Summer Newsletter
June 2018
Head of School Message
Welcome to our 2017/18 Summer Newsletter - a round up of some of the many exciting developments that have come to pass over the last twelve months at ICHK. I will not detain you with a long address here, as you will find there is plenty to read below. I will just say what a fantastic year it has been for the community, both in terms of external recognition and internal achievement.
The year started with the news that Cambridge Strategies, a research wing of Cambridge University, had included our school in its list of 100 most innovative institutions worldwide. We were further bolstered by favourable accreditation reviews from the Council of International Schools and the International Baccalaureate Organisation.
CIS commented on our first year of progress as a fully accredited school that ICHK "certainly embodies the spirit of accreditation which aims to promote a culture of continuous self-reflection and improvement which will support the learning and well-being of the students served by the school." In our 5-Year review, meanwhile, the IBO noted that "The school has created an environment where student well-being is at the heart of learning and teachers are passionate about all the attributes that stimulate student learning."
So much for external validation. As for internal achievement, well, I'll let you read about that in the commentary below ...
Happy holidays, wherever you may spend them!
Graduating Class 2018
Deep Learning
This year saw the full launch of our Deep Learning programme, which we had piloted at the end of 2016-17. This innovative programme of study, unique to ICHK, has been developed thanks to the creativity and passion of our staff.
The programme is aimed at encouraging independence, motivation, enjoyment and depth in learning. It combines aspects of Maths, Science and Literacy and requires leadership, problem solving, communication and teamwork skills.
A wide range of creative and exciting study units has been on offer, all of which have hugely popular with students. Zombie Apocalypse was a particular favourite and was a novel way to use a well known horror genre to encapsulate learning from areas as diverse as epidemiology, shelter building, first aid and cooking. The Water Sports Camp was another highlight for many students, not least due to the wakeboarding segment on the final day.
Windows of the World combined snowboarding, trigonometry, physics and geography with travel across the border into Shenzhen. There cannot be any other school in the world, where you can learn these subjects in this kind of package.
We are very grateful to David Hanson, of Hanson Robotics, who was able to showcase his company's work at the cutting edge of technology. A robotics workshop and a donation of Professor Einstein robots gave our students a fantastic insight into the industry. Other parents have also contributed including Gina Smith, a professional writer, who gave input into our Creative Writing unit; Sandra Traittel, a nutritionist, who gave students dietary advice in the Data Driven Sport unit; Patrick Chan, Chairman of the HK Sports Association for Persons with Intellectual Disability, who gave an insight into how his charity supports athletes. We always welcome contributions from parents or interested members of the community towards student learning.
We look forward to the next phase of Deep Learning in term one of next year.
Student Feedback
- “I liked how the teachers got us to do things that may have been outside our comfort zone and having fun."
- “It is one of the reasons I love school.”
- “I like Deep learning because it lets you choose what you want to do and you go deeper into it.”
- “We got to learn more about a particular subject we usually don't learn or don't learn much about at school.”
- “It was very interesting, I never had this kind of thing in my other school.”
- “I like Deep Learning because the activity I chose fits me and since I like math a lot I can learn more about trigonometry.”
- “It was really fun! I enjoyed it. Thanks for creating Deep Learning.”
Human Technologies
Netflix CEO Wilmot Reed Hastings provides a succinct definition of technology as “…The story of human progress from as long back as we know”. The epic story of human history contains everything our species has developed, from the simplest tool, to scripts, systems, devices, routines, rituals methods, methodologies, recipes, procedures, protocols, instruments, frameworks, practices, orthodoxies, conventions, apparatuses, customs, and formulae.
Take for example the words you are reading at this very moment. Now consider the earliest days in the evolution of language, the development of the Roman alphabet, pen, ink and paper, the history of printing and the emergence of the systems of education which make literacy possible.
These are all significant stories in their own right, and they are interwoven.
The Human Technologies Venn Diagram identifies four broad types of technologies, all overlapping and contained within the Somatic (The technology of using and maintaining the physical body).
