September 2017

Your choice. Their future. Our family. โรงเรียนนานาชาติการ์เด้นอีสเทิร์นซีบอร์ดบ้านฉาง September 2017
Find us at:
Website: w w w .gardenrayong.com
Twitter: w w w .tw itter.com/ gisrayong
Facebook: w w w .facebook.com/ pages/ Garden-International-School-Rayong-Thailand/128699487157809
Youtube: www.youtube.com/user/gardenrayongthailand
Accredited by
Affiliated to
1

From Mrs Hawtree: Principal
Dear GIS Community,
It seems almost unbelievable that we are already approaching the mid-term break. It has been an incredibly
busy start to the term with a number of parent events (and a couple still to come), a successful careers’ fair, a
wide range of trips, a whole host of Wednesday afternoon activities, some early sporting successes and preparations
underway for a variety of arts and cultural events. Our Community Service programme got off to a
good start with a launch assembly, followed by planning meetings, and we are already starting to see these
plans being put into action with fundraising activities including a rice drive and ball-shooting competition, and
trips being organised to visit some of our service partners.
We were delighted to receive our 5-year report from the IB which gave us a clean bill of health in every area of
the programme, and commended us on some areas of our practice. As the oldest IB school on the Eastern
Seaboard, we continue to meet the IB’s high standards in every respect, and this is reflected in the excellent
results our students achieve year on year.
Earlier this month, we said an emotional ‘goodbye’ to Ms Emmy, one of or much-loved boarding parents. She
has been as GIS for nearly 10 years, and many of our students – boarders and otherwise – very much looked
upon her as a mother-figure. We wish her all the best for her new life in the USA.
October is going to be a sad month in Thailand, and as a school we are reflecting the mood of the nation by
once again limiting festivities and staff are wearing more sombre clothes as we approach the anniversary of
the passing of H.M. King Rama IX.
Whether you are staying in Thailand, or travelling further afield, I wish you all a peaceful and safe mid-term
break.
Warm regards,
Ms Dinah Hawtree
Principal
2

Upcoming Events
Whole School
Oct 2: World Habitat Day
Oct 6: Friends of Garden action group meeting, 8am, canteen
Oct 10: World Mental Health Day
Fri Oct 13: Public holiday in remembrance of HM King Rama IX
Oct 16-29: Half-term Break
Mon Oct 30: School re-opens
Nov 1: House T-shirt Day
Primary
Oct 30-Nov 3: Nit-Busting Week
Oct 31: Hallowe’en Party
Secondary
Oct 5: Parent Forum: Digital Natives
Oct 6: Trip to see West Side Story / 19th International Festival of Dance and Music in Bangkok
Oct 9-12: KET and PET assessments
Oct 9: Secondary Grade Cards distributed
Oct 10: Years 7-10 and IB1 Parent Conference, 6pm in the Main Hall
Oct 29-Nov 2: U15 FOBISIA Games in Phuket
Oct 30-Nov 3: Final Extended Essay meeting for IB2 students
Many thanks to our generous GIS sponsors:
Platinum
Aditya Birla
Encounter Church
Indorama
3

Head to our Facebook page for the latest news on
what’s been happening at GIS. This month, you
can read about:
www.facebook.com/gardeninternationalschool
You can also watch our latest videos about what’s
been happening at GIS by going here:
www.youtube.com/user/gardenrayongthailand
Follow us on Instagram! Find us at
garden_international_school or search for
#gistitans
Check out our Pinterest page and see the dozens
of photos showcasing life at GIS.
Follow our tweets on Twitter!
https://www.twitter.com/gisrayong
See our snaps and stories on Snapchat!
Our username is gisthailand
4

