Newsletter

1. February, 2016
Volume 1, Issue 1
It‟s the ISA Newsletter!
GREETINGS!
Dear Parents and Stakeholders,
We want to inform you that we are introducing our quarterly school
newsletter for 2015-2016 academic year. The purpose of the newsletter
is to keep you informed about the progress of our school in its develop-
ment and to continue to build the bridge of trust in our community with
positive rapport.
We understand that new technologies such as Whatsapp and Edupage
have their place in our school, and this newsletter is simply another tool
that we hope can help to better serve our school community. It is our
hope that communication line with our stakeholders will always be open.
We are always proud of our students and we sincerely appreciate the
support from our parents. It is our hope that we complete each of the
terms step by step and finish the year strong together as a school com-
munity.
Warmly,
ISA International Faculty Team
IB PYP AUTHORIZATION UPDATE
Our school is currently conducting the self study for our anticipated IB
authorization visit during the 2016 ~ 2017 academic year. All of our
teachers are being trained and most of our teachers will be certified in
Primary Year Programme (PYP) workshop. PYP is a curriculum frame
work organized around five essential elements—knowledge, concepts,
skills, attitudes, and action. For more information, please visit
www.ibo.org/programmes/primary-years-programme/
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
KINDERGARTEN..............2
GRADE 1 ............................2
PERMATApintar................3
GRADE 2............................4
GRADE 3............................4
GRADE 4............................5
GRADE 5............................5
GRADE 7……………………….6
IMPORTANT DATES
 January 10 to March 18:
Quarter 3
 March 8 : International
Women‟s Day
 March 21 to March 23:
Nauryz

2. In the Kindergarten, our favourite song for this topic is “Rain, rain, go
away. Come Again another day!”.
The grade 1 teachers have sat together and formulated a six week unit of inquiry
on Sound and Light. All of the grade 1 students are currently gaining knowledge
on how the world works. Students are listening and talking about the first part
which is Sound. They have identified the Sources of Sound (animal, human and
object sounds found in everyday life situations).
The next stage of learning will be about the students' abilities to express them-
selves through sound. They (in groups) discuss what sound is and explore ways
to make these different sounds.
The final stage of the sound process will be about different human responses to
sound. Each student will communicate his or her fresh ideas through, drawings,
writing as well as speaking activities.
The second part of the unit of inquiry is Sources of Light. Students will work
together in groups and perform experiments on how light affects people's lives.
Finally, they will also communicate their findings to their peers (about how
light is used in real life situations).
Teachers will facilitate the students' learning processes and help them to focus
on essential IB attitudes. ISA students will respect each other's opinions, help
each other where needed and reflect on their own work.
Ms. Desire O‟Connell
KINDERGARTEN
GRADE 1
As this Unit‟s topic is Water, our stu-
dents in the kindergarten are learning
some new vocabulary related to the
Weather. We‟re having a lot of fun
during the lessons because it “rains”
in the classroom: every time when the
children get “some rain” they say “I‟m
wet!”. They also learned the differ-
ence between “I‟m wet”, “I‟m cold”
and “I‟m hot”. Through this sensory
experiments we developed they‟re
listening and speaking skills.
We found water in the bathroom and
now they say “Wash your hands” and
“brush your teeth”. So, don‟t forget to
practice at home these two actions!
In the Kindergarten, our favourite
song for this topic is “Rain, rain, go
away. Come Again another day!”. The
joyful umbrellas of the video make us
all very happy.
Ms. Joana de Brito
Trans-disciplinary Themes
Program of Inquiry for
Unit 4
Grade 1—Sound and Light
Grade 2—Fairy tales and sto-
ries
Grade 3—Climate and Weather
Grade 4—Arts in our Life
Grade 5—Government System
Knowledge in the PYP tends to
be transdisciplinary
(transcends the subjects). The
transdisciplinary themes help
teachers to develop a pro-
gramme of inquiry. Teachers
work together to develop inves-
tigations into important ideas,
which require a substantial and
high level of involvement on
the part of students.
2

