Intercultural Week Is Here: November 9-13, 2020
Our ES Intercultural Week begins on Monday, November 9. Congratulations to Jieming Wu in Grade 2 for designing the Intercultural Week 2020 graphic! We received many wonderful submissions by student artists for our contest. We are displaying all of these pieces of art during Intercultural Week from November 9-13.
The theme for Intercultural Week this year is: Our Cultures, Our Stories. We are so appreciative of all the support that our parent community provides to make this day such a memorable experience for students.
As a reminder, on Monday, November 9 we will be having the launch assemblies for students. Watch for a recording of the assemblies to be shared in next week’s eNews!
eNews Tip: Use the “Single Page View”
If you want to view the entire eNews with one click, use the “Single Page View” feature located at the top of the eNews email. It’s a great way to scan all of the ES news each week!
Friday, November 13th is “A” Day
Please be reminded that due to changes in our format for Intercultural Week, Friday, November 13th will now be an “A” day for our ES Specials schedule.
Intercultural Week Clothing
Monday, November 9th is when we encourage students to wear clothes representing a culture(s) that they connect with. This will add a celebratory tone to the day and will enrich our assembly experiences. As in previous years, during the remaining days of the week, students are invited to wear t-shirts from different cultures, countries and places. Intercultural week concludes by celebrating our host country, Thailand, on Friday. Please ensure your child has appropriate footwear for PE throughout the week!
ES Report Cards Are Available Now Via PowerSchool
Trimester 1 Report Cards will be posted on PowerSchool by 5 pm today. Please look over the report with your child as you discuss strengths, areas for growth and goals. It is our aim that report cards are a spring-board for positive family conversations about learning. For any questions regarding your PowerSchool log-in, please contact K. Goff trins@isb.ac.th
ES Virtual School Community Handbook & November 26th Virtual Parent Engage via Zoom
ISB students have been fortunate to have been in school learning face to face with their teachers and peers for more than three months now! Although Thailand continues to be a safe place where schools are able to provide on campus learning, we have continued to plan for the possibility of virtual school in case it will be needed. While we hope that we never have to implement these plans, having them and sharing them with our community is an important step in our community’s preparedness should we need to go to virtual school.
ISB families, students and faculty shared a wide variety of feedback about their March -June 2020 virtual school experiences which have greatly informed our 2020-21 Virtual School plans. Enhancements to the 2020-21 virtual school plans include an emphasis on:
- consistency across the school and throughout the grade levels;
- clearer communication to faculty and parents regarding the virtual school expectations;
- suggested daily schedules for all students and families as well as a defined work day schedule for teachers including collaborative team and individual planning time;
- significant increase in daily synchronous learning for students via large and small group lessons;
- plans to receive parent feedback on an ongoing basis;
- clarity of the Wednesday schedules for students, parents and faculty;
- increase in World Language synchronous offerings for students;
- Increased differentiation for students who receive EAP/LS Tier 3 support;
- Increased flexibility for students and families including an increase in optional learning tasks for students and families seeking more virtual school engagement.
The most current version of the ES Community Virtual School Handbook is linked here. Please see the details below and join us on Thursday, November 26 @ 8AM via Zoom for the ES Virtual Parent Engage Session focused on the key aspects of the ES Community Virtual School Handbook.
