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AISCT Turns 10!

APRIL 2012

Many years ago a group of educators gathered together in Cape Town to create a school based on the American curriculum and following the American (northern hemisphere) calendar. They created a Board and then began a search for a building to house the school. They found the perfect site located in Constantia Hills. The campus was originally built for the Notre Dame Academy in 1946 and then became a girls’ reformatory school for a short period of time.

When the Board first saw the site, the campus was in ruins, but they saw potential. Throughout 2001 the campus received a total facelift, and on 19 January 2002 the doors of the American International School of Cape Town (AISCT) opened to 18 students with five teachers.

Ten years later AISCT has 320 students from 46 different countries taught by 32 teachers from nine countries. The grades run from Pre-Kindergarten, a class for four year olds, to Grade 12. AISCT is proud to have just launched an early childhood development centre (Grizzly Cubs) for children aged two to four. After-school activities are offered for students in Pre-Kindergarten to Grade 12 everyday and include academic clubs as well as sports. Advanced Placement (AP) courses, recognized internationally, are offered in the High School. Graduates from AISCT have been accepted to colleges and universities on six continents.

To celebrate the grand occasion, on 19 January 2012 the student body gathered in the school hall (Parthenon) to sing the school song and view a slideshow of pictures over the past ten years. Following, everyone went to the soccer field to form the number 10 and received a cupcake with the school logo and a 10.

Happy 10th Birthday, AISCT—10 years strong! For information about AISCT, see www.aisct.org

Association of International Schools in Africa • P.O. Box 14103-00800 • Peponi Road • Nairobi, KenyaTel: +254 20 269 7442 or +254 20 8076067 • Email: info@aisa.or.ke • Web: www.aisa.or.ke

By Helen Petersen, American International School of Cape Town

Welcome to the new look AISA ConneXions newsletter. In this edition we have expanded the news from you our members. It is clear there is a lot happening in our network from school celebrations, new programmes and products, service learning and much more. Thank you to all who submitted articles. We encourage members to continue to use ConneXions to keep our connections alive. Remember that you can always submit news about your school to AISA for inclusion in one of our bi-annual editions of ConneXions. Please contact our Communications and Marketing coordinator Ida Rob at icrob@aisa.or.ke. We’ve also added more articles from the consultants who will be facilitating sessions at our October 2012 Conference in Johannesburg. These articles are very informative and will hopefully encourage you to attend AISA 2012 knowing what is on offer well in advance.

AISA is keen to know from our members what types of professional development activities you would like us to offer. Many of you are already engaging in vibrant discussions around this question in AISA’s online Communities of Practice (CoPs). We invite everyone to sign up to one of our CoPs to chat with your colleagues about

this and any other topics of interest for those undertaking similar jobs in our member schools. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank our CoP facilitators who are doing a great job guiding the discussions in these CoPs. For details of how to participate contact communities@aisa.or.ke or our Professional Development coordinator Benjamin Bett (bbett@aisa.or.ke).

As I write the 2012 AISA-Global Issues Service Summit (AISA-GISS) is about to get underway at the American International School of Johannesburg, South Africa. We wish all those participating a successful summit and look forward to hearing all about this important event in our August edition of ConneXions. Many thanks to Desiree Brown-Quilty and her team at AISJ for hosting this event. AISJ is also hosting our AISA Conference from October 19 – 24, 2012 and will be the venue for the much anticipated NEXT FRONTIER Professional Conversation taking place on March 15-17, 2013.

Do you have an event you would like us to publicize? We’d be happy to do so on the Calendar and News pages of the AISA website or right here in ConneXions. There is so much happening with IB workshops, MAP workshops, AISA SchooLink (Moodle) Training, not to mention over 100

workshops and institutes on offer during our upcoming conference. We also have important initiatives taking place for child protection, regional testing services, and the new AISA Job Board.

I would like to pay tribute to two of our AISA Board members who are leaving us at the end of this year. David Shawver (IS Tanganyika) and Wayne Rutherford (IS Dakar) have been staunch supporters of AISA throughout their time in the region. Dr. Pam Ward from the Office of Overseas Schools is also leaving us at the end of this month. Pam’s contribution to AISA has been second to none and we will certainly miss her. We welcome Dr. David Cramer from the Office of Overseas Schools who will be replacing Pam as Region Education Officer for Africa. Perhaps inevitably we also lose several heads of schools, principals and teachers at the end of the year. I am sure you join me as we wish all our departing friends every success in the future.

In closing let me wish you happy reading… why not drop us a note and let us know what you think? Dr. Peter BatemanExecutive Director

Welcome!

INSI

DE P18 AISA Shools take on Swiss Alps

P20-33 AISA 2012 Detailed InformationP34 CIS School AccreditationP37-47 Professional Development

P10 Two Schools in Africa Find SuccessP11 Creating ‘Catalysts’ for Change P14 AISA’s Visiting AuthorsP16 Follett Goes MobileP17 Responsible Profit is Possible

P1 AISCT Turns 10!P1 Welcome Note!P2 AISA Gives Back - Malaria No More P2 Week Without Walls P3 What is Round Square?

P5 ICS Addis - Grade 5 TripP6 Language Immersion Preschools P7 Nigeria LNG Launches IPCP7 Students build ECO-Friendly “Earth Banda”P9 Creating a Culture of Service

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AISA Gives Back - Malaria No MoreFollowing another wonderful event in Boston the AISA Board of Directors would like to thank all those who generously donated to our Malaria No More campaign (http://malarianomore.org.uk/) . This year we raised a record US$11,000 that will go to the purchase of nets in Africa. A special thank you should go to our Associate Members (pictured) who gave so generously:

• Robert Goodrich Passport Executive Travel• Rick Gray TieCare/Global Tax Service• Carolyn Bruner Buffalo Sate/SUNY• Ricardo Urbina Clements International• John Randolph Global Education Systems• Mark Bistline Schoolyard Inc• Jessica Magagna Search Associates• Robert Ambrogi International School Services (ISS) (not pictured)

Thank you all!

Our trip around Niamey and to the island of Kanazi was unforgettable. Students, teachers, staff and even our very own AISN Board Chair and Embassy Nurse Practitioner, Cece Jimenez took the unique opportunity to sleep under the starry Saharan sky, experience Niger and learn about the Zarma culture.

The annual AISN Week without Walls experience complements our existing academic curriculum by taking our students out of their classrooms, out of their comfort zones and encouraging them to experience Niger, learn about others and test their limits... and this year was no exception. Some say it was one of our best Week without Walls experience ever!

Four days and two nights together and an action packed itinerary of learning, reflecting and experiencing the culture of Niger. In Niamey, we visited the Grand Mosque, the Braniger Factory to see how they make beer and soda and we also shared a traditional feast at school before heading off to sleep on the village island of Kanazi in the Niger River for two nights.

Our students proved themselves to be responsible and independent as they set up their camp each night and showered by bucket on the desert island each morning. Students carried their belongings on and off the island (with a little help) and for some this was a real challenge. Our students showed that they were curious and inquisitive learners when they asked great questions to the village chief and found out many interesting answers. Our students found out a lot about the chief’s job and the rules of the island. Unfortunately Kanazi Village Chief won’t be a job for any of our students in the future as chiefs are born and not made and this job is passed down from generation to generation.

Our students demonstrated that they are thinkers and learners when they used the Zarma language to greet and communicate with the chief, the villagers and the potters in Boubon. Many students already spoke a bit of Zarma before they came on this trip and other learned some greetings and new words. Going beyond our textbooks and the

learning that takes place in our classrooms each day to open our eyes to appreciate and connect with the world around us was what Week Without Walls 2011 was all about.

A Hippopotamus RideAn afternoon pirogue ride down the Niger River in hopes of seeing a hippopotamus was worth it...we saw two hippos enjoying the cool running water.

Time to play sports with the Kanazi school studentsVillage games were taught to AISN students and we taught the village students some favorites of our own.

High School under the mango treeHigh school students brought their books and presentations to the island to practice for an upcoming assembly.

Sketching, drawing, writing and reflectingWe shared watercolor paints with the village school and some students took time to paint with their new friends.

A donkey cart rideWe loaded up the donkey carts with students and brought them into the village in a traditional mode of transport on market day.

Visiting potters in BoubonWe watched the women of Boubon decorate large clay pots using millet paint brushes and paint made from local rocks and minerals.

Week Without Walls doesn’t just teach students about Nigerien culture...it’s a time to practice important lifelong skills.

Exploring the world beyond school and sleeping away from home is a perfect opportunity to help our students develop and practice important lifelong skills such as responsibility, independence, risk taking, and also to develop lifelong healthy and safe habits. Week Without Walls is much more than learning about and experiencing Niger, it’s a time for students to take risks and develop independence.

Week Without Walls: Open your eyes to the world around you...By Heidi Cavanagh, AISN DirectorPhotos by Marc O Droma, AISN Teacher

Week without walls experience enables

students to go beyond textbooks and the

learning that takes place in classrooms each day and opens their

eyes to appreciate and

connect with the world.

>> CONT. PAGE 3

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Whether setting up or striking down our camp, bathing and washing in a new environment or sharing a traditional meal, our trip to Kanazi was a unique experience for many of our students and they took it all in stride. Each morning, students washed, dressed and prepared for breakfast. Throughout the day, students from all ages worked and learned together in small groups. They visited the village, visited the school and took a trip on the river to see if we could spot some hippopotamuses.

In the evening, getting ready for dinner, bedtime and remembering to put on some warm socks and cover up with a warm blanket was essential for a comfortable sleep under the desert night sky.

Our nightly campfire kept us warm and was a time to talk with friends and learn about each other before we tucked ourselves into bed hoping to see a shooting star..or two..or seven.

Week Without Walls is a truly unique and interesting experience that goes beyond the learning that we expect from our students in our classrooms. A time to take a risk, learn about someone else, appreciate the world around us and a trip to remember for a lifetime. ◊

Interview with the chief: under the mango trees, AISN students enjoyed a question and answer period with the chief of the village. Students asked thoughtful questions on topics that ranged from life on the island to how he became the chief to how the dead are buried to health and medicine...students learned a lot about Kanazi life from the chief.

Visiting a Kanazi House & School: During our time on the island, the students visited a Kanazi house & the school to learn more about daily life in the village. Kanazi homes & schools are very different than ours. While visiting, AISN students took careful notes about the typical items to find in a Kanazi house.

Round Square has its foundations in

the theories of the German educational philosopher Kurt Hahn,

who believed that schools should have a greater purpose beyond preparing young

people for college or university. He believed it was crucial for students to prepare for life by having them face it head on and

experience it in ways that would demand courage, generosity,

imagination, principle and resolution.

What is Round Square?By John O’Connor, Director, Brookhouse International School.

I have been fortunate enough to work in international education for the past 25 years and have observed how much has been done by organizations like ECIS, CIS and AISA to reinforce and support the professional operation of international schools – self-study accreditation cycles, professional development networking and a myriad of structural and governance support services. If international education were a living creature then one could argue that the skeleton is strong and the body healthy. However, I have been concerned that the heart or soul of the same creature can sometimes be less well catered for, and that whilst some schools point to religious affiliations as the framework for their ethos, many schools, including those that are multi-denominational, look for a suitable umbrella for all those excellent activities that contribute to the ethos of their schools.

After some time I came upon Round Square, more a movement in education than anything else, a vision shared by the 100 or so member schools worldwide, and a commitment to nurturing the hearts and souls of young people through a philosophy of international understanding, commitment to democratic principle, environmental stewardship, a spirit of adventure, servant leadership and hands-on experience of service to the wider community.

The organization called Round Square has its foundations in the theories of the German educational philosopher Kurt Hahn, who believed that schools should have a greater purpose beyond preparing young people for college or university. Hahn believed that it was crucial for students to prepare for life by having them face it head on and experience it in ways that would demand courage, generosity, imagination, principle and resolution. He also saw the dangers that are inherent for those children who come from a background of relative privilege – they can go through the corridors of their schooling without ever questioning their role in society, let alone appreciating that with advantage comes the responsibility to contribute to society. In short, Hahn understood that without guidance children of privilege can end up self-serving non-contributors, despite their access to world class educational opportunities.

My current school, Brookhouse School, is in Kenya, where the gap between the ‘haves’ (who attend Brookhouse and several other international schools in Nairobi) and the ‘have-nots’ could not be wider. It was therefore, for me, a perfect fit to embrace Round Square because it addressed some of the most important questions I had about our role as international educators. I wanted to be able to say that our school consciously addressed these issues and was committed to producing young graduates who not only went on to first class universities worldwide, but took with them those values that would make them meaningful and courageous contributors to society when they completed their studies.

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Round Square has done just that for our school, and many others around the world. It has allowed such values to be at the forefront of everything we do at the Round Square conference 2010 in Pattaya, Thailand school, at the core of every assembly and the centre of our daily Citizenship program, uniting activities as diverse as Model United Nations (MUN) and Presidents Award’s Scheme (PAS) under one philosophical umbrella.

Round Square member schools believe that the pillars of Hahn’s insight are the ideals on which our future is built. These form the broad fundamentals or IDEALS of Round Square. However, Round Square as a global organization is not only about philosophical considerations. Round Square schools commit themselves to collaboration and sharing with each other and engage in major activities, locally, regionally and globally, including:

• Annual regional and international student-led conferences that celebrate cultural diversity• Local, regional and international student exchanges• Round Square International Service (RSIS) projects that change the lives of less privileged communities or assist threatened environments• Regional and local service projects that connect students directly with local community partners.

It is hard to describe the power and impact that attendance at Round Square student-led conferences has on your school. It takes a few years for the impact to fully permeate the fabric of the school, but when it does the effect is profound. Students at a Round Square school sense their connectedness with the Round Square family of schools around the world. And family is probably the best word to use in relation to Round Square. For no matter how large this family grows, and it is growing quite fast now that more and more schools across the globe become aware of its existence, Round Square remains a wonderful glue that binds together young people, schools and educators who see such values as crucial to genuinely holistic education.

So, Round Square is a global association of schools which share a commitment, beyond academic merit, to personal growth and responsibility through service, challenge, adventure and international understanding. Ultimately, Round Square seeks to empower students to become the leaders and guardians of tomorrow’s world… rather than the leading exploiters of tomorrow’s world. Quite a lofty aim in several ways, and yet it is given tangible and meaningful form in the shape of Round Square.

In the last few years the annual international Round Square conference has been held in places as diverse as Vancouver Canada, Ajmer India and Pattaya Thailand, always hosted at the campus of a member school. In 2011 the conference was hosted at Wellington College in the UK, and in 2012 the conference comes to Africa, being co-hosted between Brookhouse School in Nairobi, Kenya and Penryn College in South Africa. Such gatherings of 500–1000 students from around the globe really affirm the crucial part Round Square has to play in the evolving role of international education.

And these conferences are above all else memorable because they are such fun for the students involved as they exchange ideas, cultures and views with students from all over the globe, eventually discovering that they have so much more in common than they first thought, and that collectively they have a great responsibility for shaping the future.

So for me and for my school Round Square has been a great lesson in how a philosophy can take on a tangible shape and form, and bring so much that is valuable to the intangibles of any school. For Brookhouse, organizations like AISA, CIS and ECIS strengthen the skeleton and body of the school in admirable ways; Round Square feeds the soul of the school. These memberships make for a powerful and positive combination in facing the challenges of international education in the 21st Century.

John O’Connor is Director at Brookhouse School in Nairobi, Kenya; he currently serves as the Regional Director for Africa on the Round Square Board.

For more information on Round Square, please visit: www.roundsquare.org

Round Square is a global association of schools which share a commitment, beyond academic merit, to personal growth and responsibility through service, challenge, adventure and international understanding. Ultimately, Round Square seeks to empower students to become the leaders and guardians of tomorrow’s world… rather than the leading exploiters of tomorrow’s world.

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Above left: H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth II meets student delegates at the 2011 Round Square conference hosted at Wellington College in the UK

Above Right: Round Square Board President H.M. King Constantine opens the 2010 conference hosted at Regent’s School in Thailand.