GIS PRAISED AFTER IB REVIEW
The International Baccalaureate Organisation (IBO) has praised Garden International School (GIS)
following a 5-year review.
The review, which is a standard procedure for all IB World schools, looked at every aspect of how the IB
Diploma Programme is run at GIS. This included examining the curriculum, the school's educational beliefs,
its leadership, resources and the teaching and learning that takes place.
The 30,000-word document, written by GIS, was sent off earlier this year and the IBO has now released its
findings. They found that: 'Based on the findings included in the report, the IB has not identified any matters
to be addressed.'
The report also commended GIS in several areas, including how the school promotes Thai language by
offering Thai A as a subject (and discounts for students taking it) and also how the IB's learner profile is
reflected in several subjects.
IB Co-ordinator Mr Mark Beales said: "It's fantastic news to have such a positive report. This confirms
everything that we already believed about GIS - that we offer excellent-value education and the highest
academic levels."
News of the review comes after this year's examination results, where for the second-year running GIS
students had a 100 per cent pass rate in the IB Diploma. The IB Diploma is the world's leading qualification
for 16-18 year olds. It is a challenging course that opens doors to the world's leading universities. GIS is
the most-experienced IB Diploma school in this part of Thailand.
5

From Mr Walsh: Head of Primary
Dear parents and carers,
House Football Tournament
On Wednesday, September 6, Primary had the House Football Tournament.
The sky was clear, with a bright sun beating down, making the field burning
hot!
The Primary students were separated into three groups; Year 1 and 2, Year 3
and 4, and Year 5 and 6. The games were really fun and exciting, with many
matches ending up in nerve-wracking penalty shootouts. Teams were screaming
and cheering in dire need for their team to score and teachers were coaching
to improve their team’s performance. Everyone was dripping head to toe in
sweat.
In the end, Eagles won the Year 1 and 2 group, Cobra won Year 3 and 4, and
Gecko won Year 5 and 6. The overall winner was Cobra!
By The House Captains
Wednesday Afternoon Activities – Global Action and Science Technology Engineering Art &
Mathematics (STEAM) groups
Some of the Wednesday afternoon activities this year will be devoted to developing environmental or
social issues, and helping students to apply STEAM skills.
Access to Water Gender Poverty Gardening
In this group children
will learn that
not everyone in the
world has access to
clean water. They
will learn about the
uses, value and
conservation of water
and how it can
be extracted and
moved.
This group is about
students understanding
that people can be
treated differently because
of their gender.
They will take part in
discussions and activities
designed to develop
their attitudes
and challenge gender
stereotypes.
This group should
help children to understand
the different
lives led by people
with different
incomes and different
life chances.
They will understand
some difficulties
faced by families
in poverty.
This group will use
a variety of skills
to help grow
plants. Students
will understand
the effort and processes
that go
into producing
crops that are
used for different
purposes.
Natural
Resources
This group will
learn about how
local resources
are used. They
will learn to construct
objects
from locally
available resources.
Mosaic
This group will
use a range of
skills to make
a mosaic that
will be displayed
in the
Primary
School.

SWIMMING GALA
The GIS Primary Swim Team travelled to the first swim gala of the year at St Andrews International
School. GIS took a team of students who have been working very hard to develop their skills and
stamina. For some students, it was their first swimming competition experience. Despite competing
against three bigger schools, the GIS swimmers performed extremely well. In fact, we took the majority
of the 1st and 2nd places. This was wonderful to share with the large group of enthusiastic parents
who had come to cheer the team. Well done, all hardworking students who took part!
PEACE DAY
It has been a very peaceful month with two events based around peace happening in September.
There was Greenpeace Day where many students dressed as hippies, and International Peace Day
on 21 September which was celebrated in many ways by children across the school. Here is what
Reception did:
The children in Reception drew a picture of what ‘peace’ is on a little piece of paper and we added it
to the Secondary students Wall of Peace. They also listened to a story called "The Peace Book",
then put their finger prints on our peace dove, wrote an extra page to the book and coloured
pictures of peace.
7

