We are into the first few weeks of semester two, so as we move forward, let’s look at some milestones from the first semester!
For the teachers and staff, the first semester starts in the summer, long before the students arrive. During that time, the school is busy preparing the school for the fall semester.
This time, we were busy with renovations on the first floor. We added three classrooms, three student bathrooms, four teacher stalls, and a dedicated break room and work room for teachers.
We also installed the first set of new desks and chairs.
It was…very hot during those days.
...very hot.
After School Activities, Events and More Events
Student interest in after school activities (ASA) remains extremely high, with over 60% of students signing up for at least one of twenty-three ASAs. Another 15% of students signed up for ELP, too.
And despite the cancellations, and changes to the whatever, we were able to host a number of events.
There were special after school sports days, like baseball day.
And football (soccer) matches with other schools for our elementary soccer teams. We were able to have friendly matches with Hanova, and DeHong, and took part in the U11 boys & girls and UO8 tournament which included XLIS.
We held the Xi’an Volleyball Classic in November, hosting DeHong and XLIS, and hosted four other schools, SSFBC (we call the Pegasus), XLIS, Hanova, Maple Leaf, and Bodi for the Table Tennis Winter Classic in December.
Mr. Burks and his team hosted the annual Fall Festival, which is an event that students look forward to every year.
The Marco Polo Department planned and hosted the Marco Polo Speech Contest, which allowed our students to showcase their progress in speaking Chinese. Every year we look forward to this event, and every year we are impressed with the level of fluency our students attain.
On the academic side, XIS students participated in the American Mathematics Competition (AMC), and XIS hosted SAT tests in August.
Our littlest warriors got to experience STEAM doing age-appropriate experiments in Elementary STEAM, while our Upper School STEAM ASA got to delve into more advanced topics.
The Secondary Drama Club opted to videotape their drama production instead of doing a live production.
It was a stretch for everyone involved, but for a first effort, everyone really enjoyed
It wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows, however. Because of reasons that our readers should be well aware, we only managed to host one Principal Coffee for parents this past fall semester. As life returns back to normal, we hope to return to our monthly Principal Coffees again.
A number of other events were also postponed or canceled. As with the Principal Coffee, we hope that as things settle back into a rhythm of normalcy, more of our events for the spring semester will go off without a hitch!
School Improvements
Whether it be our facilities, our curriculum, or our student support services, we are always looking for ways to improve our school.
One of the areas of improvement has been with the addition of heating and cooling units for the gymnasium.
We first installed larger stand-alone units. It might seem that such small units wouldn’t be able to make an impact in such a large space, but in actuality, they provided needed climate control for the areas they cover – the bleachers by the door and the playground.
Later in the semester, we installed eight larger heating and cooling units covering the entire gymnasium.
And the Secondary Woodworking Club continued the tradition of students contributing the facilities of the school by building coat racks and book hangers for elementary classrooms.
Student built furniture can be found throughout the school, and now this years’ woodworking club has added among the collection.
In fact, the engineering department is using the plans made by students to build more of these book bag hangers.
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Jean Rufin and Analisa Dorsey have been employing the PRIDE curriculum to build up the foundation for our younger English learners for their phonetic skills, writing, spelling, and reading comprehension. These are small group sessions that allows students to advance faster than they would be in larger class settings, and we have seen tremendous growth in their reading levels!
Another first is Ms. Contreras Behavior Science, which is a great cross-discipline class. In Behavior Science, students will engage with material ranging from a cross-section of subjects, all in the same class, like mathematics and statistics, English, and science.
Miss Julie Social Studies classes continue to integrate science, technology, engineering and art related disciplines into their class projects.
In Lower Elementary Teachers have been focusing on phonetics for all students. Like many functions in the early years of education, this lays a foundation for being able to encounter new words and correctly pronounce them without needing 3rd party instruction on how to do so. Learning phonetics is not unique to non-native speakers; native English speakers also spend time learning phonetics.
ELP concluded early so teachers could asses students and graduate them out if they have progressed far enough. Graduating out of ELP is a significant milestone since these students can now take other ASAs!
