IB Asia Pacific Newsletter

January - March 2006

The PYP journey at Choithram International (CI), India

The aim at CI is to impart education as a means of providing students with a philosophy of life, thereby facilitating their overall growth, intellectual development, thinking and learning skills so that they may integrate themselves into the community with respect, confidence and purpose. CI belongs to the Choithram banner in Indore and is one of the premier institutional setups of Madhya Pradesh. It has been nurturing the children of Indore since 1972 and been providing IB education since 2003 in order to:

Address people’s need and evolve global citizenship
Adapt with changing times to emphasize acquisition of skills
Recognize individual differences and encourage originality, innovation and creativity from early childhood
Facilitate students so that they are able to meet their global counterparts with confidence and compassion

Complying with the IB philosophy, CI promises that apart from preparing engineers, doctors and technocrats, we shall gift the world with thinkers, communicators, risk takers and most importantly, doers.

The PYP began in June 2004. As the PYP methodology is an inquiry-based approach, teachers were given in-house training. Next followed an array school visits and familiarizing ourselves with other IB schools in India. Conscious steps were taken to educate the parents by conducting workshops, open house sessions andcirculating leaflets. They were also given the opportunity to interact with visiting IB teachers from other institutions across the continent. All information was provided to parents in English as well as the national language – Hindi. It was a fascinating journey to see things taking shape in that the PYP classes looked different as compared to the classes of the traditional techniques of teaching methodologies in India. The students were frequently exposed to the IB students profile as they were clearly displayed on the notice boards. Inquirers, Communicators, Thinkers were interesting new words and challenged the students to become these themselves.

The Parent Teacher Body (PTB) was a great support during the early months of our new institution. We have an enthusiastic teaching staff that truly fits the bill of the IB students profile too.

The previous academic session included an annual athletic meet, celebrations of various Indian and world community festivals with special emphasis on Christmas. An array of field trips, regular PTB meetings and community service towards fellow citizens made the previous session at CI very rewarding. Both students and staff aspire for the best in the years to come.

June 2005 was busy as teachers began the new session with a three day in-house workshop followed by weeks of brain storming to prepare the unit planners. It was a Herculean task as several questions were addressed to as how to go about the planning phase. Amongst the staff were some facilitators who had attended the Asia – Pacific workshop in March 2005 at Ecole Mondiale, Bombay. A few staff were new to the IB philosophy but not the field of education. There were endless discussions and also open-mindedness to learn anew. Unit planners were made which reflected zeal, enthusiasm and the idea to do things differently. The POIs followed the unit planners and skill mapping was cartographed. We were then ready to welcome students back to campus with open arms and classes started in July 2005.

It was a happy month which saw the campus and classes abuzz with enthusiastic and inquisitive learners addressing the first theme of the session across all the PYP years – Who We Are. On 6 October, Andrea Muller and Mignon Weckert visited to extend their helping help and co-operation for the pre scheduled pre-authorization visit. They were given a warm traditional welcome by two representatives of CI 1st graders, this was done by the traditional kumkum-tilak thali. (A typical Indian custom to welcome guests as in India, guests are believed to be gods in disguise….. Atithi devo bhavah).

The pre-authorization visit was an ideological exchange programme in the real sense because the staff was highly enlightened by the experience of our guests. We recently received the commendations and the recommendations of our pre-authorization visit. The commendations have made us feel worthy and encouraged while the recommendations have served as guides to renew our commitment to achieve the goal of becoming an authorized PYP school.

In the current phase, we are gearing up for the annual PYP exhibition, working out a streamlined plan of action and developing a scope and sequence document. Besides this we are on the threshold of shifting into a new school building for the next academic session. We are looking forward to the authorization visit that is scheduled for October 2006.

Contributed by
Sonali Geed, PYP Coordinator, Choithram International

Website: http://global.choithramschool.com

Snapshot from India

PYP students donating clothes to children living in a nearby community during Christmas.