ES Virtual Parent Engage Session – ES Community Virtual School Handbook
Thursday, November 26 @ 8AM
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82240982806
Meeting ID: 822 4098 2806
Weekly Message from Dr. Michael Allen
Thank you goes out to the 50+ ES parents who attended our November 5 Parent Engage session! Our ES PTA Coordinators, Teresa Caravelli & Rika Gupta <pta-es@isb.ac.th>, launched the session by sharing a detailed update regarding next week’s Intercultural Week, one of our largest PTA parent partnership events of the year. Then the ES admin team and counselors facilitated a workshop focused on partnering with parents via the core principles of guiding students’ behaviour at home and school. We reviewed a variety of home/school strategies and tools, addressed parent questions, and reviewed the fundamental differences between typical peer conflict and bullying. All aspects of the workshop aligned with the ISB Culture of Care and these core discipline principles:
- Kind and Firm at the same time
- Build a strong sense of Belonging and Significance within the home/community
- Tools and strategies that work long term
- Focus on developing the long term social & life skills
- Solutions-focused problem solving
- Children develop a sense that they are capable
Please save these dates to join us for future ES Parent Engage sessions:
Nov. 26 – Virtual Parent Engage via Zoom – ES Community Virtual School Handbook @ 8AM https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82240982806
Jan. 21 – Growing Readers – Selecting Just Right Books, Reading Progressions and Skills
Feb. 4 – Growing Mathematicians – Math Foundational Skills and Skill Progression to High Level Mathematics
Mar. 4 – Growing Innovators – Design, Technology and Engineering Skills in the ES
May 13 – Looking Back, Looking Ahead
Your partner in education,
Michael Allen
michaela@isb.ac.th
Our ES Tortoises Have New Names!
Election Results are in!! We are thrilled to announce the names of our new friends in the World Languages quad…Shelly and Spike! Some Grade 5 writers will create an information board about Shelly and Spike’s species to be included nearby their home.
RSV (Respiratory Syncitial Virus)
Amidst the global Covid-19 pandemic, RSV has started to crop up locally in the community. RSV is a common contagiable virus infection affecting the airways. The virus common amongst toddlers and infants is passed easily through secretions. Children can present with difficulty breathing, runny nose, coughing and significant sputum. Typically treatment is supportive as in helping the child get through the difficult stages while staying hydrated and nourished to fight off the infection. RSV if worsened can lead to pneumonia. Especially in the current environment, we advise parents and students alike to wear a mask and wash hands regularly. Anyone with a fever or upper respiratory symptoms should stay home until recovered.
Panther Activities
Please note that due the intercultural day, some of ES Explore classes will be relocated to different locations during the week of November 9th – 13th.
Monday, November 9th:
Zumba class in the CC building, room 202 (MS Drama room, 2nd floor)
Chess class in the ES Cafeteria
Tuesday, November 10th:
Chess class in the ES Cafeteria
Wednesday, November 11th:
PreK clay class in room 117 (PreK room)
Clay class in ES Cafeteria
Zumba class in the CC building, room 139 (Ground floor)
Thursday, November 12th:
Clay class in the ES Cafeteria
Lego class in G3 room 211
Friday, November 13th:
PreK Brick 4 kidz in room 117 (Prek room)
Bricks 4 Kidz in the ES Cafeteria
The instructors were asked to meet the students near the activity classroom and escort them to the new location.
Thank you for your cooperation,
Livnat Ziskinder
ES Explore Coordinator
esactivities@isb.ac.th
Reminder: Student Passport Information in Powerschool
We are six weeks away from winter break. Please check your passports to see when your visa expires and contact Khun Tang in the admissions office to renew your paperwork before December 11th. Limited resources are available after December 18, and five working days are needed to process documents. The school is closed from December 25-January 3.
Also, in order to ensure that thorough contact tracing can be conducted if necessary and ensure that schools are maintaining proper records, earlier this school year, Thailand’s Office of the Private Education Commission (OPEC) issued a directive to schools regarding the collection of passport or national ID numbers and other details (listed below) of community members, including students and staff.
In line with Thailand’s Personal Data Protection Act, ISB would not disclose this information to any individual or organization for any purpose other than that designated by our legal obligation to the Government of Thailand.
Please ensure that one person from each family reviews and updates Powerschool with your student’s current demographic information.
NOTE: Passport issue date is a new required field.