Right: the official photo for the 2011 Round Square conference gathering at Wellington College, UK

Below right: students from Round Square schools working together on an international service project in South Africa

International Community School of Addis Ababa - Grade 5 Trip to Ethiopia’s Coffee RegionBy Traci Chanyalew – Communication Associate, International Community School Addis Ababa

Early on a cool Addis Ababa morning, grade 5 students from ICS Addis assembled in the school parking lot, loaded their bags onto the bus and started off on the 8-hour bus ride to Aregash Lodge in the village of YirgaAlem, in the Sidamo region, the land of coffee. This trip to Aregash Lodge has become an integral part of the grade 5 curriculum at ICS. Linked to the grade 5, world economies unit of study, the trip allows students to learn firsthand about the climate, geography and economics of coffee growing in Ethiopia. Each class is also able to grow closer as a group, with activities to develop and practice skills of leadership, teamwork and cooperation.Although the bus ride was long, the students were excited and had plenty to talk about amongst themselves. The bus ride also gave students an opportunity to see the beautiful landscapes of Ethiopia and the striking contrast between regions such as dry and arid Langano with its acacia trees and the deep red soil and lush vegetation of Sidamo. For many students, this was their first time away from home and the first time they would experience a ‘sleepover’. As students exited the bus, they were greeted by Gregori and Marika, an Italian/Greek/Ethiopian couple who run Aregash Lodge. Students sipped fresh passion-fruit juice as they stretched their legs, explored the lodge and took in the scenery. After the students settled into their tukuls (traditional Ethiopian mud huts), they participated in a scavenger hunt/team building activity led by their teachers. As the sun began to set, the nearby grassy area became a viewing area for the half-a-dozen hyenas that come to feast on the offerings of the ‘hyena’ man. The ‘hyena’ man is employed by the lodge and can be seen feeding hyenas in this region for tourists who gather nightly.

“We learned about coffee and about how the money coffee farmers were making was unfair. It was interesting to see how they lived and it was fun to see their houses and compare them to ours.” Hans

“The trip was fun yet educational. I got to see how people live in the different regions of Ethiopia. I even got to harvest coffee. I’m not happy about how companies take advantage of the Ethiopian farmers by not paying a lot of money. I want to see fair trade.” Tom

“We learned about the coffee process. I like to watch the pulping machines. The trip was a good opportunity to learn in a fun way.” Diana

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It’s well known that young children learn languages very quickly by immersion. Teachers know this, and parents know this. Our students are now proving this daily right in front of our eyes. If you walk into the English immersion preschool, you may find the teacher reading a storybook in English - but the students may be discussing it in French. Likewise, in the French classroom, the teacher may ask a question in French and get an answer in English. On the playground, both languages mingle seamlessly.

What happened to our original marketing plan? Firstly, the fact that our French preschool is now enrolling the exact opposite of its intended market-Anglophone rather than Francophone families - may point to the unarticulated needs of the francophone families. When the francophone families told us that they hesitated to enrol their children because our school’s language of instruction is English, maybe what they were really telling us was how much they wanted their children to learn English! In retrospect, this seems to be the case at ASD.

As night began to fall, local Sidamas treated the students to a traditional coffee ceremony, which includes roasting the beans on an open fire and then grinding them by hand to make a very fresh and aromatic coffee. The evening ended with a lovely meal that included both Italian and Ethiopian dishes.

The next day, the students visited a coffee plantation, where they had an opportunity to harvest coffee alongside the Sidamo people. In the afternoon, they visited a coffee research center and a processing plant where they watched how coffee cherries were separated, pulped and cleaned. They also visited a traditional village where they watched a woman harvest the false banana plant, known locally as enset. It is an extremely labor-intensive process to make the false banana pulp edible. After it is harvested, the pulp is wrapped in banana leaves and is buried in the ground for at least a month so it can ferment. At the end of their visit, students were invited into the woman’s tukul and she prepared kocho, a type of bread made out of the false banana pulp.

After returning to school, the students were able to reflect on their experience. Field experiences such as this are an important part of the ICS Addis curriculum, allowing students to learn in a manner that is tangible and giving them a closer view of our host country, Ethiopia.

Language Immersion Preschools in CameroonBy Beverly Sortland - Director, American School of Douala, Cameroon

Here at the American School of Douala we have two language immersion preschools - one in French and one in English. The French program is new, having just started in August 2011. But already it’s obvious that we have a lively, creative, bilingual group of preschoolers! It didn’t start out this way. The French preschool program was initially conceived as a way to appeal to local families and enlarge our market in Cameroon. Cameroon is officially bilingual, French/English, although a majority of people here in Douala seem to be francophone. These francophone families told us that they hesitated sending their children to our school because the language of instruction was English.

We listened to their concerns, and we decided to offer a program in French. The French language preschools enrolled its first two francophone students-but at the same time the English language preschool enrolled eight francophone students. Then the French program enrolled two English-speaking preschoolers whose parents wanted their children to benefit from living in a French-speaking country by learning French, and we began to find our direction.

Students get a feel of coffee cherries at the coffee processing plant

ICS Grade 5 students pose in front of a Tukul

Children learn language very quickly by immersion. Our students are proving this daily. Walk into the English immersion preschool, you may find the teacher reading a story book in English- but the students may be discussing it in French.

Secondly, it may be that we need to introduce more rigor into our qualitative data collection and analysis. Our sample of francophone families may have been too small, and since there were several people collecting the data, the questioning could have been inconsistent. Both of these factors could have made the analysis -and subsequent decision to market the preschool to francophone families - inaccurate.

The success of the French immersion preschool has important lessons for our marketing and strategic planning teams, as well as exciting implications for the rest of the school. At ASD, all students except the preschool go to French classes every day. If our students are already bilingual when they enter kindergarten or first grade, we will need to rethink our language programs to accommodate the needs of a largely bilingual student body.

Teacher guides preschoolers through a language immersion exercise

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Nigeria LNG Launches International Primary

Curriculum in the Early Years

By Mathews Emike – Nigeria LNG School

The Nigeria LNG School, Bonny Island is located in Rivers State of Nigeria. It is an international school and has a pupil population of about more than 500. There are about 60 teachers on the staff list. Both staff and pupils are drawn from different parts of the world. There are two streams: the International Stream and the Nigerian Stream. The former teaches the international curriculum whereas the latter teaches the Nigerian curriculum. However, it has been planned that by 2016, the whole school will be running one curriculum: the International Primary Curriculum (IPC). The transition to the IPC has been planned to happen in phases, starting with the Nigerian Stream Early Years in 2012.

In addition, the school has a Common Curriculum unit in which teachers teach specialist subjects across the streams. Such subjects include French, Home Economics, Music, Arts, Swimming, Physical Education and ICT. These subjects provide an opportunity for children to interact with one another. Assemblies and play time also foster additional integration across streams.

Recently, the school commenced the implementation of the International Primary Curriculum (IPC) in the early years of Nigerian Stream i.e. Nursery One and Two classes for the 3 and 4 year olds. Nursery one started with Animal units while Nursery Two commenced with the unit on Clothes. The entry points of both units were

fun - filled as children and parents present were all excited and happy. In order to ensure continuity with best practices in IPC, the Milepost One teachers are having learning-focused meetings and preparations to usher the present nursery 2 pupils into an IPC compliant class (primary 1), come September 2012.

We have already introduced some other elements of IPC in the primary classes where the Nigerian Curriculum is still going on. These elements include the personal goals, use of golden rules, activity based lesson plans and delivery and learning-focused unit meetings. International events /competitions like World Book Day, Teacher’s Day/World education games, etc are now celebrated by the whole school. The transition to IPC however is a gradual process and it’s being done in phases.

Pioneers of IPC : Nursery One Students

Students Learn Science and Development Issues while building Environmentally-Friendly and Sustainable “Earth Banda”By Kristeen Chachage – Head of School, Iringa International School

The senior student council at Iringa International School, Tanzania, had been raising money to build a new ‘Banda’ (open air structure) for nearly a year. They decided to use their funds to create a proto-type for an exciting new movement in architecture. This ‘earth-banda’ uses only local, reusable materials, and no cement. Earthen-filled sacks replace bricks or cement blocks, and the design requires no cement between sacks, either. The sacks are re-used flour sacks from local bakeries. Because all the materials are local, there is less transport and fuel needed. Students learned that cement production is one of the leading CO2-emitting industries which means the less cement used; the less we will ultimately contribute to global warming.

First the students had to agree on a design. Their advisor, Steve Borman, who is sponsored by the company J.U.A. solutions, suggested a composite approach – one side of the banda will have archways, while the other will have a low, curving wall with seats built in.

A clay model design of the structure (without roof)

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Once the sack-blocks are all in place and the walls are rendered, they can be painted for decoration. The soil used must be a special mix of clay and gravel that has no organic matter. Because the clay is wet when packed it goes around all the hard particles, then shrinks as it dries and holds it together, knocking out any air. Organic matter in the soil is dangerous, as it would break down over time and create weaknesses. This project has been a great opportunity for service learning through action. One class did a study of the soil profile used and learned to test the moisture levels. Another has looked at the issue of ‘squatter settlements’ in urban areas and the need for low-cost housing.

The roof is the current challenge; the traditional grass roof is expensive these days, both because of the wooden frame and

because the thatch is harder to find than it used to be. Another

option is a flat roof, with sod on top to keep the banda cool.

The soil dug out for the foundation of the structure was saved so that it can be used in a sod roof. However, plywood which is strong enough to support the sod is expensive, and poses a challenge to those attempting to use this architecture for alternative, lower-cost building. The more common corrugated-tin roof is also possible, or a domed (enclosed) structure.

Students have been involved in the construction of the banda from the outset. On the school service day, two groups of students spent the whole day finishing the foundation and starting to make sack-blocks. Since then, students have helped continue the construction after school and on holidays. Here are some of their views: Imran (14) “I learned that building out of materials from our surroundings is both attractive and useful. I may consider building a banda one day for my house in the future out of soil and flour sacks.

Another thing I learned today was the effectiveness of teamwork. . The project is practical as the earth that can be used to build

a house is available and provided people are trained and tools are available, the project could be sustainable as well. It’s attractive and can be earth-quake proof. ..”

Aaron (14) “It’s simple to build, it’s strong and provides a good shelter...It was hard even though we had the work force, tools, etc. I now have a sense of achievement and I felt like part of a team. “and Evans, (11) said working on the banda has “made me feel proud of myself … although it was tiring and needed a lot of strength.” One Community Service Coordinator, Megan Queripel notes, “I am so impressed with how well the students have co operated in order to make the Banda become a reality. They have worked hard to fundraise to buy the materials required and they are always eager to get their hands dirty and lend a hand in the building of the Banda,” and Coordinator Madeline Leno adds: “The banda construction has been a great way to integrate learning and community service. As a math teacher, I am often asked, ‘When are we ever going to use this?’ and with all the calculations that go into the design of the banda, the project serves as a great answer to this question.”

In addition to a platform for service learning and team building, perhaps the best thing about the Earth Banda is, if you ever need to move, you can take it apart and move it with you or re-use the materials in another way. J.U.A. Solutions will next build a home for a disabled worker with the same materials and technology, using the Iringa IS Banda as a proto-type. By the end of this year, our students will not only have the fruit of their labour – a completed banda – to enjoy, but also new ideas and deeper understanding of sustainability, local solutions and working as a team.

A teacher and students making blocks on Service Day

An archway under construction: The framework will be removed once the bags are solidly in place.

Students ensure the soil is mixed

before it gets packed into the sacks

“A sense of accomplishment”: Student volunteers pose on a wall they have built”

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it was handled, alternative ways in which they could have resolved a conflict, and how they might act differently in a similar situation in the future. There are a variety of different methods used for their reflection. Poetry, music, art or photographs may accompany a discussion of their feelings about the project.

An ISK students reflected that the service learning program, “has enabled me to inspire more people, especially children of the

future, to care about others and care about the environment.” Another student who painted murals at local health clinics commented, “ If service projects are meant to be about connecting with a community that you wouldn’t have

otherwise interacted with, the Nairobi Mural project was successful. If service learning is about learning valuable people skills then the Nairobi Mural project achieved this for me.” Finally another student shared that her peer mentoring experience, “was an extremely inspirational and important interaction, because these children are living in tough and difficult times yet they are full of hope, life and joy. What was really inspiring, was how these young children have so much faith despite the difficult conditions in which they live in and how they believe that one day their lives will change forever and for the better.”

Creating a Culture of ServiceBy Pierina Redler - International School of Kenya

“It is only in the giving of oneself to others that we truly live.” Ethel Percy Andrus, founder AARP (American Association of Retired persons).

The desire to incorporate service learning into education is growing throughout the world. The International School of Kenya has implemented an active service learning program in all three school divisions: the elementary school, the middle school and the high school. Our program is in the process of developing and aims to enhance the academic curriculum of the students.

Each week ISK has 200 enthusiastic students participating in various school service programs timetabled into our academic program and many more working on the week ends with their families or individual organizations. Bead making with the women of Kibera, (the largest slum in Nairobi) peer mentoring and reading programs with community schools, animal protection, recycling, Habitat for Humanity, drama and dance with disabled and disadvantaged schools, Interact and environmental projects are some of the areas our students are involved in. ISK students’ address critical issues affecting our challenging world and develop confidence as they cultivate mutually beneficial and sustainable relationships in our local community.

This year ISK created structured time within our timetable for our students to reflect on their service experiences in a weekly advisory period. Reflections are an important part of the experience because students are encouraged to evaluate one’s attributes that will be used in performing the service-learning project. At the conclusion of the project, students are encouraged to reflect on personal changes, skills acquired and changes to others in the community. During our Wednesday afternoon service learning program, students learn to work for a common goal and by doing so acquire a variety of skills, such as how to lead, how to communicate ideas, how to listen to others, and to how work as a team. They learn to appreciate as other cultures as they develop an understanding of similarities and differences. Through reflection, ISK students integrate both the service and the learning into their framework of personal experience. Our students maintain an electronic reflective journal. In order to encourage reflection, our advisors may ask students to describe the event, how

The service learning program at ISK uses direct experience to assist students learn to take the initiative, assume responsibility, empathize and understand their local community and develop problem-solving skills. It integrates meaningful service with instruction and reflection to enrich the learning experience, a method under which students learn and develop through active participation. It also empowers our students with the realization that they can make a difference in our world today.

ISK students posing with Kenyan students after mural painting with SODAS

(Save Our Daughters And Sons)in Kibera – the largest slum in East Africa

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TESOL: Students from the English-speaking School of Lubumbashi (TESOL) work on their UNL Independent Study High School courses.

AISC: A proctor from the American International School of Conakry (AISC) assists students with a UNL Independent Study High School course.

From Africa’s west coast to its center and beyond, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Independent Study High School (ISHS) and its partner schools in Africa have found ways to successfully provide accredited high school curriculum to students across the continent.

In the southeast corner of the Democratic Republic of Congo sits The English-speaking School of Lubumbashi (TESOL), dedicated to providing quality English-based education to children.

“In making initial inquiries with ISHS, I could see they were willing to work out the details of payment from overseas, shipment of materials and so on,” said Dr. Ellen Hoover, Director of TESOL. “We decided to give it a try with one or two students in 2007. We now have 21.”

While ninth grade uses a traditional classroom setting, TESOL uses ISHS as a full-scale substitute for grades 10 through 12. The staff has worked to make the transition to independent study as seamless as possible for students, incorporating one online course into the ninth grade curriculum to help students learn online course procedures as well as self-discipline and goal-setting.

Hoover said the following benefits have allowed the program to grow at her school:

• Courses are updated with appropriate frequency

• Courses range from basic through AP

• Customer service promptly handles orders, transcripts and questions

• Six-week to one-year allowance to complete a one-semester course allows student to move at their own pace

• Courses are provided online, on CD or in print

The American International School of Conakry (AISC) has also used these benefits for more than 10 years to help it provide the rigorous academic program it is known for.

“We have been very happy with the quality and integrity of the program,” said Dr. Raymond Lemoine, Director of AISC. “Our high school section is very small, so ISHS is the next best thing to having full-time faculty.”

For extended information about TESOL, AISC and ISHS, please visit highschool.unl.edu. If you have questions about ISHS, please contact Charlotte Seewald at cseewald2@unl.edu.

Two Schools in Africa Find Success with University of Nebraska-Lincoln Independent Study High SchoolBy Katelyn K. Ideus - Assistant Director of Marketing, Extended Education & OutreachPhoto by: Guy Mulobe

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Creating ‘Catalysts’ for ChangeSpecial Needs and 21st Century Teaching and Learning, February 22-25By Laura Malbogat – Educational Consultant

Take 25 participants from diverse World IBO schools, create an environment and space to purposefully encourage and support creativity, innovation and collaboration and what you can have – is – magic. This is what emerged during the three-day workshop; the room became a space filled with positive energy, flow, humour and laughter.

