Grade 6 Farm Trips
On the 21st of October 2008 grade 6 went to a farm in Gross Kreuz. We were there because in Science we recently started a topic about food and nutrition.
The first thing we did was to watch a movie about the robotic milking machine. After we watched the movie we split into two groups. One group went on a tour while the other had a milk breakfast with fruit yogurt and strawberry, lemon, or banana milk. While eating breakfast we looked at the overhead projector and learned about the nutrients in milk and what cows eat to make good milk. On the tour we saw cows, bulls, and goats. Then we saw a big pile of chopped up corn that the cows eat. Next we went into the barn and saw the large container they hold the milk in. Finally, we saw the bulls.
In Gross Kreuz we learned many different interesting things. We learned that milk contains important nutrients like protein, calcium, fat, and vitamins. Then we learned about the cows. The Holstein Friesen are the milking cows. One cow produces about 30 liters of milk per day. When the cows have calves the calf gets separated from its mom immediately.
It gets the mother’s milk for one week then it gets normal milk. After a milk cow is about 5 years old and doesn’t give milk anymore, it goes to the slaughterhouse and costs 800-900 Euros. We saw the bulls that will be killed soon and finally we learned that a milking cow is pregnant once a year.
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On the 22nd of October grade 6 went to Brodowin, an organic farm 117 kilometers east of Berlin.
When we arrived at the farm, a person who worked there greeted us and was our tour guide for the day. We saw cows and sheep and we also saw where they kept the animals. In addition, we saw how they bottle the milk.
We were able to see a sheep that was getting used to the farm habitat. We viewed the milking barn. We also got to meet a kitty. We got to pet and feed the healthy cows. Later, we saw a calf that was only a few hours old. We got to see some sick calves. We learned that at Brodowin they sell their milk products made on the farm. Later, we climbed up a big hill and saw a valley cut out by a glacier and the fields where they grow the organic feed for the cows. Finally, we finished off with a two hour ride back to school.
In Brodowin we learned that they milk their cows twice a day. They said that it’s silly to cut off the cows’ horns because horns belong on a cow. Then we learned that a female cow is not a cow until it gives birth to a calf. The calves are allowed to stay with their mothers five days after their birth. We learned that the calves need to drink milk that has the proper temperature for them. After that they told us about their four bulls, which are divided into four groups with female cows. They taught us that they produce non homogenized milk which means that when you let it stand for a while it separates into cream and milk. It was fun to see all these happy and well- cared for animals!
It was very interesting to compare the organic farm Brodowin and the factory farm Gross Kreutz. We learned many interesting facts about cows and producing milk on both farms. We had two great days!
Grade 6 Students
International Week - 13 to 17 October 2008
International Week is a time when we focus our thoughts on what it is to be part of an international community and about what responsibilities we have as members of such a community. It is a time when all three school sections come together with a common theme. The theme of this year’s International Week was Environments.
Tuesday was Green Day where students were asked to come in wearing green, and we as a community focused on how we can reduce our impact on the environment.
The annual Move-a-thon, which was dedicated to a staff member “Micha” who passed away in the summer, took place on Wednesday. The whole school raised money for worthy causes by getting outside and moving around a course in our school grounds, through the woods and down to the lakeside.
On Thursday, parents set up World Rooms in the Elementary School, each one explaining about a different culture. The Middle and High school students acted as helpers on this day. Students from all sections of the school took part in a huge campus cleanup, which included the land outside the school fence and some of the junk was used to make sculptures by Blue House in Middle School. Other events included guest speakers, in-class learning based on the ‘Environmens’ theme, displays and exhibitions and a ‘pledge’ campaign where each Middle School student pledged four different actions to help reduce our impact on the environment, totaling nearly 700 actions!
The week ended with a whole school assembly in our Sports Hall and an international buffet of food brought in by our students from around the world.
Ben Kestner
MS Principal
The Ten Suns
In February 2008, the Grade One classes were learning that people and cultures express themselves through stories. Each class chose a different story telling method to share a story that explains why the sun moves across the sky. One class did a play based on the African tale Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People’s Ears. Another class did a story telling version of a Maori tale from New Zealand. Attached is a video that the grade 1C students made with the assistance of their teacher Kate Lynch. It is based on a Chinese story called The Ten Suns. The students used a mix of animation (with drawings they made themselves) and acting to convey the story. For the premiere it was a silent film and the children played live the “sound track” which they composed in cooperation with their music teacher. The sound track has now been recorded and added to the clip so you can hear it. The production of this film was a really wonderful learning experience for the students (and the teacher alike) as none of them had made a film before!
Please click here to watch the film.
Camille Du Aime
ES Principal
Poi Workshop with 8th Graders
Physical education provides an opportunity for people of all ages to learn a myriad of skills including fundamentals in human movement, sport, rhythms, and dance. In November 2007, the children in Kristin Perry and Steve Vandersteen’s 8th grade physical education class were given a unique opportunity to participate in a special workshop: Thomas Kies, along with friends Mike and Josh, developed a Poi workshop for the youth to develop and harness these skills and to learn principles in human performance, activities that the organizers believe will lead to a healthy, active lifestyle.
Poi is a form of juggling that involves balance, coordination, and provides a first hand experience in the principles of force and motion. Poi originated with the Maoris in New Zealand and was used both by women and men to increase their flexibility and strength in their hands and arms as well as improving coordination. Poi literally means “ball” on a cord.
Simple Pois were constructed for the students from stockings with a sack of rice placed inside, and the students spent the morning spinning and swinging them on the sports field.The students played games ranging from throwing the Pois for accuracy and distance to learning controlled spinning with one Poi and coordinated spinning with two. Students enjoyed both spinning individually and with others, and afterwards those students that took a particular interest in the activity were given the Pois for further enjoyment.
