Newsletter Grades 1 & 2

PYP News!

Dear Parents, Our journey through the year continues. Students are about to start their third unit of inquiry in all classes. I would encourage teacher to come to our parent workshop on Wednesday 26th November to learn more about PYP and how we support learning in our classes. Some behind the scenes successes have included teachers attending workshops in Chiang Mai, Phuket and an on site 2 day training on supporting English learners of all levels. This is part of our continual commitment to improving learning at HIS. Neil Johnstone PYP Coordinator njohnstone@hisvietnam.com

THE ARTS In music, grade 1 and 2 have finished their unit on forces and can now make connections between the materials used to make instruments, the force used to play them and how they sound. Our current unit about World Celebrations will give us the opportunity to explore music from all over the world. Mr. Grant.

Unit 3: How We Express Ourselves People express themselves in different ways through different celebrations. Lines of Inquiry: ­ Types of celebrations ­Why and how people express themselves ­Similarities and differences between celebrations ­How people express their identity Students will create their own kind of celebration at the end of the unit for welcoming or saying goodbye to students.

LANGUAGES: (Including French, EAL and Vietnamese) Students have been working on procedural writing over the last two units.Through experiences such as cooking and making things, we learnt how to use procedural language to show the process.. Students also worked to show their understanding of procedural language in relation to how forces work, by talking or writing about a creation they made. In Vietnamese in unit 2, students learned vocabulary and steps to make moon cake relating to forces (push, pull, knead, press...). In Unit 3, students have been learning Vietnamese vocabulary about Christmas and Vietnamese holiday songs. They will also learn about special celebrations such as Tet; how people celebrate Tet focusing on decorating the house and cooking special food..

MATHS: Students have been inquiring into numbers, in order to understand numbers as a naming system, the relationship between numbers and the interconnectedness of numbers. This inquiry has extended into place value, and addition and subtraction. Students have also been exploring data handling through the use of graphs.

Key Dates: Friday 28th November: grade 2P assembly Wednesday 3rd December: School Photos Friday 5th December: Book week Friday 12th December: Grade 4 assembly/Bookworm Wednesday, 26th November : PYP Parent Session Friday 12th December : Report cards issued Friday 12th December: School finishes at 11am

Unit 2 and 3

PSPE Grade 1 ­ 2 have been working on a multi skills unit. Basic skills of throwing, catching, aiming and movement with the ball have been learnt. Students have been working with enthusiasm and commitment. Mr Adam

This shows one group of Grade 1’s working on their parachutes.

Miss Lisa’s comment: This newsletter reflects unit 2 and an overview of unit 3. Teachers plan collaboratively and reflect in teams to make a unit happen and we aim to focus on student interest and learning abilities. The recent late start focussed on teachers developing assessment techniques and strategies and learning about the range of resources to help facilitate with assessment.

Miss Lisa Hughes

Student Reflections Grade 1G collectively agreed that making and testing parachutes was their favourite learning experience to learn about gravity and air resistance. Jennifer said “ A parachute needs to be wide and curved to float down slowly.” Duc Anh added “because this will have more air resistance.” Grade 2A Bao Minh: We organized our forces experiments by doing steps for procedures and labs. I learned that when we use something we have to put it back. We need to organize more and more.

Hanoi International School enables all students to realise their full potential in a caring and positive learning environment. Through our broad and balanced international curriculum, we endeavour to develop responsible, globally conscious citizens. We strive to develop the whole child as a life­long learner with a strong sense of self worth.

Unit 2 and 3