I had the pleasure of leading this three day workshop for AISA, at the American International School of Johannesburg, a school I had previously worked for a number of years, as their Director of Student Services and College Advisor. Having led numerous workshops for IB, AISA and ECIS, I’ve learnt the importance of what may, at first glance appear contradictory – to develop the organization and structure of the workshop to closely reflect the description of the workshop, while at the same time, remain flexible and open during the workshop to accommodate the more immediate and evolving needs of the participants. It is this combination of structure and intuition that makes the difference. Following a few simple strategies can successfully do this:

Contact the participants prior to the workshop and initiate dialogue and connection between and amongst participants and the workshop leader.

Check in frequently during the workshop, keep a pulse on how everyone is doing, and if necessary, make changes.

Pay close attention to the questions and comments shared by participants during the workshop and shift, either the content or process, if needed.

Contacting participants and inviting their responses to a few specific questions prior to finalizing the details of the workshop facilitates deeper understanding of the participants’ needs and begins the important process of collaboration amongst them. In this workshop, participants responded to four open-ended questions, shared on a google document. This created the opportunity for participants to view and share responses to such questions as, ‘Fast forward to the end of the workshop and share what skills, strategies, and tools do you hope to take away with you? Or, provide a description of a ‘case study’ from your school that outlines a dilemma or academic challenge a student or a group of students face, that you would like to gain a deeper understanding and, very importantly, leave with some solutions. By setting up a shared google doc, participants begin to connect with people they do not yet know – but will.

Collaboration is a key 21st century skill, modeling this behavior throughout the three day workshop was a primary goal. Flexibility is another skills we need to develop in our students and, consequently, in our teachers. It begins with leader flexibility, being open to changing the workshop to respond to the evolving needs of participants, the unplanned technology glitches, and /or the flow of the workshop as it unfolds. Risk and chance leads to change. How often do teachers participate in a workshop that encourages risk taking in a safe, supportive forum? One example was to encourage a

participant to practice her leadership skills, she did so by leading her group in a session and sharing the results with the whole group.

Many 21st century teaching and learning principles focus on the skills, behaviors, and attitudes needed: it is essential that our teachers are provided with opportunities and training to risk, create and innovate.The group of participants came not only from diverse countries but also represented the range of IB Programs: PYP, MYP and DP. When working on the case

studies, or addressing a specific challenge raised, we worked collaboratively and collectively across programs. Too often teachers only meet in their respective teams or departments despite knowing that diversity brings different perspectives, understandings and solutions. We learn not just from those who teach similar grades or subjects but also by engaging in discussions and problem solving with a wider, more inclusive group. Some questions posed to the group included:

Are LSS/SEN teachers typically included in IB or PYP Coordinator meetings?

Should we be ‘equal’ in assigning duties and preps when it comes to SEN/LSS teachers? What is best use of an SEN teacher’s expertise and time? Is equal – fair?

How can we practice ‘differentiated scheduling and work loads’ to more effectively model differentiation and meet the diverse needs of students?

Teaching our students to ask critical, higher order thinking questions is essential for 21st century learning. Too often, we miss the significant potential questions have

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in learning. If we can engage our students in asking critical, thoughtful questions, we can instill a lifelong curiosity for learning. In general, teachers ask too many questions and too often, the same students reply. How can we differentiate the questions we ask, and ultimately, how we involve more students to engage in higher order thinking? We spent a number of the workshop hours working with Bloom’s Taxonomy and Critical Thinking; reading, researching and applying what was learnt.

You may wonder how a workshop leader can meet diverse participant needs, abilities and interests? One strategy is to step off the stage and become, instead, a facilitator for learning. Modeling a differentiated learning approach during the three-day workshop reflected one of the workshop goals. One example implemented was to set up stations, in this case, based on the participants’ interests, needs and prior knowledge acquired from a quick pre- assessment and survey done on day two of the workshop.

What became clear was the following:

A few participants new to Special Needs (even though they were experienced IB educators wanted to learn the ‘basics about learning disabilities’

A second group wanted to learn the basics about differentiation

A third group was interested in extending their knowledge about differentiated instruction

A fourth group wanted to learn strategies to support and influence regular classroom teachers who were reluctant or struggled with how to implement differentiated instruction.

Participants chose the station that reflected their needs. As a workshop leader, my focus on 21st century skills was to ‘facilitate’ their learning, modeling my role as ‘guide on the side’ instead of ‘sage on the stage’.

Perhaps one strategy, more than any other became a highlight; the ‘gift sharing’ that took place during random times became a favorite moment, both for the participants and myself. As workshop leader, I wanted to reinforce the power of collective knowledge, where participants shared, for example, a strategy, tool, or program. By the last day, participants were volunteering even more strategies and resources; eventually this resulted in setting up a google doc/wiki site to continue the learning, sharing and dialogue following the workshop. What better way to end a workshop – than to set it up as just, the beginning.

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Livingstone with African music for my soundtrack, a beer on a hot day in a bar in Livingstone and a conversation with a guy who writes novels and arranges for used cars from Japan, a ride with 25 people, some chickens, bags of flour and three babies in a pickup truck going from Salima, Malawi to the Jolly Boys lodge on the Lake, or the countless smiling angels who helped me find my way as I ‘confidently’ tried to find ‘shortcuts’ over the hills from my hotel to downtown Antananarivo. Along with the wonderful support, conversations and learning I experienced during the dinners, lunches and classroom visits at the great AISA schools, it was Africa’s everyday life, that in prior trips I was not comfortable experiencing, that made this trip so memorable. It made me think of a subject that comes up often in International School circles…How to leave the security of the school community to really experience the

culture the host country. As someone who often works with parents on TCK issues, I hear this question all the time; “How can I help my children appreciate where we are living?”

I guess everyone has a different way to do this. Many go on outings, driving to various sights and adventures. For me, it can be much simpler. There is no substitute for opening the gates and just ‘being there’ on the streets, on public transportation and taking one step outside of my comfort zone. While I realize that we need our ‘street smarts’ to consider where and when to do so, I think that we often over-estimate the dangers as we ratchet up our fears. Our gated communities, be they mental or physical, keep others out, but also us ‘in’. While we protect ourselves against the real and imagined dangers of the ‘outside’, we inadvertently become prisoners of our own fear…and the problem is, the philosophy that keeps us ‘inside’ is self-perpetuating. The more we rely on rumors, TV news stories and internet blogs for our information, the ‘outside’ can look scarier and scarier as stories of car jacking, muggings and robberies dominate dinner conversation.

Again, let’s be clear…I’m not saying that we need to throw all caution to the wind. There are plenty of dangers we need to be aware of, loved ones to protect and plenty of people in the world everywhere who do not want the best for us. Everyone’s zone of comfort also extends differently. I am saying though that a crust of fear tends to form on all of us as we get older and that there are small steps we each can take that will clean the ‘mental plaque’ from our minds and hearts and help us remember the beauty of everyday life, the joy of immersion and the ecstatic freedom of surprise and spontaneity.

This is what I luckily realized on this last trip to AISA schools in Africa, where my subjects of teaching ‘expertise’ were writing, school culture and TCK experiences. As always, I learned more than I taught. As I taught the importance of writing from everyday experience, I thought of the stair/streets filled with people and their goods in Antananarivo. As I taught about the importance of diversity, I thought the village proverb taught to me by a someone who I sat next to on the bus to Livingstone and as I taught about how TCK parents might help their children learn from the culture within which they live, I thought of the 40 women, young and old, walking along the road near Salima, bursting into joyous song that they would later sing in the hills to bless the growth of a kernel of corn.

Oh by the way, the proverb on that bus? “The old man sees twice as much from his chair as the young person does from the top of a mountain.” I’m not sure I believe this. In some ways it seems a proverb of consolation. But now past 60, it rather made me at least temporarily feel good about my age…another benefit of the wisdom of the road, although truthfully, after my bus ride and my trip to Africa, I felt both younger and wiser.

Thanks to all the Schools, to AISA and to the angels I met on the way.

AISA’S VISITING AUTHORS TELL THEIR STORY OF AFRICA

By Marc Levitt

I recently completed a tour of three AISA schools, The American School of Lusaka, Bishop McKenzie International School in Lilongwe, Malawi and the American International School in Antananarivo. This is my third African tour, the first time in Zambia and Malawi, my second in ‘Tana’. First, I had a great time, but that shouldn’t surprise any of you who already know Africa. I loved my last two trips to Africa of course, witnessing the ancient connection between Christians and Jews during the Christmas pilgrimage to Lalibela, taking a Safari at Masa Mari, seeing the coastal slave ‘castles’ in Ghana, watching acrobatic surfers in Senegal, seeing lemurs in central Madagascar and hiking the hills outside Johannesburg. This time however was the first time I felt genuinely comfortable walking, taking buses, jumping on the back of pickup trucks and wandering the hillsides of Antananarivo. The expected joys were all there…the roar and thunder of Victoria Falls, the fishing nets along Lake Malawi, the silk markets of Antananarivo. But perhaps even more importantly for me were the smaller, less advertised joys of temporary integration into everyday life; the bus ride from Lusaka to

About the AISA’s Visiting Author ProgrammeThe visiting author program enables international schools who are full or affiliate school members of AISA to pool resources to source and invite an author from Africa or from any another continent to visit each of the schools for about a week. The author works with students and teachers to share stories and experiences as well as run training sessions for teachers and librarians. Recently AISA coordinated two visits by authors Marc Levitt and Toni Buzzeo. Below are their stories of Africa:

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By Toni Buzzeo

How lucky I have been to travel to Africa three times in the past sixteen years—but never more lucky than during my recent trip to Ethiopia and Kenya to visit two international schools! What an extraordinary experience to visit these two capital cities, in turn, and work with children and teachers from all over the world at the International Community School in Addis and the International School of Kenya in Nairobi.

I spent five delightful days at ICS-Addis with my host, librarian Martha Langille, meeting with individual classes and small grade-level groupings in the library. With flannel board, puppets, and fingerplays, I introduced the youngest learners to my stories for young children. It was especially pleasurable to share my forthcoming African savannah story, Stay Close to Mama. In grades 1-5, I shared slides that introduced them to the connections between my life experiences and the books that I write. We also spent a good deal of time in discussion, as the students were well-versed in my body of work and came to sessions with so many interesting questions and connections of their own!

I also had the opportunity to address middle schoolers in a morning assembly. Using my new book, Lighthouse Christmas, as a model, I shared the necessity of a team approach in creating children’s literature—a team that includes the author, the illustrator, the editor, the designer, and a subject specialists. My goal in talking to young adults is to share a vision for the many creative career paths open to them in the arts. That same afternoon found me meeting with the elementary and middle school faculty in a workshop entitled, “Show, Don’t Tell.” We had a lively hour of writing together, and teachers took a plan for lessons back to the classroom that they could use the very next day.

The Addis Ababa week wouldn’t have been complete without a visit to the Tesfa-sponsored Mercato School. My good friend and fellow writer, Jane Kurtz, has long been involved in Ethiopia Reads, she was anxious to have me visit this school where her organization has planted a library. Martha and I then travelled across the city to meet with the librarians who staff the many school libraries that Ethiopia Reads has planted. What a rich and inspiring experience it was to meet with these librarians.

The second week found me equally excited to be at ISK for three days with my host, librarian Barbara Jones. We opened with a grade 2-5 assembly in the lovely theater space where students in grade three presented an outstanding recitation-and-movement performance focused on my books and my characters. I was so touched by their deep thinking about my writing! I shared slides of my journey from childhood to children’s author that served as a jumping off point for my class and grade level meetings with them. That same day, I met with the youngest students in early childhood, Kindergarten, and first grade classes for a storytelling session that included songs, a puppet-play, and finger plays.

Our week continued with smaller groupings, from single classes to grade level meetings in which we focused on specific books students had studied in depth, allowing us to have valuable discussions of the inspiration and creative process for each book. Especially enjoyable were two sessions with grades four and five in which we looked at my latest book, One Cool Friend. I shared an early draft with them and we discussed the changes I’d made to both plot and character. I was also able to share David Small’s early character sketches so that we could understand the character development process for the artist, as well.

One of the most remarkable mornings came on Thursday, when the grade three teachers and parents hosted a breakfast for students who then joined me in a morning-long writing workshop. Seated at tables with tablecloths and folders, like adult professionals, students took their writing seriously, eager to contribute examples of their own work. As one student said at the end of the session, “That’s the most fun I ever had writing!”

As at ICS-Addis, I had a chance to present a faculty workshop at ISK. This time, we worked with Reader’s Theater (RT). Elementary faculty members cheerfully volunteered to be readers of two RT scripts—Bee-bim Bop (from the book by Linda Sue Park) and Faraway Home (from the book by Jane Kurtz)—and I must say, their performances were superb! We then examined the benefits and procedures for employing RT in the classroom. Several teachers let me know that they planned to implement RT as soon as the next day in their classrooms, a sure sign of a successful in-service.

I’ll not soon forget my two weeks of school visits in Africa, and I can hardly wait to return!

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Follett Goes MobileBy Britten Follett

“Media specialists need to use everything available to connect with this generation of kids.” Don Rokusek : Follett Program Director-Destiny

iPads and tablets and smart phones, oh my! Educators around the world are struggling with how best to use this new mobile technology in their libraries and classrooms. Follett is delivering solutions. Follett, a global education solutions provider, has spent the past year working to solve the problems educators face bringing retail eBook devices into a classroom setting, such as lending and circulation. Follett’s answer lies in a series of applications designed to take powerful e-Content management solutions…mobile.

The Destiny Quest mobile app is based on Follett’s award winning Destiny Library Manager Software. The app allows students to search and access library resources including databases and eBooks anytime, anywhere. Don Rokusek, the Program Director for Follett’s Destiny says, “Kids today may use their mobile device to search Google and we all know the tons of information you are going to get in response to a Google search. Our products provide access to educator friendly information making research easy.”

A student using the Destiny Quest app, who wants to read a particular eBook title, can virtually check out the eBook, and read it on his or her mobile device using Follett’s Digital Reader app. John Williams, the Director of Digital Products at Follett says, “These apps are designed to be the ideal preK-12 mobile application for reading Follett’s eBooks. We are providing the content and features that work for students. It is not a separate system. All of your circulation is kept in one place.”

Speaking of circulation and collection development, Follett’s new apps are not just for students. Librarians who use Titlewave, Follett’s online collection development tool, can download the mobile app to gain immediate access to their library collection. Williams explains, “If I’m in a bookstore and I see a book I like, I want to make sure I’ve already purchased that book for my library. If I haven’t ordered it, I can immediately add it to my wish list.” Rokusek says as technology evolves, so will Follett, “There’s a whole lot more we want to do to leverage mobile devices.”

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Responsible Profit is Possible Dipesh Pabari – Camps International, Africa Operations Manager

As we wound down our summer season with a big smile of satisfaction and some relief, I could not help but think how middle class high school Kenyan students would fit into a program like ours. Most of our hip youth loathe the thought of spending a long weekend in ‘shags’ let alone spending a month planting trees and digging toilets. Then I wondered whether this lot who spend their holidays hanging out in Nairobi’s shopping malls would feel about spending a month in the south of France picking grapes in a vineyard or working on a sheep farm in the UK? Would this appeal to them?

Over the course of two months we hosted about 650 students from the UK in Kenya and Tanzania who spent a month in country working hard and playing hard. I recalled scenes of 30-40 pairs of hands digging away under the baking sun as they eagerly tried to complete their target on a trench in yet another neglected primary school on the periphery of Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary. I remembered another group who sang through the entire six days of laying blocks for a classroom in a little primary school tucked away on the South Coast and I smiled thinking about the team who refused to stop working until they finished breaking the old concrete of a massive water tank for cattle that was to be restored for elephants on Rukinga Ranch.

This was my third full-blown season with Camps International - a responsible Travel company that operates its own camps and projects across the Coast Province in Kenya and around the Arusha-Moshi region in northern Tanzania. With the primary clientele being under 18 high school students from the UK, one is immediately inclined to wonder how you would convince a teenager who has just completed high school to spend their first month of freedom taking bucket baths and digging holes in the African outback.

And equally important, is the enigma that 95% of these students actually fundraise and work odd jobs for over a year to save up and come out for these trips. This is not mommy and daddy paying to get rid of little Johnny for the summer. This is someone who believes that this is the right thing to do: a young mind who chooses to spend a month working on various projects that they may or may not see to completion on a continent that they have never set foot on and in the case of Kenya, probably the only thing they have heard is that people were hacking one another to pieces over some rigged election less than two years ago.

