ANNIVERSARY SHOW: SATURDAY 8TH DECEMBER 16:00, PHILHARMONIA

We look forward to welcoming our whole community to the Anniversary Show in the Philarmonia this Saturday 8th December where our students will perform the ‘Wizard of Oz’. If you don’t have tickets, they are available to purchase here for 100 to 200 Som. All income is given to charity ‘Obereg’ to provide education for children in need.

Newsletter for BIS Parents and Friends. No: 12 / 2018-19

7th December 2018 Newsletter for BIS Parents and Friends. No: 15/ 2018-19

LEARNER PROFILE OF THE MONTH: REFLECTIVE This month we celebrate a new Learner Profile trait: reflective. The IB defines reflective learners as those who ‘give thoughtful consideration to their own learning and experience. They are able to assess and understand their strengths and limitations in order to support their learning and personal development.’

As the end of our first semester approaches, it’s a perfect time to reflect on the school year so far. During December we will be encouraging students to look back on things that have gone well, challenges they have overcome, ways in which they have grown and, most importantly, how they can make improvements for an even more successful semester 2. Through regular reflection, students develop critical thinking and analysis skills that are important steps in our goal to become lifelong learners.

Frances Garsed, Director of Studies

P1’S MAGNIFICENT MUSEUM Hello ESCA! We have been making a museum in our room. We put a lot of black fabric around the room. We made windows with pictures in them. "I made the Eiffel Tower," says Helen. "I made signs and columns that stand up," says Aimar. We made all the stuff that goes in the museum. There are lifecycles of

butterflies, fish and pumpkins. "The pumpkin life cycle is my favorite," says Helen. "I like the world timeline the best," says Aimar. Timelines can show us long ago all the way to today! "I drew pictures that we photographed and put on invitations," says Ryan. There are also family trees in the museum. We also made future things. One is a bracelet that makes a telephone on your wrist. We got to pick what is in our museum too! Before our museum opened, we made food to give our Mommies and Daddies. We made meatballs, apple cider, sweet balls, and cheese things. "I liked the apple cider and cheese things best!" says Avila. Our Mommies and Daddies came to see the museum. We told them about our museum. We told them look at everything! Then when they looked at everything ,we told them what they looked at. Teachers also came. We had fun being tour guides! "I was so excited about all the museum things!" says Avila. "It was so much fun!"

Ryan, Avila, Aimar and Helen, Primary 1 students

DO YOU WANT TO BE COOL? READ THIS ARTICLE! Our class, Primary 5R, went to Asia Mall on Friday morning, November 30th to learn about advertising outside of the classroom in a real-life situation. We walked there from school safely, and we followed the teacher's directions. When we arrived, and walked through the door, we saw a large movie poster. We stopped and took notes on it. In our notes, we wrote about the target audience, the language, the visuals, the advertising methods used, and the location of the ad. We saw ads everywhere! They were hanging from the ceiling. They were inside and outside of the shops. There was a big TV showing ads. There were ads on the escalators. We could not escape! One of the techniques that we noticed was celebrity endorsement used at a sporting goods store, and in a store for make-up. The celebrities were in the ads because they are popular. They motivate people to buy the products because of their appearance. Most of the advertisements used “beautiful people”, and not “plain folks”. There was a competition to win a Ferrari if you buy an apartment. This was an example of the bribery technique to make people think that they can get something more. We also saw an advertisement that demonstrated the warm and fuzzy technique by showing a cute baby in the ad. The food advertisements made us want to eat. Some of us were very hungry. The trip to Asia Mall helped us to see real advertisements and how they work. By knowing about advertisements, it helps us to be more aware, and be better consumers. Other than that, it was very fun. Thank you for reading. Now you are cool!

Primary 5R students

CHINESE RESTAURANT ADVENTURE Last week on Friday the 30th, Ms. Nazira’s MYP Mandarin class embarked on a field trip to Hou Gou restaurant to practice our Chinese and eat delicious food! Leading up to this event, our class has been practicing useful restaurant phrases and different types of foods and drinks. We had the chance to put our knowledge to the test by ordering food and buying items from the store. As well as being educational, our excursion was also very fun. We got to eat scrumptious Chinese food and we were also able to buy items from the little market that was in the restaurant. A special thank you to Ms. Nazira, for making this amazing event possible and Ms. Aida I, for accompanying us on the trip. Without them, we would not be able to have this incredible learning, bonding and fun experience.

