Moshi Campus News – 18 Nov 18

On Friday we had an opportunity to listen to Mathias wow us with a concert related to his Personal Project.  This was a great end to the week and featured an original song as part of the repertoire. Proceeds from the event were donated to the Upendo orphanage.  This was followed by the Sparkling Elephant Project’s unveiling of Tumaini in her new location in front of school.  After much travel, she will be there as a reminder of the human animal conflicts around us.

It is events like these that remind us what is best about the IB.  The combination of creativity and service which showcase students’ skills and passions is something any school would be proud of.  Students learn a lot in class, but often to really internalize this learning they need to put it into action outside of class.

As the year goes on, we will see this in big ways with CAS projects and PYP exhibition and in little everyday ways around school.  I look forward to seeing these moments of action at all levels of the school and in projects of all sizes.

Bob Cofer

Tuesday the government has declared a national holiday for Maulid.  Due to this there will be no classes or clubs on this day. Classes will continue as normal on Wednesday.

Yoga, which is normally scheduled for Tuesday afternoon will move to Wednesday at the same time for this week only.

Starting Friday around noon we will kick off the 18th annual ISM Secondary Sports Weekend.  This has become quite a tradition in Tanzania and this one I am sure will not disappoint those who come.  We will have about 800 students representing the Moshi and Arusha campuses and 13 other schools. 

The schedule is packed from the start through 9pm on Friday, from 7am to 9pm on Saturday and from 7am to the afternoon closing ceremony.  Please come and enjoy the spirit on campus.

On Saturday starting at 10am there will be a special session of the Farmers’ Market and a craft fair as well.  Please come and shop between watching the events.

This annual craft fair is always a popular event on the ISM calendar and is a great opportunity to buy presents for the holiday season.

Less than 1 week to go until ISM Sports Weekend, 23-25th November.  As most of you will know it is a huge event in the ISM calendar and we will have 9 different sports being played at the same time.  Any assistance during the weekend would be greatly appreciated, we have particular need of timers and score keepers.  If you have time to help, please contact me at robinmarsh@ed.ismoshi.com and make sure you make it down to support the ISM students too.

Wellbeing is certainly a buzzword in education at the moment. Wellbeing is defined as the state of being comfortable, healthy or happy. Across the globe, schools and colleges are exploring how to promote wellbeing across their communities and how to respond to emerging concerns. At the same time, many schools now include a focus on promoting wellbeing as part of ongoing internal evaluation processes.

At ISM, we are dedicated to supporting our students to effectively manage their lives and their wellbeing and to help and support each other in achieving this. Wellbeing in this instance encompasses social, emotional and mental health. We address the idea of healthy eating, physical activity and sleep. At the same time, we explore sex and relationship education. As a community, we strive to promote and encourage student voice and agency.

As a staff too, we are conscious of the importance of our own collective wellbeing. We need to maintain balance in our lives too in order for us to be the most effective we can be in our roles and interactions. In an extremely dynamic and eventful environment such as ISM, this is an ongoing challenge.

At ISM, there is never an intention to focus solely on the academic side of school life but it is often this aspect that causes anxiety. Of course, anxiety is not a healthy emotional state to exist in. However, anxiety is not an exact science and what concerns or worries one person may not be an issue with someone else and vice versa. As educators and parents, there are markers that we can look out for. Sudden or unexpected mood swings or changes in behaviour, outbursts of emotion, tiredness, indifference and so on. These changes may appear overnight in response to an imminent deadline or significant event but they are more likely to creep up over time.

We want you to know that we care. When you are feeling that you have lost control, when you are overwhelmed, when you can not see how to manage what is being asked of you, please talk to us. Remember, this is not a permanent position. Together, we can explore strategies to help break the cycle and change the sense of control and influence we have over things.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the power of community and how special the community is here at ISM. One aspect of a strong, supportive community is, I believe, to watch out for each other.

As with any area of school life, as a staff we are constantly evaluating our practice, considering if what we are doing to promote and respond to student wellbeing is working and whether we can do better.

Once again, wellbeing is a buzzword at the moment but it must be more than a word. What we must not do as a community is constantly talk about wellbeing without actually doing something about it. As Rumi said, we can all “be a lamp, a lifeboat or a ladder” and look out for the wellbeing of those around us. It is our collective responsibility.

Ben Morley

Congratulations to all Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College graduates

On Saturday 17th November Bob Cofer and I were delighted to attend the 19th graduation ceremony of students from Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College, a constituent College of Tumaini Makumira. ISM has close, historical links with both Tuimaini Makumira and KCMC and it was wonderful to be invited to be part of this event.