3. GIFTED VISIT FROM MALAYSIA
On January 15, 2016, ISA hosted visitors from Malaysia‟s prestigious
Permata Pintar National Gifted Centre(PPNGC) led by Director Prof
Noriah Mohd Ishak Nurul Suzaina Joli. This visit was part of the Naz-
arbayev Intellectual School (NIS) of Physics and Mathematics in Asta-
na‟s exchange program for faculty and students. NIS exchange pro-
gramme currently provides opportunities to expand students‟ outlook,
exchange ideas, and experiences with students and teachers from Ma-
laysia.
Though ISA does not have a direct exchange program with PPNGC at
the moment, Dr. Noriah showed great interest in our school, our pro-
grams, our teachers, and students. She visited three classes in total and
shared her thoughts about the importance of cultural exchange. Princi-
pal of our school, Mr. Bakhyt Zhumatay, expressed that this visit could
not have been more timely as ISA was preparing for various transitions
in upgrading our own programs and facility in the near future.
Dr. Noriah challenged and inspired our school to think outside the box.
With possibilities of PPNGC expanding their programs to grades k to 6,
ISA can look forward to starting our own exchange programs in the fu-
ture with Malaysia.
Mr. Peter Shon
ABOUT PERMATA
PINTAR
NATIONAL
GIFTED CENTRE
From the School Website:
Malaysian government has
developed PERMATApintar
(TM) Programme in order to
fulfill the needs of gifted and
talented students. The pro-
gramme was initially con-
ceived by YABhg Datin Seri
Rosmah Mansor, wife of the
Prime Minister of Malaysia,
who has a keen interest in
helping the students develop
their potentials. .
Today, PERMATApintar
(TM) UKM is the only centre
of Excellence in Malaysia
tasked with the responsible
to identify gifted and talent-
ed children from all over
Malaysia, and give them
some opportunities to devel-
op their talents and poten-
tials. It is imperative to carry
out these tasks as these chil-
dren are our precious na-
tional assets. Failure to iden-
tify these children could
results in Malaysia losing
some of its invaluable work
force, thinkers, scientists or
technocrats either because
they have become school
dropout, or they have mi-
grated to other countries
that offer better educational
experiences.
Visitors from Permata Pintar National Gifted Centre in Malaysia
3

4. Concepts
The key concepts in PYP are
used to frame questions or
inquiries into related con-
cepts. Here‟s what we want
our students to understand.
Form—What is it like?
Function—How does it
work?
Causation—Why is it like
this?
Connection—How is it
connected to other things?
Change—How is it chang-
ing?
Perspective—What are the
points of view?
Responsibility—What is
our responsibility?
Reflection—How do we
know?
From ibo.org
GRADES 2
GRADES 3
The grade 2 teachers have compiled an interesting six week unit of inquiry on
Fairytales and Real Life Stories. It will help the students to understand the dif-
ferences and similarities between fairytales and everyday stories around the
world.
Interactive story texts and visual clues will help each student to improve their
critical thinking skills when speaking, writing or reading about Fairytales and
Everyday Stories. Students will have ample opportunities to describe fairytale
characters or their everyday life characters. They will develop fundamental lis-
tening and speaking skills on general news in Astana and around the world.
Students will also reflect on what's real and what's not real about such stories.
The final part of the course will focus on the communication and expression of
each student's ideas about Fairytales and Real Life Stories. Simple drawings,
(descriptive) written work and oral presentations will strengthen each student's
knowledge on this topic. Teachers will mentor their students to rely on good
teamwork, respect for each other's point of view and participation from every-
one during class presentations.
Mr. Corne de Lange
In the third term our students have been learning about their assigned PYP unit
of inquiry of weather and climate. As a class we have been going through each
of the seasons: winter, spring, summer, and fall and learning interesting vocab-
ulary about each season. This vocabulary includes different activities done in
each season, clothes people wear in each season, weather of each season, and
the months that make up each season.
Throughout our lessons we complete reading, writing, speaking, and listening
activities as well as having discussions on how the weather impacts animals,
plants, and people around the world. This unit has encouraged our students to
be better communicators through their English language development and
more knowledgeable about the world and climate, as we have discussed how
different weather in parts of the world other than Kazakhstan impact how peo-
ple animals, and plants behave.
Our students have developed international mindedness by recalling and shar-
ing their experiences doing beach activities in Thailand, Turkey, Vietnam, and
Dubai, during the time known here in Kazakhstan as winter. This also lead stu-
dents to be open-minded thinkers about how the world and weather can change
so much in different places.
Mr. Brendan McCabe
4

