TIS Director's Blog

This Saturday March 7 many of the OIS faculty and teachers from other JCIS (Japan Council of International Schools) participated in a Foundation Day workshop at our school. The workshop was run by Deborah Masters from Visible Learning Plus, a consultant group that helps schools implement the ideas of education professor, Dr. John Hattie. The New Zealand based company focuses on Dr. Hattie’s principles, detailed in his 2012 book, “Visible Learning for Teachers: Maximizing Impact on Learning.” Visible Learning is part of Cognition Education and it is the first time they came to OIS. I would like to thank JCIS for partially supporting Master’s visit.

The Foundation Day is an introduction to the ideas of Dr. Hattie. Below are my notes and major learning points of the day.

One of Dr. Hattie’s big contributions to the field of education was the synthesize a huge number (over 50,000 papers) of research studies focusing on student achievement. In my 20 years in education, I have seen many good ideas and innovations come and go in schools. Hattie looked at 150 of them and put on one scale, the effect on student achievement of these. The full chart is here. An effect size of 0.40 on his scale is what educators should expect and aim for when trying to influence student learning. It was enlightening to see which influences had the greatest impact on achievement and many of them go against current popular opinion. They are great conversation starters for faculty.

The second session brought to light assessment-capable learners. I was inspired to do a better job of looking at our current learning data, both standardized test scores and other assessments, and use them better to guide learning. More importantly, to get these in the hands of the students so they themselves can guide their learning. The third session, Know Thy Impact, introduced effect size and gave some statistical data analysis to help us convert student achievement data so teachers know what effect they have on learning. I will definitely dig deeper into our international schools assessment data and share it with faculty.

Session four broke feedback from teachers to students into different levels. Beginning students need basic task level feedback, intermediate students need process feedback, and expert students need self-regulation feedback. Visible learning does not regard praise as feedback, although important, it does not impact learning directly. We went through an exercise of giving examples of the three levels of feedback.

The final session introduced Mindframes, which are a set of beliefs that underpin the actions and decisions of teachers. Two that resonated with me were using assessment as feedback to the teacher on how they can improve, not only what the students achieved and a school developing a culture of positive relationships where teachers and students are not afraid to make mistakes and trust and support each other.

All of my notes can be found in this Google document.

The Foundation Day was an introduction to the research and several days could be spent further learning about the five strands of Visible Learning. We hope to further explore how our school can improve student learning through putting into practice, Dr. Hattie’s ideas.

I like to compare Kwansei Gakuin University to the University of Alabama in the USA. They are the premier American football school in the country. They have won more national championships than any other university in Japan. Later this month Ivy League university, Princeton, will be coming to Japan to play in the Legacy Bowl. The famous New Jersey university has an extensive co curricular program. Connected to the visit is a symposium hosted by KG university entitled “How Co-Curricular Activities Help Universities Foster Global Leaders- Information Exchange with Princeton University”. Dr. Allison Rich, the Associate Athletic Director of Princeton, the football coaches from both schools, and KG professor Yukio Mirata from the International Studies program will be speaking.  They symposium takes place in the afternoon of Thursday March 19 . For more information, please follow the link above.

Go Fighters!

This is the third in a series of posts about the people from the Kwansei Gakuin Foundation that work behind the scenes at the school. Keishi works in the business office and this year he has devoted much time to facilities. He is shown above with a new L.E.D. light and the old fluorescent light.The campus facilities people are replacing lights with energy efficient L.E.D. lights and Keishi explained to the students who are studying sustainability, the cost savings to school and some of the technical aspects of the new lights.

Mr. Uenoya has been working here at the school for 1 year. He is a graduate of Kwansei Gakuin university and was working in the School of International Studies office before being transferred to our campus. Keishi is originally from the Fukui prefecture and after a year of studying abroad at the University of Georgia (USA), he wanted to support students going abroad, hence the reason why he was working in the international studies office. His bilingualism and comfort with foreigners have been assets for the school. Besides facilities, Mr. Uenoya works with the special programs (Just For Kids, Saturday English School) office and deals with the Osaka Prefecture MEXT (Ministry of Education) subsidies program.

Keishi finds the international atmosphere and the style of education at SOIS very interesting. We are glad that he brings a youthful, positive, energy to the school.

On Tuesday the OIS music department hosted an International Baccalaurate (IB) music recital. Performing were IB music students Sara Okino and Leila Sakamoto. As part of the IB music curriculum, students need to submit videos of performances for IB examiners to assess. Both of the grade 11 students composed original music pieces for the performance. They were accompanied by other SOIS students. Sara’s speciality is voice and her vocal skills and range were exhibited with a variety of singing styles from traditional Celtic to modern musical theatre songs.

