Apr 21, 20232 min read

Message from the Principals 4/21/2023

Updated: Apr 21, 2023

Hello everyone! (this blog post was translated by ChatGPT)

Today's topics: 1: Important Reminders

2: Curriculum Focus: Metacognition

3: Learning Highlight

4: House Points

5: Photos of the week

1: Important Reminders

The Parent workshop scheduled for April 28 is canceled.
Golden Week: May 1-5 (NO SCHOOL)
Open School - May 16th
- The school will be open to all visitors from 8:20-10:00.
- Non-Hope visitors must complete this form.

2: Curriculum Focus:

In last week’s blog, we started to share more information about the four areas that come under the heading of “Progressive Pedagogies” for IPC and IMYC learners. These methods remain very alive in our High School classes too. As a reminder, these areas of learning are:

Constructivism
Metacognition
Experiential and Active
Brain-based

Today’s curriculum focus takes a deeper look at “metacognition” within Hope’s Teaching and Learning Practices.

For Hope learners, metacognition is the opportunity for students to reflect on what they are learning, how they are learning, and how their learning might be improved.

At the start of a unit, teachers will introduce a Knowledge Harvest to the students to support with metacognition. The Knowledge Harvest allows the students to see what they already know about a particular topic, and throughout the unit, they can return to the knowledge harvest to connect their existing knowledge to their new knowledge. The Knowledge Harvest also presents opportunities for the students to make notes of questions they have about the topic, encouraging independent investigation.

All main learning activities in our IPC and IMYC classes follow a “Research, Record and Reflect” cycle, meaning that students have multiple opportunities throughout a unit to take time to reflect on what they have just learned, as well as considering how they would like to improve in the future, and continue to add questions they would like to explore as a result of their reflections.

Through the use of assessment rubrics, students at Hope are also able to have an opportunity to explain and justify their own learning to themselves, their peers and their teachers. As the students at Hope get older, they will be able to explain in more detail how they have achieved their assessment result, demonstrating that they have self-awareness of their progress with a given skill.

In our report cards that get issued at the end of each semester, we also keep the concept of metacognition alive by identifying a student’s successes, as well as providing advice on areas of development, which the students can reflect on and identify how they could improve with the key skills over time.

We encourage parents to also discuss the successes and next steps at home, as this helps to embed metacognition practices at home too.

3: Learning Highlight

Grade 5 was visited by Dr. Mok, who practiced dentistry in the USA, for their unit 'Being Human'. She taught the students about the function of teeth, how cavities form and proper brushing and flossing technique. The students now know how to look after their dental hygiene. Thank you, Dr. Mok!