Expeditions such as the ones Camps International offer are part of a growing trend across the globe. For those that work in the industry, you will be very familiar with the ‘Gap Year’ industry which is all about offering young people a useful holiday which gives them exposure to new cultures and societies and hands on experience with various ‘problems’ from wildlife conservation

to community development in parts of the world like ours – the so-called Third World. In the UK, taking a ‘gap year’ has become so much the norm that one would be considered weird if they went straight to University out of High School.

Like any other trend, the gap industry has not been spared from the critical gaze of the media, which keeps a tab on just how these expeditions are packaged. It’s a necessary evil that keep its eye on the profit moguls for like anything else that operates in regions like ours, it is so easy to turn pictures of swollen bellies and fly infested children or elephants grazing peacefully on the savanna landscape into profit. As a Kenyan, I loathe what Africa has become in the western eyes (more so because we allowed it to happen) and thus approached entry into the responsible travel industry very cautiously.

Having worked in the not-for-profit sector for the past 15 years, words like ‘sustainable’, ‘eco’, ‘responsible’ ‘community’ had long since become a cryptic crossword divorced from the reality that they are used to describe. Most people who are not in the NGO are very skeptical about this do-good industry but that is another discussion. Suffice to say, that from where I am sitting now in a company that employs over 60 people and spends millions of shillings building schools, creating income generating activities for various local youth groups and women’s groups, repairs water tanks for elephants, builds new homes for widows and the elderly, plants thousands of trees and still manages to make some profit – I would like to think that those countless workshops and conferences that led to trends like ‘responsible travel’ and ‘sustainable tourism’ have actually played their part in creating what I hope one day will be the norm and not the exception.

Students help maintaining fish ponds owned by a local woman’s group on the South Coast of Kenya

UK school expedition to Kenya helps to construct a centre for a basket weaving group in Kenya

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For the last ten years, the beautiful village of Anzère, in the Swiss Alps, has been the destination of many AISA schools for their annual ski trip. 2012 is no exception and February say the International School of Uganda, Ambrosoli International School and AVI-Cenna International School enjoying some of the best snow conditions that the Alps have seen in nearly 20 years. March welcomed Addis Ababa International School, Lincoln Community School from Ghana and the International School of Tanganyika together for a week, for a unique experience, giving their students the chance to meet and enjoy time with students from other AISA schools.

On arrival in Anzère, everyone soon forgets about the many hours of travel. Greeted with snow and temperatures often many, many, degrees lower than when they left home, big smiles stretch across the faces of everyone! A ski trip is unique, providing experiences not usually available to international students, but it is easy to forget that for some students, the pleasure of just touching and throwing snow for the first time in their lives, is the highlight of the trip!

Skiing challenges students of all abilities. Of course, for those who have never skied before, there is the challenge of learning new skills and skiing can be physically demanding. But even for students who are accomplished skiers, there is always something to learn and skills can be honed on new pistes. Skiing is an incredibly inclusive activity, which

makes it the ideal focus for a school trip. In only one week, students who had never touched snow before the trip can be skiing the same slalom course as other, experienced, skiers and the joy on their faces, having faced such a challenge and overcome it, is inspirational to their ski instructors and the school chaperones alike.

A successful school trip is one when students are kept busy and motivated and with a minimum of free time. One of the reasons so many AISA schools choose Anzère is its suitability for school trips. Swiss efficiency and safety is combined with charm and a friendly welcome. A small village, with a pedestrianized area, Anzère is ideal for the programme of evening activities on offer to AISA schools. Sledding, snow sculptures and torch-lit walks are combined with less traditional “Stock Exchange”, “Mini-Olympics” and “Jeopardy” to ensure that the fun continues after the skiing stops. Of course, the school chaperones are not forgotten and Anzère’s Spa and Wellness helps sooth aching muscles and a traditional fondue or raclette is always organised.

For many students, the ski trip will be the first time away from home. For some students, it will be the first time tying their own shoelaces! Whilst it can be a challenge to bring students on a school trip who are used to being pampered by parents or maids, the benefits in terms of independence and maturity shouldn’t be underestimated.

The

counsellors will always be

on hand to support and remind students, but personal responsibility is encouraged and this extends to keeping their personal space in their bedrooms tidy and helping serve and clear tables at mealtimes.

Although the benefits of a ski trip are clear during the trip, many benefits are less obvious and only discovered on return to school. As the school chaperones are supported throughout the trip by an experienced and motivated team of counsellors, many of the responsibilities of a school trip are shared and the stress and challenges are reduced or eliminated. The result is the opportunity for the chaperones to interact with the students on a level not always possible in the classroom and the benefit of this is realized in the classroom long after the ski trip is over.

For more information: info@viamonde.com www.viamonde.com

AISA Shools take on Swiss AlpsBy Robert Perris - Viamonde

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AISA School Leaders Retreat 19-21 October, 2012

AISA School Leaders Retreat 19-21 October, 2012 AISA School Leaders’ Retreat will be held in Johannesburg, South Africa on October 19-21, 2012 at the Indaba Hotel. This will be a holistic two day programme dedicated to addressing the personal & professional development needs of administrators in the AISA region. Heads of School, Principals & Board Members are encouraged to attend in teams.

The complete programme for the AISA School Leaders’ Retreat to be held 19-21 October, 2012 can be found on the AISA website www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012.

Presenters

Carrie Levenson-Wahl & Mike MillerArea of Specialty: Development / Strategic Planning

Carrie Levenson-Wahl has thirty years of experience working in independent school development. As a former French teacher in both high schools and universities, she has a Masters Degree in French Linguistics, and speaks French fluently. She has personally managed five successful capital campaigns, established strong annual funds by initiating leadership donor and alumni reunion giving programs,

worked closely with trustees and development committees, and effectively managed development offices of two to six staff members. As a consultant, she has special expertise in assisting small development offices reach their potential in both annual and capital efforts. She is currently the Director of External Affairs at the International School of Paris where she has been for the past ten years. In addition, Carrie has been a frequent speaker and presenter at CASE, ECIS, IDPE and NAIS workshops and conferences, both in the United States, Europe and Asia, served as a trustee on the CASE-Europe Board, and was a member of the ECIS Development Committee. She is a recent recipient of CASE’s Robert Bell Crow Award for Excellence in the Independent School Advancement Field, and the Chrystal Apple Teaching Award for excellence in presenting at CASE conferences.

Mike Miller is a 42-year veteran of independent advancement, now in his twelfth year in an international setting. Mike is a frequent speaker at CASE, NAIS, ECIS, IDPE and regional associations around the world and for eight years taught the summer institute (Independent School Management) in educational fundraising for newcomers to development and international schools. He served as chair of the ECIS Development Committee and is a CASE Europe advisor for international schools. Mike has chaired both major school advancement conferences in the United States and Europe and is the recipient of CASE’s Robert Bell Crow Award for Excellence in the Independent School Advancement Field, a designated Blue Ribbon Principal (secondary) by the U. S. Department of Education and the inaugural recipient of the new CASE Europe Award for Distinguished Service to International Schools. Mike retired as the Director of External Affairs at The American School in London in June 2008 to devote time to consulting with international schools. Mike’s degrees are in history, communications, secondary school administration and international education. Mike has been a teacher, High School Principal, Assistant Head of School, and a Campus Head, as well as a practitioner in all areas of advancement.

Full Day Institute

Title: Strategic Planning Made Fun - No stress, just success!Programme: School Leaders’ RetreatDays Offered: Saturday October 20, 2012 (10:00-17:00) and repeated Sunday October 21, 2012 (10:00-17:00) Description Does the very thought of Strategic Planning for your school make you groan? Whether your priorities are facilities, finances, or faculty, this lively, highly interactive session will introduce you to a new way of planning your institution’s future. You will learn how to engage members of your constituencies in a full-day, thought-provoking, interactive and out-of-the-box workshop which will move everyone together towards a successful and highly achievable Strategic Plan complete with action steps and paced timeline. This session will also include ways to address finding the resources necessary to fund your clearly-defined and prioritized strategic projects!

Objective • To provide a straight-forward Strategic Planning process • To engage the participants in a realistic process for future planning • To introduce participants to the process of funding their strategic plan Target Audience : School Leaders and Administrators

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Chris JansenSenior Lecturer, School of Sciences and Physical Education, University of CanterburyArea of Specialty: Educational Innovation / Appreciative Inquiry

Chris Jansen is a senior lecturer at the University of Canterbury, where he teaches and supervises school leaders studying at the Masters Degree level in Educational Leadership. Chris is also the Learning Community Director at Linwood College, a role focused on professional learning and community partnerships. Chris works alongside principals and other school leaders through implementing school based professional learning communities, and facilitates workshops for a range of schools and

organisations both in New Zealand and in the Asia Pacific region. Chris has written a range of international journal publications including ‘Leadership for emergence: Exploring organisations through a living system lens’ and ‘Leaders building professional learning communities: Appreciative inquiry in action’.

Full Day InstituteTitle: Educational innovation - building responsive, creative and flexible organisational capacityProgramme: School Leaders’ RetreatDays Offered: Saturday October 20, 2012 (10:00-17:00) and repeated Sunday October 21, 2012 (10:00-17:00) Description In this retreat we will explore the principles of self organisation (linked to complexity dynamics) with respect to developing the capacity of organisations to respond in an innovative manner to the rapidly changing and unpredictable global context that we operate in. This will involve reflecting on the assumptions inherent in the way organisation operate, considering both the strengths and weakness of a machine based lens as well as a living systems lens. We will then examine the catalyst role of leaders to cultivate this generative process in their organisations and introduce a range of practical strategies that leaders can implement including adaptive leadership. Finally participants will be introduced to systems mapping processes as a tool for engaging staff in strategic thinking.

Objective • Exploring self organisation and emergence - what drives this behaviour?• Viewing organisations through a living system lens.• Implications for adaptive leadership and systems thinking in practice.

Target Audience: School Leaders and Administrators

Judith SchechtmanSenior Consultant and Partner, Triangle AssociatesArea of Specialty: Governance / Leadership

Judith Schechtman is a Senior Consultant and principal in Triangle Associates, St. Louis, an international consulting firm specializing in leadership and organizational management. Ms. Schechtman holds a masters degree in Social Work from Washington University, St Louis where she was formerly an adjunct professor. Ms. Schechtman consults and trains internationally primarily in the fields of higher education and independent elementary and secondary school education. Ms. Schechtman researches and

writes extensively in the fields of leadership, governance, strategy and coaching in independent and international schools. She is a regular speaker at conferences within North America, Europe, and Asia. Ms. Schechtman lives in St. Louis with her husband, Richard. Their daughter lives and works in Washington, DC.

Marc FrankelSenior Consultant and Partner, Triangle AssociatesArea of Specialty: Governance / Leadership

Marc T. Frankel is a consulting psychologist in St. Louis, Missouri, and is a senior consultant and principal in Triangle Associates. Dr. Frankel trained at Emory University where he received a Ph.D., and at the University of Missouri -Columbia School of Medicine. He consults and coaches with individuals and groups primarily in the health care, education, and technology industries. His experience as a practicing manager and as a trustee gives him first-hand familiarity with issues of leadership and governance in

nonprofit institutions. Dr. Frankel is a faculty member for several international and national leadership institutes. Together with colleagues at Triangle Associates, Dr Frankel writes extensively on strategy, leadership and governance, and regularly speaks at conferences in Europe, North America, Central America and Asia. He is a trustee at the Wildwood School in Los Angeles, and serves as co-chair of its strategic planning committee. Dr. Frankel lives in St. Louis, along with his wife, Jacqueline, and their son, Alexander.

AISA School Leaders Retreat 19-21 October, 2012

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Full Day InstituteTitle Turmoil and Conundrum: Governance, Leadership and the Interface with StrategyProgramme School Leaders’ RetreatDays Offered Saturday October 20, 2012 (10:00-17:00) and repeated Sunday October 21, 2012 (10:00-17:00) Description Governance and leadership are inextricably linked in the world of international education. Boards lead by how they govern, and heads/directors lead by the tone they set for everyone else in the school, much in the same way that the leader of a jazz band lays down a basic rhythm and then encourages talented colleagues to improvise. This workshop will first approach governance and leadership as separate concepts, and then will integrate the two into a mutually dependent paradigm for stable, sustainable school futures. Topics will include:

• Challenges and issues for international school leaders in Africa; • The five primary responsibilities of governing boards; • Strategies for board-head partnership; • Visioning for 2015-20; • Charting strategy in a turbulent world; • Forming strategic trajectories for your school; • Talking about the future with your present-oriented board; • Calibrating style of leadership with school culture and strategic directions; and • How heads/directors lead their boards. Participants will engage in a variety of case studies and brainstorming exercises. Everyone will leave the session with a menu of topics and ideas to discuss with their boards and administrative teams.

Objective • Explore and apply good practice in governance. • Laying down the theme: exploring the role of heads/directors. • Formulating strategies for school stability and sustainability. Target Audience : School Leaders and Administrators

Opportunities for Business Associates Many of our Associate Members also attend conference and often exhibit their products and services for teachers and administrators. This year Business Associates exhibition will run concurrently with AISA School Leaders Retreat. Some also conduct very popular workshops in their areas of expertise. AISA invites business associates to submit proposals to present 60-Minute workshops during this institute. (Closes June 30, 2012)

Presenters

Marc LevinsonPrincipal, Independent School SolutionsArea of Specialty: Business ManagementMarc Levinson is currently serving as Interim Executive Director for Mid-South Independent School Business Officers (MISBO) – the largest regional association of independent school business officers in the US with 300 member schools. In addition he has his own practice - consulting to independent schools primarily in the areas of finance and operations. From 2007-2011 Marc served as a Director with the National Business Officers Association (NBOA). Prior to joining NBOA, Marc spent six years as the Business Manager at Alexander Dawson School in Lafayette, Colorado. Prior to entering the Independent School world Marc spent three years as Director of Operations and Finance at Sounds True, a Spoken Word Audio Publishing company and three years in a similar position at Community Food Share, Boulder

County’s Food Bank. Much of his career has been in the food service industry, owning and operating a number of very successful restaurants in Boulder and Denver, as well as providing executive direction for a natural foods grocery store. Marc recently served as the Chair of the Finance Committee of the Board of Trustees of Watershed School. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Science and a MBA (Organizational Development) from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

AISA School Leaders Retreat 19-21 October, 2012

AISA Business Managers’ Institute 21-24 October, 2012

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AISA Business Managers’ Institute 21-24 October, 2012

Sarah DaignaultInstructor, Teachers College, Columbia UniversityArea of Specialty:Business ManagementSarah Daignault is an instructor at the Klingenstein Center at Teachers College, Columbia University in New York City. She is working with Masters candidates in the area of school finance. She also has a consulting practice working with schools and associations in the areas of operations, finance and governance. Sarah spent 12 years as the Executive Director of the National Business Officers Association (NBOA), an association dedicated to serving school business officers by providing professional development and information on schools finance and operations. Prior to founding NBOA, Sarah spent five years as the Business Officer at Friends School of Baltimore and four years as the Business Manager at Bryn Mawr School for Girls. In addition to her experience in school finance and operations, she has

extensive governance experience. During her 19 year tenure on the Board of Directors of the Madeira School in Virginia, Sarah was the President of the Board for eight years. She also chaired the Capital Campaign for five years and the Head Search process. She serves on the Boards of the National Coalition of Girls’ Schools (NCGS) and the Association of Independent School Admission Professionals (AISAP). She has also served on the Board of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) as well as three other independent schools.

AISA Educators’ Conference will be held at the Indaba Hotel and American International School of Johannesburg in South Africa on October 21-24, 2012. During the Educators’ Conference there will be workshops and institutes targeting both administrators and teachers.

The complete programme for the AISA Educators’ Conference may be found on the AISA website here www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012AISA Educators’ Conference Keynote Speakers

Every year, AISA carefully selects the best international speakers to deliver keynotes at our conferences. The following is a list of keynotes at the AISA 2012 events.

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Dr. Beverley NaidooAuthor

Beverley Naidoo grew up in South Africa, joining student resistance to apartheid, leading to detention without trial and exile in Britain, where she became a teacher, education adviser and award-winning writer of novels, short stories, plays and poetry. Her first children’s book, Journey to Jo’burg, originally banned in her birth country, remains an eye-opener for readers worldwide after 27 years. She won the Carnegie Medal for The Other Side of Truth. No Turning Back, Out of Bounds and Burn My Heart all won Children’s Africana Book Awards.

