During the Professional Learning days this week, our faculty worked collaboratively on the many matters that arose during the self-study last year, ahead of our re-accreditation visit by MSA (Middle States Association) and CIS (Council of International Schools) next March. There were also sessions that focused on refining strong pedagogical practices. One such session centered around how best to strengthen inquiry-based learning through visible thinking. The strategy of visible thinking improves deep learning through inquiry, with a focus on HOW to think as opposed to WHAT to think. This approach, which is at the center of the IB curriculum framework, is already commonplace at AISL and indeed many parents have commented that this approach is why their children study at this school.
Teaching Children How to Think not What to Think is a crucial skill and the very nature of education in the 21st Century in our world today. Enjoy the article.

And To Consider
A Poem
How Joy Works
You could not stop it
if you tried--
how this blessing
begins to sing
every time it sees
your face,
how it turns itself
in wonder
merely at the mention
of your name.

It is simply
how joy works,
going out to you
when you least expect,
running up to meet you
when you had not thought
to ask.

 - Jan Richardson

Wishing you all a peaceful weekend.
Dr. Oli Tooher-Hancock
Director
​American International School 

Dear Parents,
AISL has adopted the Association of International Schools in Africa (AISA) Child Protection Personal Safety Curriculum. This curriculum is a research-based initiative designed especially for international school students.
This program will include age-appropriate information about maintaining personal safety and raising awareness about physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect for all students in Grades 6-12. These classes are a core element of AISL’s plan to protect our students’ right to be safe.
These lessons will be led by Ms. Driekie Smith (Gr6-10) and will be held over the next several weeks. In each grade, the following key concepts and skills will be addressed:
IDENTIFY - Students will learn how to identify safe and unsafe situations
ACCESS - Students will learn how to access support structures
ACT - Students will learn how to act to stay safe
VALUE - Students will learn how to value themselves and others
Your child will receive a range of exercises to be completed at school. Please use this opportunity to engage in meaningful conversation regarding protection with your child. Children are more likely to use safety rules when they have multiple opportunities to practice and talk about the topic with their parents and family. You play an essential role in helping your child know how to stay safe!
For more information, please feel free to contact Ms. Smith.
Sincerely,
 
Mrs. Driekie Smith                                                    
dsmith@aislusaka.org                                              
AISL Secondary School Counselor​

(Please note: these are programs provided and administered by entities outside of AISL. If you are interested in participating, or have any questions, please direct your correspondence to the sponsoring institution)

Future Doctors Program by Harvard Student Agencies:
Duration: 2 weekends (over 9 days)
Fees: USD 240
Program Start Date - 18th September 2021
Program details here. 
Apply now here. 
 
Harvard Student Agencies Young Leaders in Entrepreneurship and Innovation:
Duration: 2 weekends over 9 Days
Fees: USD 240
Program Start Date - 18th September 2021
Grades: 8-12th
Program details here.
To apply, click here.
 
Harvard Student Agencies program on Scholars in Communication:
Duration: 4 weeks (only Saturdays); 
Fees: USD 250
Program Start Date: 18th September 2021 
Eligibility: Grades 7-12
Program details here. 
To Apply Click Here
The Center for Sustainable Development & Global Competitiveness (CSDGC) at Stanford University, 
The Center for Sustainable Development & Global Competitiveness (CSDGC) at Stanford University, in collaboration with Learn with Leaders, has announced the winter edition (October – December 2021) for its sustainability and development program for high school students (grades 8-12).
There will be limited spots, and a small group of young learners from all across the world will be selected for participation. The summer edition of the program had 34 students across 15 countries.
The Program:
New Ideas from the Inside – Stanford Environmental & Water Studies Scholars Program’ offered by the Center for Sustainable Development & Global Competitiveness (CSDGC) at Stanford University.
We only select a small cohort of students globally for this program 
In this program, speakers from the Stanford SEWSS Scholars Program community all over the world will share their insights and experiences. The program promotes multidisciplinary exploration through connections with real-world practitioners.
Students undertake two creative thinking assignments with the professor as part of the program.
 
