EUROPEAN SECONDARY CAMPUS NEWSLETTERBethany EUROPEAN SECONDARY CAMPUS NEWSLETTER Edition 8.0 Friday 18th January 2008 TAIPEI EUROPEAN SCHOOL 台北歐洲學校 Message from the Head

EUROPEAN SECONDARY CAMPUS

NEWSLETTER Edition 8.0 Friday 18th January 2008

TAIPEI EUROPEAN SCHOOL 台北歐洲學校

M e s s a g e f r o m the H e a d o f H i g h Sc h o o l

Dear Parents, Students and Friends of TES The H2 and H4 students finish their mock exams this week and their teachers will write their reports over the next 2 weeks. The reports will be sent home before Chinese New Year, with parent-teacher interviews being held after the holiday. This week our H1 students have been experiencing the world of work. They will have a workshop day today at the EPC to reflect upon their experience and discuss it with their peers. Student photographs will be taken on Monday 28th-29th and these will be available for parents to purchase through the school. offices Roger Schultz [email protected] FOR TH C O M I N G DAT E S FOR Y O U R D I A R Y . . .

TO REMEMBER... TES is hosting the U15 FOBISSEA Games in May this year. The PSC is holding a Coffee morning at the EPC on Thursday 24th about this. H2 and H4 reports will be sent home on Friday 1st February

SCHOOL WEBSITE: www.taipeieuropeanschool.com

CONTACT: Taipei European School, Swire European Secondary Campus, 31 Jian Ye Road, Shihlin, Taipei 11193,

Taiwan Telephone: +886 2 2862 2920 Ext

January 7 – 18 H2 (IGCSE) and H4 (IB) mock exams January 14 – 18 H1 Work experience week January 18 Newsletter 8 January 26 JV and JVB basketball (TES, MCA and Bethany January 28 – 29 ESC Class and individual photographs February 1 H2 and H4 reports issued February 4 – 8 Chinese New Year Holiday February 12 – 13 H2 profiling – Futurewise February 15 TES Middle School Football Tournament February 18 – 19 H2 and H4 parent-teacher interviews

An invitation to all parents from the new Chair of the TES Parent

Support Council (PSC) – Veronika Bobke Dear Parents, First of all I want to thank you for your support and trust having me as the new PSC chair as Paula Hughes will leave Taiwan this summer. There are a lot of events coming up soon and I hope we all have successful events with the help of all parents. One of those events is

UNDER 15 FOBISSEA SPORT GAMES

TAIPEI 24 - 28 May 2008 Leighton Edwards and Roger Schultz would like to explain the international FOBISSEA Sports Games, which is a major event and very important to the school as students ( aged between 13 - 15 years old) from 7 countries of British International Schools in Asia will visit us: a successful event means a good reputation for us! They school is asking for the help and support of all parents, so please come to the:

Coffee Morning - European Primary Campus Thursday 24th January

9:00 – 11:00am in the Amphitheatre

where parents will get more information about our hosting of the Games in May and can offer to volunteer on different committees. We need your support and we thank you in advance for coming and supporting FOBISSEA!! See you there and best regards Veronika Bobke

TITLE - What is he TOKKING about? Maybe some of your children are studying TOK presently, and you wonder what they are tokking about when they come home and share some of the material with you. Or maybe your are aware that little Johnny or petite Claire will be "doing TOK" next year, and you have wondered to yourself, "What exactly is TOK?" Well.........TOK is a pre-university course designed to get students thinking critically about the sources of our knowledge, (be it scientific, historical, ethical, religious, artistic, national, familial.....etc) and to then critically assess those claims across the spectrum of knowledge that an educated modern-day human possesses. It is an essential part of the IB Diploma and underpins all the work done in the six subject areas. A friend of mine was involved in the introduction of the IB to a school in Jordan, and some parents there were alarmed that TOK was atheist in nature and would turn their children against Islam. But the truth is that TOK is neither theist nor atheist, but does encourage the examination of faith as one of the many ways of knowing open to humans, alongside emotion, perception, language and reason, for example. Other ways of knowing examined might be conscience and intuition. We put science to the test as well, exploring how many in the modern world "put their faith" in it and why, not to mention a critical appraisal of maths, history, applied sciences, ethics and the arts. The course is not set in an ivory tower - it is not a sub-branch of philosophy. The students are encouraged to consider how thinking adults deal with various knowledge issues in real-life situations, across all those knowledge domains. Teaching it is fascinating, the most enjoyable part of what I do at TES, and I am sure I speak for the five other members of the TOK team in saying that. Maybe some of you parents would like to know more about TOK, and maybe some of you would even be willing to offer your expertise to help us run a series of TOK workshops later in the year. Please contact me at [email protected] to express your interest or to ask questions. If enough of us are interested I feel sure we could open some bottles of wine and share some cheese at TES one night to find out more together in a TOK exploratory session. Over to you! Mr. Sean Kenny TOK Subject Leader “A human being is part of the whole called by us the universe… We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. The true value of a human being is determined by the measure and the sense in which they have obtained liberation from the self. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to survive” (Albert Einstein) “Only when we know little can we be certain; doubt grows with greater learning” (Goehte)

Theory of Knowledge in the IB Diploma Porgramme

Fiction Library opens in Phase 1 at the ESC

Over the Christmas holiday, the ESC library staff were busy relocating the fiction resources from the Phase 2 library to the library in Phase 1. The ESC now has two libraries for students. Non-fiction resources are in the Phase 2 library, with Fiction resources in the Phase 1 library.

