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Dear JVLR Primary & Secondary Students, Staff, & Families,
As giving is great all year round, we especially turn our attention to it this time of the year! Being the season of giving, Grade 5 had taken this initiative to help children in need. We would like to continue this tradition and inspire our community to share with others. We have contacted St Catherine’s Orphanage Home to share the joy of giving and in our way to express gratitude. Saint Catherine’s Orphanage Home is a foundation that supports orphans, deprived, abused, and underprivileged children. In order to support them, we have come up with a shoebox drive. A shoebox drive is where you can put different things in a shoebox. The quantity and the number of items to put in the box depend entirely on you. This collection is purely voluntary, and yet we do encourage you to participate. The home has provided a list of (unused) items which they need.
You can drop your shoebox at the JVLR Campus next week (Monday, December 7 - Friday, December 11) between the hours of 9:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. If you are driving in, you can see in the image attached below that the collection point will be at the rear of the Lobby (please remain in your car to ensure safety). If you are on foot, the collection point will be just inside Gate 1. In the image below, you will see that boxes can be dropped off at the rear of the building, using our driveway. We will then arrange for delivery of the boxes to the Orphanage. Thank you in advance for any help you can give. Regards OIS Team 
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26th November 2020 Parent Teacher Student Meetings Dear Parents and Guardians, Many parents have inquired about student assessment and how we, the teachers, know how our children are achieving their goals and learning outcomes, especially whilst learning from home. We are moving towards more on-going formative assessment to ensure that we are in-line and meeting the requirements of the Enhanced Primary Years Programme. During the week of December 7th-11th, our Primary school will host Parent Teacher Student Meetings (PTSMs). This is an opportunity for both parents and their child to meet with their class teacher to discuss student progress and achievements. Your child’s teacher will help navigate you through an assessment folder, which will be available on Seesaw. Following this, student goal setting will be discussed and parents will have an opportunity to discuss any other area of their child’s learning, within the 20 minute time frame. Of course, we encourage parents to meet with their child’s teacher at any time of the year but this is a timely event for you to discover how your child is progressing. On November 29th parents will receive a sign up sheet for the PTSMs from your child’s homeroom teacher. The sign-ups will close on December 4th. Parents will be sent a Zoom link the day before the meeting. We hope that all our parents and students will sign up for these meetings. Ms Lisa Hughes Head of Primary JVLR Campus As part of our ongoing series of events to support parent understating of learning at OIS, we are pleased to share the following videos on the role of single subject teachers (SST). These videos explain how the single subjects work within the PYP framework at OIS JVLR. This presentation is divided into 2 parts.
Dear Parents,
On the 10th and 11th of November, JVLR Primary school will have virtual Parent-Teacher meetings (PTM) with the Single Subject teachers. During these meetings, you will have the opportunity to discuss your child’s individual learning and progress. Please note that there will be no single subject classes on the 10th and 11th November. Meeting sign up will be on a first come, first served basis. The sign up sheet will open on Saturday 24th October at 8am and close on Monday 2nd November at 8am. You will not be able to sign up for a PTM for the 10th and 11th November, after this date. SchoolCloud - Parentseveningsystems.co.uk We are using School Cloud to sign up for the meetings and to host the video calls with teachers. School Cloud runs through your internet browser. On School Cloud, you will only be able to use one device, so you cannot join a call from multiple locations or devices. On conference day, please log into your account so that you are not prompted to login for each call. You will need to allow School Cloud access to your video and microphone for the video call. Please attend your scheduled meetings promptly, as meetings will automatically be disconnected after the allotted time. Login Setup You will need to follow this link to login to your account https://oisjvlr.schoolcloud.co.uk Please do this before the sign up opens to check your login information. You need to have the following details, as registered with OIS: Parent
Video Tutorial This link will take you to a video explaining: Using School Cloud. Appointment Booking Window The window for setting up appointments will open on Saturday 24th October at 8am and close on Monday 2nd November at 8am. This allows our teachers time to prepare for their meetings with you, in order to make effective use of the meeting time. After the sign up session has closed, there will be no further sign ups for this PTM. If you cannot attend these dates, you miss the sign ups or there are no slots available when you access the system, you can contact the single subject teachers directly to make a meeting for an alternative day and time. Support email If you have any problems logging in or setting up appointments then help is available from our IT team from Monday - Friday from 08:00 am to 05:00 pm at the following email address: mobileapp_support@oberoi-is.org Focus of discussions This meeting is to discuss your child’s progress with the single subject teacher. Non-attendance/ technical issues on the day If you are unable to attend your meeting after you have signed up, or you have a technical problem on the day, please contact the teacher(s) to let them know. If there is an issue, meetings can be rescheduled for an alternative date. Kind regards, Nicola Holloway Deputy Head of Primary (JVLR)
A huge thank you to parents who have attended recent webinars run by our teachers. We have a tab on the blog for all webinars to be accessed at any time.
