Jack and Jed's school

Yesterday and today I attended the end of year parties for Jack and Jed's classes at the International School. I am there all the time but I am always amazed when I go there. The first thing I noticed today was that when recess is over, rather than ring a bell or blow a whistle, they play fun rock music about party ending. It's great.

Jack's class party started at one of the Upper Elementary School computer labs. Pictures are below. The children showed off their end of the year projects. They had planted kidney bean seeds in April. They followed the progress, took digital pictures and put together a power point presentation slide show of the progress and all they learned. Next, they created claymation movies of the life cycle of a bean plant. They did all the work themselves, from making the clay models, to shooting the film and choosing the music. The opportunities the school gives the kids are remarkable.

Jed's class also did some great things with hands on learning, working with worms, giant snails and fish in the past few weeks, for instance. But their end of the year party included water play in the fabulous Outdoor Learning Environment.

When we were planning our move to Beijing, no one told us that there were any school choices other than ISB. So, I applied and registered the boys, sight unseen. Once I arrived, I learned there are actually several choices and I second guessed my decision. ISB has a reputation for being tough, competitive and cold. The other schools are supposedly warmer and more touchy feely and self esteem oriented. The things people say about ISB have some truth to them but are mostly false. Yes, the school is very academics oriented. They have an intense curriculum and expect a lot from the kids. But the teachers are as warm and caring as you'd find anywhere. The administration is very concerned with the children and the whole place works toward doing the best for our kids. Someone summed up the environments as the other schools are "touchy feeling" and ISB is "itchy scratchy". True, they do not coddle the kids, but I am very happy they go there and will not be changing their schools.

Here are pictures from the last days of 3rd grade and kindergarten.