CLUBS
The Primary students have enjoyed a whole range of clubs run by the multi-talented academic staff. We also
have lots of multi-talented students and after the mid-term break some of the clubs will be student-led.
This means that though the clubs will be supervised by an adult, the activities and resources will have been
planned by some of our Year 6 students. The student-led clubs will include Slime Club, Football Club, Basketball
Club and Nerf Club. As with all of the clubs, these will be designed for specific age groups. We are
happy that so many of our Year 6 students have volunteered to run a club; it will help to develop their leadership
and organisational skills as well as their ability to assess risks. The student-led clubs will all take
place on Tuesdays to leave the Year 6 students free to continue with Spanish club. LAMDA club will also
start on Thursdays next half term and will be open to Year 5 and Year 6 students.
8

Year 2 Trips
Plants
Year 2 had a wonderful time learning about plants with two
exciting trips. First we went to the Siri Charoenwat Royal Forest
Project at Silverlake for an exciting forest trail. The children
loved seeing all the wonderful different trees that grow there and
we finished the trail by learning about the lifecycle of a lotus
plant.
Our second trip was to the Birds and Bees Resort in Pattaya.
The children visited the kitchen garden to learn about sustainable farming, hydroponics
and ways to maximise the space that you have to grow food.
We had a brilliant time, finishing up with an exploration and playtime in the beautiful resort
gardens.
9

Why did we go to the
weather station?
In Year 3 we are learning all about weather and
climate. Part of this is to know how different types
of weather are recorded and formed into a reliable
and useful weather forecast.
The Royal Thai Weather Station is a great example
of this, as it is very important for naval ships
to know whether the weather will be dangerous
or not. The weather station has many great
examples of real weather instruments and plenty
hands on activities for the children to get involved
in.
What did we do and what did we
learn?
The meteorologists gave us a presentation about
the importance of weather forecasts and then
showed us all the different instruments they use.
We learned what part of the weather each one
measures.
After the presentation we went to the roof
to launch large red weather balloons into
the atmosphere. We also had a chance to
look at the clouds through a telescope.
It was great to see all the real equipment
they use and the people who make the
weather forecasts happen.
A few children’s comments ...
“I loved launching the balloon!”
“We saw a rainbow in the sky!”
“I would like to go again.”
“I liked looking through the telescope”
Overall, it was a great
morning out and all the
children were well behaved.
10

PEACE DAY MARKED WITH MESSAGES
Students marked World Peace Day with some messages of hope.
At GIS, students watched videos promoting peace and then wrote various peace messages and posted them
on a large noticeboard. The event was organised by the school's Global Action Committee.
FAREWELL AND GOOD LUCK, EMMY
Both GIS and the Friends of Garden group
held a surprise party for one of our boarding
parents, Emmy.
She has been working at GIS as a boarding
parent for 9 years and has been an
active member of the Friends of Garden
group. She is going to migrate to the US -
we wish her all the best and thank her for
all her hard work.
11

FLOWER POWER!
Students and staff from GIS dressed as hippies
to raise money for charity.
Flower power and peace signs were everywhere
as everyone made a donation, which
will go to charity.
12

HELPING OUR COMMUNITY
Students have been planning how they can make a difference in our local community.
At a whole school assembly, GIS launched its Community Service plan for the year.
This involves helping six charities in the Ban Chang/Pattaya area. Two year groups (one
from Primary and one from Secondary) have been assigned to each charity.
At the assembly, they met people from the charities and then learned more about their work.
The students then brainstormed ideas about the different ways they could help.
13

From our Head Student
MANY EVENTS TO
TAKE PART IN
In this past month we have had many exciting events take place
to encourage students to think about their future and work collaboratively
with others.
In terms of considering their future, we had a large variety of
speakers come in and talk about their careers to us GIS students,
as well as students from REPS and GIS Bangkok. We
have also had a "Succeeding at IB" evening where our university
counsellors and IB Co-ordinator Mr Beales advised us IB students
on how to do well.
Earlier in the month, we had students work collaboratively by
putting together a music video choreographed by our new House
captains to represent each House as a whole.
Rachel — GIS Head Student
As well as all this - we had a whole school hippie-themed mufti
day, which managed to raise over 17,000 baht for charity.
There was also a World Peace Day board organised, where
each student contributed by sticking post-it notes with messages
rated to world peace on the peace board.
For some exciting up coming events our school is organising
Diwali, which is always a great evening, and there will be some
Halloween events after the half-term break.
Also, this year’s Secondary production 'Almost Maine' is coming
soon, which is all very exciting! I hope you enjoy and participate
in as many of these events as possible.