Many thanks,
Dear Parents,
On Friday, September 18th, we will have a non-student day, the majority of our students are expected to sign up for a 20 minutes time slot with their child's homeroom teacher. We will also have 'buffer' time slots on Thursday, 17th and Monday 21st. Please have a look at the video which explains exactly how the conferences will work. A big thank you to Ms Archana for putting the video together. Many thanks, Ms Lisa Primary Coffee Morning Questions
Dear Parents and Families, Many thanks for your questions before and after Mr Steve’s recent Parent session. Just to let you know we are planning Parent sessions/webinars/workshops in the near future to cover a range of topics. Our first session will be for new families to understand the Primary Years Programme, this will be led by our PYP Coordinator; Archana Gera. Please find responses to some of your questions below. The questions are in green and responses are in blue, please note I have not edited parent questions: Can we have two levels of Hindi for differentiated learning, advanced and beginners? I suppose at least half of the kids are pretty proficient in Hindi. As we are a PYP school, streaming of languages is not accepted by the IB. However, we are looking at ways of possible different grouping for the larger classes. Why don't we use Zoom for classes at JVLR? Google Meet is not a very good user-interface. Zoom allows so much more flexibility for teachers. When do you expect the transition to Zoom happen? All single subject teachers are switching to Zoom and once teachers have received training they too will work towards using Zoom for most of their sessions. Hi Stephen. A query on the asynchronous learning. We are new to the OIS family and the tools etc. are a bit of a catch up for the child. In this scenario asynchronous learning (given both of us are working) becomes a bit much especially if it is expected daily. Realistically we are in a “weekend catchup” mode with the asynchronous learning. Is there any way to relax the timelines a bit to allow kid to catch up? Thanks. Please speak to your child’s homeroom teacher with regards to completion of tasks. Given limitations of online, could you consider one on one sessions with the kid once a month to evaluate how they are coping up vis a vi’s then larger group and course correct if need be This would be impossible to do considering the number of children we have at the school. However, please feel free to ask for an appointment with an individual teacher if you have any questions or queries, we also have our Learning Support Team who are available to assist you in any way. How about using Microsoft Teams instead of Google Meet or Zoom since we can do online classes and assignments on it. We have explored Microsoft Teams as a Senior Leadership Team and as most of the functions were offline, we didn’t feel it was user friendly for the students and being an Apple School, we are using more of the online features for teaching and learning. As a one school two campus philosophy there is yet a disparity in the schedule and content for the same grades at both campuses. How are we planning to reduce that? Disparities are: OGC started with Zoom from Day 1; Weekly schedules were better prepared from Day 1 With regards to schedules, teachers have different approaches to design schedules, some of our children are creating their own schedules independently (student choice and agency) and some students have been given a schedule, and some teachers are helping some students create schedules. We received the very beautifully designed note books . Thankyou got that !As a new parent would like to know do we need to buy text books ? Primary Parents do not need to buy textbooks. We do not use textbooks in Primary school, as we are a PYP school. Can we have online workshops from the Counselor like we had last year with Dr. Patricia? Please contact the Learning Support team if you have any questions about counselling. Now that the new education policy has made coding compulsory from Grade 6. how is school incorporating this into the curriculum? As shared by Steve, a great deal of the elements of the NEP, we are doing already with our IB Programmes. Can we have email of school counsellor if the child is facing school related anxiety. Please contact the Learning Support team if you have any questions about counselling. Is there a way to know in advance what all Units Kids are going to cover in each term? The PYP Coordinator will be sharing the Programme of Inquiry with you very soon. Do you have a set curriculum for nursery so we can get an idea what kids will learn and if yes can you share it with us. We have a Programme of Inquiry set for the year, please ask your teacher to share it with you. Now that school reopening till December looks next to impossible, may we request an insight into units and inquiries for next two terms. We have a Programme of Inquiry set for the year, please ask your teacher to share it with you. i believe that these early years are extremely important as they are the basis of laying a strong foundation.i understand that the school is doing the best they can.But i m concerned about the impact of a virtual class room on my child as it simply cannot replace the real thing.Are you looking at newer and more dynamic ways of teaching online? we have so many resources we have access too.we need to make optimal use of them and try and introduce learning which is more hands on.Though there is 2 way communication between the child and teacher but it is no way as dynamic as it is in a real class room. Learning on a screen can never replicate learning in ‘real-life,’ so many elements can never be accessed online, such as play time with friends, freedom of physical movement, interactions with each other. However, we are providing sessions for our teachers to look at best practice online teaching and learning, so please give your child some time and I am sure you will see some positive changes in the near future. Live session for Grade 2 is concerning in terms of screen time. Children have to sit and wait for each child to answer the same question. Engagement is minimal in big group. Out of interaction time of 20 minutes each child maybe speaks for 1 minute or even lesser. Repetitive answers as it’s 1 question. Can this be structured better so live sessions are more interactive and engaging? Grade 2 are re-evaluating their schedules and creating more opportunities for smaller groups. Online Session time are more than 2 hours a days and in addition the assignments solving makes online screen time upto 3 hours almost. CAN WE WORK AROUND THIS? Ask your teacher for more flexibility