Embedded Files
MSHS
Written by Mr. Alex Nenes
Welcome to Term 2! I hope all of you have enjoyed the brief, but well deserved break to enjoy time with family and friends, catch up on reviewing your course material, preparing for the upcoming competitions and events, and also review your plans and goals.
It may not seem like it but term 2 is one of the most dynamic parts of the academic year as it presents students with the opportunity to familiarise themselves with the content for the semester exams, prepare for events such as Hour of Code, Sports Day, Holiday Concert, and more. As we head towards the half point in the academic year I hope all students and their families are well, in good health, and can find a good school/work-life balance as I truly believe that the ancient Latin statement “mens sana in corpore sano” has never been so current and relevant.
I am looking forward to meeting the parents and students’ families on November 5th in the SWA 15th anniversary celebration. The day will be a great opportunity for the school community to get together and spend an amazing family day!
MYP UPDATE
Written by Mr. Haoken
Dear MYP Parents & Guardians,
Our MYP Programme embraces key elements of the IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) as well as external assessments of CAIE. Together with our BEST Pathways, SWA's Grade 6 to 10 programme combines age-appropriate approaches, a focus on ATL skills development and academic rigour, ensuring that our students are prepared for success.
Please see the notices and reminders for the coming weeks of Term 2:
Summative assessment tasks are posted on Managebac. Teachers clarify the expectations for each summative task with direct reference to the subject assessment criteria, (A, B, C, D). All teachers will provide a minimum of 5 days notice in advance informing students of summative assessments. Assignment feedback will be key to encouraging our students' development. Teachers provide an overall guidance comment within the Managebac platform and return all markings within the 7 days turnaround period. Please feel free to contact us if you encounter any issues.
MYP Semester 1 Examinations will take place as follows:
Grades 6 - 8 : November 21st - 25th, 2022 from 7:20 - 12:15 (exam leave dismissal)
Grade 9 : November 21st - 25th, 2018 from 7:20 - 12:30 (exam leave dismissal)
Grade 10 : November 23rd - December 1st, 2022 from 7:20 AM - 3:30 PM
Revision in all classes will take place the week before each examination session begins and no summative assessments are allowed during this period devoted to revision. All G6 – 9 examinations are summative of material in both Terms 1 and 2 in all subjects while Grade 10 examinations are summative of Grade 9 and also Terms 1 and 2 of Grade 10. Exam leave forms will be distributed the week before revision week and require students to have satisfactory academic performance, attendance and service as action and personal project progress in order to qualify.
We encourage all students to be involved in at least one Sport or Athletic EX. Please review your child's chosen activities to ensure pickup time arrangements as needed.
Academic Support classes for all subjects have started in Term 2. These support sessions take precedence over non-paid EX and CAS activities. Teachers may place students on these academic support lists as needed based on performance on assessments.
The MSHS STUCO is throwing a Halloween celebration on Monday, October 31st 2022. There will be a Halloween Assembly featuring house competitions, a photo booth, Halloween Holograms, and a Halloween Movie Night. For the first time since the pandemic, we will be celebrating Halloween in person, and we hope that the members of the SWA community will participate and celebrate together.
Please check Managebac regularly and contact us if you are having any trouble logging into the website.
SCIENCE DEPARTMENT
Grade 8 Science
Written by Ms. Michelle
It has been a busy Term 1 of great learning in the Grade 8 Science classroom. We start off the academic year exploring the patterns in the natural world. In this unit, students deepened their understanding of classification of organisms, DNA, traits, and variation.
Group activity - designing dichotomous key to identify leaves found in school
DNA extraction experiment
Investigating human variation - presence of dimples among SWA students
Grade 12 Environmental Systems and Societies
Written by Ms. Michelle
In Term 1, Grade 12 ESS students explored the structure and changes that occurred in ecosystems around the school compound. Students carried out several practical fieldworks in order to understand and evaluate different ecological sampling techniques.
Students used quadrats to measure the percentage cover, population density, and percentage frequency of vegetation around the school compound.
The best way to measure the size of a population in an ecosystem is to count all the individuals in the population. However, counting every individual would be difficult. The Grade 12 students use Lincoln Index to estimate population size based on the capture-mark-release-recapture method. In this activity, students used peanuts to evaluate the accuracy of the Lincoln index.
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
Written by Ms. Daniele
Grade 7
As we transitioned from media studies to a focus on literature, students were tasked with exploring the significant elements of fiction; namely, the setting, character, plot, theme, narrator, and literary devices. Each student presented their findings with references to common texts that were familiar to all. G7 Richard explained the different types of narrator with a reference to The Diary of a Wimpy Kid; Bridget walked us through the different types of character with examples from the classic fairy tale, Cinderella.