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Fiction Library opens in Phase 1 at the ESC

Student Council BBQ and Disco - end of term 1

Students staying at the European Secondary Campus after school Some students are staying on at school after 3pm this term, either to take part in an extra curricular club/sports team or to wait for friends or brothers/sisters while they are involved in a school activity. Students who stay at school should use the library until 4pm or must sit and read or work quietly in the cafeteria until their club begins. If your son/daughter is involved in a club which runs from 4:30pm to 6:00pm then we will have a signed letter of permission if you have agreed to your child leaving school, perhaps to walk over to the village to buy a snack before their club starts. If your son or daughter in Key Stage 3 stays behind after school for another reason, please provide a written note (signed and dated by parents) if you would like them to be able to leave school, otherwise we will assume they will remain inside school and be working quietly in the areas provided. Thanks for your support in this area. J Evans. Assistant Head of Secondary.

Thanks to the PTA for their fundraising efforts on behalf of the school.

Money raised by the PTA has been used in a variety of ways around the ESC to improve the facilities for the students this year.

Student Council BBQ and Disco - end of term 1

Dear Parents/Caregivers Swim Club was very successful this last term. We had a registered 66 swimmers, three times the amount of our record from the 2006-2007 year. We would like to offer this popular ECA again. The program will run Tuesdays and Thursdays after school 3.30pm – 5pm. We will still be swimming at the Tien Mu pool near Carrefour in Tien Mu. Students have the option of taking the free school bus to this ECA. The TES Swim club will also include training for Fobissea events. The U15 FOBISSEA competition is being held from the 23rd May – 28th May, hosted by our very own school. The qualified coaches will be myself, A.J. Lee, Diane Schultz and Barbara Fieschi. Specifically the club will work on stroke correction, fitness, competitions, learning to swim meets and of course it will be fun and interactive. Promt payment will ensure your child a place in this ECA. Each swim session is NT100. Please indicate which days you would like your child to swim. The Physical Education office also has a supply of TES swimming caps and goggles. We offer a range of swimming kit. For more information you may contact Kaight Forgie on 28622920 ext 616 or 0926197940 [email protected] Yours sincerely Kaight Forgie AJ Lee Diane Schultz Barbara Fieschi Head Swim Coach Swim Coach Swim Coach Swim Coach

Swimming Club ECA: Tien Mu Pool, No.2, Lane 55, Huangxi St., Shilin District, Taipei Student Name: Form Class: Day Day Tuesday 15th January Thursday 17th January Tuesday 22nd January Thursday 24th January Tuesday 29th January Thursday 31st January Tuesday 5th February CNY Thursday 7th February CNY Tuesday 12th February Thursday 14th February Tuesday 19th February Thursday 21st February Tuesday 26th February Thursday 28th February PMD PMD Tuesday 4th March Thursday 6th March Tuesday 11th March Thursday 13 th March NS Tuesday 18th March Thursday 20th March Tuesday 25th March Holiday Thursday 27th March Holiday Tuesday 1st April Holiday Thursday 3rd April Holiday Tuesday 8th April Thursday 10th April Tuesday 15th April NS Thursday 17th April Tuesday 22 April Thursday 24th April Tuesday 29th April Thursday 1st May Tuesday 6th May NS Thursday 8th May Tuesday 13th May Holiday Thursday 15th May Tuesday 20th May Thursday 22nd May NS Tuesday 27th May NS Thursday 29th May Tuesday 3rd June Thursday 5th June Tuesday 10th June Thursday 12th June NS Tuesday 17th June Thursday 19th June NS is No Swimming for that day. Total amount due: ________________________ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Parents Name: ______________________________________________ Parents contact phone number: _________________________________ Parents email address: ________________________________________ Does your child have any physical conditions/ailments that the coaches should know about? ________________________________________________ How will your swimmer be getting home? _____________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________

Taipei European School Dance Classes

Open to all TES students throughout the school The dance classes are going very well and every child is improving a great deal. Each group has settled in well together and we have a lot of fun every week - I am really delighted with everyone’s progress. We’ve had some delays with the uniform, but we’re getting there slowly – thanks to help from the ladies in the TES shop. Some parents have been good enough to pass on feedback to me and I am very grateful for that also. Please keep it coming. Now is that time to plan the next term of dance classes from January-April. All current classes will remain the same - possibly with a little time adjustment. I would really like to hear from you if you have an interest in any new classes - the two I have in mind are: 1 - Adult dance class - could be held Tues or Thurs possibly from 6-7pm at Wen Lin Road and would be a mix of ballet and modern dance exercises & routines. Suitable for any adult. 2 - Boys only ballet class - would be Tues or Thurs at Wen-Lin Road, for approx 45minutes and would be for ages 5-8. This is for boys who are interested in dancing, but who are too intimidated by joining a class with lots of girls in it. Boys who currently are ok with that could swap to a boys only class, or could stay in a mixed class depending on preference. For new classes, there must be a minimum of 5 people to commit to start the class. Lastly, I am hoping to split the Beginners ballet class on Thursdays into Beginners 1 (3yr olds) and Beginners 2 (4yr olds). This will allow more children to join in (we have a waitlist building already for beginners ballet) and the 4yr olds can be stretched a little bit more than the 3s. I will confirm the new times as soon as I can. If you have a little one who’d like to try ballet, email me now and get your name on the waitlist for this class! If you are interested in any of the above, or would like to know more about anything to do with the TES dance programme, please email me, Imogen Knight, directly at [email protected] I look forward to hearing from you.