with the asynchronous learning. As a school we are committing to up to certain time limits. We need details of Academic curriculum which will be covered in this year. Please share all topics of UOI. The PYP Coordinator will be sharing the Programme of Inquiry with you very soon. While the oberoi-is.org page highlights 11 as the average class size, isn't 21 too many students for a single JKG group? (I am new and my expectation was classes in the 10-15 max). Normally in school, new student's are mixed between the classes. For the one JKG group, we placed all the new students together. We felt it was important that they could focus on building relationships with the adults. There are two teachers and 1 assistant linked to this class and the teachers will be doing more split class sessions, now that we have begun the year. Many thanks for your questions, Ms Lisa Dear Parents, Happy Parsi New Year and Happy Birthday India! Thank you to all our families who have been incredibly supportive and flexible during our first week of Phase 2 LFH. Please check out: sites.google.com/view/jvlrprimaryschoolclosure/phase-2 for archived phase 1 LFH and more recent comments from parents, students and teachers. Our teachers have been observing and collecting some feedback from our parent community over the last week and we would like to address a few points: The school day starts at 8:00 and finishes at 2pm. Each day will look slightly different for your child so please be sure to check the schedule on Managebac, which will be posted for the following week at the end of the working day on Fridays. Please note, that currently: Nursery and JKG are scheduled up to 1 hour online. SKG-2 are scheduled up to 2 hours online. Grade 3, 4 and 5 are scheduled up to 3 hours online. We have noticed that some of our younger learners are finding it challenging to remain online and focused for a certain amount of time. This is normal, we are encouraging teachers to include movement in their sessions, as well as water breaks. Parents, please don't force your child online and have them sit in a comfortable position for the lesson. Parents cannot log in and join a virtual call, the call is for the child only, with an adult in the vicinity. Parents who join by themselves and are outside school will not be permitted to join the class. As part of our Child Safeguarding Policy, parents are not permitted to take photos of record lessons. Parents, please be advised you are online and are visible to other children and other parents; Please dress suitable. We would also like to advise that parents refrain from prompting their child on-line or doing an activity for their child. Each teacher needs to know what your child is capable of and what they may need further explanation of, having parents do the prompting or responding, doesn't help. As we embark on smaller groupings, and for some classes make the transition to using Zoom, children will have more opportunity to speak and share ideas and thoughts in the group. We encourage children to take turns, be patient, actively listen to others, parents are advised not to call-on the teacher if their child has not had a turn to speak. Sessions have a start and end time, which can clearly be seen on the calendar, we highly recommend that you log on a few minutes before the class starts. We are being flexible for the time being but will reevaluate lateness and tardiness in the next few weeks. If you wish to request a leave, or your child is ill, or you have connectivity issues, please inform your child's teacher ahead of time. We know there are many birthdays and we do give time to celebrate whilst online, please speak to your child's HRT to arrange something well ahead of time and the teacher will share their guidelines for birthday celebrations. Some parents have requested schedules, please speak to your child's teacher about scheduling your child's week. We are a PYP school and encouraging student agency, creating their own schedules, with some guidance from the school empowers students to take charge of their week. Yours Sincerely, Ms Lisa Hughes Head of Primary OIS;JVLR Campus  Hello everyone!
My name is Archana Gera, and I am the new PYP Coordinator at JVLR. I’m truly delighted to be a part of the OIS family. As of today, we enter into our second week of school.. Congratulations to all for (somehow?) getting through the first week. Have you ever thought of this.. Educational institutions are the only places which are designed to have an annual rebirth year after year: New faces, new goals/resolutions, and sometimes new ways of doing things. As a teacher I always felt like these restarts gave me opportunities to be a new and improved version of myself every single year. I am sure students feel the same way. And there are some facts that always hold true for the start of every year: excitement, anxiety, questions and endless change of plans. We at OIS have been no different, the only addition being our reliance on the functioning of technology! Our 10-week spell of online learning before summer break left us with several points of both celebration and reflection. Combined with feedback from parents, our new understanding allowed us to make informed decisions for our current 'Phase 2' of online learning, which are calling ‘Learning From Home’. Over the summer break, many of our teachers also engaged in a lot of widely available professional development and came back with some fresh thinking and ideas. With reference to the Stages of eLearning by Jennifer Chang, we believe that we have progressed from the ‘Survive’ stage in Phase 1 to ‘Thrive’ in Phase 2. Our Head of Primary Ms Lisa talked about it with parents and teachers during the start of this school year. We are truly looking forward to actually implementing many of our refreshed plans with our students. Of course we miss being in the building with all the chitter-chatter, but we are making use of this time to meaningfully integrate technology with the inquiry- and concept-based learning the PYP stands for. We will soon bring you more insights into what’s happening in those online classes. Meanwhile, here is an important IB resource that has plenty of ideas and food for thought about the implications of the ongoing pandemic on the schools, families, teachers and students: https://ibo.org/covid-19-support/ Have a great second week. If you have a question, don’t forget to talk to your child’s homeroom teacher. Warm regards, Archana |
Lisa Hughes
Primary Head
Nicola Holloway
Deputy Primary Head
ARCHANA GERA
PYP COORDINATOR
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December 2020
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