Leila is an accomplished violinist, and besides having her classmates play her original piece, “Stained Glass and Instability”, she played Bach’s Partita No. 1, a four-movement piece written for the violin. The audience was moved by the stirring performance.

The IB music course consists of composition, performance and critical analysis of music. It exposes students to a wide range of music forms in a wider range of historical and social contexts. It is the highest level of study a high school music student can complete in an international school. Congratulations to Sara, Leila, and music teacher Mr. Vernon Villapando on the recital. We are looking forward to hearing more from them in the spring concert.

The OIS elementary students have been getting fit, often without even knowing they were exercising. PE teacher Mrs. Leanne Entwhistle wanted to get students running more and came up with the idea of measuring how much they run and challenging them to make it to Disneyland in Tokyo, 522 kilometers from Minoh. It is 86 meters around the gymnasium, and for the 6-week fitness unit this term, the students begin class with running around the gym as a warm up for the lesson. The students start with 3 minutes and depending on the age group, build up to over 15 minutes of running at one time. “The Big Run” challenge is taking place this week as a culmination of the unit. Grade 1 students run up to 8 minutes, grade two for 10 minutes, etc. Besides endurance, Mrs. Entwhistle teaches form, technique, and pacing. This is such a valuable life long skill!

I am happy to announce that the combined efforts of the students were more than enough to make the 522 kilometers. This was even before the Big Run starting today. Mickey Mouse even sends them a gift and a certificate for accomplishing the feat.

Perhaps next year they will set their sights on a further destination. How about the 1,363 kilometers to the Disneyland resort in Shanghai?

Thanks to all the parents and faculty who attended and participated in the discussion last week about technology’s impact on families and education. The session was recorded and the link to the podcast is located here. Below are some links of resources mentioned during the conversation.

Background Info: The internet and mobile technology devices have profoundly changed the way we live and work. The increased access to information and ease of communication came so suddenly that families are still figuring out how to deal with it.

Links

Khan Academy (https://www.khanacademy.org/)

BBC series The Educators (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04dwbkt)

Article from MacWorld about jail breaking an Apple product

(http://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/ios-jailbreaking-pros-cons-jailbreak-iphone-good-bad-3491721/)

In the April 2014 issue of the Educator, OIS Technology Director Stephen Frater summarizes research on children and screen time.

(http://www.senri.ed.jp/site/attachments/852_Educator_12%20April%202014.pdf)

Article from the NY Times September 10, 2014 “Steve Jobs Was a Low-Tech Parent”

(http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/11/fashion/steve-jobs-apple-was-a-low-tech-parent.html?_r=0)

Article from the May7, 2014 issue of The NewYorker “Multitask Masters”

(http://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/multitask-masters)

I am always astounded at the varied and rich learning experiences at SOIS that occur on a weekly basis. Last week was especially abundant as we look forward to the winter break. The PYP students on Friday were wonderful in their performance at the winter concert under the guidance of our ES music teacher Sarah Bonner. The standing-room only crowd had their hearts warmed with Christmas cheer that only children can produce. There was singing, dancing, playing of instruments – a true demonstration of learning music.

Above are lights designed by grade 5 students using Japanese washi paper. They were so good I wanted to buy a couple of them for my home! It is interesting to see the different designs from the students. Our school is full of art works from the students.

We had a special night on Wednesday with the annual students versus teachers basketball game. The boys’ varsity team was too much for the “fossils” again this year, defeating us 47-41 in a close game. It is good practice for the team and a good workout for us.

Visiting artist Allison Samuels gave a talk to our diploma program visual arts students on Friday. She described her experience as a working artist in New York City. The students had questions about attending art school, starting her own business, and how to follow one’s passion. As with all young people who enjoy the visual arts, finding a balance between making a living and making art is always difficult. Allison is a fabric artist and next week will be giving some embroidery workshops.

In the photo above, SIS principal, Mayumi Ito putts through an obstacle course in our annual Two Schools Golf Cup. We are always finding ways for our two schools to work together. Each day last week, a different hole was set up in the faculty lounge and an OIS staff member was paired with an SIS staff member. It was funny to hear cheers throughout the day coming from the usually quiet break area. The event was small, but important in encouraging communication between the two schools. I have found in my career that doing fun activities together, allows for more collaboration throughout the year.

And finally, I wanted to share this photo of the faculty at the All School Production auditions. They evaluated the singing and dancing talent of our students. The cast for this year’s musical, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is set and rehearsals started last week. Students, parents, and teachers from grades 3-12 are involved. Much goes into the production including the designing and building of sets and props, perfecting the songs and dances, making costumes, managing the stage, live music, sound quality, lights, etc. It brings us all together and it should be an entertaining performance in February.