Grade 12 English B
Written by Ms. Olive
Having ended last term with a focus on listening and reading skills, it was time students turned their attention to speaking. This term’s springboard for thematic discussions is Eggers’ dystopian novel The Circle which presents a satirical look on the impact technology has had on our identities and relationships. Here the G12 students, Zheng ban and Sehyun, introduce the main characters, Mae and Annie.
MATHEMATICS DEPARTMENT
Grade 7 International Math - Knowing Myself Better
Written by Ms. Olive
Every student is different. Determining the student’s individual learning style would benefit both students and teachers. In maths class, the students answered the questionnaire about what best described their learning style (maths specific) in class. Below is the result of the test:
As part of knowing myself better activity, students answered a questionnaire about their multiple intelligences. With the help of Ms. Lindi, the school counsellor, she explained each strength and skill in the multiple intelligences. Through these activities, students applied their knowledge and skills in statistics in real-life situations.
I&S DEPARTMENT
Written by Ms. Renu
Grade 9 Economics
In term 1 students are showing their understanding on economics resource allocation available resources to various uses. In the context of an entire economy, resources can be allocated by various means, such as markets, or planning.
INDONESIAN DEPARTMENT
Written by Ms. Yulia
At the end of term 1, Grade 7 Indonesian language and literature class learned to present a descriptive text to describe their surroundings. This time, they described the Sinarmas World Academy school environment. Each student took a different place around the school, they sat down and wrote down what they saw, felt, and heard. Students wrote their outline of the information in their notebooks. After that, they returned to class and developed the outline of the writing in the form of descriptive text effectively.
The purpose of this activity is for students to be able to communicate all the things that they see, feel, and hear directly into writing. Their writing is expected to be more authentic and convincing because it comes from what they have observed and experienced directly. Students acknowledged that they were happy to have the opportunity to see, hear, and feel the natural atmosphere at this school alone and in peace, so that they could write down the details that they had never realised before. Finally, with some language feedback in their assignments, the students produced good descriptive, detailed, and had an impact on the reader.
Grade 8 Indonesian language and literature class studied news texts in the last term. In one of the lessons, they learned to identify the main idea or conclusion of a news text, identify facts and opinions, and examine language in news texts, such as direct sentences, indirect sentences, temporal conjunctions, and adverbs of time. To engage students more deeply about these skills, they did cooperative grouping activity, where the class was divided into several groups. Each group will discuss a different topic, together they try to understand the topic, discuss it, write down the results effectively, which will then be conveyed to other groups, and vice versa. The goal was to provide opportunities for students to deepen their inquiry on a topic, learn collaboratively, and most importantly, be able to communicate their understanding by doing peer teaching. In this activity, students showed very good involvement and engagement in their respective groups. Each student has tried to make an effort, and contributed to teach their peers to understand what they were explaining.
CHINESE DEPARTMENT
Written by Mr. Xia
Ancient Chinese poetry is an important way to understand and appreciate Chinese culture. Recently, Grade 7 students in the Chinese language and culture class, we appreciated and recited some poems of the Tang and Song Dynasties. The students showed great enthusiasm and interest in learning.
VIRTUAL ARTS DEPARTMENT
Written by Mr. Alan
On the last day of school term one, I managed to bring a handful of students from Grade 9 to Grade 12 to visit a local art gallery (Agus Suwage: The Theater of Me). Our students were long for this day to come and they were excited, in the gallery we saw many wonders of amazing works display from traditional art to contemporary art in various media and platforms. Here are some snapshots and students' feedbacks.
On arrival at the museum.
Mr. Andika Devara was our art exhibition tour explanatory.
An old traditional comic illustrated back-to-back style.
What a colorful-sounding journey.
Our students have been given an opportunity to do a mini-workshop on carbon-print artwork.
See you next time! Sampai jumpa lain waktu!
G11, Sanadha
The art gallery trip exposed me to different ways to approach art. Also, since I was able to visit the art gallery with friends, we were able to share our opinions on the art pieces and express our interpretations of the pieces. This allowed me to have varied different points of view about intriguing art pieces in the gallery. Additionally, this gallery visit has also given me inspiration for my future artworks. I am happy that SWA has given us the opportunity to go on an art field trip as I found it to fuel my creative spark :)
G11, K.
The trip to Agus Suwage's art gallery was extremely exciting and intriguing as we were toured around by the guide and got to see interesting artworks. I like that we got to go on an excursion outside of school to discover new things because, for me, self-exploration is one of the best forms of learning. In the museum, I took notes of the different methods and materials Suwage used to present his artworks as inspiration for my own IB art exhibition in grade 12. The combination of 2D, 3D, traditional, digital, and interactive art caught my interest and in my opinion, made the gallery much more diverse and amusing. Suwage's artworks hint at his eccentric personality and absurd ideas, which made me appreciate him more as an artist as he was not afraid to convey his thoughts in a creative form.
G12, Zheng Ban
It was eye-opening because it made me think about displaying artworks in different and more unique ways, for example, the pile of black bones which used the corner space of the room and the wall installation.
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