MYP Personal Project Exhibition

Today was the big day for the grade 10 students to present their Personal Projects to the rest of the school and to the parents. The students had a choice of "displaying", "discussing" or "demonstrating" their projects and they have done a great job of all three!

This is a day I've come to love because I get to discuss the students passions with them. They speak eloquently and knowledgeably about a wide range of topics. Today, I learned about making a computer, Foot and Mouth disease in Korean farm animals, wakeboarding tricks, the battle of Normandy as seen through Google Sketch-up drawings. I spoke to a student who researched child soldiers and then wrote his own short story. I saw students dance, play their own musical creations using software, perform their own musical scores, one with a Chinese guzheng and another with harp, who incidently, also sang!

Thank you to Mr. Mark Patton for overseeing the entire process from start to finish as our Middle Years Programme Coordinator. He has again raised the bar for the current grades 9 for next year's exhibition. Thank you to all of the teacher supervisors who supported the students in completing their projects, edited their personal statements and monitored the displays. It has been the efforts of many that have made today a success.



But the biggest thanks goes to the students who have put in countless hours following their passions and creating the projects that we saw in today's exhibition.

Congratulations!

Howdya Like Dem Apples - ADE '11 Greatest Moments

I'm still fairly new to the international education gig, but in my seven years I have had the opportunity to attend a number of conferences, workshops, institutes and courses (Which I would like to thank the Canadian International School and it's directors for supporting). The ADE 2011 Institute ranks very high on the list. I dare say the top in terms of educational collaboration and connection, and consistent (and seemingly never-ending) positive energy. Yes, I guzzled the Kool-ADE. Here are my 11 Greatest Moments of ADE 2011 (in no particular order). Some of these obviously apply to all 60 of us, some are more personal and focus on the fantastic groups I had a chance to work with. Feel free to add your own to the list in the comment section.

1. Warm-up, ice-breaker and group activities presented by Rebecca Stockley. More activities can be found at http://thiagi.com/


2. Photo sharing and tips by Joseph Linaschke.


3. Thinking different with Rob Ferrin, Hillary Daniels and Jabiz Raisdana. Creating a video for the Saigon Race contest that satisfied the least number of criteria ... and winning.


4. Feeling like bumbling idiots, scouring the streets of HCMC with Sean Deetlefs, Steve Katz and John Wu looking for potential interviewees ... while Br. Dennis Magbanua, Dianna Pratt and Hillary were holding new born babies.


5. Fantastic Food!


6. Evening connection time.


7. Meeting the sweetest little girl in the market. And the ensuing conversations about her story.


8. Being introduced to the "3 Idiots" ... not literally ... the movie.


9. Spotlight Sharing (the REAL TED talk) and Un-Conferences (thanks Rebecca and Mano)


10. Accessibility session and the tricks and tips learned! Thanks Sarah!


11. The stories of Chow Pei Sze and Chai Yee-wei.


12. I had to add a 12th ... watching the amazing 59 other application videos and tortuously waiting through all four days to have mine shown second last.

Thanks Adrian and the rest of the Apple Team, the ADE Alumni and the ADE Class of 2011. I'll see you online soon. Ted

ADE Day 1 - The Brand of Me

My first day at the Apple Distinguished Educator (ADE) Workshop was a long one, not long in the sense of "drawn out and when is this going to end" long. But, "full of energy and man I'm beat, we talked about a lot and reflected a lot" long. It was a great start to the workshop and apparently things will ramp up tomorrow with the HCMC ADE Race.

Most of the morning was spent talking about "Personal Branding", both as an educator and as an ADE. It was uncomfortable. It was difficult. But that's what makes us grow. Educators aren't used to talking about themselves. We like to talk about the great things students (and in my case the staff as well) are doing, creating, publishing and achieving ... not ourselves. The sessions made us think about who we are and what roles we play in life, both educationally and personally. The idea being that we have to tell "our story". After paring down the brainstorming list of roles I play to three, here's how far I got using a Mind Mapping App called Total Recall.

The next steps are to refine, revise, reflect and create the presentation as a movie, photo, on the stage or written. I'm leaning towards a movie or a presentation. The afternoon focused on pointers to enhance each of the above modes of presentation.

Then, the day was capped off with a rousing and passionate keynote address by film maker and director, Chai Yee Wei. Here is a review of his first film Blood Ties. Probably not something you'll see in a classroom anytime soon ... at least I hope not.

I'd love your feedback on the Mind Map and if you feel there is anything I could add.

Thanks. Early start tomorrow with a Photo Walk of a HCMC wet market at 6:00 am.

Teaching Science and Humanities with Technology

Part of the focus for ongoing professional development this year at the high school has been learning about new and meaningful ways to implement technology in classroom. I'd like to share two recent classroom activities with you.

First, Tanya Nizam's grade 9 Science class. Tanya has been using blogs to have students share hypotheses and data. They also used the blog to analyze data, charts and the MYP assessment criteria, giving the students the opportunity to comment on each other's posts. It was a great way for the students to be engaged in a virtual discussion that could be happening at any time. Then follow-up discussions in the classroom reinforce the concepts and understandings.

Have look at the 9C Electricity Investigation Blog.

Second, in Travel and Tourism, Scott Little had students create a "glog" using Glogster. The students' glogs were to showcase an adventure or eco-tourism travel destination of their choice.

One student told me that she felt she learned more by creating a glog, rather than writing an essay, because it was fun to create the glog (so she was more engaged in the activity) and she got to illustrate her travel destination using photos, videos, sound clips, charts and graphs as well as text (addressing multiple intelligences).

Click to see student glogs about Italy, Malacca, Chamonix, Tanzania and Kenya

Enjoy the learning!