Books for younger readers include Baba’s Gift; The Great Tug of War; S is for South Africa, a poetry alphabet with photographer Prodeepta Das (Children’s Africana Honor Book, USA 2011); and Aesop’s Fables with illustrator Piet Grobler (Parent’s Choice Silver Award, USA 2011, USBBY 2012 Outstanding International Booklist). Adult non-fiction includes a biography Death of an Idealist: In search of Neil Aggett, (October 2012, Jonathan Ball, SA), and Through Whose Eyes? based on her PhD research into reading responses and racism. Beverley is also an honorary doctorate (Open University, Southampton University, Exeter University) and was the South African nominee for the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2008. See also www.beverleynaidoo.com.

Keynote: Welcome to Jo’burg: We Are Our Stories

DescriptionThe stories, oral and literary, that we tell ourselves and our children are a vital part of who we are. Like our stories, we can be ‘fixed’ or capable of change. Beverley Naidoo will tell something of her own story, born during WW2 into ‘white Johannesburg’, and how both reading and writing have been a critical part of her own journeys in crossing boundaries. She will reflect on her experiences in returning from exile in the 1990s to work with young South Africans of all backgrounds. She will offer you glimpses into this city ‘Jozi’ and beyond - through Aesop’s ancient tales set in the nearby veld to her newly-launched adult/young adult biography of Neil Aggett who died 30 years ago in a Johannesburg police cell. Beverley upholds that while our stories are our ‘memory against forgetting’, they are also our future. When: Educators’ Conference and Business Managers’ Institute Opening Plenary (October 21, 2012)

In addition, Beverley will also be presenting institutes and workshops www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012

Linda SillsDirector of Program Development, Global Issues Network

Linda Sills is the Director of Program Development for the Global Issues Network (GIN). Linda has been involved with GIN since 2006. Presently based in Berkeley, CA, she began in East Asia and has since worked in various regions building the Global Issues Network organizing student-led conferences first in Asia: China and Thailand, and now for the Americas: Peru, Brazil, and Costa Rica. GIN’s membership is 1500 strong and growing www.global-issues-network.org.

Working in six international schools as a teacher, counselor and school psychologist has proven to be invaluable. Three of these schools were in Kenya, Burkina Faso and Morocco for 18 wonderful years. Having a leadership role with EARCOS was excellent preparation for her current role. Linda received a BA from UC Berkeley, a MA from Harvard and Tufts and is a devoted lifelong learner Keynote: Responsible Global Citizenship-Service-Student Empowerment (create a circle with arrows between each idea)

DescriptionThe power of accepting one’s Global Citizenship challenges us to recognize our shared responsibility to act on global issues that affect us all as members of an interconnected global community. Service, carefully and well chosen, is then the imperative to address these shared responsibilities. Student Empowerment comes through taking action. Service with sustainable solutions fuels this powerful relationship. When: October 24, 2012

Linda will also be presenting institutes and workshops www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012See the AISA website www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012 for full details

AISA Educator’s Conference - Keynotes 21-24 October, 2012

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Brett DillinghamDirector, Performance Literacy Institute Brett Dillingham created the performance literacy process, where students write and tell their own stories to authentic audiences. He has spent the past 20 years teaching in remote villages in Alaska and Canada, high-poverty urban environments in the United States and Western Europe, and international schools and conferences in North and South America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa. Brett’s keynote addresses include the World Congress on Reading and the International

Reading Association. He is the author of the children’s book Raven Day and the textbook Performance Literacy through Storytelling. Keynote: A Pre-history and History of Storytelling… and Why It Matters To Teachers

DescriptionStorytelling surrounds us yet it is often difficult to “see” it- we often seem as unaware that storytelling is continuously occurring around us, much like a fish is unaware that it is surrounded by water. In this keynote you will hear stories, learn the likely origin of storytelling, become more aware of the stories around you, and have a basic understanding of what the latest brain research tells us about why storytelling is the means by which humans’ brains remember and transmit information. When the keynote- the storytelling- is over, you will have stories unfolding in your head and breathe the stories that envelop you.

When: October 23, 2012

In addition, Brett will also be presenting institutes and workshops www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012

Cathy Berger KayePresident, CBK Associates When asked, “Where do you live?” Cathryn Berger Kaye often answers “in Los Angeles and airports.” In her work as president of CBK Associates and ABCD Books, Cathy travels 120 plus days a year throughout the United States and globally providing professional and organizational development, keynotes, in-depth institutes, and exceptional education and learning resources. Most recent journeys include keynoting Singapore Character and Civic Education Conference, leading a three-day service learning institute in Jakarta for educators from 10 countries, leading a yea- long series professional development for educators through the department of education in Hawaii, and addressing

critical education needs of New York City teachers. Cathryn authored The Complete Guide to Service Learning, and a Kids in Action workbook series. With Philippe Cousteau she has written two books Going Blue: A Teen Guide to Saving Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers & Wetlands and the upcoming Make a Splash! A Kids Guide to Saving Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers, & Wetlands. Her program Strategies for Success: A Learning Curriculum that Serves has been implemented with over 50,000 students in the Los Angeles Unified School District. She reads, dances, cooks, and she is delighted to be at the AISA Conference.

Keynote : In Youth We Trust

Description Essential to education and to the service learning process is the concept of youth voice and choice. Yet, our schools all too often lack the essential ingredient of trust that encourages and allows for many aspects of youth initiative and authentic participation. If we trust our students more, what could possibly happen? Let’s embark on a thoughtful exchange to uncover and discover how trust may make all the difference in a school culture. We will examine the connection between trust and creativity. We will see the enactment of trust in schools around the world. And we will uncover the Five Steps to Trust that each of us can take to enact and re-build the most essential ingredient for learning and for service. What may we discover? Welcome (and even joyful) consequences.

When : October 22, 2012

Cathy will also be presenting institutes and workshops www.aisa.or.ke/aisa2012

AISA Educator’s Conference - Keynotes 21-24 October, 2012

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AISA 2012 Presenters

School Leaders’ Retreat 19-21 October, 2012

Presenter Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Carrie Levenson-Wahl & Mike Miller

Partners, MLW Consultants, Inc.

Full Day InstituteStrategic Planning Made Fun - No stress, just success!

School Leaders and Administrators

Full Day InstituteStrategic Planning Made Fun - No stress, just success!

School Leaders and Administrators

Chris Jansen

Senior Lecturer, School of Sciences and Physical Education, University of Canterbury

Full Day Institute

Educational innovation - building responsive, creative and flexible organizational capacity

School Leaders and Administrators

Judith Schechtman & Marc Frankel

Senior Consultants and Partners, Triangle Associates Full Day Institute

Turmoil and Conundrum: Governance, Leadership and the Interface with Strategy

School Leaders and Administrators

Pre-Conference InstitutesInstitute Date Presenter Target Group

IB - Inquiry and the Librarian across the three IB Programmes October 19-21, 2012 TBA IB Educators

IB - The Role of ICT (PYP) October 19-21, 2012 TBA IB Educators

IB - The Role of the PYP Coordinator October 19-21, 2012 TBA IB Educators

Schoolink Facilitators Training October 19-20, 2012 Neven Soric Educators

Moodle Training for Teachers October 19-21, 2012 TBA Educators

Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) Training October 20-21, 2012 Ginger Hopkins Educators

Professional Learning Communities October 19-21, 2012 Margaret Maclean Educators

AERO Curriculum Institute October 19-20, 2012 Naomi Woolsey Educators

Educators’ Conference 21-24 October, 2012 Presenter(s) Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Dr. Beverley Naidoo Author, Independent

Full Day Institute Exploring perspectives: A creative storytelling and writing workshop

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop A Longer View on Today Administrators and Educators

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Presenter(s) Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Dr. Linda MeloyProfessor of Special Education, Western Illinois University - Quad-Cities

Full Day Institute Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder - Straight Talk and More!

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop

Curriculum-based Measurement: A formative assessment tool for ease in tracking academic performance

Administrators and Educators

Dr. Lori Langer de RamírezChair, ESL and World Language Department, Herricks Public Schools

Full Day Institute Empower Language Learners with Tools from the Web

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Language, Identity, and the Multicultural School

Administrators and Educators

Dr. Nancy Robinson

Professor Emerita of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington (retired)

Full Day Institute Figuring Out the Student Who Bugs You

School Leaders and Administrators

1-Hour Workshop Figuring Out the Puzzling Student School Leaders and Administrators

Dr. Patricia Wallace

Senior Director, CTYOnline and IT, Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth

3-Hour Workshop Identifying and Nurturing Gifted 21st Century Students

Administrators and Educators

Brett Dillingham Director, Performance Literacy Institute

Full Day Institute Culturally Responsive Literacy Through Storytelling

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Culturally Responsive Literacy Through Storytelling

Administrators and Educators

Graham Watts Founder and Director, Tomorrow’s Learning

Full Day Institute Introducing Higher Order Thinking Tools

Administrators and Educators

Full Day Institute Introducing Higher Order Thinking Tools

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Developing Self Directing Learners with Habits of Mind

Administrators and Educators

John Ritter Senior Associate, Search Associates Full Day Institute Board Facilitators Workshop Administrators and

School Leaders

AISA 2012 Presenters

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Presenter(s) Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Kevin Simpson Global Education Collaborator, KDSL - Know.Do.Serve.Learn

Full Day Institute School Improvement: Reflect, Plan, Do

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Make It Rich Administrators and Educators

Michael Griffin Educator, Music Education World

Full Day Institute Motivation in Music; Motivation with Music Educators

3-Hour Workshop Pathway to Expertise Educators

Mrs. Barbara Sunday Teacher, Sentinel Secondary School

Full Day InstituteIdea Fest Encouraging Breadth in student art projects: Drawing, 2-D Design, and 3-D Design

Educators

3-Hour WorkshopThemes, Layers, and Juxtapositions: Creating a variety of lessons from one idea

Educators

Cathryn Berger Kaye President, CBK Associates

Full Day InstituteTransforming Community Service to Service Learning: Academic, Relevant, Engaging

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Going Blue: A Service Learning Experience

Administrators and Educators

Christine Brown Deputy Head, Carol Morgan School- Dominican Republic

Full Day Institute

Planning, Teaching and Assessing Standards-Based World Language Units and Curricula Using Understanding By Design

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop

Understanding and Constructing Standards Based Assessments in World Language and ELL Learning and Teaching

Administrators and Educators

Devon Riley ES/MS Drama Specialist, International School of Kenya

Full Day Institute Drama Integration in the Elementary Classroom Educators

3-Hour Workshop Building a Cooperative Classroom through Drama Educators

Elizabeth Imende Consultant, Research For Better Teaching

Full Day Institute TBA Educators

3-Hour Workshop TBA Educators

Ellen GreenblattMaster and Mentor Teacher, The Bay School of San Francisco

Full Day Institute Writing to Learn: A School-wide Initiative

Administrators and Educators

Full Day Institute Strategies for Teaching Literature Educators

3-Hour Workshop Student-made Films as a Vehicle to Interpretation

Administrators and Educators

AISA 2012 Presenters

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Presenter(s) Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Karen Boyes CEO, Spectrum Education

Full Day Institute Cutting-edge teaching and learning techniques

Administrators and Educators

Full Day Institute An Introduction to the Habits Of Mind

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop Develolping Self Directing Learners with Habits of Mind

Administrators and Educators

Linda SillsDirector of Program Development, Global Issues Network

Full Day Institute

Educators and Students as Global Leaders & Citizens, your role in Student Empowerment through Service Learning striving for Sustainable Solutions

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour Workshop

Creating a Vision to Support Student Empowerment through Global Citizenship and Service Learning.

Administrators

Sharon Storrier Educational Consultant, Independent

Full Day InstituteConversations That Transform Thinking: An Introduction to Cognitive Coaching SM

Administrators and Educators

3-Hour WorkshopBuilding Trust to Increase Student Achievement : Two Sides of the Same Coin

Administrators and Educators

Business Managers’ Institute 21-24 October, 2012Presenter Position / Institution Duration Title Target Group

Marc Levinson & Sarah Daignault

Principal, Independent School Solutions / Instructor Teachers College, Columbia University

Full Day Institute Business Manager Institute Day 1

Business Managers, School Leaders & Administrators

Principal, Independent School Solutions Full Day Institute Business Manager

Institute Day 2

Business Managers, School Leaders & Administrators

Principal, Independent School Solutions 3-Hour Workshop Business Manager

Institute Day 3

Business Managers, School Leaders & Administrators

AISA 2012 Presenters

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American International School of Johannesburg

The American International School of Johannesburg is a pre-kindergarten through grade 12 co-educational school founded in 1982. The school offers an American Diploma Program, the rigorous International Baccalaureate (IB) Full Diploma program and IB Certificate courses.

The main conference venue for the AISA 2012 Conference is the Indaba Hotel.

Indaba Hotel, Johannesburg

Indaba is a 4 star Johannesburg hotel located within easy travelling distance of all the city’s main business and tourist attractions. Renowned for its luxurious accommodation, superior guest facilities and function venues, the Indaba Hotel staff look forward to welcoming you with open arms. It’s award-winning conference, meeting and banqueting facilities are recognised as being some of the best and most comprehensive on the African continent. Designed in keeping with the country-style character of the hotel, each of our 260 en-suite, air-conditioned bedrooms offer luxury accommodation with all the modern facilities. The newly opened Chiefs Boma is an African themed restaurant, which offers 350 seats, open lunch and dinner. Traditional cuisine: A Taste of Africa, show cooking and entertainment. Indaba has easy and convenient access to all main highways, the O.R. Tambo International Airport and is a mere 15kms from Lanseria International Airport.

AISA 2012 Hotel Accomodation

Room and Booking InformationStandard Single Room R895 (approximately USD.112 depending on the current foreign exchange rate).

Standard Double Room R1,145 (approximately USD. 143 depending on the current foreign exchange rate).

• Rates are inclusive of breakfast

• Rates are exclusive of 1% bed levy

• Be sure to mention that you are attending the AISA conference in order to get the conference rates

• Bookings should be made before September 28, 2012, after which the rooms reserved for AISA will be open for Non–AISA guests.

To book at the Indaba Hotel contact Sharon Thom or Patricia Mlambo the AISA Account Manager on this email reservations@indabahotel.co.za

AISA 2012 Host School

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AISA 2012 Hotel Accomodation

City Lodge Fourways

Across the road from the popular Monte Casino Entertainment Complex, this modern 211-room hotel is ideally situated in northern Johannesburg, offering easy access to the city’s freeways, facilities and other attractions. A multitude of restaurants, a variety of shows and a wide range of shopping opportunities are just an easy walk away. With two spacious meeting rooms, a sparkling swimming pool and glorious pool deck, a coffee shop, ample parking and wireless internet, it’s an ideal venue for a comfortable business or leisure stay in South Africa’s busiest city. A variety of room types are available to suit the specific needs of individual guests.

Room and Booking InformationStandard Single Room R895 (approximately USD.112 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

Standard Double Room R1,145 (approximately USD. 143 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

• Rates are inclusive of breakfast

• Rates are exclusive of 1% bed levy

• Be sure to mention that you are attending the AISA conference in order to get the conference rates

• Bookings should be made before September 19, 2012, after which the rooms reserved for AISA will be open for Non-AISA guests.

For reseravations, contact Rahab Sathekge clfourways.resv@ciylodge.co.za

Zulu Nyala Country Lodge and Manor

Get a tantalizing taste of the bush while staying just five minutes away from all the glitz, glamour and good times offered by one of Southern Africa’s premier shopping and entertainment areas. Set in 13 acres of beautifully landscaped gardens in peaceful surroundings, the Country Manor is a spacious thatched country estate, offering excellent quality and affordable accommodation. Springbok, Blesbok, Zebra and a wealth of birdlife abound.

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Room and Booking InformationStandard Single Room R695 (approximately USD.87 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

Standard Double Room R990 (approximately USD.124 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

• Rates are inclusive of breakfast

• Rates are inclusive of 1% bed levy

• Be sure to mention that you are attending the AISA conference in order to get the conference rates

• Bookings should be made before September 28, 2012, after which the rooms reserved for AISA will be open for Non–AISA guests

For bookings contact Carlo Folchi -Vici, the AISA Account Manager on this email carlo@zulunyala.com and copy Yovenie (Reservations) on this email zncmres@zulunyala.com

Hoyohoyo Chartwell Lodge

“Hoyohoyo” is a Shangaan / Xitsonga word used to express the highest form of an enthusiastic, festive, zealous, celebratory and “royal” welcome mood.Rooms & Suites Each room of the 15 rooms is spacious and equipped with air conditioning, flat screen TV, DST V, wireless connectivity and fully serviced daily. Ten out of the fifteen rooms are self catering units fully equipped with fridge, microwave, pots, crockery and cutlery, kettle and toaster. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are served in our cosy restaurant with fireplace and free access to the bar.