The graduation saw, in addition to the many Diploma and Master graduates, degrees conferred upon 84 nurses, 146 doctors, 23 physiotherapists and 11 graduate midwifes. The excitement was palpable and it was an honor to be witness to this new generation of healthcare professionals.

Anna Marsden

The M4 students of Moshi and Arusha met on the slopes of West Kilimanjaro this week for an eventful interdisciplinary trip investigating the various factors that influence this unique ecosystem. We were lucky to have four beautiful days to explore the intersections between science and mathematics by collecting and analysing biomass, altitude and temperature data, which we used to make predictions about the various factors affecting the crops that are grown in this region. We listened to an engaging talk from the farmers who run Simba Farm (who have graciously hosted ISM students for 40 years now) and students used their newly developed knowledge of the environment to ask questions and deepen their understanding of how climate and weather influence the farms descions when growing food. We played a rousing game of Predator-Prey, which demonstrates the various factors that influence an ecosystem and the ramifications for different trophic levels. Students from both campuses bonded over dinners around a campfire, rap battles and data analysis.

William Melhado

This Tuesday, November 20th will be a Public holiday. Boarders will follow a weekend programme, with breakfast starting at 8.45 to 9.45am. Lunch will be served at 1.00 to 1.45pm and dinner at the usual time. Different dorms will have activities in between meals. They will however, follow a normal schedule in the evening.

Next weekend, the school will host the annual Sports Weekend from Friday 23rd to Sunday 25th November. Close to 800 visiting students and their coaches will be on campus, sharing our facilities. However, the visitors will not be allowed in the boarding houses. The dorms will be locked and will only be opened on an as needed basis, without inconveniencing the boarders. There will be no trips that weekend and sign-outs will also not be possible, as students will be engaged in different areas. They are all excited to host this major event.

Rosemary Bango

What a huge week of sports we have had in various NTAA tournaments.  Last Friday and Saturday saw the Primary and Secondary Athletics meets at ISMAC.  The tournament was incredibly well run and all our athletes competed well and had a great day out.  ISM Leopards picked up some great 1st place finishes.  A big thank you to Coach Elly and all the helpers who came along to the primary event to help get athletes to their events on time. 

In Primary we had

• Tristan 1st in U9 boys High Jump with a whooping 110cm jump.
• Khari 1st place in U9 boys Shot Put.
• Ciara 1st place and NTAA U7 girls Shot Put record holder.
• Townes 1st place U11 boys 400m.
• Aiden 1st place U11 boys 200m.

In Secondary we had

• Gurtej 1st U13 boys High Jump.
• Silipa 1st U15 girls High Jump.
• Arjun 1st U15 boys High Jump.
• Michael 1st U19 boys High Jump and NTAA record holder with 180cm cleared.
• Sacha 1st U19 boys Long Jump.
• Ejofon 1st U19 girls Shot Put.
• Michael 1st U19 boys Discus.
• Jerome 1st U15 boys 1500m.
• Thomson 1st U15 boys 100m.

Special recognition goes to Silipa in U15 who was voted by the NTAA sports directors as female athlete of the meet. She set records in the high jump and stood out in the relays as she caught and passed so many runners in her races. 

Coach Elly was busy again on Tuesday, taking the U9 and U11 soccer teams to Kennedy house tournament.  The U11s won most games, however, were narrowly beaten in 1 game by the eventual winners and picked up 2nd place. The U9s were even closer finishing equal 1st, with 3 wins and 1 draw, however ended up second of points differential. Great effort from all the players, Coach Elly and Coach Owain.

Lastly our U19 Netball girls travelled to St Constantine’s to compete in the NTAA tournament.  It looked like the games were going to be called off due to the weather, but they took the chance and the sun came out, and the girls shone for the entire tournament taking the first-place trophy in style.  Congratulations to Magreth who was awarded player of the tournament.

Go Leopards

Robin Marsh

Monday saw Meru, Kibo and Mawenzi fight it out in the Primary inter house tug-o-war.  All of the houses fought hard but Kibo definitely has the better tug-o-war technique, taking a clean sweep of their 4 attempts.  Meru and Mawenzi were equal 2nd with 1 win each. 

The week started with a lot of excitement from the Primary Inter-house Tug of War. It was such great fun and Kibo seemed to have had the right breakfast as they shattered the other teams and were champions of the day.  The next Inter-house event is a Design and Technology challenge this coming week on Friday 23rd Nov. The students are supposed to come dressed in their house t-shirts.

Enhanced PYP- thank you to the parents that came in for the coffee morning. We had a wonderful session and were able to look at what some of the developments will look like in our setting. An outline of these developments will be sent to you for the benefit of those who could not attend.

Kindly be reminded- PYP Sharing Assembly- 26th November from 10:35 to 11:35 am.

