News for Parents

Over the past two weeks, the students in classes 7 and 8 have had some fun and creative time to design their own bulletin board which is usually attached to a wall in order to post their messages and display notices giving information about what they are currently interested in such as some popular slogans, favorite quotes or even some hilarious trendy memes that are circulating on social media.
A bulletin board is also a great way to motivate budding authors to show off their super drawing skills as well as use their creative ideas and beautiful artwork.
Well done!

Did you know that microplastics are everywhere?
Against this devil, even the mother’s precious love and infinite care is powerless to protect what is most precious.
Scientists have demonstrated in numerous studies that microplastics are even present in the placenta, which nourishes the unborn child. Even before it is born, plastic pollution endangers the health and life of future generations. Now , scientists have discovered that microplastics are also found in the breast milk that feeds our loved ones. We don’t know exactly what the consequences will be, but we can imagine the worst.
Microplastics are so light and ubiquitous that they are in the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat.
This is a danger to humanity and all life on earth.
The  HRK-GROUP has taken up the fight against plastic pollution and aims to leave a clean and unpolluted earth to our children and descendants. As part of the Environment Day, Mr. Jonathan SOURINTHA  of the HRK Group was a guest at the IGS and gave an exciting lecture about the dangers of plastic and explained valuable strategies on how to use environmentally friendly products and packaging from the HRK Group.
The children and teachers were enthusiastic about the lecture.

Just in time for the Autumn break the children from Klasse 1 to 10 participated in an Environmental Awareness Day on Friday. This was to create awareness and encourage enthusiasm to protect our Environment.
The children were divided into groups and had the opportunity to experience different aspects of our lives that impact our environment by going round to the different stations and being involved in various activities. There was an upcycling station, one repurposing non-recyclables, another creating an artistic representation of a turtle. The groups participated in doing experiments, planting plants, learning about our carbon footprint and the importance of clean water and how little fresh water we have in the world. We were also privileged to have experts come to the school to give an informative talk about reducing the use of plastics in industry.
The Environment Committee was formed with the aim of encouraging the children and teachers to become involved in an ongoing process of becoming an environmentally conscious school.
It was exciting and rewarding to see how enthusiastic the children were about engaging with the activities and how keen they were to learn about how to look after our precious environment and what they can do to contribute to a better, cleaner world.
Thank you to everyone who participated and contributed to making this important day a great success. 

After more than two years, it was finally time again this Monday: the U6 area invited all interested parents to play and do handicrafts, and of course to have fun with the children.
The children greeted their parents with a big “Hello” and showed them their rooms and their favorite toys with a beaming smile. There was a picnic in the role-playing room and the kids cooked for their parents. Some kids kneaded funny figures at the table and others threaded colorful beads into long chains.
In kindergarten, the children made colorful butterflies and rainbows together with their parents. The end of the visit was crowned with singing together in the final circle – in which some parents showed themselves to be very sure of the lyrics and everyone had a lot of fun making music.
We are looking forward to the next parent game day in the U6 area on December 5th, 2022.

“Freedom, more than just a word.” With a small portion of pathos and yet a lot of substance, the IGS day of action began last Monday as part of the celebrations for the Day of German Unity. Early in the morning, the eyewitness Holger Timmreck gave a lecture with the title mentioned at the beginning and knew how to inspire the students. Classes 8 to 12 listened spellbound to the story of his life in the GDR and his escape to the West. The students then took the opportunity to ask personal questions of Mr. Timmreck, who was extremely impressed by the interest of our students and the depth of their questions.

At the same time, Classes 5 to 7 were able to successfully demonstrate their background knowledge on the subject during a school rally. At several stations, small teams competed against each other and answered various questions about German Unity Day in order to find the greatest “reunification experts”. Congratulations to David, Jimmy, Leon and Niko from Class 6 who took first place.After the rally, the students had the opportunity to process their impressions in an art project. To do this, they graffitied replica parts of the Berlin Wall to create their own little “IGS East Side Gallery”.
The afternoon area then offered the programmatic highlight of the day for all students in Classes 5 to 12: the active exchange with real eyewitnesses! The IGS was able to welcome Ms. Spicher from the German Consulate General and Mr. Hilbert from Café Deutsch to our campus. Furthermore, Ms. Strohner, a contemporary witness from Berlin, took part online via Zoom. In small groups, the students conducted eyewitness interviews for 20 minutes each and asked the participants about their lives before and after reunification and their view of Germany today.
Later, the individual groups then had the opportunity to evaluate and work through the impressions and experiences of the day together with their teachers. Thanks to the work with the eyewitnesses, it became clear to the students that there is not just “one” reunification, but that different life experiences also lead to different perspectives on this important event. This is an important insight that applies to all areas of history.
Special thanks go to the eyewitnesses who were so committed to our day of action. In addition, the Humanities Department would like to thank the entire IGS team for the outstanding support on October 3, 2022!