Kristin Perry
Teacher of Physical Education
Before the Trip to Vukovar
In a few weeks our grade 8th class will be travelling to Vukovar in Croatia. We will stay there from the 10th of June to the 14th of June 2007. In this class trip we will meet with children from our age. These children had to live their lives in a post war era. The hate of the parents was also still be a little in the children. That is why the children go to a peace camp. This peace camp was set up by one of our teachers. We as 8th graders will visit them.
We read the diary of a girl who lived in Sarajevo during the siege of the town. The book is called “Zlata’s Diary”. She was ten years old when she started her diary in 1991. She wrote a lot about the war in Bosnia. She said that because of the war, her childhood had been taken away from her, and she felt robbed by the people who started the war. She missed out on birthday parties, sleeping over with friends, playing in the park, having special events with her family and friends, and going to school. Life was difficult for Zlata and her family because of the war. Often they had no electricity, gas, water or food at their home. They had to go get water at a well, which was dangerous because of snipers. In 1993 she could leave Sarajevo with her family. They went to Paris. By reading this book we have an idea of how the war was. Of course we can never imagine how it was to live in that terrible place.
On the 7th of May 2007 we had a visitor in our grade. His name was Mr. van Duurling. Mr. van Duurling was a soldier for the UN. He went to Sarajevo to help with the peace operations. He was there half a year from 1994 to 1995.
We asked him a few questions and we got elaborated answers from him. He also told a story about a woman called Black Sonja. She was guarding a checkpoint somewhere near Sarajevo. She did not let Mr. van Duurling pass. He did not care but asked her why she did not let him pass. She told him that she wanted to kill as many Muslims as possible. Mr. van Duurling asked why and she said that some Muslims killed her whole family. After a while he could pass and go on. This story was terrible; just imagine your whole family killed. The hate is so deep in that person, that she can’t forget it.
Koen
8th grade student
Our grade 8 English class has been working on a project about "How does a war affect the life of a child?"
We read the book "Zlata's diary". It is a diary of a girl in Sarajevo and it was written during the war in former Yugoslavia. We read the whole book and started researching about the break-up of Yugoslavia.
We prepared presentations about the war and the history of the region and invited other classes and teachers to join us for the presentations.
On 7th of May, Mr. van Duurling (who worked for the UN in Sarajevo) came to visit grade 8. He shared his stories of what he experienced in Sarajevo with us. And he told us about a lot of interesting experiences which was really nice.
We were especially interested, because for the grade 8 class trip, we are going to visit a city in Croatia, Vukovar. This city was badly destroyed in the war. We will go there and see how Vukovar is now, and also how the war destroyed the town. We will work and play with teenagers in Vukovar and have a lot of fun. We even designed our own T-Shirts for the trip.
We will also paint a mural on the theme of "Oasis". We planned this together with our art teachers. This mural will be on the wall in Vukovar forever.
Kanade Nagata
8th grade student
IB Slapton Trip
I am delighted to write about a very successful trip that our students have returned from this week. As always the purpose of the trip is focused on the curriculum that the students are following and the teachers spend a lot of time preparing themselves, and the students, for the trip. This, in addition to the general organizational work, requires a lot of effort by the teachers beforehand which is mainly involves their own time.
Grade 11 students studying Biology and Geography traveled on Sunday, 6 May 2007 to Slapton Sands, in South-west England, arriving at the Field Studies Centre in the evening.
Monday began with teachers waking the students at 07.30 before spending the day studying coastal processes such as longshore drift and the problems caused by human interference with the natural system. The day was spent outside undertaking practical work and observations and concluded with laboratory sessions that ended at 20.30. The following three days had a similar schedule; the teachers, of course, remaining awake until midnight when the students were asleep.
Friday was spent traveling with students arriving at Schoenefeld at 22.00; one student summed it up as “We spent the whole day working. It was fun but tiring.”
Thanks to Mr Schmelz (trip leader), Ms Klooster, and Ms Lim for a great job and for making this trip possible.
Richard Bartlett
High School Principal
Move-A-Thon
On 4 October 2006 over 500 students, parents, and teachers took part in the annual Move-A-Thon, raising a total of over 5,200 euros. It was an exciting event where the community of BBIS showed how working together for common causes can really make a difference. Even though there was a slight drizzle of rain, all participants enjoyed the lovely Seeberg area as they skipped, danced and sang their way through the forest and hills of our campus.
Half of the amount raised has been donated to a local soup kitchen housed in St. Marien's church in Berlin. This soup kitchen has been providing underpriviliged people with food and clothing since 1993, and supplies food to approximately 80 people each day. BBIS forged a relationship with St. Marien's after the 6th grade had visited the soup kitchen last year for a school project. 2006 is the first year in which the Elementary School has participated in the Move-A-Thon, and all of the proceeds collected by the primary grades has gone to St. Marien's.
The other half of the fundraising money, which was raised by the Middle and High School will be donated to an educational and literacy programme in Bolivia, Latin America. This programme is devoted to the expansion of literacy, education, sport and leadership training in the province of Chuquisaca, where 43 percent of the inhabitants live in extreme poverty and the illiteracy rate is 67.4 percent. This has been an on-going project for the last three years at BBIS. This past summer two teachers, Ms Christina Hayes and Mr Wayra Montero Fernandez, visited the people involved in Bolivia and were involved in further discussions and planning of the programme.
We want to thank all of those who participated and for a job well done; your donations have helped and will help to improve the lives of numerous people in need. It is this kind of community spirit which makes BBIS a global and caring community.
Anastasia, BBIS student and member of the Human Rights Club
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