This program includes:

• Weekly seminars
• Group discussion following each seminar presentation
• Workgroup session every 2 weeks to complete a challenging assignment

Letter of Recognition will be sent to participants who successfully complete the program assignments by CSDGC at Stanford University.
We are offering a special fee waiver scholarship to early applicants.
Program Start Date – 16th October 2021
Duration – 8 weeks (Only Saturdays)
Mode – Video Conferencing
Early Application Deadline: 30th September 2021
Program Fee for Early Applicants: USD 1000
Regular Program Fee – USD 1210
To Apply, Click Here. 

During the teacher professional development days on Monday and Tuesday, teachers engaged in a two hour workshop on Visible Thinking. This is a Harvard initiative called Project Zero that enables teachers to build thinking dispositions in their students. Nelson Goodman founded the program at Harvard in 1967.  David Perkins, Howard Gardener (Multiple intelligences), Ron Howard and Shari Tishman, Daniel Wilson and Mark Church are other names involved in this initiative. When planning ‘learning experiences’, teachers link the objectives to thinking moves they want their student to make. Then teachers (sometimes in collaboration with students) find a routine that will promote the thinking move. As students become more familiar with the thinking moves and routines, the hope is that they start using them automatically in order to access deep thinking.. Here is the link to the Project Zero website for more information.

Our Visible Thinking Journey at AISL
Our journey here at AISL with Visible Thinking began in 2010 when the then director Chris Muller agreed to two teachers attending an institute at Harvard. This was instigated by one of the teachers Laura Manni who had completed a masters at Cambridge in the ‘art of questions’. She was particularly interested in the more thoughtful question or routinely asked question the researchers at Harvard were promoting. Instead of asking students ‘why?’ they were asking students ‘what makes you say that?’ This small change solicits deeper thinking and responses. 

So, Susan Lacy, the DP Literature teacher and Laura Manni, the Preschool teacher spent two weeks at Harvard and came back to immediately put into practice what they had learnt. They reached out to other teachers on their return and fortunately we are a school of early adopters! Teachers observed lessons to see how Laura and Susan were using the routines and began to adopt and adapt them for themselves

AISL in the spirit of making sure that we continue to support good pedagogical practice sent three teachers in 2011 to London to a Visible Thinking conference where they heard some educational greats including David Perkins and Howard Gardener. They came back to AISL enthused and shared enthusiastically with their colleagues what they had learnt. We have had 4 whole, part school trainings with Mark Church and other researchers. Our own teachers have led a number of Visible Thinking workshops representing the school at the ISAZ International Schools Association of Zambia) conference, AISA (The Association of International Schools in Africa) twice, in Amsterdam at a CASIE conference (Routines in the Language and Literature classroom), in Ghana on behalf of AISA at Lincoln community school (An introduction to Visible Thinking) at a two day institute there. We have also had an article published in the AISA magazine on Visible Thinking. Teachers have twice been involved in Professional book clubs to study Making Thinking Visible and The 8 Cultural Forces of  a Thinking Classroom.  As you can see we are enormously committed here at AISL to improving the learning of our students. We are hoping to start another book club soon using the latest book about Visible Thinking: The Power of Visible Thinking. ​

Dear parents, 

So, as some of you may know, I am a big fan of American Football. Being from Texas, this is something of a cultural expectation, and one that I happily rise up to meet. 

This past weekend I spent more than a fair amount of time watching college football. I watched traditional powerhouses plow over weaker opponents. I saw massive underdogs rise up to defeat traditional powers (who is Jacksonville State?). I also saw teams with amazing potential play horrendous football because they could not adjust to change. Unfortunately, this last example is best exemplified by my Texas A&M Aggies, but the season is still early. 

What sports taught me is that “potential” only matters up until the game starts, and what happened when this game started? We were forced by an injury to pivot to a new situation, and adjust our plans to account for change. The big takeaway here is that you can have all the best individuals, with all the talent in the world. You can have the best plan, with contingencies mapped out in excruciating detail. You can have the best intentions, and security in your ethical correctness. None of that matters until you are expected to improvise in the face of the unexpected. 

That is something we try to instill in our kids at AISL. It would be very straightforward to prepare them for their futures if this was 30 or 40 years ago. Things were more set then. Today we have to build in them the skills to quickly analyze and adapt to changing environments. One of the most prevalent cliches in education is that “we are preparing kids for jobs that don’t yet exist.” Too often this is interpreted as being simply a call for more STEAM education. That’s not how I read it. 