Room and Booking InformationStandard Single Room R695 (approximately USD.87 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

Standard Double Room R990 (approximately USD.124 depending on the current foreign exchange rate)

• Rates are inclusive of breakfast

• Rates are inclusive of 1% bed levy

• Be sure to mention that you are attending the AISA conference in order to get the conference rates.

For bookings contact Rumbidzai Chinyoka on email rumbichinyoka@gmail.com

AISA 2012 Hotel Accomodation

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Conference Event

Full School Member

Affiliate School Member

Associate Member Non Member

US $ US $ US $ US $

Early Regular Early Regular Early Regular Early Regular

School Leaders’ Retreat (October 19-21, 2012) 675 690 740 760 675 690 805 825

Educators’ Conference (October 21-24, 2012) 415 430 480 505 415 430 530 545

Business Managers’ Institute (October 21-24, 2012) 415 430 480 505 415 430 530 545

Pre-Conference Institutes

IB - Inquiry and the Librarian across the three IB Programmes

(October 19-21, 2012)790 820 790 820 790 820 850 870

IB - The Role of ICT (PYP) (October 19-21, 2012) 790 820 790 820 790 820 850 870

IB - The Role of the PYP Coordinator Workshop (October 19-21, 2012) 790 820 790 820 790 820 850 870

Professional Learning Communities (October 19-21, 2012) 390 410 390 410 390 410 430 450

Moodle Training for Teachers (October 20-21, 2012) 0 0 0 0 0 0 210 230

AISA SchooLink Facilitators’ Training (October 20-21, 2012) 390 410 390 410 390 410 430 450

Measures of Academic Progress - MAP (October 20-21, 2012) 180 200 180 200 180 200 210 230

AERO Curriculum Institute (October 19-20, 2012) 180 200 180 200 180 200.00 210 230

Exhibition Space Per Table (Associates Only) N / A N / A $ 260 N / A

* NOTE: Fees for Early Bird Registrations MUST be received by AISA before August 31, 2012 23:00 EAT (GMT+0300)

* NOTE: Registration of delegates closes on October 07, 2012 16:00 EAT (GMT+0300

AISA 2012 Conference Fees

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CIS School Accreditation The Guide to School Evaluation and Accreditation, 8th EditionThe Journey to Excellence in International Education©

By Margaret Alvarez - Associate Director of Accreditation, CIS

The Council of International Schools (CIS) is a not-for-profit membership organisation which aims to serve schools and higher education institutions around the world. CIS offers various services to its members including teacher and leadership recruitment for schools, programs and services that promote collaboration between schools and higher education in the area of guidance and admission, and a school accreditation service, the latter of which is used by more than 500 schools with international programmes located around the globe, and is the topic of this article.

CIS has defined accreditation as a process which provides “an opportunity to improve the quality of education offered at the school through a rigorous process of self-evaluation followed by an objective external appraisal by a team of peers.” The process is viewed as a framework for school development, as opposed to an inspection process and is geared to supporting schools which are committed to ongoing school improvement and global citizenship.

Through its professional staff of Regional Accreditation Officers, backed by a team of CIS staff and volunteers, the Accreditation Service manages the Accreditation Programme which encourages teaching and learning focused school improvement through a process of continuous self-study and peer visitor evaluation. Working in partnership with member schools, this Service sets the standards for international education as laid out in the Guide to School Evaluation and Accreditation, currently in its 8th Edition and introduced in 2010.

One Size Does Not Fit AllThe CIS accreditation process does not seek to create uniformity among schools but rather, to emphasise each school’s mission and vision as the basis for decision making to support the school in the process of delivering its promises to the school community. Another hallmark of CIS accreditation is that it does not subscribe to any one national educational system or ethos. The process and framework are structured and demanding, yet curriculum-neutral and flexible enough to allow for adaptation by schools worldwide to their local realities. The main objective of the process is to identify strengths and areas needing improvement that will lead to proposals and plans for improvement.

The Accreditation ProcessA school that seeks to be accredited by CIS must first become a member of the organisation.

The CIS accreditation process itself works on a 10 year cycle and, within that cycle, schools undergo a variety of structured evaluation procedures designed to build upon the developmental stage the school has reached to support its ongoing development. The five components which make up the accreditation process are: a preliminary visit, a self-study, a team visit, a decision about the school’s accredited status and follow up procedures.

Schools undertaking CIS accreditation must constantly demonstrate throughout the process and within school systems, policies, assessment procedures, curricular goals and school culture that the school’s programmes and operations:

• Are mission driven and vision led • Have as their primary focus the promotion of student learning and well being• Are committed to furthering global citizenship/interculturalism

The 8th Edition of ‘The Guide to School Evaluation and Accreditation’ is designed to support the specific needs of internationally focused CIS member schools as they prepare students to work or study in an increasingly globalized world. Its design is the fruit of three years of research; both educational research and consultation with member schools to ensure a school is committed to, and is actively promoting in its students, global citizenship/interculturalism in education through:

• ETHICS: Discussion of substantive matters of principle from multiple perspectives• DIVERSITY: The understanding of the histories, cultures, beliefs, values and perspectives of a range of individuals and peoples• GLOBAL ISSUES: The understanding of current issues of global significance relating to geopolitics, the environment, health, trade, sustainable development and human rights• COMMUNICATION: Development of fluency in the language(s) of instruction, in another language, and –with as much support as the school can offer- in student mother tongues• SERVICE: The development of their disposition to serve the community – local and global - through engagement in meaningful and reflective service• LEADERSHIP: The acquisition and refinement of the skills of leading and following, collaborating, adapting to the ideas of others, constructive problem-solving, and conflict resolution through experiencing leadership in authentic contexts.

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This definition, which is accompanied by examples of what this can look like in practice, provides schools in the accreditation process with a common language with which to debate and discuss the school’s alignment with standards addressing global citizenship. Furthermore, it clearly outlines CIS’ position that this construct involves more than the 6 F’s (fun, flags, fashion, food, fieldtrips, fundraising), which are often associated with the notion of global citizenship. In addition, it assists CIS accredited schools embed the dispositions and skills which further global citizenship into the curriculum, co- curricular programmes, organisational systems and multiple aspects of school life.

The Value of Peer ReviewHeads and teachers from member schools play an active role as Peer Visitors and Report Readers, assessing and evaluating the progress of schools at the Visiting Team stage and over the rest of the accreditation cycle. The process is thereby enriched by the sharing of knowledge and effective practice, to the benefit of not only schools but also the peers involved in their evaluation.

Joint Evaluation/Accreditation Processes The CIS accreditation process also allows for joint accreditation/evaluation with other entities such as U.S. regional accrediting agencies (e.g. New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), the Middle States Association (MSA) and the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) at the request of the school, which means several aspects of the evaluation (the preliminary/preparatory visits, self-study, team visit, visiting ream report), and subsequent procedures can be combined. Partnerships also exist between CIS and other organisations or international government agencies responsible for evaluation or accreditation of schools such as the International Baccalaureate (IB), the National Center for Curriculum and Textbook Development (NCCT) in China and the Office of National Education Standards and Quality Assessment (ONESQA) in Thailand to conduct evaluation processes jointly using “hybrid” protocols.

The Meaning of Accreditation The final award of Accredited Status demonstrates that a member school has achieved high standards of professional performance in international education and has a commitment to continuous improvement.

Future DevelopmentsTo date, the 8th Edition has received an overwhelmingly positive reception from member schools. The rich resources that accompany the process in the form of supporting booklets, information papers and guides have assisted schools make many of the conceptual shifts required by this protocol. The structures embedded in the process such as the reporting sequence appear to help schools focus on the learning environment and student well- being. CIS, with the support of its members, continues to gather examples of innovative practices aligned with the 8th Edition and is further developing school and evaluator training programmes to assist schools in gaining maximum returns for the investment made in the process. CIS also ensures that it remains abreast of current educational thinking so that future iterations of ‘The Guide to School Evaluation and Accreditation’ continue to satisfy its members’ desire for a meaningful, innovative yet rigorous, user friendly evaluation tool that supports continuous school improvement.

AISA Consultant Pool Programme

The goal of the consultant pool programme is to contribute to the professional development of faculty within AISA member schools by reducing the cost of school visits by high calibre consultants.

The specific target group of the consultant programme is the teachers and administrators in international schools across the African continent.

How does it work?

The programme involves several schools teaming up with AISA to jointly select and invite a consultant to visit each participating school(s) for 2-5 days.

Generally, a consultant would visit at least three (3) different schools located in one of the following sub-regions:-

• Eastern Africa • West Africa • Central and Southern Africa

In exceptional circumstances, AISA will arrange visitations to more than one of the regions above by an individual consultant.

This service is available to Full and Affiliate School members of AISA only, and is designed to assist schools wanting help in a particular managerial or pedagogical area.

In selecting consultants, preference is given to subject areas related to the AISA curriculum review cycle for the current academic year.

Consultants should have specific expertise in a subject area and could either be:-

•from outside the AISA region; or •from within the AISA region.

In the past, consultants have been sent to schools wanting assistance in areas such as curriculum development, early childhood training, guidance and testing, ESL, board training, music, and a number of other areas.

How can your school benefit?

For your school to participate in the Consultant Pool Programme:

•It must be an AISA Full or Affiliate school member with current membership;

•AISA pays round-trip airfare for the consultant to each participating school including visas and other costs related to travel;

•The host schools will negotiate and pay professional fees directly to the consultant;

•The host schools pays for all on-site expenses including the consultant’s accommodation, local transport etc;

For consultants living outside Africa:

•Each host school pays AISA US$825 as a participation fee. There should be no less than three schools per consultant (or if fewer schools are involved, the participating schools will be required to jointly pay the equivalent of three schools’ participation fees i.e. $2,475).

For consultants living inside Africa:

•Each host school pays AISA US$500 as a participation fee. There should be no less than three schools per consultant (or if fewer schools are involved, the participating schools will be required to jointly pay the equivalent of three schools’ participation fees i.e. $1500).

For more information on how your school can benefit from consultant pool opportunities, contact Benjamin Bett at bbett@aisa.or.ke

Upcoming Consultant Pool visit in 2012/13

John Ritter visit to West Africa in October 2012 for School Board Training

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The Student Who Bugs YouBy Dr. Nancy M. Robinson, Ph.D.

Professor Emerita of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Washington, SeattleChair, Advisory Committee on Exceptional Children, U.S. State

Department Office of Overseas Schools

Almost every teacher, almost every year, has at least one student who is troubling. We figuratively take them home with us, wondering at odd moments why we don’t seem to be reaching them, why they seem to be tuned out -- remote or sad or angry much of the time. Some of them are just plain frustrating, especially when we’ve gone over and over something one day but they can’t cope with it at all the next. Some take forever to get anything done. Some are obviously lazy; they’re bright enough – you can tell from their conversation -- but apparently won’t put in the work to learn number facts or the rules of spelling and punctuation. Some are novice English-language learners – but they’ve been in our school for three years, so what is going on? Some just seem too young to be in this class, though their birth date checks out. And, of course, there are various combinations of any of the above.

Then, there are other students whom you are pretty sure you do understand but whose parents don’t agree. Like the fidgety boy with obvious ADHD whose parents insist is just bored. Or the girl who must be pampered by servants at home; her desk is a pigsty and she pays attention only when she’s super-interested in what we’re doing. Or the apparently below-average youngster who isn’t keeping up. How can you get the parents to see what is going on?

There is nothing quite as rewarding to a teacher as enabling a student to be successful. Most of your students come to school prepared to learn and generally are happy doing so. It’s a pleasure to see them beam when they discover something “cool,” when they know the answers and bask in your approval. But the pleasure you get from helping a struggling youngster achieve even a minor victory is even more precious.

Puzzle-Solving QuestionsObviously, an article this brief isn’t going to solve these puzzles, but let’s think strategically about questions you can ask that might put you on the road to victory.

What, exactly, is going on? Calm, undistracted time watching and recording in detail this student‘s behavior may be quite revealing. Give yourself a few minutes when he’s (supposed to be) doing seat work, a few minutes when another student is reciting, and another few when he’s working in a group. A little notebook or note card in your pocket is handy for jotting down odd glimpses or hypotheses that occur to you at other times. Does he work or pay attention as steadily as the other students? What task strategies does he use? Does he really seem as lazy as you thought? Any grimacing or wiggling? How gracefully does he hold his pencil? Is he looking around for cues from others? Does he speak up in the group and is he respected there? What errors does his homework reveal? Is his voice expressive and his speech smooth or irregular? What about friendships? Does he by any chance actually do the work, albeit sloppily, and then pull out a book of his own? Be sure to record successes as well as problems!

Do any patterns emerge that create an initial hypothesis for you about what could be going on? An underlying learning disability? (Learning disabilities are often revealed by deficits in the most basic skills like letter-sound correspondence or simple number facts.) Asperger Disorder? Depression? Subtle difficulties with attention, language, or immediate memory? Could this student be brighter than you’ve realized?

What else could it be? Don’t stop with one hypothesis unless it really clicks! Not only do more than one glitch often happen at the same time, but in sorting out your observations, comparing competing hypotheses, you’ll go deeper into your own reasoning. What are the most successful things this student does? Something visual-spatial? Hands-on lab projects? Talents not usually seen in the classroom, such as music, dance, painting, or non-team sports? Does she come up with answers that sound off the wall, but are actually amazing when you decode them?

What do the parents describe about this child at home? Ask lots of questions. There are many reasons why parents may be seeing quite a different person than you are. Sometimes they are, possibly unconsciously, compensating for an unrecognized disability (you can learn from them what helps) or there may be things about the home that facilitate success, such as having more adult attention, more space, one’s own room and personal technology. When the parent tells you the child is smart, ask (with an open mind, if you have doubts) what they’ve seen that tells them that. Ask about special interests, interactions around homework, and relationships with siblings and friends. What books does the student read for pleasure and which does she like having read to her? (Occasionally you’ll discover a student being cared for by servants, not much by parents.)

1. Questions to ask to get the attention of the student who bugs you…..

2. What, exactly, is going on?

3. Do any patterns emerge that create an initial hypothesis for you about what could be going on?

4. What else could it be?

5. What are the most successful things this student does?

6. What do the parents describe about this child at home?

And Now What?Armed with your new insights and hypotheses, you’re ready to figure out individualized accommodations that may circumvent the issues your student is experiencing. Remember that accommodations are changes you make in the environment, such as classroom seating, special cues, modalities in which the student receives information or responds, time allowed for seatwork and exams, technological assists, etc. These are not major changes in the curriculum but classroom management strategies that support student strengths. On the other hand, there may be some students for whom adaptations of the curriculum – modifying expectations up or down – may be appropriate.

Embark on a series of enlightened trial and error efforts. Give the accommodations time to work (students may find them a bit disquieting at first) and keep notes about outcomes. Likely you’ll need to introduce several changes, but you may be surprised both at how easy they are to do, and how much more planful a teacher they make you for all your students. Keep notes and pass these on to next year’s teachers – who will be ever so grateful.

No short article such as this one can adequately cover this topic – but a workshop can go much farther. You are welcome to come to mine at the AISA Conference in October, a day we’ll spend not only talking about possible learning differences and accommodations designed to get around them, but also ways in which you can identify and challenge students whose intellectual and academic advancement (giftedness) constitutes a “special need.” I’ll welcome you to the workshop as well as a chat about your students.

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Responsible TeachingBy Karen Boyes A child learns to walk by experience, getting up, falling down, crying and getting up again. To learn ‘hot’ you must touch hot. To learn to ride a bike, you must get on a bike.

Students need authentic experiences to learn from. However many times in life when we have experiences, give something new ago, we fail, make a mistake or just plain screw up.

The challenge is that many times when something does not work, ‘below the line thinking’ occurs. People blame, make excuses or deny that they are able to learn from the experience, or have can control what happened next. This leaves them playing life as a victim. However there is always another option – to play life “above the line” To take ownership, be accountable for the results and take responsibility for their actions. This is where the learning, growth and success occur. Now I know we cannot control everything that happens to us, however we can have a choice about what we do about it. W Mitchell, an inspiring international speaker has written a book called “It’s not what happens to you that matters, it’s what you do about it.”