On October 3rd an action day for Classes 5 to 12 will take place at the International German School under the leadership of the GeWi student council. In the sense of the attractiveness of actively living history, far away from textbooks and non-fiction texts, our students will be active on this day and explore German history on their own, and expand their knowledge on the subject in the course of a wide variety of activities. However, the focus in the afternoon will be on eyewitness accounts of the events.
The students will enter into an active exchange with several eyewitnesses who will be present on the IGS campus as well as participating online. Among other things, the German Consulate General and the Deutsch-Café will be represented by contemporary witnesses.
Since this entire day of action is characterized by the importance of perspective and interpretation of historical events, the students will compare their impressions after the eyewitness talks and evaluate them with the teachers of the GeWi Department in order to examine whether there are divergent perspectives on one of the most important events in German history, or whether everyone can agree on what actually happened back then.

Have you ever seen reality turned upside down? No? Harry Potter did it. Now the students from Classes 5 and 6 have done it too. This week, the U6 kids were able to witness first-hand how objects appeared and disappeared. Minds were read and straws suddenly multiplied.
Classes 5 and 6 took the children into the world of magic and the researchers and discoverers watched with amazed eyes and open mouths as objects transformed or floated. Even the adults were amazed and laughed when the student wizards enchanted everyone.
At the end all the children are happy. When asked how they liked it, there’s a resounding answer: “It was magical!”

Two Allstars of the 1st Bundesliga visited our school on September 29th, 2022 after they had played with the Allstar Team Dortmund against the Allstar Team Vietnam the day before. Soccer legends Karl Heinz Riedle and Ibrahim Tanko were both outstanding players of their time, with Karl Heinz Riedle being part of the Germany national team that won the 1990 World Cup.

During their visit, after a reception by curious students and the headmaster and his deputy, along with numerous colleagues, there was plenty of time to play with some IGS students on the school’s own soccer field. After that lots of pictures were taken and autographs signed.

Our prominent guests then took the time to look over the school grounds before the players headed home that same evening.
This spontaneous visit provided for an exciting exchange on both sides and turned out to be a very special highlight in our everyday school life.

We’ve been exploring all things cartoon in the Kunstraum with the Class 2 students!
From Lego to Pop Art there are so many topics for us to explore.
Last week we worked together to create our own short animation, using 4 photo frames per student. We each pulled our best happy, silly, angry and scary faces, then decorated our pictures to make them really stand out. 

The students are proud to share their final GIF with you to enjoy.

The little giraffes have been going to school for three weeks now and have learned a lot of new things. In our science lessons, we dealt with the topic of community using the picture book Das kleine WIR in der Schule (The little US in school) by Daniela Kunkel.
The little US is a small, fuzzy green monster that reflects the sense of community in the class. Everything is nicer with the little “We”! A “We”grows when people like each other and treat each other well. But it can also shrink if there are arguments or mean things said among each other. because even good friends and classmates don’t always agree.
In the picture book, the little “We” disappears and the giraffes help to find it, nurture it and make it grow. By joining forces, they were able to find out why it is important to have a “We” feeling in the class. For the little giraffes, these are actions like playing together, comforting someone, hugging, sharing, listening, baking for someone, or even dancing together. 

And what about you? Do you also have a little “We”?

Afterwards, we brainstormed rules that promote good coexistence and listed those that we want to focus on in our class. 

Over the past week Classes 3 & 9 have worked with the Art Department on a special top-secret project;  together, we created a celebration Piñata to be enjoyed by the whole school.
What is a Piñata?
A Piñata is a container, most often made of papier-mâché, pottery, or cloth, that is decorated, filled with candy, and then broken as part of a celebration. They are most traditionally used in Mexico especially during birthday celebrations.
We decided to dedicate our Piñata to our dear former Kunstlehrer Mr Wayman on his birthday (22nd September) and send him a video of our celebrations.
The students were so excited to gather and break apart our creation and enjoy the candy stored inside. Luckily the Piñata was pretty sturdy and we can now repair it and put it on display in Haus B for us all to enjoy and remember our celebration.’
Link to Google Drive Video