So the scope of Human Technologies is far-reaching. We can choose to consider everything that humankind has created for it’s ongoing benefit, but also to its detriment. We consider how we acquire better thinking skills, how we learn to influence others, and the forces that shape who we become, we consider how best to collaborate, and how to cooperate toward shared common purposes.
As a subject, Human Technologies invites us to explore the cumulative technological progress of humankind and with the growing awareness of that, the wisdom, in ourselves, to employ appropriate technologies, whilst avoiding those which will not serve us well. Perhaps, given the lack of wisdom we sometimes display as a species, ’Homo technologicus’ might be a more fitting title that ‘Homo Sapien’.
Human Technologies is at an exciting point in its development as a curriculum area at ICHK. We are currently engaged in a year-long curriculum review process which will consolidate and refine Human Technologies in Years Seven to ten, and extend the curriculum into Year Eleven.
We will be also writing and promoting ‘Human Technologies’ as a School-Based Syllabus for the IB Diploma Program, ultimately making it available to schools IB schools worldwide; Spreading ‘Human Technologies’ as a technology.
English
It has been another successful and creative year in the department, with students across all year groups impressing with the quality of their work.
A particular highlight has been the new Creative Writing Deep Learning unit, which has given students many opportunities to develop their writing skills. Groups have spent time exploring the city for inspiration on creative and journalistic pieces. They have met experts, worked on characterisation, setting and atmosphere, plot and structure and created short stories, restaurant reviews, feature articles and profile articles.
Year 7 and 8 students have impressed their teachers with the way they have embraced Shakespeare’s language. A special mention must be made of Clarissa Ho and Lucia Pareja Lopez, who were recognised in the Hong Kong Young Writers Awards shortlist.
Students continue to showcase their writing in our school blog The Peek.
Maths
It has been another exciting year for the Mathematics Department to help students master concepts through fun, guided problem solving. In Years 7 and 8, students had number talks to develop their numeracy skills. Students studied factors, multiples and prime numbers, which are the building blocks of whole numbers. In Year 9, the Stock Market Challenge was surely a highlight for some. It gave students an opportunity to explore simple and compound interest and how the stock market operates, linking to a unit in Human Technologies. Through investigation, Year 9 Students also learned about the famous Pythagoras’ theorem, an amazing discovery about right triangles. Many mathematical concepts covered in Years 7 to 9 have been integrated in Deep Learning this year.
Of course, mathematics would not be as fun without competition. In addition to Junior/Senior Team Maths Challenge, North East Asian Mathematics Competition, and Gauss Contests, students from Years 7 to 9 also participated in World Maths Day 2018. Students answered a series of timed questions ranging through different levels of difficulty. ICHK was one of just three Hong Kong schools who made the top 100 in World Maths Day 2018, and amongst all Year 7 participants, Jason Day was ranked 6th in the world.
Languages
It has been another year full of engaging activities and achievements for the Department of Languages, both within and outside the classroom. Together with another set of excellent exam results, our students celebrated stunning performances in prestigious inter-school competitions and festivals.
Students achieved an amazing haul of awards once again at the Super Language Recitation Competition. They won 13 ‘Champions’ awards, six ‘First Runner Up’ and two ‘Second Runner Up’ awards.
They also delivered outstanding performances at the Hispanic Culture Festival, the 69th Hong Kong Music and Speech Association Competition, the Hong Kong “Jing Ying Cup” Chinese Writing Competition and the ESF Chinese-English Bilingual Speech Competition.
We are delighted at the results, and commend everyone who took part, along with our inspirational language teachers who supported our students.
During the year, our programme was further enriched through language trips and cultural celebrations.
Our successful exchange programme continues to go from strength to strength, and we were delighted to welcome students from Nengren Middle School in Jiangsu Province back to ICHK for the fifth year running.
A Chinese immersion and IB preparation camp at Nengren was held for the first time and Deep Learning units were developed in the Food and Culture series.
Highlights of the year can be viewed here.
Science
It has been a hugely successful year for the Science department, with students benefitting from many unique learning opportunities. These have included trips to the Mai Po marshes, agarwood plantations as well as the mangrove areas which surround our school.