Cathy Wambua-Saha

Our week of ‘thinking about thinking’ was a great success as a ‘tuning in’ activity for our new unit. The children came up with some great questions. This week we explored Eefke’s interest in animal eye colour. We found out about the parts of an eye and painted some animal eyes ourselves. From here we found out a little more about each wild animal we had painted.

• Elephant cry if you shoot. It wants to go home. Benny
• I’d be Spiderman. Fight the people who shoot. Jeremy
• People are knocking down the trees. They want to grow palm oil. If superheroes are real, get Hulk to throw the truck away. If you want to have biscuits look at the back. If it says Palm Oil, put it back. Milo
• People want to eat them. They want to shoot. We can say “Stop!” Ima
• Big Elephant! Parth
• They’re endangered. The hunters kill them. When I’m the real batman, I’ll take them to jail. Henry
• People are breaking the lions’ houses. We can peek inside, look if it is a lion’s house and the go around it. Eefke
• Everyone destroyed the planet. They cut the trees. What are you doing? Abi

?Owain Evans

Sabine was the first one to bring in her plant project to class. She shared her work, observations and outcomes. Her plants clearly highlighted to us the importance of placing plants in the sunlight once they have sprouted in the dark (under the ground).

We are looking forward to hearing from the other projects in the coming few days. Some of you have asked me to extend the project for another week as the seeds which were used were not good and we will do that.

Our research into plant life in different biomes has continued. This week, the focus was on reading articles from different websites and choosing which information was needed by the group member and which was not. The children also visited Ms. Grace who helped them print out colour pictures of their plants.

We are now left with one week in which we will be compiling all the information we have gained into an information poster.

There will be no show and tell this Friday as we will be preparing our class for sports weekend.

Mboka Mwasongwe

The art pieces in P 2/3 are coming along fabulously! The inspirational feeling has been great, and students have produced gorgeous backgrounds for their artwork about their homes. Students have also used their learning of 3D shape drawing to create some wonderful 3D images in their artwork. An exciting part of our learning this week was to inquire into how chalk and oil pastels can be blended to create different effects. This knowledge was then translated into their artwork with students learning that chalk pastels were brighter and worked better than oil pastels when colouring over water colours.

I would like to thank Mama Jasmijn and Mama Janieck for coming in this week to talk to the students about Dutch homes, what materials they are constructed with, Dutch traditions and cultures.

A big congratulations to the P 2/3 boys who took part in the football tournament this past week. Well done boys!

Elisha Jaffer

This week the P4s have carried out more investigations and are working on their information booklets. They have also worked well on calculating area of regular and irregular shapes and reviewing division as a concept of sharing. In the coming week we will be editing our booklets and working on our Summative project for the close of the unit. We have also started a personal inquiry on snakes as they are becoming more visible around the campus. Our P4 experts are teaching about the different types and how to handle ourselves when we spot them around us. This was student initiated and a real way to promote agency in our classroom. It will be led by the students and hopefully they will educate the rest of the community. In Math we will be focusing on Patterns in Math where we will describe an increasing pattern, find the rules and solve different problems involving patterns.

Kindly note that Tuesday will be a public holiday therefore the students can bring in their library books on Monday for changing.

Thursday is P.E. as normal however on Friday, the Sports department will be busy setting up for the sports weekend therefore I will inform you of changes to the swimming lesson.

Cathy Wambua-Saha

The excited young authors of P5 have started writing their narratives about Migration. The response after the first day of writing was, “This is Fun!” and “Can we keep writing?” Both of these comments shared by multiple children made my heart happy. It is inspiring to see them in such a creative flow, and enjoying their work.

As you may have seen in your email box, we are staring a SeeSaw page for our class. To access the feed, you will need to check your email for an invitation from me. Please be thoughtful with your comments and use the heart for items or activities you like or love. The children added math items to it this week, but if you scroll down you will find the video from our play about Migration that we performed for the Primary Gathering.

Please remember there is no school next Tuesday.

Sarah Brummel

This week the children planned their designs for vehicles powered by elastic bands, batteries, bicarbonate of soda and balloons. Some children have started the construction phase and others will commence next week. We hope to get these completed soon so that we can present them to younger students. We are planning to end our unit with an investigation into Rube Goldberg machines and hope to set one up in the classroom to illustrate energy transfer. Some children have finished their mystery stories and are ready to publish, others are putting the final touches to their work. In maths we have learned several decimal games on the calculator and have been adding and subtracting decimals. Next week we will be multiplying and dividing decimals. Many thanks to Ms. Catherine for all of the work she did with P6 during my absence this week and also to Ms. Grace for working with the students on how to use the presentation tool, Prezi (see photo.)

Deborah Mills