One of the traditions of celebrating Christmas is the act of giving. This can take the form of presents to each other, but also, it can mean giving to the poor. Not only money, but time as well. Serving the community and helping the least fortunate in our society is important to OIS. We have many initiatives from K – 12 led by our students and faculty that lend support to the poor.

• The Grade 1 students are collecting money, rice, soap, underwear, and sleeping bags for the homeless in Osaka. Our students regularly visit the Sannoh Childrens Center in Nishinariku. There is still time for you to donate to the cause, and you can find deposit boxes in the genkan.
• Grade 11 student Sawako Tachibana is promoting the Nozomi Project, a non-profit organization helping women in the Ishinomaki region. Nozomi means “hope” in English and one of the initiatives Nozomi Project does is take broken pottery left in the wake of the tsunami and turn it into beautiful jewelry. Sawako is raising funds to give to the organization.
• The SOIS Eco Club continues to collect paper for Gyokokai, a shelter for formerly homeless, physically disabled people in the Nishinariku part of Osaka. They are also starting to collect aluminum. Gyokkai collects the paper monthly for processing. The Eco Club also purchased 20 planters with the grades 3 and 4 students are adopting. They will take care of the plants and place them in the balcony in front of the elementary classrooms.
• The elementary school through fundraising efforts donated $450 to Bobonaro, a NGO providing potable water in schools in Timor Leste. This was done through Kopernik, whose founder, Toshi Nakamura, an Osakan native, started. He visited our school last year.
• Other donations from OIS went to Canaan Village, a facility near Fukushima that houses adults with disabilities and to the School of Hope in Cambodia.
• The grade 11 service trip this March will be to Cebu, Phillipines. They are raising money and building a playground for the children at a disadvantaged school.
• The grade six students visited ARK (Animal Refuge Kansai) and also raised funds for the refuge.
• The grade 10 students are working with our neighbor, the Senri Rehabilitation Hospital. They volunteer and assist speech pathologists, physical therapists and other specialists with the patients.

I would like to wish everyone in our community a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Let this time of peace and giving inspire you to help others.

 

(This is the second in a series of KG personnel who play a role at our school.)

Atushide Sakakura is our head of campus and visits our school on a monthly basis for one of our main administrative meetings. Administrators from the school also have frequent chances to meet up with him when they visit the main Kwansei Gakuin (KG) Uegahara campus. He is an administrative trustee of the KG Educational Foundation with overseeing responsibility for all the KG K-12 schools and a professor at KG university in the School of Humanities. A native of Kyoto, he has bachelors and masters degrees from KG University in the field of Chinese history. He feels it important that for students to be global or internationally-minded, they must first understand their neighbors.

Professor Sakakura enjoys his time on the SOIS campus. He sees that the students here have more choice in what they learn than in the average Japanese school, something he sees as a positive trait of the education we offer, as he thinks students are happier and learn more when they can decide for themselves what path their learning will take. His time also spent in K-12 schools brings him back to a time earlier in his career when he wanted to be a teacher in a high school instead of a professor and he likes being around younger students.

Besides being an expert in Chinese history and a leader on the KG Board of Trustees, Sakakura sensei enjoys spending time with his grandchildren and is a skilled curer (smoker) of different kinds of meat.

Sakakura sensei’s experience and common sense have helped our school immensely. He is a strong advocate for the Senri and Osaka International Schools. He always has the best interests of our students in his focus. The campus head plays a very important role in representing our campus within the KG foundation.

This is the first in a series of posts introducing the members of Kwansei Gakuin University who play a role at our school. The goal of this series is to improve communication between OIS and KG and strengthen the bonds between the university and OIS.

Reverend Musubi Tabucchi is our SOIS Campus Supervisor on behalf of Kwansei Gakuin University. He has a variety of roles within the KG foundation, but finds time to be at our campus for at least two days per week. Reverend Musubi, besides his role a supervisor of our campus, is also a professor in the school of education and the dean of chaplains, coordinating the entire Christian program for the university. He started at KG in 1981 and has been working with our campus since negotiations started with the Senri International School Foundation and KG.

He is a native of Ashiya City located on the Kobe side of the Osaka Bay. Reverend Tabucchi has bachelors, masters, and doctorate degrees in theology from KG. He also has done post graduate work at Kings College in London. He is also an ordained minister with the United Church of Christ in Japan. Reverend Tabuchi is a third-generation Christian minister. His grandmother was part of the first group of women ministers to be ordained in Japan.

Reverend Tabucchi has grown quite fond of OIS in his time here. He feels he is part of both the KG and OIS families. His international perspective has been invaluable for our transition to KG. His daughter is a graduate of international schools and his multicultural insights, wisdom, and commitment to international education have been invaluable for our community.