We have some great school blogs to tell you about life at GIS. Click
on the links below to see what’s been going on!
PRIMARY BLOGS
Early Years http://earlyyears.gardenrayong.com/
Nursery http://nursery.gardenrayong.com/
Reception http://reception.gardenrayong.com/
Year 1 http://year1.gardenrayong.com/
Year 2 http://year2.gardenrayong.com/
Year 3 http://year3.gardenrayong.com/
Year 4 http://year4.gardenrayong.com/
Year 5 http://year5.gardenrayong.com/
Year 6 http://year6.gardenrayong.com/
ESL Blog: http://primaryels.gardenrayong.com
SECONDARY BLOGS
Year 7-9
IGCSE
IB
ELS
http://year7to9.gardenrayong.com/
http://gisigcse.gardenrayong.com/
http://ib.gardenrayong.com/
http://secondaryels.gardenrayong.com
WHOLE SCHOOL BLOGS
Extra-curricular Sport
Extra-curricular Music
http://gissport.gardenrayong.com/
http://gismusicblog.gardenrayong.com/
Extra-curricular Drama http://gisdrama.gardenrayong.com/
Library
http://library.gardenrayong.com/
Community Programmes http://communityprogrammes.gardenrayong.com/
Community Service
Friends of Garden
Boarding
http://gisserviceprojects.gardenrayong.com/
http://friendsofgarden.gardenrayong.com/
http://gisboarding.gardenrayong.com/

From Mr Share: Head of Secondary
Dear parents and carers,
We are very proud of the large number of sporting activities and opportunities at GIS. Just this week we
saw some excellent results from an athletics meet at Regent’s. As a small school we regularly take part in
FOBISIA and local competitions against larger schools who have a larger pool of students and coaches,
yet we continually punch above our weight and show passion to succeed. It is common for parents to not
be aware of the importance of sport to our community. We have been lucky enough to host FOBISIA last
year and have visits from Olympians and international professional athletes. We compete regularly against
local schools with pupils swimming personal bests, and the boys and girls football, badminton, volleyball,
netball and basketball teams, are developing and competing at all age groups.
We publish our results to students, parents and staff via our Facebook and Twitter feeds and we rightly
celebrate our wins, but also recognise that when we are not winning we analyse what we did well and how
we could develop. People often overlook the benefits of good quality sport provision at school and do not
see how much it complements our students developing our Core Values and building a resilient attitude to
success and loss, and having a growth mindset.
Physical literacy is the act of running, jumping, catching and throwing of which all Primary school students
are expected to graduate from Year 6. Research has shown that at all ages where schools have good PE
provision, SATs results, attendance records and behaviour tend to improve. Young people’s participation
in sport improves their numeracy scores by 8% on average above non-participants. It is well known that
there is the need for exercise as part of a healthy lifestyle, but our sport provision dovetails with our learning
in all areas of the school.
Pupils are challenged to be independent and constantly practising to improve. Students are provided with
personal targets to achieve personal bests and also have to work collaboratively as part of a team. Our PE
teachers and additional coaches drawn from across all our staff ask pupils to reflect and analyse on performance.
The physical and mental challenge of trying an array of sports or competing with peers and in front
of crowds, builds character, encourages risk taking and helps focus students which links with our values
for good behaviour.
The flourishing nature of our PE and After School sports programmes gives students access to a range of
opportunities to perform at many levels. Our sports provision helps build the idea of community amongst
students, staff and parents who come to support. Please do check the week ahead notices to see when
there are fixtures and if they are home or away. We all appreciate the support and it is a great chance to
interact and celebrate a student’s willingness to compete, improve and succeed. If you are a parent and
would like to help, use our facilities or even raise a team to compete against our staff in any sport please
get in contact. We already have parents joining us for dancing, football and Zumba. Sport is a great way to
further build on our successful community and we are constantly looking for new opportunities.
Regards
Mr Share
Head of Secondary
headsec@gardenrayong.com