Login to Powerschool Parent Portal> Contact/Passport Information
If you are unable to login to Powerschool or need assistance, contact: help@isb.ac.th
G5 Parent Partnership Session – Health & Wellbeing Unit Overview – November 19 @ 8AM, MPR
All G5 parents are invited to the “Health and Well-being” unit overview session for parents on Thursday, November 19th in the MPR. Come learn the unit content so you can better link learning to home. The purpose of the Health and Wellbeing unit is to provide knowledge and understanding of how the human body changes during puberty to prepare for human reproduction. The key aims of the G5 Health and Well-being unit are to:
- Assess personal health practices
- Investigate resources and strategies to manage changes and transitions associated with puberty
- Plan and practice strategies to promote health, safety and well-being
- Practice skills to establish and manage relationships
- Examine the influence of emotional responses on behavior and relationships
Links to “Always Changing and Growing Up” Video Resources:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G57Suq7JpQE (boys)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR1XJZ0xRSo (girls)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKfJ8w7XX6E (co-ed video)
The parent session is exclusively for parents of G5 students. If you are attending the parent information session on Thursday, November 19th @ 8AM in the MPR, please register here!
Panther News
Season Two ISB Athletics Registrations (U11 Soccer)
Season Two registration is now open on CHQ for U11 Soccer programs (grade 3-5). Parents are asked to sign up their child through CHQ. The first practice starts on Monday 9 November.
For instructions on how to sign up using CHQ please use the following link – REGISTRATION INSTRUCTIONS CHQ,
ES Cafeteria Menu
Please find the ES Cafeteria menu for next week linked here. Here is the menu for Kindergarten and here is the menu for Pre-Kindergarten.
Reminder: ISB PTA Touchstone Issue 1 2020-21 is Online
Once again, congratulations go out to Gunjan Mullick (pta-touchstone@isb.ac.th) and the many members of the ISB community who shared their stories via the latest edition of the ISB Touchstone digital magazine! Please take a close look here: Touchstone Issue 1 2020/21.
(Repeat) PARENT ACTION REQUIRED: Student Tracking of Student After School and Weekend Locations
All ES parents are required to login to Powerschool and update their journal for the week, listing locations visited outside school hours. All schools in Thailand are required by the Ministry of Education to have their students/parents keep and complete a daily journal of their whereabouts after school hours. Only 60 families have completed the needed ES PowerSchool form. ES secretaries will need to contact individual families who don’t complete the PowerSchool form, therefore we ask for your support in completing this important Covid-19 safety task each Sunday.
Logging into Powerschool, you will see a notification to update the Journal:
Each Sunday, complete the journal for the preceding week for each ES child. If you are having trouble accessing Powerschool or are unable to see your students in Powerschool, email ES Powerschool Secretary, Khun Tom <cholthis@isb.ac.th>
eNews Guidelines
Shelley Bragg
shelleyb@isb.ac.th
ISB eNewsletters provide a valuable avenue for communication within the ISB parent community. For your convenience we have provided you with our eNewsletter guidelines below.
Submitting an announcement for publication
ISB accepts announcements from ISB families for potential publication in our eNewsletters. The announcements are generally intended to highlight events that occur at ISB and/or highlight information about ISB.
What to include in the announcement
- A title for your announcement
- An email contact for further information
Where to submit your announcement
4publish@isb.ac.th is for announcements of interest to the entire ISB community.
naiyanar@isb.ac.th is for Elementary School (ES) announcements of interest to ES families.
phremjiz@isb.ac.th is for Middle School (MS) announcements of interest to MS families.
vijitl@isb.ac.th is for High School (HS) announcements of interest to HS families.
Your announcement will be submitted to the appropriate Principal and/or to our Director of Marketing and Communications for review. ISB reserves the right to determine which announcements will and will not be published, and to edit announcements that are approved for publication.
Calendar of Events
November 2020
| Nov. 6 | Trimester 1 Report Cards Posted on PowerSchool |
| Nov. 9 | ES Intercultural Day (Assembly Chevron) |
| Nov.10-13 | ES Intercultural Week |
| Nov.12-13 | ES ‘Out of School Uniform’ Day |
| Nov. 17 | Board of Trustees (BOT) Meeting 6:00 pm (MPB 1&2) |
| Nov. 19 | G5 Parent Partnership Session – Health & Wellbeing 8:00 am (ES MPR) |
| Nov. 19 | Staff Appreciation Cookie Day |
| Nov. 24 | Early Dismissal (1:10 pm) |
| Nov. 26 | Virtual Parent Engage via Zoom – ES Community Virtual School Handbook @ 8AM https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82240982806 |
| Nov. 27 | Black & Gold Day |