5. “As always, your children will learn through a variety of teaching meth-
odologies and will tackle new concepts and ideas through games, quizzes,
projects and songs. “
Fifth grade recently completed their “immigration” unit by completing a re-
search based project on “The Silk Road”. This project allowed the students to
journey back in history by mapping and understanding the effects of “The Silk
Road” .This was the first attempt at students completing a research action pro-
ject which is imperative to IB and PYP. The students were responsible for deter-
mining what they wanted included in their project. This allowed students to be
completely creative with their knowledge and research. The students decided
how they wanted to present their research in class. Some students made vide-
os, animated and lecture based PowerPoint‟s, posters, and information book-
lets. This project was a complete success for our students. We are extremely
proud of their accomplishments with this project. We look forward to allowing
our students the opportunity to complete another research action project in the
future. Ms. Juliane Jackson
During the third term your chil-
dren will be engaged in a series of
lessons that are both challenging
and fun! They will be learning
about „Art in Our Life‟ and in the
latter part of the term „Natural
and Artificial Materials‟. Through
these topics we hope to target
many elements of the IB Learner
Profile.
For example, under the theme of
art your children will be exposed
to a variety of topics such as:
types of art, emotions, painting,
architecture, music and perfor-
mance art (dance). These creative
lessons will nurture your children
as inquirers and thinkers. It will
also allow them to be reflective
and creative.
As they progress through the unit,
they will become more knowl-
edgeable and open minded. Art is
a wonderful way to foster cultural
awareness. Studies have also
shown it assists in developing
critical thinking and observation-
al skills.
As always, your children will
learn through a variety of teach-
ing methodologies and will tackle
new concepts and ideas through
games, quizzes, projects and
songs. We expect our students
will enjoy these topics and we
look forward to the coming term!
Ms. Ruth Elizabeth Delahunty.
GRADE 5
GRADE 4
5

6. The International Baccalau-
reate® (IB) Middle Years
Programme (MYP) empha-
sizes intellectual challenge.
It encourages students aged
11 to 16 to make practical
connections between their
studies and the real world,
preparing them for success
in further study and in life.
The MYP aims to develop
active learners and interna-
tionally minded young peo-
ple who can empathize with
others and pursue lives of
purpose and meaning.
The programme empowers
students to inquire into a
wide range of issues and
ideas of significance locally,
nationally and globally. The
result is young people who
are creative, critical and
reflective thinkers.
From ibo.org
GRADE 7
I believe all students should be proficient in English not just to prepare
for their further progression in education but also their future. This
term our 7th grade classes will continue our inquiry journey as before
and they will also focus on grammar and vocabulary.
We have begun learning new words to improve the lexicon of each stu-
dent and working on using these words. This emphasis would aid stu-
dents in becoming more accustomed to the English language as they
continue to discover and work towards their proficiency; which can on-
ly be achieved with the concerted effort of all stakeholders who have a
common interest and desire. We emphasize learning with meaning to
establish a connection to the context rather than just learning the rules
of grammar.
This is designed to assist the student in their discovery of another lan-
guage. Our MYP program has also taken into account students who
may require additional support in their journey. Complimenting our
Language Acquisition classes are our newly instituted English Enhance-
ment classes that further supports the students should they require.
Mr. Kelvin Wee
INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL OF ASTANA
2/1 Turkestan Street, Astana, Republic of Kazakhstan, 010000
Phone: Phone: 79-72-73 ; 79-72-74
E-mail: info@isa.nis.edu.kz
ISA International Team
Name Duties Name Duties
Peter Shon Deputy Principal Corne de Lange 2H, 1C, 1D
Anna Lucia Bracken 3G, 3D, 4D, 3F Beverly Martin 5A, 5D, 5E
Joana de Brito K, 2A, 2B Brendan McCabe 3A, 3B, 4A
Brian Davis 3F, 3C, 4B Desire O‟Connell 1E, 2I, 2F
Ruth Delahunty 3E, 3D, 4C Pauline O‟Halloran 2D, 2C, 1A
Kasia Dzideczek 1B, 1H, 1G Kelvin Wee 7A, 7B
Juliane Jackson 5B, 3G, 5C Veselina Yaneva 1F, 2G, 2E