Updates and Announcements

Deputy Head GPD

We warmly welcome Inga Riedel-Narayan to our team.

She takes on the position of Deputy Head of German Primary Department. In the last few years, Mrs Riedel-Narayan has worked in the English Primary Department in the area of student support. In the Primary, she has already worked on projects such as "Sensory Path - Zen room" and "project week" and will continue to supervise them.

Congratulations to Mrs Riedel-Narayan on this new position and we are happy to have a committed, cooperative and experienced colleague in the German Primary Department.

ECAs/AAs

Dear Parents of Primary Peak Students,

Since the Crisis Management Team decided that, for the safety of the children, there would be no ECA/AAs from 11 to 13/ 20 to 22 November and school would dismiss all primary students at 1:15pm, the Primary Leadership Team made the decision to implement the procedure below at 12:30 pm.

This decision was made to ensure that all Primary children would have the opportunity to eat a snack or lunch, refill their drink bottles and visit the bathroom before going home, as we cannot guarantee how long the children may have to spend travelling.

12:30 procedure:

• Collect ordered lunch from the kiosk
• Eat lunch / snack in the homeroom
• Go to the toilet
• Fill up water bottles
• Go to the bus at 1:10pm to ensure Primary children are seated before the Secondary students are dismissed (on days when Secondary are also dismissed at 1:15pm).

If you would like to consider providing extra snacks for your children to eat, please feel free to do so.

Our priority is, as always, the safety and wellbeing of the children and we appreciate your understanding.

Updates and Announcements

Priska Erni Head of German Primary Department Email

Inga Riedel-Narayan Deputy Head of German Primary Department Email

Dear Parents

We are very glad that classes resumed on Wednesday and that we are able to hold lessons live on site again. The days during school closure were a challenge for all involved; being a mother, I know very well what it means to support the children in organising their work. These unusual circumstances required all of us to make special adjustments beyond normal procedures and routines. While this went well and smoothly overall, we also identified areas for improvement in terms of organisation and planning for such special situations, which hopefully do not recur anytime soon.

Thank you very much for your patience and cooperation!

The school closure last week has also affected our calendar. As you already know, we decided to move the outing day scheduled for 3rd December to the second half of the school year. In some classes, class tests and exams had to be rescheduled as well and we have informed your children about these changes. The updated class test schedules are also available in the GSD section of the GSIS Parent Portal.

I hope next week we can all continue with regular school life and I look forward to seeing many of you at the 50th Anniversary celebrations of GSIS!

Warm regards

Updates and Announcements

Wiebke Langer Head of German Secondary Email

Updates and Announcements

Dear Parents,

We would like to congratulate Inga Riedel-Narayan on her appointment as Deputy Head of the German Primary. Inga Riedel-Narayan has served as a SEN teacher for the English Primary since 2016. She has worked with primary students across all year levels and has been instrumental in introducing several new programmes such as our sensory trolleys and “zen” room for breaks. We are disappointed to lose her as an English Stream teacher, but are delighted to work with her as part of the Primary Leadership Team. In the spirit of cross-stream cooperation, Ms Riedel-Narayan will continue working with EPD students until the Christmas break, while we interview for her replacement. Please join me in congratulating her on her promotion.

ECAs/AAs

Dear Parents of Primary Peak Students,

Since the Crisis Management Team decided that, for the safety of the children, there would be no ECA/AAs from 11 to 13/ 20 to 22 November and school would dismiss all primary students at 1:15pm, the Primary Leadership Team made the decision to implement the procedure below at 12:30 pm.

This decision was made to ensure that all Primary children would have the opportunity to eat a snack or lunch, refill their drink bottles and visit the bathroom before going home, as we cannot guarantee how long the children may have to spend travelling.

12:30 procedure:

• Collect ordered lunch from the kiosk
• Eat lunch / snack in the homeroom
• Go to the toilet
• Fill up water bottles
• Go to the bus at 1:10pm to ensure Primary children are seated before the Secondary students are dismissed (on days when Secondary are also dismissed at 1:15pm).

If you would like to consider providing extra snacks for your children to eat, please feel free to do so.

Our priority is, as always, the safety and wellbeing of the children and we appreciate your understanding.

Updates and Announcements

Kim Cunningham Head of English Primary Email

Donna Morley Deputy Head of English Primary Email

Just a brief note this week to wish all students, staff, parents and families the very best during these challenging times. I hope that you are all safe and well.

Clearly, it is not ideal to have classes suspended for four days (at the time of writing, hopefully no more!).  Unfortunately, some valuable activities and events, not to mention lessons, have had to be postponed or cancelled. I would like to thank the teaching staff for all the work that they have put into providing imaginative, interesting and varied online learning activities for their students.

Thank you also to the students & parents who have offered feedback on the provision for online learning. We are currently reviewing our systems and procedures for this, should classes be suspended again (hopefully not). Teachers are exploring, evaluating and trialling technologies and strategies to augment and enhance our online learning, should it be necessary to work in this way again. Please continue to feedback any suggestions and ideas to me via email.

Please also be reassured that, for the examination years in particular, our subject leaders are carefully monitoring the progress through the IGCSE, AS Level and IB Diploma Courses and that we will ensure that all courses are completed in time to provide our usual thorough revision and review prior to the final examinations. Currently, the situation in all subjects is that, whilst the days "lost" are far from optimal, the progress through the courses has not been materially jeopardised and our students are meeting their checkpoints and milestones.

I fervently hope that the situation calms down and we can get back to some semblance of normality in the coming weeks.

Stay safe.

Updates and Announcements

Ken Stevenson Head of English Secondary Email