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on February 11, 2022

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PTO Newsletter Feb.11-17

From the PTO

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From the Preschool/Elementary School Principal

*This week's images come from the Grade 5 residential trip to the Nethy Bridge Outdoor Activity Centre, where the children had the opportunity to develop bonds, to push themselves to take risks and to learn more about themselves and their classmates. A Week Away & the Power of Classroom Communities Early in my teaching career, I used to start the school year having the children in Grade 5 read E. L. Konigsburg’s classic children’s novel, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler . The story follows a brother and sister who, despite their frequent squabbles, decide to run away together and take up residence in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. At its heart, the book carries a profound truth: that the true point of going on a journey or adventure is to return transformed . We would read it with our students as preparation for the week-long residential trip, encouraging them to step away from the comforts of routine, face shared challenges in an outdoor setting, ...

From the Head of School

Artificial Intelligence at ISA - Head of School Coffee, Next Friday from 8.30am Plato was the first great writer in the Western Tradition. He was also the first known, and certainly greatest, critic of literacy. Ironically, two and half thousand years later, we can still connect with Plato’s arguments because he wrote them down. In Phaedrus he creates a dialogue between the Egyptian God Theuth, the inventor of writing, and King Thamus, whom Theuth is trying to persuade to take it up. He claims writing will improve memory and wisdom; Thamus counters by saying that writing is in fact a tool for reminders and not true memory; because we don’t internalise the knowledge, we will have the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom. Phaedrus is, like Plato’s other works, a dialogue - writing that imitated an oral form. No wonder Plato worried that writing was a technology which threatened to diminish a human process (spoken language). Curiously, he still couldn’t resist the allure...

From the Middle and High School Principal

When I was at school, career advice generally consisted of flicking through a dusty binder in the library and being gently nudged towards a handful of conventional professions. There wasn't much discussion about global flexibility, tech directors, or unconventional trajectories! Ironically my Mum was right in my teenage years when she used to ask me if I had ever thought of being a teacher, but as is pretty normal with teenagers, I didn’t listen and needed to find that out for myself after a few years working in business. Having since worked across the world and experienced the joys of international teaching, I have seen first-hand just how non-linear life really is. Today's young people need far more than standard textbook answers; they need authentic human stories, genuine agency, and a window into the wider world to help them map out their own unique pathways to success. That spirit of global connectedness arrived on our doorstep this week in the Grade 11/12 Common Room. B...

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