During the year ICHK was commended for helping to identify and record plants and wildlife, as part of the global City Nature Challenge. More than 100 students joined thousands from around the world for the challenge, which enabled them to explore the rich environment on the school’s doorstep. The event was the largest collaborative biodiversity engagement exercise that Hong Kong has ever seen, and the city identified the most species in the Asia region.
A new project was launched in collaboration with research scientists from City University of Hong Kong. Year 12 students worked with scientists in a bid to make a polymer yarn from food waste, that could be used to make clothing.
This was a hugely valuable experience for them, providing them with an authentic learning opportunity, and giving them a real insight into the role of a research scientist.
Finally, a wonderful showcase of learning was celebrated at ICHK’s annual science fair. Hundreds of guests joined us for an evening of inspirational exhibitions and activities all around the school. Students demonstrated highly innovative work with cleverly conceived and ambitious projects. It featured displays from students in Years 7-9 and a series of IB presentations by Year 12 students.
Humanities
It has been a successful year for the Humanities department, building on the achievements of the previous years. Central to this has been the continuing belief in the central role of Humanities in creating knowledgeable, well-rounded, critical thinking, and empathetic young people. As we review the curriculum in Years 7 to 9 this goal is central to improving what we do.
In Year 7, ‘Big History’ will continue to provide the core of the curriculum but is being streamlined to allow students to dig deeper into certain topics and to increase our connections with Science and Human Tech. In Years 8 and 9 we are following a thematic ‘Little Big History’ approach with a focus on discrete themes - to help make connections to IGCSE subjects - and to help students see the ‘big picture’ of change across time.
To support the development of students in the classroom, students have been involved in many extra curricular activities, including the Model United Nations, visits to Mai Po Nature Reserve and trips around the local area. The location of the school has meant that we are able to explore several World War II defensive fortifications as well as villages that demonstrate the changing economic and cultural pressures on the local area - we hope to further incorporate these sites in the coming year. As we develop the curriculum these experiences will always be important.
The IGCSE and IB subjects continue to be successful and have again produced good results; both IB and IGCSE are above the global averages. We are making changes to the IGCSE and IB History courses, IB Psychology is in the first year of its new course, Economics remains unchanged as is the quality provision for the students. Our changes further down the school will support the new courses, and we believe create greater enthusiasm for the subjects, as well as ensuring students get the best possible results. These changes will all support us in achieving our goal of creating knowledgeable, well-rounded, critical thinking, and empathetic young people.
Free Learning
At ICHK we maintain a dual interest in how students learn, and how, as teachers, we can best facilitate this. Free Learning represents a challenge to the status quo on both fronts: it simultaneously encourages students to see themselves as active agents in their own learning, whilst asking teachers to act as facilitators rather than instructors. The result is something that often does not feel like school, and in which learning happens in new, and unexpected ways.
This year represents a watershed moment for Free Learning at ICHK, as the pedagogy has been incorporated into the timetable as a subject in its own right, with Year 7-9 students enjoying dedicated Free Learning time each week. This is a boon for students, who gain in choice, power, independence and variety. In terms of the bigger picture this represents a progressive shift in the educational stance of ICHK.
One aspect of this shift is a movement away from measurement, for education tends to measure only those things which can be measured, whether or not they are truly valuable. Much of education ignores the immeasurable value of kindness, zest, cooperation and grit precisely because it cannot be measured. In directing and giving feedback on Free Learning, we seek to ensure that these values don’t get overshadowed by other, more easily measurable, metrics. We also try and take the time to go beyond the curriculum, to eat fresh bread, go out for lunch, talk about important issues, and learn about the nature of being human.
And so, rather than offering statistics about unit completion or student outcomes, perhaps it is better to summarise the year that has been with this Year 7 student reflection on why they enjoy Free Learning: “Because it is fun even though it is challenging.”