The way I see it is that we need to prepare our kids to decode, interpret, analyze, plan and execute in the face of constant and unrelenting change, the pace of which accelerates as technology advances. That is what traditional education lacks, and the big advantage of the IB framework. 

A few logistical items:

1. Students can have Excused Absences for the following circumstances:
   1. Illness
   2. Family emergencies
   3. Religious observances
   4. School sponsored activities
   5. Other reasons than those listed above, which are beyond the control of the student or the family. 
2. From the Secondary Handbook:
   1. “Parents are asked to report an absence on the day it occurs before 07:15. The best way to do so is via email to attendance@aislusaka.org. If no email was sent, when upon returning a student who has been absent must provide a parent note to the Secondary office staff explaining the reasons for the absence.  Students are expected to submit all missed assignments within two days of an absence.”
   2. “Special arrangements can be made in the case of prolonged illness, or family emergency to help students stay up-to-date with their responsibilities.”
   3. “Attendance is recorded each class period and students must be present for a minimum of 90% of the scheduled class periods for each course during a semester. Absences exceeding 10% of scheduled classes during a semester may result in loss of course credit for the semester as determined by the administration. Students may not be allowed to travel on school-sponsored trips if it will cause their total absent days from school (including excused absences) to exceed 10% per semester. This travel restriction may be waived by the principal based on strong achievement and ATL development or extenuating circumstances beyond the student’s control.”

 

1. Campus is still restricted. If you need to come to campus during school hours, please contact whomever you are meeting so that they can let the guards know to allow you in with a visitor’s badge. 
2. Please do not drop off lunch at the gate. It pulls the guards away from their duty to manage student lunches. 
3. If your child needs to move from Path 1 to Path 3, and it is not simply a temporary sick day or the like, that information needs to come from a parent. If you wish for your child to change learning paths, please send that request to attendance@aislusaka.org. After we receive a parent request, the Leadership Team will review each case and communicate with parents and their children. 
4. In a related note, excused absences: If your child needs to miss school for any reason, please notify us at attendance@aislusaka.org , as well as all your child’s teachers. Also, please let us know the reason for the absence. This way we can identify the absence as excused. Examples of excused absences include (but are not necessarily limited to): personal illness, family emergencies or religious observances.  
5. In another related note: remember that Path 3 is available for students who are in special circumstances which preclude them from joining us on campus. Path 3 is NOT available to students to facilitate a vacation/trip during school days. 

 
For further clarification please refer to the attendance policy in the Secondary Handbook. 


Thanks to you all. AISL wouldn’t be the same without you. Have a great weekend!
Dr. Rick Odum​

Preparations for the Primary Talent Show are underway and we are so excited! This year, we have 31 students who have created original performances. In the coming days, there will be two rehearsals in the theater so that the students will be prepared for the final performance. 

On the performance day, which will be Friday, 24 September at 11:00, we would like to invite one parent per performer to join us physically in the audience in the Tiyende Pamodzi Theater. For the remaining audience members, we will live stream the event for everyone to see. The link will be shared soon. We are so grateful to be able to “revive” one of our favourite performing arts events at AISL!

For any final questions pertaining to the Primary Talent Show, please contact Natalie Coombs at ncoombs@aislusaka.org. Thank you.

The PE swimming unit will begin on Monday, 4 October 2021 and will end on Friday, 10 December, 2021. Please take note that students from KG-G5 will swim twice every week during their regular PE days/times according to the class schedule. ELC students, on the other hand, will be split into two groups with one group swimming while the other group has a dry PE lesson. This will alternate each week.

For swimming, please pack the following in a small bag (remembering that all items need to be labeled)

Swimsuit (girls required to wear one-piece suits)
Swim cap - a MUST have for all students
Towel
Sunscreen/cream
Goggles (optional) only IF they are certain they will use them
No flotation devices are necessary

Students must come dressed in their PE uniform and appropriate shoes even if they are swimming during the lesson. This is so that they are ready to participate in a dry PE lesson in the event that swimming is canceled (e.g. due to weather conditions).

For any information/queries regarding swimming please send an email to kluwisha@aislusaka.org.