While teaching, you face situations where you have little control over how students act – at least at first. Your reaction can put you back in “control.” Again you have a choice: Have you ever had a child walk into your classroom without knocking and without pausing and while you are teaching deliver the message? It is easy to think “how rude! I wish the parents had taught them manners etc.” The truth is it may be a parents’ job to teach a child to wait while an adult is talking before saying what they wish to express, however blaming the parent for not having done so does not solve the challenge. Instead, if you take responsibility and simply teach the student how to do this, or have a notice on your classroom door saying “please knock, come in quietly and wait for the teacher to… “you not only eliminate the frustration and challenge, you might just teach others by simply over hearing you”.

Another example is I often hear teachers complaining that students do not know how to say “sorry” again you have a choice… complain about it and live below the line, or take responsibility and teach them.

Tony Ryan tells of watching a teacher help students know what to do when they are distracted by other students. After brainstorming ideas of what students might do, the teacher invited 2 students to sit at 2 desks placed at the front of the class. They then role play, one student working and the other being annoying, the working student then practices the strategies discussed in the brainstorm. Students take turns role playing. While this may have taken 20 minutes of class time, the effect is that students are focused in class and much more productive for the rest of the year.

How might you practice being a responsible teacher this year? What structure will you use to encourage students to take ownership of their learning?

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their ability to attract quality employees was dependent upon the availability of a rigorous educational program compatible to the educational program their employee’s children transferred from or might to be going to.

In this day and age, and in the present economic climate, with changes in ex-pat packages, downsizing or the outright collapse of many corporations, schools need to consider future alternate streams of revenue and to plan for change.The fact is, quality education is expensive, and schools have limited options for resources (see chart).

Heads of school and trustees must, therefore, maximize opportunities for acquiring income sources other than tuition, but in a planned and realistic manner and one that is appropriate for their institution. In this regard each school is unique, thus the need for the establishment of a development office and program suitable for a particular school. Only you will know when the time is right for your school!

About the Authors: Mike Miller is a 42-year veteran of independent advancement, now in his twelfth year in an international setting. Mike is a frequent speaker at CASE, NAIS, ECIS, IDPE and regional associations around the world and for eight years taught the summer institute (Independent School Management) in educational fundraising for newcomers to development and international schools.

Carrie Levenson-Wahl has thirty years of experience working in independent school development. She has personally managed five successful capital campaigns, established strong annual funds by initiating leadership donor and alumni reunion giving programs, worked closely with trustees and development committees, and effectively managed development offices of two to six staff members.

To Start or Not to Start?...That is the Question.By Mike Miller and Carrie Levenson-Wahl

What are the universal indicators that signal it’s time for an international school to create its first development office and to hire its first professionally-trained development staff to introduce this “relationship-building” and “resource acquisition” program to a (many-times) skeptical international community? The simple answer is that there aren’t any.

Each school is unique and will determine its own indicators based on its mission and vision, its current operating budget and fiscal health, as well as its long-term financial and admissions projections. In international schools, in particular, attention must be paid to the school’s demographics and culture, use of volunteers, as well as the laws and culture of the host country and their impact on this important effort.

Schools, Heads and Boards contemplating the establishment of a comprehensive development program in their institutions should consider answering some of the following basic questions before proceeding:

Is this true for your School?Tuition income alone meets all of the school’s annual costs and provides the institution with a balanced budget.The school’s faculty/staff are paid as much as they should be, their benefit package is not lacking in anything and each has all of the professional development funds necessary to stay current with cutting edge or global educational issues. The school has all of the equipment it needs at every level and program within the school and the facilities are of exemplary quality and quantity; nothing else is needed.

The school has sufficient aid to assist talented/qualified, yet needy new admissions applicants, as well as current students whose families have been impacted by this current global financial crisis.The school has sufficient funds to add new programs or to enhance existing programs that directly benefit its students and fulfill the school’s mission/vision. The school has all of the financial resources it will ever need now and in the future. The school has stayed connected to its global constituency, communicates regularly with all of them and keeps them informed concerning the school’s fiscal health, current and future plans, and progress (a process of transparency).

International schools at one time did exist on tuition income alone. Tuition revenues took care of the current school year, but did not plan for the future, any increase in the cost of providing that education, expansion of educational, athletic or other co-curricular programs, emergencies, a more diverse or larger student enrolment or even increased competition in the marketplace. Corporations, closely associated with the schools, did support necessary capital expenditures because

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Culturally Responsive Performance Literacy through Storytelling

Culturally responsive performance literacy is the process of teaching students to write and perform personal narratives that affirm their cultures and identities. Africa is a highly diverse and multicultural continent that challenges educators to find ways to engage children of different cultures - including third culture children - in literacy development, language learning, content area exploration, and responsible citizenship within our global community. Performance literacy offers a process to engage all children in constructive, interesting and meaningful academic and socio-emotional growth.

Theoretical BasisPerformance literacy has received a wealth of research support as an important culturally responsive teaching tool. (Willingham, 2004; Pink, 2005; Dillingham, 2005; Fisher & Frey, 2007; Adomat, 2009; Lesley, 2009; Stanley and Dillingham, 2009, 2010). The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE, 1999) Position Statement from the Committee on Storytelling states, “Children at any level of schooling who do not feel as competent as their peers in reading or writing are often masterful at storytelling. The comfort zone of the oral tale can be the path by which they reach the written one.”

Performance literacy is a rich interactive learning, often “transformational” process, that stimulates the imagination, creative thinking, language learning and the cooperative learning processes. Storytelling (Gay, 2000) is universal, the oldest form of teaching, and affirms students’ cultural identities by encouraging them to express and validate what they already know. These processes resonate with constructivist learning principles with the learner as an active participant in the process of learning (Palmer, Harshbarger, & Koch, 2001).

The instruction helps English as a Second Language (ESL) students develop speaking skills in a natural, meaningful context. By performing personal narratives relevant to them, students develop accurate vocal inflections and consistent expressions in the English language. Fisher and Frey (2007) studied Rosa Parks Elementary, a large underperforming urban elementary school with a large ESL population in San Diego California that was successful using storytelling. The school increased literacy academic performance dramatically by developing a comprehensive instructional framework that included the use of storytelling. Their teachers‘commitment to the core beliefs supported through performance literacy is as follows:

Learning is Social: It provides significant opportunities for students to work in groups.Conversations are critical for learning: It allows students to work in their Zone of Proximal Development (Vygotsky, 1962/1986). Peer talk about telling, writing, and performing stories with a knowledgeable other person improves performance.

Learners require a gradual increase in responsibility: It focuses on learning literacy by engagement with modeling and scaffolding.Reading, writing, and oral language instruction must be integrated: It focuses on listening to and reading stories, telling stories, and writing stories

Applications of TheoryThe teacher should make storytelling a regular part of the day, set an example by telling stories, and guide children to:

• tell stories about themselves and the important people, pets and events in their lives using sound, expression, and movement;• brainstorm topics, problems, and solutions;• create a story map or visual portrait of a story (VPS);• write or dictate a first draft;• tell and retell to improve stories; and• rehearse and perform stories for parents and their classroom peers.

Figure 1: Adapted from (Stanley and Dillingham, 2010, p.2.)

By Brett Dillingham and Nile Stanley

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Conclusion

Many children still lack basic reading and writing skills which place them at risk of social exclusion, make it harder for them to find a job and reduce their quality of life. Increased diversity and immigration challenges educators to be inclusive and focus on improving the literacy of all children.

Culturally responsive performance literacy (Stanley and Dillingham, 2009, 2010) is a process that uses storytelling to develop literacy in a way that affirms cultural identity, as it motivates and engages. Storytelling (Gay, 2007) is student centered and encourages students to bring personal cultural experiences, perspectives and ideas into the classroom. Stanley and Dillingham (2009, 2010) recommend that educators teach the elements of storytelling by having students write and perform personal narratives using a constructivist (Fisher and Frey, 2007) story development process. Since ancient times, stories have been shared in every culture as a means to educate, entertain, preserve culture, and instill knowledge, values and morals. When teachers use culturally responsive literacy through storytelling they ensure the traditional strengths of storytelling are not lost to humanity, and that their students can speak, listen, read and write.

Do you want to learn more about Culturally Responsive Performance Literacy through Storytelling? You are welcome to attend the AISA Educators’ Conference 2012.

Map. Students create a story map or visual portrait of the story (VPS):

• Tell and retell. After understanding the concepts of using sound, expression, and movement, students tell their stories to a partner, using these storytelling skills. In retelling, the listener tells the story back to the original teller, who can now see and hear her own story live. Make sure both students get to tell and listen.

• Write. Students write out their stories from beginning to end.

• Retell and revise. Students retell their stories in pairs or small groups, listen, respond, and provide feedback about improving their writing and storytelling.

• Done? Do students need more work telling? Listening? Writing? Literacy objectives will drive this decision and further work in mastery.

• Next steps -- perform and publish. Students work on story development, performing stories for an audience. Students may do digital storytelling by adding artwork and multimedia. Teacher may record stories

References:

Adomat, D. (2009, May). Actively engaging with stories through drama: Portraits of two young readers. The Reading Teacher, 6 2(8), 628–636.

Dillingham, B. (2005). Performance literacy. The Reading Teacher, 59(1), 72-76.

Fisher, D., & Fry, N. (2007). Implementing a schoolwide literacy framework: Improving achievement in an urban elementary school. The Reading Teacher, 6 (1) 32-43.

Gay, G. (2000). Culturally responsive teaching: Theory, research and practice. New York, NY: Teacher’s College Press

Lesley, M. (2009). “You Gotta Read It With Awake in You”: Marginalized High School Readers, Engagement, Agency, and Reading as Performance. In J.C. Richards, & C.A. Lassonde (Eds.), Literacy Tutoring That Works (pp. 46-55). Newark, DE: International Reading Association

NCTE (1992). Teaching storytelling: A position statement from the committee on storytelling. NCTE Guideline. Retrieved on June 28, 2010 from http://www.ncte.org/about/over/positions/category/lang/107637.htm?source=gs

Palmer, B.C., Harshbarger, S. J., & Koch, C.A. (2001). Storytelling as a constructivist model for developing language and literacy. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 14 (4), 199-212.

Pink, D.H. (2005). A whole new mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. New York: Riverhead Books.

Stanley, N. & Dillingham, B., (2010, September). Telling tales: Nile Stanley and Brett Dillingham explain the benefits of teaching performance literacy through storytelling. Language Magazine, 10 (1) 27-29.

Stanley, N., & Dillingham, B. (2009). Performance literacy through storytelling. Gainesville, FL: Maupin House Publishing.

Vygotsky, L.S. (1986). Thought and language (A. Kozalin. Trans.). Cambridge. MA: The MIT Press. (Original work published 1962)

Willingham, D. T. (2004). Ask the cognitive scientist: The privileged status of story. American Educator, 28(2), 43-45; 51-53.

About the Author: Brett Dillingham is an internationally known storyteller, author and educator and may be reached at brett@brettdillingham.com

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Take part in AISA’s School Exchange

Programme

What is the School Exchange Programme? School Exchange Programme (previously Teacher to Teacher Programme) is a professional development opportunity offered to AISA Full or Affiliate School Members. The objective of the programme is to enable participating schools to collaborate and share expertise.

AISA sponsors the round trip transport costs (air/overland ticket) for a visiting administrator / teacher from one AISA Member School (i.e. Originating School) to another AISA Member School (i.e. Host School).

How can your school participate?

• The Originating School agrees to send an administrator / teacher to the Host School for the purposes of either (i) providing training and/or sharing expertise with the faculty of the host school; or (ii) gaining expertise and training from faculty of the host school with a view of implementing the newly acquired skills in the originating school as well as cascade the skills to other administrators/teachers

• Both originating and host school establish an itinerary

• The Host School and/or Originating School agrees to provide accommodation, daily subsistence, airport transfers and ground transportation to the visiting administrator / teacher

• The Originating School seeks (if need be) a replacement or substitute person (and meet the costs) to cover the functions of the visiting person

• The visiting administrator / teacher does NOT charge any professional fees for the visit;

• The visiting administrator / teacher will provide a narrative report to AISA on the visit within 14 days of completion of the visit.

How to start? Identify the visiting administrator / teacher and ensure that the originating and host schools have agreed to the exchange visit. Either of the schools will then have to formally write to AISA requesting sponsorship through the School Exchange Programme.

For more information on School Exchange Programme, contact Benjamin Bett at bbett@aisa.or.ke

Overview of Cognitive CoachingSM

By Sharon Storrier

Cognitive Coaching SM is a process for developing a culture of reflective practice and enhanced learning for all members of the school community. Cognitive CoachingSM is a set of skills, tools, and structures that provides a means for building cognitive capacity in others. It is a peaceful way of being in this ever changing world.

Cognitive CoachingSM:• Capitalizes upon and enhances cognitive processes.• Enables people to modify their capacity to modify

themselves.• Allows the thinker to evaluate what is good or bad, appropriate

or inappropriate, effective or ineffective, etc.• Mediates thinking and enables the thinker to become

metacognitive.• Helps to convey thinkers from where they are to where they

want to be.• Is a powerful approach to enhancing performance and

building learning organizations.

Art Costa and Bob Garmston, the co-developers, define Cognitive CoachingSM as a set of strategies, a way of thinking and a way of working that invites self and others to shape and reshape their thinking and problem solving capacities.

Specifically, a person will do the following in the Cognitive CoachingSM Foundations training:

• Build trust by developing physical and verbal rapport.• Facilitate thinking through questioning and developing

greater precision in language.• Develop a person’s autonomy and sense of community by

increasing their sense of efficacy and self-awareness.• Distinguish between coaching and evaluation.• Rehearse coaching interactions that are congruent with a

variety of styles.• Apply coaching skills which enhance the intellectual processes

of performance.

Why Cognitive CoachingSM?

Cognitive CoachingSM requires systemic and long-term investment to create a culture that values the development of thoughtful teaching and administrative practices, self-directed learning and a support for mediation of thinking. This is not an idle venture. So why would a system make that investment?

The following represent some of the benefits that can be derived from this work over time:

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Improving Student Outcomes

There is a direct link between the types and qualities of teacher thinking and student outcomes. Traditional models of supervision and coaching have focused on installing and extinguishing certain teacher behaviors. These approaches have had limited success and, over time, have narrowed teachers’ conceptual frameworks. Cognitive CoachingSM focuses on the internal thinking and decision making capabilities of the teacher. Bruce Joyce and Beverly Showers refer to these as the invisible skills of teaching. A focus on these skills helps teachers to generate new possibilities, increase instructional flexibility, nd focus on outcomes, not problems. (Costa and Garmston)

Supporting Instructional Change

Conventional approaches to staff development workshops, lectures, demonstrations, etc., show little evidence of transfer into ongoing daily instructional practice. In several studies by Bruce Joyce and Beverly Showers, the level of classroom application after even high quality training hovered around 5%. When they added peer coaching to the training designs the level of application increased to 90%, and with periodic review of both the teaching models and coaching skills, classroom application remained at the 90% level. (Joyce and Showers) Enhancing Student Thinking There is a direct link between the language that teachers use and the quality of their thinking. Precision in language leads to precision in thinking. Cognitive CoachingSM leads to greater language precision for all involved. This linkage extends to the quality of student thinking in the classrooms of those same teachers. Further, Cognitive CoachingSM includes skill development in questioning and response behaviors appropriate to adult interaction and teacher/student interaction as well. Teacher question and response behaviors and language patterns cue student thinking, mediate student responses, focus student attention on details and essential processes, and convey caring and expectations. (Costa and Marzano; Costa and Garmston)

Benefits of Cognitive CoachingSM

• Improving Student Outcomes

• Supporting Instructional Change

• Appreciating and Celebrating Diversity

• Promoting Collegiality

• Developing Teacher Conceptual Development

• Building School Culture

Appreciating and Celebrating Diversity

Human beings operate with a rich variety of cultural, personal, and cognitive style differences. These differences are resources for learning. Appreciating and working with style differences requires awareness, knowledge, skills, and positive attitudes for all involved. Key strands in the Cognitive CoachingSM training provide frameworks and tools for coaches to work with other adults and with students in open and resourceful ways. (Costa and Garmston; Witkin; Bandler and Grinder)

Promoting Collegiality

Problem solving, creativity, and faculty collaboration are powerful sources of teacher renewal. Collegiality is not the same as conviviality. True professional collegiality is built upon shared norms of interaction that focus on the many roles of teachers as they share materials and ideas and seek and offer assistance to one another. The Cognitive CoachingSM model provides a comfortable format for professional dialogue and develops the skills for deep instructional planning, reflection on practice, and problem solving. (Little; Rosenholtz; Costa and Garmston)

Developing Teacher Conceptual Development

Cognitive CoachingSM enhances and stretches the conceptual frameworks of teachers. Teachers with higher conceptual levels are more adaptive and flexible in their teaching style, approaches to students, and classroom designs (Hunt; Harvey). They employ a broader repertoire of teaching strategies and a wider range of coping behaviors (Hunt and Joyce). High concept teachers are more effective with a wider range of students, including students from diverse cultural backgrounds (Harvey, Prather, White & Hoffmeister; Hunt). And they are more stress tolerant and able to deal with ambiguity. (Tomlinson and Hunt; Gordon; Suedfeld)

Building School Culture

Good instruction does not exist in a vacuum. Effective teachers working in isolation cannot create cohesive instructional patterns that serve students in a cumulative fashion. The culture of the school--the pattern of adult interaction, the traditions, rituals, and shared norms--has a strong influence on the instructional outcomes for students. Cognitive CoachingSM promotes cohesive school cultures where norms of experimentation and open and honest communication enable everyone in the school to interact in healthy and respectful ways. (Saphier and King).

