Service Action is an opportunity for students to engage in Service to their community. This service learning has the students working in groups to identify a need, research the issue, plan an action, take some sort of action then reflect on each stage of the cycle.

The final culminating task in Grade 10 is a yearlong project that allows students to participate in a sustained self-directed inquiry within a global context. Students are able to generate new insights and develop deeper understanding. Ultimately our goal is that the students appreciate the process of learning and take pride in their accomplishments.

Dream Time is our in-school project for students grades 6 to 9. It is a personal project without the rigor of the MYP Personal Project. This allows students an opportunity to engage in a sustained inquiry and truly find out what their passion is. This is not an official part of the MYP but, this is something we do to support project-based learning.

There are two aspects in the IB Programmes that are worth noting. These are not unique to the IB programmes but are fundamental to any programme anywhere; teaching and learning. The IB has a particular methodology for teaching called the approaches to teaching. The approaches to teaching have aspects that lead to better performance in the classroom and an overall better education. The first point is that IB teachers have a commitment to inquiry-based teaching.

Student prior knowledge is honoured, and students are at the centre of the learning using their natural curiosity and sense of wonder to drive the learning process. The next approaches to teaching methodology is teaching for conceptual understanding. Students are taught through broad organizing concepts that raise the intellectual bar by teaching for understanding versus remembering. Concept-based teaching allows for more in-depth learning by preparing students for the real world, allowing for transfer beyond the disciplines utilizing big ideas that are not locked into place or time.

The next aspect of the IB programmes is the idea that learning is developed in both local and global contexts. Students are clearly thought of in terms of preparing the material with the purpose and why in mind. Getting to why they are learning and providing students with rich experiences to match provides the motivation that drives engagement. Students are taught to understand their own culture and value their personal experiences. They are also taught to look at the world through a lens of international mindedness. It is through this lens that students are able to develop perspective, empathy and to find ways to take positive action.

The approaches to teaching are differentiated to allow success for all learners. Studnets are taught to develop teamwork and how to collaborate to accomplish authentic hands on real life experiences. The programmes are informed by assessment; diagnostic, formative and summative. Through diagnostic assessment student prior knowledge is accessed and teachers to plan taking this into consideration. Formative assessment is used to guide teaching and learning by offering feedback to learners and teachers about how learning is progressing. Summative assessments provide positive pressure but also feedback to students and teachers on how well learning took place during a particular timeframe.

Students are also developed in the IB programmes by the approaches to learning skills. We help students become better students by explicitly teaching the skills needed to be successful. These skills are divided up into skill categories that include many of the apparent abilities but also some not so obvious ones. The first category is thinking skills; students are taught to think critically, think creatively and apply their thinking into novel situations.

The next type Are social skills; as mentioned before, students are taught to be active collaborators and team players. Next are the communication skills where students learn to become effective communicators who are not just great at presenting their own ideas but also can listen and provide feedback. Students are taught to self-manage, and they learn to manage time and tasks through the organization skills. They learn through these skills to also manage their emotional states, stress, and mindfulness and deal with and cope with adverse situations. Reflection skills allow students to benefit from their experiences and from those of others, and it is from these skills that students mature and develop awareness and understanding.

For students to access the incredible volume of information, they also need to have highly evolved research skills. To be able to develop this media literacy and this information literacy helps them when they put together the independent research that is required at university.

So what does this mean for us at Beanstalk? Our founder Kathy Shi was the original pioneer of bilingual education in China, and it is her vision that a school could bring together the best of the eastern education traditions and the best of the western cultures.

The IB keeps evolving but ATL (Approach to Learning) skills has always been at its core. The IB focuses on Who we are? How do I learn? How can I learn better? Always finding ways to improve, students must truly master the skills to gain new knowledge to refine their knowledge framework and understanding of themselves.

MYP does not only offer ATL courses to learn about communication, socialization, self-management (organize and master emotions, and reflect), research (information literacy and press literacy), thinking (critical thinking and creative thinking), but also incorporate ATL to each unit design, and inform the students to practice interdisciplinary study.

In the learning process, students will gain learning methods, planning skills, habits, attitude and confidence. IB encourages learners to become inquiring, knowledgeable, thinking, communicating and reflecting. And the key is ATL.

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