beach. The views from the drone are amazing. He then took us to the ISM top pitch and flew it for us. He also answered lots of questions which the children asked. Finally, he allowed each student in the class to have a turn using it. Alex then had to go back to class, whilst we reflected on what we had learned. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Alex for presenting his drone to us.
Unit: Transdisciplinary Theme: How we organise ourselves Central Idea: Transportation systems are directly related to the needs of a community. This week we will present our assembly at 7.40am on Monday in Karibu Hall. We are also looking forward to hearing from Mr Buck (secondary science teacher) about his former career as a pilot. We will continue our actions about safety with transport, e.g. wearing helmets when cycling, not disturbing our parents when they are driving and looking both ways when crossing the road.

Mathematics Focus: Multiplication
English Focus: words ending with the suffix -ation, e.g. information, adoration, sensation, preparation, admiration. We will continue reading Michael Morpurgo’s, Kaspar: The Prince of Cats
What to bring to school every day: A hat, water bottle, a pair of indoor shoes and a healthy snack.
The Week Ahead: Monday: P2/3 present assembly in K-hall at 7.40 | Homework will be set | swimming lesson Tuesday: Library session Thursday: PE lesson Friday: Homework due in Kate Schermbrucker – P2/3 Teacher and PYP Coordinator

This week the P4s continued to be inquirers, exploring their school environment and studying about habitats and ecosystems. They continue taking action towards making their environment better and our focus this time is looking out for trash around the “duka” area and keeping that space clean.
Unit of Inquiry Students have done a study of the different environments around the school and created graphs to compare the distribution of mini beasts found. In the coming week they will study food chains and familiarize with the related vocabulary.
Language Arts
This week our vocabulary focus will be on compound words as well as unit related words. We will be reviewing what compound words mean and we will come up with many different compound words as a class. We will play various games to sharpen our grammar skills and continue to explore news headlines in writing.
Math
We will review fractions and what they mean and explore different ways to represent fraction models – using visual representations and equivalent fractions.
I would like to welcome Amaya Shah who joined us on the 1st of February. Her enthusiasm and curiosity have sparked the energy in our class in a wonderful way. She is a joy to have in P4.
Our Valentine’s Day celebrations were crowned by Paige’s birthday! We also received treats from Nina and cards from Prisca. I hope you all had a love-filled weekend!

Information for Parents The children had a great time at the Valentine’s Day party last week. Thank you to all the parents that sent in snacks for the party. The kids have been working really hard on the ISA tests and we will finish up with them this week.
Language focus for the week In reading groups this week we will be looking at an article about a person who has worked throughout his career to include various types of digital media in the Library of Congress. This will help us improve our reading skills when it comes to reading for information. We will continue to work on the difference between fact and opinion and how to write an opinion paragraph.
Maths focus for the week This week we will be looking at the relationship between fractions, decimals, and percentages. We will be looking at how they are connected and the function of each one. I am impressed with how clearly students are able to explain their new knowledge. You should ask them what they have learned so far!
Unit of Inquiry Digital media has changed our lives in many ways. We will be thinking about how peoples’ lives have changed through the use of digital media in a variety of situations. We will take a look at some educational opportunities to use digital media in school and how it can help improve your learning.
What to bring to school: A hat for playtime and a healthful snack.
Timetable: Monday: PE (wear PE shoes and a house T shirt) Thursday: Swimming (bring swim kit) Friday: Library (bring books to return or renew)
 

We have been having a very eventful week with our ISA Testing, brochures, a Guest Speaker and learning new things in Maths. The ISA testing will continue next week on Monday and Tuesday and will cover Reading and the Writing Task B. Majority of the students have finished their Brochures and I am very proud of the effort and neatness they have included.
Mr. Aat was a guest speaker in our class on Thursday and he provided us with a lot of information with flying planes and what happens to planes in a weather storm. I am sure your child has informed you about what they were able to ask or what information they took away from his presentation. In Maths over the last week, we have been recording data on rainfall and what our information looks like on a bar graph. We then moved on to how to take the information we have for rainfall and create fractions using number sentences. The students are working on an Earth wind catcher. They have so far made the earth.
This Week: Unit of Inquiry We are going to be starting our Summative Assessment process. This is our final week of the weather unit. During our UOI, I will be going over what the students will need to bring to class, how their Summative Assessment is going to be presented and etc. I will include all of this information in the homework because the homework for the week is going to be centered towards their Summative Assessment.
English Since we have finished our Weather Brochures on a certain place, we are going to create and finish our Weather Poetry Books. The students have started one poem or have decorated the front of their books and I would like for them to finish and write as many different styles and types of poetry as they can to fulfill their book.
Maths The focus for the week will be to finish our Wild Weather activities involving weather with fractions, graphs and group work.
Notices We will be doing our Summative Assessment as homework this week. I have provided your student with what they need to do for the week. It will be very simple and uncomplicated, if you raise any questions or concerns please e-mail me at .

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