PE and Sport
This was yet another successful year of sport. From the touch fields to the pistes of Zhangjiakou, trophies were brought back home to ICHK. Horse Riding has continued to thrive and the team of Gabby Thomas, Charli Haddican and Seth Thomas are showing that they are able to compete with the best in Hong Kong. Andrea Cheng has been selected to train further with the Hong Kong ski team after representing ICHK in the inter school competition which is a great achievement. Evita Chan also harbours dreams of representing Hong Kong through the sport of Fencing and we wish her all the best as she leaves to further her ambition in this sport.
Climbing is growing as a competitive sport and there were two rounds of a mini league this year. We had 16 climbers take part from years 7-9 and Fedoria Wong won first place overall in the U14 girls category, Seth Thomas came first and Ettore Perri placed third in the U14 boys category.
With Ms Leung at the helm, volleyball goes from strength to strength. It’s great for the school to see there is now a U16 boys team as well as the girls team. We hope this sport can continue to grow. Ryan Chan has just been selected into the U16 HK Team Squad of 50. He will receive training alongside with other selected members and a final list of 12-14 will be selected by July to go to the National Volleyball Championship hosted in China. Basketball is steadily growing in the number of players and the team narrowly lost out in the final of their championship playoffs. With the amount of practise we see the boys putting in, it’s only a matter of time before we see some great results in this area.
Touch is still the major sport at the school and we were happy to have reclaimed the Grand Champions trophy from CDNIS. We were especially proud to have put out a record 10 teams and had the greatest numbers of players in a touch tournament ever. The healthy number of participants serves to grow the pool of quality players and since participation is a key value for us a school, we are pleased to be amongst one of only two schools in the ISSFHK who had teams in each category.
We were also pleased with our record this year with each of our teams reaching the playoffs, our U20 boys and girls winning silver medals and our U14 boys winning the bronze play off. We were the only school to be competing for medals in each category and when we combine it with our best result to date at the HKTA Primary Tournament with the girls winning the cup competition and the boys bringing the plate back home, we can feel justified in saying that we are achieving the PE department’s vision to be the leading school in Hong Kong for Touch Rugby.
There have been more boys joining U16 Basketball this year. Although the boys did not make it to the playoffs, the season has been a rewarding one for all. With the increasing popularity of basketball, we plan to have both U16 and U14 squads next year.
Expressive Arts
It has been another amazingly creative year, with new innovations in dance, drama, media arts, design and visual arts.
The visual environment of ICHK continues to evolve thanks to the creativity of our staff and students.
ICHK swept the board once again at the prestigious Hong Kong School Drama Festival, winning Awards for Outstanding Director, Outstanding Actor, Outstanding Stage Effect, Outstanding Cooperation and Commendable Overall Performance.
During the year, our award-winning team left audiences spellbound with the amazing production of The Forgotten Circus and, in the past week, Matilda.
Students participated in the Stitch to Stitch Deep Learning unit in which they experimented with textiles and fabric to design and construct a range of costumes and accessory items.
It has been another phenomenal year, with new and meaningful learning experiences offered, enabling students to grow and develop into thinkers, makers and doers of art.
Wild Learning
Our outdoor learning programme continues to grow, and this year there have been many new study experiences in our beautiful surroundings.
The Primary School Outdoor Education Programme has developed further, and we have expanded the offer we make to our partner and feeder primary schools. A variety of new activities have been offered across several year groups. These have included ICHK Hong Lok Yuen students joining us for a mangrove study. Adventure Days have been offered for Year 4 students and our popular Wild Science Days have been run for students from KIS, JIS, NIS, Anfield Primary and ICHK Hong Lok Yuen.
A wonderful development this year was the number of older students who volunteered as helpers and acted with real professionalism and care to support and look after their primary fellow students. Over the coming year we will be developing and recognising this contribution by awarding the ICHK Outdoor Leadership Certificate to students who volunteer for several of these activities.
Continuous Professional Development at ICHK
The learning that takes place at ICHK is not confined to the student body. We are a faculty of committed, lifelong learners who make the most of varied opportunities to update our knowledge and skills.