About the Author:

Sharon Storrier is a national training associate for Cognitive Coaching and Adaptive Schools. She has worked extensively with administrators, teachers, colleges, and community groups to build collaboration and increase student achievement.

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In Written Expression, a three-minute writing sample for young children, and a 7 to 10 minute one for older students, is obtained from a story prompt. For the emerging writer total words written, words spelled correctly, and correct word sequences are counted and then charted. The correct word sequences count is the most telling evidence for growth because to earn a sequence all aspects of writing mechanics needs to be correct, i.e. spelling, capitalization, grammar, syntax, and punctuation. For the more advanced writer, more sophisticated counts are obtained and charted.

In the basic skill area of mathematics, various types of probes are available – computation or concepts/applications. Students do a short grade-leveled probe, usually three minutes; scores are obtained and charted. The early literacy and early numeracy probes consist of probes in four specific skills in literacy and in numeracy,

such as phonemic segmentation for the former and quantity discrimination for the latter. Probes are administered individually, counts done of correct responses, and results charted.

Curriculum-based measurement can be given three times per school year (fall, winter, and spring) to all students at a grade level for what is called benchmarking. The lowest performing children, based on

ample performance criteria available in the literature or from CBM materials suppliers, can be identified and provided with additional targeted instruction. [Note: High achieving students can also be identified for enrichment opportunities.]

The targeted children are then progress monitored on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, with scores charted to ascertain the impact of the intervention methods/approaches being used. Such progress monitoring and charting of intervention effectiveness has a solid research base in all four basic skill areas, a recent meta-analysis of research studies yielding an ES of .75, i.e. the method can increase academic performance in groups of children by ¾ of a standard deviation.

In my own experience working as a school psychologist and as a trainer of CBM at the graduate level, I have witnessed skill growth in countless numbers of children from the use of this formative assessment tool, partnered with quality intervention instruction. The charting, which provides a baseline before intervention begins, shows progress across time to an aim point that can be established from Rate of Improvement (ROI) data available, and is a visualization for students, their teachers, and their parents of skill growth. Such charting is not only informative, but also motivational.

An overview of curriculum-based measurement (CBM) in reading, spelling, and written expression, its benefits, and available resources will be presented in a half-day workshop at AISA Educators Conference in October 2012.

About the Author: Dr. Lucy Meloy is a Professor Emeritus of Special Education, a Nationally Certified School Psychologist, and a former classroom teacher. She has over 20 years of experience working with teachers/parents of children/adolescents with a variety of learning/behavior problems.

An overview of curriculum-based measurement (CBM) in reading,

spelling, and written expression, its benefits, and available resources will be presented in a half-day workshop

at AISA Educators Conference in

October 2012.

All schools have low achieving children for a variety of reasons, children that we educators need to be committed to in order to maximize their educational experience. Response to Intervention (RtI) is an emerging paradigm in U.S. schools as a result of many years of research indicating that when school personnel use assessment tools for early identification of students not mastering basic skills as expected and then provide extra instruction to address those skill deficits, children benefit and may not need continuing years of remedial or special education. One of the assessment tools in this RtI process is curriculum-based measurement (CBM), a formative assessment approach with over 30 years of research on the validity of its use for first identifying low achieving students and then progress monitoring them when they are being provided intervention (additional instruction). The beauty of this type of assessment is its ease – ease in administration (one, two, and three minute probes); ease in scoring (simple counts); ease in learning how to do it; and ease in charting results. The materials are low to no cost and the impact, as calculated in effect size, is substantial, i.e. ES=.75.

Curriculum-based measurement materials are available at K-8 grade levels in reading, spelling, written expression, and mathematics. There are also early literacy and early numeracy probes (the term for the “tests”) for pre-school and kindergarten levels. Reading is individually administered as are the early literacy and early numeracy probes. All the others can be done individually or in small groups of children.

In Reading, a student reads orally for one minute on a grade-leveled passage, with the teacher counting words read correctly in that minute and then charting the results. In Spelling, grade-leveled word lists are dictated across two minutes and the student writes them. The scoring is done by calculating correct sequences and placing the total number of those correct sequence counts on the student’s chart.

Curriculum-based Measurement: A formative assessment tool for ease in tracking academic progressBy Linda L. Meloy, Ph.D., NCSP, Professor of Special Education

Western Illinois University – Quad-Cities, Moline, IL, USA

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Governance by DesignBy Marc Frankel and Judith Schechtman Triangle AssociatesAt least once during every board meeting one of us attends as a member or consultant, the conversation veers in a less-than-useful direction. We call these moments “gateways to hell” for boards, because too often the conversation continues in the direction of analyzing the problem and suggesting potential courses of specific action. With every step deeper into the discussion, the board departs further from good practice and enters what should be the province of administration. Our post hoc conversations with

the trustees suggests that few such segues happen because of malicious intent or hidden agendas; rather, they occur because of a genuine desire on the part of the trustee to attend to what they see as a potential problem.

Guiding and monitoring are distinct from implementation.

Implementation should remain the province of

administration and staff.

Start by asking what committees your strategic plan calls for. Where necessary,

use a board committee or task force to frame the problems that will be

solved by the administration and faculty, rather than figure

out solutions to problems framed by management.

What compounds the governance/management issue is the tendency of many boards to design their activities in such a way as to invite micromanagement. Board agendas or committee structures that follow functional lines (building and grounds, technology, education, etc.) call for discussion of administrative issues, with these in turn making their way into full board session via the committee’s report.

Another culprit is the practice, typical in smaller day schools, of board members performing quasi-administrative functions. These are especially common in areas where trustees might have subject matter expertise. In some cases, the trustee’s skills are frankly superior to anyone’s inside the school, and it seems a waste not to take advantage of the free labor. But, that is exactly the problem: trustees should govern, not be a source of administrative work. When the governance role becomes confounded in this way, it is almost impossible to maintain appropriate boundaries at all times. The professional background of the members themselves, often a criterion for their selection in the first place, can become a force pushing in a managerial direction. Many board members are managers in their day jobs--CEO’s, CFO’s, and so forth--and carry this role over into their board duties, since fixing problems is what they do for a living. The managerial tendency can be a hard one to leave behind.

A misunderstanding of the fiduciary concept and responsibility lies at the heart of many micromanagement episodes, and seems especially prominent in international schools. Fiduciary responsibility means that the board is required to act reasonably, prudently and in the best interests of the organization, to avoid negligence or fraud, and to avoid conflicts of interest. What fiduciary responsibility does not mean is that individual trustees are expected to scrutinize the minutia or to challenge the veracity of the data management reports to auditors, except when there is abundant cause.

Governance by Design The presence of one or more of the above factors ensures that a board chair will spend much time beating back the push to manage. We believe the alternative is governance by design; that is, to intentionally design the board and its activities for governance rather than management. As John Carver notes, governance is a social construct, not a natural phenomenon.[1] Because of this, principles of good practice aim to be prescriptive, laying down norms to discipline and guide behavior according to the assumed purpose for which governance exists.The board as a whole holds the school in trust for future generations of students, and it is primarily for them that it governs. This distinguishes the independent school board from the governing body of a for-profit corporation or even a community hospital. Of course, the board is also accountable to society for fidelity to the school’s mission and stewardship of its resources.

In light of this purpose, start by organizing the board along strategic rather than functional lines. Apart from finance and governance, two committees with regular, recurring and legally mandated work, other committees or task forces should exist to guide and monitor strategy. Our bias is to minimize the empanelling of permanent or standing committees and supplement with time-limited task forces as needed for the strategic plan. Guiding and monitoring are distinct from implementation, something that should remain the province of the administration and staff. Start by asking what committees your strategic plan calls for. Where necessary, use a board committee or task force to frame the problems that will be solved by the administration and faculty, rather than figure out solutions to problems framed by management.

Redesign or eliminate the reporting process. Savvy heads of school will use their report time during board meetings not to provide updates, but to identify challenges, share strategic thinking, and tee- up topics that will become relevant to committee work in the future. Heads should see report time at board meetings as a platform from which to advance their ideas and solicit feedback. Or, in other words, to ask themselves what topics or issues would benefit most from the collective insights of a group of smart people who are passionate about the school’s mission?

Frame conversations and agenda items in governance, not management, terms. Instead of directing attention towards questions of the “what should we do?” type, aim the discussion toward framing (“what sort of problem is this?”) or clarifying (“what range of possibilities fits within our mission and values?”).

Orient new trustees to their fiduciary role by including the school’s attorney in the orientation process. Explain exactly

how the board assures compliance with applicable human resource, tax and financial stewardship laws

without crossing the line into micromanagement. Show new trustees how the board uses control,

measurement and reporting tools to track school financial performance. Beyond the financial, board

members need to agree on general indicators to measure the effectiveness of organizational

accomplishments; e.g., academics and delivery on mission.

Organize board agendas in keeping with the school’s strategic trajectories. Board agenda

setting should be led by the executive committee in consultation with the head of school and board

chair. We agree with Carver that the board’s agenda should be the board’s agenda; that is, under the

control of the governors rather than the managers. But, this does not mean that the agenda should be

developed without management input. The chair should then guide the conversation during board meetings toward

framing problems and questions rather than solutions.

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Do not allow extra-agenda items to deviate discussion from the already-set agenda. Board conversation should not resemble a ball moving on a pinball table. Yet, there will always be the board member or two who will ping from one topic to another regardless of whether the latter follows the former or is even on the agenda. This particular gateway to hell can be a challenge to avoid, as it requires an exceptionally tactful and firm response from the board chair. The agenda is the agenda, and extra-agenda items should be referred to committee or considered for the next board meeting rather than simply discussed at the point where they arise.

Resist the temptation to conflate governance and administration by assuming that additional board meetings are necessary when large projects are on tap. Paradoxically, the strategically oriented board pursuing a big project requires fewer, not more, meetings, as the real heavy lifting goes on in committees and task forces. What coping with complexity does require more of is trust; specifically, trust that one’s fellow board members on other committees are working just as hard with just as much care and prudence. Trust of this sort doesn’t happen by chance; rather, it requires intentional action on the part of board leadership.

It is important for heads and board chairs to understand that the default status for almost every board is to drift toward management rather than governance. Left alone, board members will do calorie-hours of work, solve problems, and otherwise interfere with management, not out of malevolent intent, but because that is what they think adds value.

Designing the board and its activities for governance is at best a Sisyphean task. The rock rolls back down the hill, propelled by the gravity of drift toward the default option and the annual arrival of new members with their own idiosyncratic understandings of governance. Orientation processes alone, while helpful, are not enough to avoid gateways to hell; nor are principles of good pactice. Good governance requires intentionally good design.

References: [1] Carver, J. (2010). A case for global governance theory: practitioners avoid it, academics narrow it, the world needs it. In Corporate Governance: An International Review, 18(2), 149-157.

About the Authors:Marc T. Frankel is a consulting psychologist in St. Louis, Missouri, and is a senior consultant and principal in Triangle Associates. Dr. Frankel trained at Emory University where he received a Ph.D., and at the University of Missouri -Columbia School of Medicine. He consults and coaches with individuals and groups primarily in the health care, education, and technology industries. His experience as a practicing manager and as a trustee in Los Angeles gives him first-hand familiarity with issues of leadership and governance in nonprofit institutions. Dr. Frankel is a faculty member for several international and national leadership institutes.

Judith Schechtman is a Senior Consultant and principal in Triangle Associates, St. Louis, an international consulting firm specializing in leadership and organizational management. Ms. Schechtman holds a masters degree in Social Work from Washington University, St Louis where she was formerly an adjunct professor. Ms. Schechtman consults and trains internationally primarily in the fields of higher education and independent elementary and secondary school education. Judith researches and writes extensively in the fields of leadership, governance, strategy and coaching in independent and international school.

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Writing to Learn Across DisciplinesBy Ellen Greenblatt

Everyone talks about having students write more in their classes, but injunctions to bring more writing into the curriculum often evoke dismay in classroom teachers. How will they manage the increased paper load? How can they possibly add yet another task to their already full agendas? And how can teachers of the arts, the sciences, mathematics—who do not themselves feel trained to teach writing—bring writing to their students?

More writing in all disciplines can, paradoxically, lessen a teacher’s workload while enhancing student learning. Writing theorists have told us for years that writing is an essential part of learning because it allows students—allows us all--to see what we are thinking. As I am writing this paragraph, I am witnessing my ideas unfold on the page, and if I don’t agree with what I am seeing, if I am not conveying what I mean, I can rethink, delete, reconfigure and think again. All learning is recursive—we are constantly adding to what we already know and then reassessing what we think we know in the context of new information. So it is with students in the classroom.

How, then, does writing to learn work? Writing theorist Lisa Delpitsays we should start with whatever experiences a student brings to the classroom—that their culture is the springboard, the entry. But we as teachers must then encourage students to go beyond the familiar, and writing can lead students to become familiar with the unfamiliar by encouraging them to take chances, to float ideas, in low-stakes writing exercises. In science, this can mean speculating on why something they observe in nature is behaving the way it does; in literature, wondering about a characters’ actions; in the arts, hazarding opinions about why an artist chooses a certain brushstroke or a camera angle or director a particular staging of a scene.

If we want students to move from the familiar to the unfamiliar, and then from observation to interpretation in any discipline, we must scaffold their learning, and one sure way to lead them from

step to step is through short writing exercises, exercises designed to help them see what they are thinking. “An effective assignment does more than ask students to write about what they have read or experienced. It engages students in a series of cognitive processes, such as reflection, analysis, and synthesis, so that they are required to transform the information from the reading material or other sources in order to complete the assignment”(from Because Writing Matters from the USA National Writing Project).

How, then, can students write more without crushing their teachers under the weight of papers to read? The short answer is, of course, that teachers do not have to read and mark every word that their students write because the writing itself is the learning activity. But how can teachers be sure that students are taking advantage of the crucial learning activity of writing? Once again, a short answer appears: students, with teachers moving around the room, read and respond to each other’s responses, engaging in a conversation on paper. In the short run, the classroom discussions that follow such written conversations begin at a much higher level, and the written conversations themselves, ultimately submitted along with more formal assessments, make studentsaccountable in the long run. With some well-crafted rubrics—perhaps created and designed by students themselves—students can even assess their own and their peers’ effectiveness in their writing to learn exercises.

Writing to learn involves shifting the paradigm for students and, perhaps even more, for teachers, but the potential payoff for everyone in the classroom is substantial.

About the Author: Ellen Greenblatt has taught writing and literature for decades in schools in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York and for the School Year Abroad program in Spain. Her interdisciplinary focus most recently is on using writing as a means to help students move from observation to interpretation and analysis in a range of subject areas, including literature, history, science, mathematics and the arts. In addition, she has been using student-made films as an additional tool for learning and reflection.

For enqueries and more information contact:

Association of International Schools in Africa • P.O. Box 14103-00800 • Peponi Road • Nairobi, KenyaTel: +254 20 269 7442 or +254 20 807 6067 • Email: info@aisa.or.ke • Web: www.aisa.or.ke

is the Bi-Annual Newsletter of the Association of International Schools in Africa (AISA)

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