Aida Hung, MYP1 Student

ECA SIGN-UP FOR TERM 3

Don’t forget to sign up for the Term 3 extracurricular activities! On the last day before the winter break, Friday, December 14 at 19:00,

you will receive an email from Ms. Elena, our ECA coordinator, with the link for the next term’s ECAs. This term will last for 11 weeks, and all the ECAs are going to start from the very first week after the break – on Monday, January, 7. If you have any questions regarding the ECAs, please contact Ms. Elena via ekharchenko@bis.kg .

SPELLING BEE SUCCESS! Last week, I had the fun privilege of attending the Spelling Bee hosted by QSI and attended by several students from BIS. I went on Friday when the middle school students were competing. QSI had decorated the outside of the school and the inside of their gymnasium with yellow and black balloons (the colors of a bee!) and had welcome signs all over the place. Student representatives met us at the front entrance and escorted us to the gym where we waited for the action. The competition started with MYP1/the 6th graders, then MYP2/the 7th graders, and then only one MYP3 student from BIS, Erin Casey, competed against all the QSI high schoolers. She was really brave! BIS took first place in MYP1 and MYP2. I was proud of our students and happy to see them competing academically in a fun, welcoming environment.

Sunny Stimmler, BIS parents and Governing Board member

It is with great pleasure that I share last week's fantastic news from the Bishkek Spelling Bee. Participants

from P2-MYP3 took part in the event which saw students spell over 450 words over the two-day event. A huge well done to all those who participated: Naail, Aman and Henri (P2); Lev, Milana and Apolline (P3); Kais, Ella and Maddyson (P4); Zeynep, Melek and Sevara (P5); Lea, Sam and Asek (P6); Cholponai and Ayan (MYP1); Callum, Jett and Story (MYP2) and Erin representing MYP3! Not only did our students work tirelessly to learn the spellings on their preparation sheet, they also turned up to the event representing BIS with utter pride and respect. Clapping for participants even if they were our opposition, BIS students

showcased a fantastic attitude toward spelling and healthy competition. A special congratulations to Naail, Apolline, Cholponai and Story who all took first place in their age group competitions. Top Right: P3 Spelling Bee Participants Lev, Apolline and Milana returned to class to find a board of celebratory messages and a room full of applause. Middle Left: QSI and BIS secondary school participants join for a photo following a morning of tension. Our very own Story Stimmler took joint first place after correctly spelling 62 words! Bottom Right: A very Proud Naail – the tournament’s youngest winner!

Krisha Gandhi, PYP Coordinator

BRILLIANT BLOGGERS

Hello everyone! Our names are Sabira, Meerim, and Zhasmin and we would like to tell you about our Instagram blog(@sabirim_ib). Nowadays social media is a huge platform for people all over the globe to express themselves in every way possible. The impact social media has had on us in recent years is astonishing; information has never been as easy to access. However, the amount of information that we get is not always valuable and worthy of our attention. Thus, we decided to create a helpful blog that could serve as a means of conveying relevant ideas through the internet. The main aim of the blog is to enlighten the youth about the IB programme, aid students who aspire to study overseas by giving them advice and give tips regarding English language acquisition (TOEFL/SAT).

We came up with the idea of creating an educational blog after we realized that the number of free resources at an average student’s disposal to develop language speaking skills or to learn a new language, in general, is incredibly narrow. This realization resulted in us being the first IB bloggers in Kyrgyzstan. Even though starting a blog might seem like a simple and straightforward process, it was rather challenging for us at first. We had to teach ourselves the basics of film editing, constantly evolve in terms of writing and finding quality material to write about and learn how to advertise the product of our collaboration. Dividing our duties also played a significant role in improving the blog. Meerim is responsible for the visual aspects of the blog, while Sabira does all the research and makes the information presented in our posts coherent, and Zhasmin writes descriptions for each post and shares her experiences regarding studying abroad. Each time our followers praise our blog for being informative, we get tremendously motivated to better ourselves and the blog.