International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma
Succeeding at GIS
GIS has run several evening events
explaining how to succeed at school.
The three evenings were aimed at
helping students in Years 7-9,
IGCSE students and those studying
for the IB Diploma.
Parents and students came along to
hear some advice and tips on how to
study, do well in examinations and
enjoy the experience of learning.
TOK PRESENTATIONS
Our IB2 students have been giving their Theory of Knowledge (TOK) presentations.
These presentations are a large part of the TOK assessment, which is part of the IB Diploma,
the world's most-recognised qualification for 16-18 year olds.
Students have to plan their presentation then deliver it front of a live audience as part
PARENT CONFERENCE
Parents of Year 11 and IB2 students had a chance to hear about their child’s progress at a
Parent Conference. Students in both years will have important examinations in May and June
2018, so it was a good chance for teachers and parents to discuss what needs to be done to
achieve the best-possible grades.

PILOTS, doctors and journalists talked about
their jobs as part of a successful Careers’
Day at GIS.
CAREERS’ DAY
@GIS
Around 200 students, including visitors from
GIS Bangkok and REPS, came to the Main
Hall on September 27 for the event.
Introduced by Head Student Rachel, the
event aimed to give real-life examples of
success in various professions and also to
inspire students from Year 10 and above
who are starting to think about possible professions.
A dozen talks were given by various speakers,
including Dr Iain Corness, a Consultant
at Bangkok Pattaya Hospital, Mr Stephen
Street, who talked about international banking,
pilot Tomasz Bankowics and Lonely
Planet travel writer Mark Beales. Other topics
covered were accounting, teaching in
Early Years, engineering, marketing and
science and research.
Students listened to the talks then had a
chance to chat and ask questions with the
various guests.
Many of the GIS students are currently studying
for their IGCSEs or IB Diploma, which
will give them a pathway into the world’s
leading universities.
18

We continue to celebrate all the countries represented at GIS by flying a different nation’s
flag each week. Here are the countries that have recently been recognised at the
front of the school. These are compiled by our Humanities’ Prefect Aniela.

20

21

22

FLAMENCO SHOW THRILLS
GIS STUDENTS
GIS students had the opportunity this year to visit
Thailand’s Cultural Centre and experience the
19 th anniversary of the Spanish performing arts
group ‘Torera- Antonio Andrade flamenco’.
After arriving early in Bangkok, students had the
chance to watch cultural Thai dancing beautifully
accompanied by traditional costumes and southern
instrumental rhythm. The Bangkok Cultural
Museum also has an art gallery displaying the
works of experienced artist ‘Suthep Sungpetch’,
who, delighted by our interest, generously
demonstrated the process of his paintings. With
the sounds of rain and flowing water currents in
the background, he proceeded to “use paint to
visually represent what he hears”.
We then took our seats in the theatre and the audience
was greeted with an interactive first dance
performance followed by several more artistic
pieces. The intricate and colourful fiesta of outfits
glimmered in the spotlight and caught the whole
theatre’s attention with every twirl, all through to
their spectacular ending. It is a must see, perfectly
synchronized, festive performance to look forward
to next year.
Garden International School
Your choice. Their future. Our family.
Find us at:
Website: www.gardenrayong.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/Garden-International-School-Rayong-Thailand/128699487157809
Youtube: www.youtube.com/user/gardenrayongthailand
Twitter:
www.twitter.com/gisrayong
Accredited by
Affiliated to
23