Were there punishments and why were there punishments? How did the children get to school? Did the children have school materials? Were there school uniforms? What did classrooms look like in the past? Were they different in the past than they are today?
These were the questions the Class 4 children explored over the past few weeks. They researched and found many exciting, new and surprising answers. It quickly became clear to them: we want to tell the other children about our discoveries! So, Class 4 prepared a presentation lesson for all children of the elementary school of the IGS.
In their “history exhibition” on Thursday, the fourth graders presented their research results. They enabled the first, second and third graders to discover various secrets of the school of 100 years ago in a playful way. The children were able to explore the writing of yesteryear in a memory game, marvel at the punishments in still pictures, try out the school materials of yesteryear for themselves, retrace the children’s everyday school life in a picture story, and admire and compare the classrooms of yesteryear and today in shoeboxes. All the children were able to learn something new and had a lot of fun in the process.
That’s great! The “history exhibition” was a great success! Video clip

My first impressions of the IGS are wonderful!
I was very nervous on the first day at school, but my classmates and teachers were very nice and welcoming. The food here is unique and there are many breaks. The way my teachers teach me here is different from my old school: it’s more fun! There are also some new school subjects that I didn’t have before. I’m still trying to improve my German and the lessons I’ve had so far are helping me. I’m glad to be enrolled in this school!
Christina, class 8

My first days in IGS were a lot of fun. Everyone was so welcoming and the food here is really tasty. There are some subjects that are new to me that I am excited to learn about the difference in teaching techniques here is very enjoyable.
Mai, class 8

The class representatives of all classes of the IGS came together and carried out the election of this year’s SV teachers in a first meeting of the student council.
This year’s liaison teachers are:

1. Rebecca Joy Hughes
   
2. Tobias Steier

As a next step and with their support, the student representatives will be elected to the Student Council.

Since this school year, the students of the IGS can finally enjoy the cool water again as part of their swimming lessons. After a long dry spell, crawl, breaststroke and backstroke are back on the curriculum. Until now, only the pre-school children have had the great privilege of having their first encounters with the water in the school’s own pool since April 2022.
After long Covid restrictions and construction work on the swimming pool grounds, Classes 1-10 are back in the game. We are looking forward to swimming again, a big step towards normality, and can’t wait to have new (super) vital experiences outside the classroom! 

This week saw the launch of two new music ensembles and some exciting new repertoire.   The rock band for Classes 7, 8 and 9 certainly made an excellent impression at their first rehearsal on Monday afternoon.
The wonderful acoustic band led by Classes 10 and 11 continued to work with dedication (along with a good sense of fun) on Wednesday afternoon.
IGS Community Choir (Classes 5 to 12) had its inaugural rehearsal on Thursday after school.  Plans are already in place for some Christmas performances!
There are still some limited places for any students who might be interested in joining.

We’ve had a wonderful first few weeks with Class 1 and 2, learning new routines and having a lot of fun being in school. We want to continue connecting you with your child’s learning and creativity with the Seesaw classroom. Seesaw is a great platform for students to create and share their learning in a safe and secure online environment. When students are more confident using the website or app, they will be able to see messages from their teacher, practice worksheets and resources when they are at home. This is also a great way for them to share with you the special moments throughout the day in a place only accessible to you.
I encourage you to have a look at the SeeSaw.me website and I will send more guidance on how to connect to your child’s account in the coming weeks.
Official information from each department and internal class communications will continue to be sent via email. 

As a German school in Vietnam, the IGS also wants to honour the traditions of the host country. This is why we celebrated the Vietnamese Moon Festival last Friday.
On this day the children talked about the meaning of the Vietnamese Mid-Autumn Festival and read the traditional stories. Of course, the tasting of the traditional mooncake could not be missed. For the smaller children in Classes 1 to 6 there were various activities, such as making lanterns or decorating moon cakes.

Since this school year, the IGS has been offering students the subject of physics as the third natural science in the diploma program of the International Baccalaureate. This is an important step in the development of the school to offer students the opportunity to further their education and focus on a specialization in all aspects of science. The course is offered at both standard and higher levels. In contrast to biology and chemistry, physics is taught in English. This strengthens the diploma program in its bilingual orientation.
The Science Department is particularly proud that all the requirements have been met in order to implement physics in the diploma program and looks forward to the weeks and months ahead in which the 11th grade students will be taught all three natural sciences.

Together with our first graders, Gloria, the class mascot of Class !, experienced a warm welcome at the IGS Primary School.
It’s finally starting! With wide eyes, the little ones listen to the story of Gloria, who is  finally going to school and will discover the land of numbers and the secrets of reading and writing.
The handing over of the school cones, which could be opened in the classroom after the official ceremony, was special.
We wish the Giraffe Class, led by their class teachers Ms. Polzin and Ms. Jurischka, a great year and especially thank Ms. Kiefer, who prepared our youngest students in the preschool.

We are pleased to announce a successful start to the 2022/23 school year. Classes 2-12 started the first day of school together with their class teachers. Organizational questions, timetables and of course getting to know new classmates.
We wish all members of the IGS a successful school year 2022/23 and look forward to an exciting school year.