Zhasmin Taalaibek and Meerim Zholdoshova, DP 1

NEW FACES AT BIS

Azamat Sarinzhiev, Primary 5N Co-Teacher and MYP Russian Teacher, asarinzhiev@bis.kg Hello, everyone. I am very glad to be part of the BIS community. It is such a pleasure to work here surrounded by such friendly people. Ever since I can remember I’ve enjoyed working with children, so when I learned about the position of co-teacher I immediately applied. I spent 8 years teaching English and Turkish for speakers of other languages and Russian for foreigners, so I’m used to working with students from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. It’s a privilege to work here, since I not only teach, but also learn and grow. My goal is to share my passion for learning with my students and provide them with a positive learning environment. I’m from Bishkek (what a surprise!), which was built and developed by people all over the former Soviet Union. It’s no wonder that I have peers representing Korean, Kazakh, Ukrainian, Uyghur, Russian and many other ethnicities. I like reading and playing any active games, so when I’m not working you will definitely find me reading a novel, playing football, running or taking a walk with my family. Чоң Рахмат!

DP2: I WANT TO LIVE HEALTHY Last Thursday DP2 Spanish students had the lovely opportunity of interviewing 2 Spanish speaking people. Alberto (from El Salvador) and Irene (from Mexico) have been working for the organization Quiero Vivir Sano (I want to live healthy) in different countries and are currently working in Kyrgyzstan, trying to spread information about leading healthier lifestyles.

For language students it is always very interesting to talk to native speakers and improve their oral and listening skills. In addition, on this occasion both guests were specialist in two of the topics that the students have studied for the DP program: health and mass media. Alberto is a doctor, while Irene is the head of the communication department in the NGO. For one hour and a quarter they presented their project and explained lots of interesting aspects about both of these areas. The students listened, asked questions and participated actively in the discussion. They were able to follow the technical explanations

perfectly, so the conversation was always very smooth. The students were impressed and fascinated by many of the topics discussed during the interview, such as how health has to be approached from different perspectives depending on cultural, political or religious considerations, and how faith and positivity can make a huge difference to our health. Probably the most interesting aspect for the students was the idea that health is like a chair, as this idea breaks all our common conceptions that health is all about the body! This theory states that our health is like a chair with four legs - if one of them is shorter or longer than the others, then the chair is not balanced. The four legs which support the chair are physical, mental, social and spiritual health. All of them are connected and each of them depends on the others. ¡It was muy interesante!

Juan Verger, Spanish language teacher

UPCOMING EVENTS

Saturday 8th December, Anniversary Show – Wizard of Oz, Kyrgyz National Philharmonic Hall.

Friday 14th December, Ded Moroz & Last day of school before Winter Break

More information about all of these events will be sent to you later, or see http://www.bis.kg

LUNCH MENU The lunch menu for December 10th – 14th is Menu A: Menu

Form Teachers and our Chef are responsible for adjusting this menu to avoid any foods your child cannot eat, according to the information provided to us by you.

mmn

PRESCHOOL 1

Preschool 1 group has enjoyed 2 weeks of impersonation - almost every day we have transformed into different community helpers. We have tried being doctors, vets, firefighters, dentists, pilots and chefs. The friends really like participating in pretending to be community helpers. They have embraced their roles and exceeded expected actions. This week, the friends started by being firefighters. We put on our firefighters’ hats and went to help people. On our way, we saw a house on fire and used a handmade fire extinguisher. In the blink of an eye, the fire was stopped and lives were saved. The next day we were in a pilot’s shoes. Sitting on chairs, we put on our safety belts and flew above the clouds. That was a memorable trip. On Friday the friends did some familiar things – they made small fruit sandwiches and shared them with the other preschool friends. So, this time we were chefs. Next week we are going to have a lot of fun, as every day will be special.

Ms Oksana, Preschool 1 homeroom teacher

Preschool Newsletter No: 12/ 2018-19

Preschool Newsletter No: 11/ 2018-19 7th December 2018 Preschool Newsletter No: 15/ 2018-19

PRESCHOOL 2 This week Preschool 2 started a new unit about ‘How we express ourselves’. The central idea of this unit is ‘We use play to express our feelings and in order to come to new understanding.’ We read the book ‘Fergal is fuming!’ by Robert Starling and discussed many ways of calming down. The children used paper plates and cardboard to make faces with different expressions.

Ms Goulnara, Preschool 2 homeroom teacher

PRESCHOOL 3 The anniversary show is finally here, and we have been practicing all week. We can’t wait to show you all our fancy dance moves! We also learned about the letter 'r' this week. We learned that the letter 'r' is for 'Rudolf the red nose reindeer' and we had fun pretending to be Rudolf. We also played ring-a-ring-a-roses to help us remember the letter 'r'. Next week will be spirit week at school and we will be focusing on having fun in our class by revising old letters we already learned and recapping all the numbers from 1-15.

Ms Carmen, Preschool 3 homeroom teacher