Because ICHK understands that ‘One size does not fit all” where education is concerned, we encourage a multi-layered approach to Continuous Professional Development to address diverse needs. There are three strands to our current model:
- Externally-provided CPD
- Internally-provided CPD
- CPD that forms part of the culture of teaching and learning at ICHK.
There is strong commitment and enthusiasm within our school for continual learning and personal growth. Forty-five workshops/conferences were attended this year, in Hong Kong and overseas. These have included certification courses, workshop attendance, conferences, summits, webinars and the use of online learning platforms.
Much of the internal CPD took on the form of Interest-based learning groups, which convened regularly throughout terms one and two. These inter-departmental groups were formed based on interest. They designed a project to produce a product and finally ‘folded the learning back’ to the faculty as a whole. These learning group studies included digging deeper into ‘Transactional analysis’, creating ‘Green Initiatives’, understanding ‘Creative classroom design’, planning to ‘Prepare students for post-13’, teaching ‘PERMA’ and exploring ‘Concept-based learning’. The work of some of these groups will continue to inform developments well into the next academic year.
Sharing our work with other teachers is excellent professional development and this year has provided some wonderful opportunities for us to showcase ICHK’s innovative pedagogy on the international stage, with audiences at the ACAMIS conference, Positive Education Asia, and AISC. Teaching schools about Human Technologies has been a particular focus reaching and engaging educators as far afield as Mumbai, Singapore, Lisbon and Australia.
SRC
It has been an amazing year for the SRC, with many accomplishments to celebrate.
During the year members organised Spirit Week, Extreme Reading Competition, Operation Santa Claus, Candy Grams, Chinese New Year scavenger hunt, Autism Awareness campaign, dress down days and more for students to participate in and contribute to the community. They have raised money for Kiva, enabling 23 different loans for projects in 13 different countries.
The whole school was delighted when the SRC was awarded the Most Creative School Award for its fundraising drive for Operation Santa Claus.
We look forward to another exciting year of fun filled fundraising ahead.
House Competitions
It’s been another successful year, with many House events taking place, including Spirit Week, House Chess, CNY Poster competition, Sports Day and fundraising efforts. More initiatives are planned for next term, as we continue to promote the importance of the House system, which creates a spirit of friendly competition, collaboration and cooperation.
Staff
This year we say goodbye to Steven Rines. We would like to thank him for his contributions to the success of the school, and wish him well for the future. Next term we welcome Natalie Bailey, Matthew Ho, Alex Edwards, Sherry She and Amy Thibeault to our staffing team.
Links with Partner Primaries
Our strong partnership with our primary schools continues to grow and we look forward to welcoming new students into Year 7 in August. We continue to work closely with ICHK Hong Lok Yuen, KIS, JIS and Anfield to ensure a smooth transition for their students. A series of parent talks will be held next term, along with our annual Open Day, Taster days and our Welcome Evening.
Looking Ahead
Our Human Technologies curriculum is at an exciting point in its development. We are currently engaged in a year-long curriculum review process which will consolidate and refine Human Technologies in Years 7 to 10, and extend the curriculum into Year 11.
We will be also writing and promoting ‘Human Technologies’ as a School-Based Syllabus for the IB Diploma Program, in the hope of ultimately making it available to IB schools worldwide. Spreading ‘Human Technologies’ as a technology.
Free Learning will continue to expand. It will also be the focus of a university research project, with the ultimate aim of being implemented on a larger scale in secondary and tertiary education.
We look forward to welcoming a new addition to our Chinese team, thanks to the generous support of our partner school KIS. Sherry She will join us as we begin the careful planning process for our new Kingston Chinese Programme, which will be introduced in 2019.
We will continue with our innovative Deep Learning programme, introducing more new and creative experiences for students. We are also looking into ways to introduce designated reading time into the school day, every day.
Thank you to all our families for your ongoing support and we wish you a happy and healthy summer, wherever in the world you may be.
ICHK Secondary
Email: info@ichk.edu.hk
Website: https://www.ichk.edu.hk/
Location: International College Hong Kong (nt), Hong Kong
Phone: +(852) 2655-9018
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ICHK.ICHKHongLokYuen
Twitter: @ICHK_Secondary