AIS’s Winter Wonders

Albanian International School began a new tradition in December 2013 by celebrating the arrival of Winter with songs and poetry that truly embodied the season. Under the direction of music teacher Veisla Mucaj, our students’ voices soared, and delighted the audience with songs both traditional and more rockin’! We also used the occasion as an end-of-term celebration. Teachers issued awards to stand-out students, and Mr. Semerjian’s 5th and 6th grade students proudly shared what they learned in Term 1 with a spelling bee. They’ve become such wonderful spellers that there were THREE winners, all tied for first place! However, the day wasn’t a non-stop celebration. Sadly, we were also saying goodbye to two of our brightest stars, who’ve attended AIS since its humble beginning. Maryam Pirpiran and her younger sister Melika returned to Iran at the end of 2013, which saddened us all. We bid them farewell with a performance of the Iranian national anthem, a special presentation from one of our other Iranian parents, and a letter written and read by Maryam herself, which touched all of our hearts deeply. Goodbye girls! We’ll never forget you!

W int e r Ce l e b ra t i on s

Albanian International School

February 3 r d , 2014 Vo lume 2 , Issue 5

A Message From The Executive Director

December began with Albanian International School (AIS) attending the Christmas Bazaar at the Sheraton Hotel supporting the ‘Organization for the Support of Albania’s Abandoned Babies’ (OSAAB). We had a great time meeting people from all over Tirana. AIS plans on adopting OSAAB as one of the charities in Tirana we will be supporting throughout the year. If you wish to help, please contact me. ! The last day of the first semester and the last day of classes in 2013 found students singing seasonal and holiday songs. We were joined by students from the Iranian school who taught AIS students the Iranian national anthem. The two schools joined in singing the Iranian national anthem as a good-bye to their friends, our students, returning to Iran after two years at AIS. ! The Winter/Holiday celebration also saw the awarding of certificates to the best student, most improved student and the best artists in various grades. Everyone enjoyed the treats provided at the end of the celebration. That evening the teachers were treated to dinner at a local restaurant as a thank you for the end of the first part of what should be a great school year. ! January has been quieter here at AIS. Students are studying hard and preparing for the Black History Month Celebration on Friday, February 28th at 1:00PM. This will be a major production, including songs and poems to tell the history of the African American experience in the U.S. Everyone is welcome. ! We are happy to be welcoming Mr. Sotiraq Trebicka to the AIS family as Administrative Coordinator and Ms. Nina Messenger as our new 1st/2nd grade teacher. ! For more information about the Albanian International School please visit our website: www.ais-tirana.org. You are welcome to visit the school, just call first at 067 416 0637 to make an appointment. Warren Anderson,

Executive Director

Albanian International School was proud to participate in the thirteenth annual holiday bazaar at the Sheraton Hotel in Tirana. This charity event helps children all over Albania, and AIS students were happy to take part in it, giving back to their community by creating hand-crafted Christmas cards, ornaments and edible goodies to sell. Mr. Anderson even got in the kitchen himself, and baked for charity. We donated ten cakes made by our own Chef Vera and our Librarian, Mrs. Pitarka, to the charity’s bake sale table. Proceeds from our sales added up to about 180 USD! What a wonderful way to give back to the community that has supported us so much!

A I SA I S F e bF e b rr u a r yu a r y N e w s N e w s

Sheraton Holiday Bazaar : AIS Gives Back

Also In This Issue: Classroom news . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . pages 3-4 Games & puzzles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 5 Google Apps in Education: Balkans Summit . page 2 New teacher profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 2 The history of Black History Month . . . . . . . . page 2 Student Spotlight: Sibora Berisha . . . . page 5

Albanian International School February Newsletter Page 2

In December 2013, AIS Head Teacher Keelah Rose Calloway and Pre-K teacher Barbara Meinel attended the Balkans Google Education Summit held in Sofia, Bulgaria at the world-renowned Anglo American School. Accompanied by School President Vladimir Mulaj, his wife, and 4th grade student Elisabeta, they arrived in Sofia on a very cold, snowy night after driving eight hours across three borders from Albania. Ms. Meinel presented a session called Google 3D Earth and Heart Tours. This session taught other educators how to use Google 3D Earth in the classroom for maps, satellite images, photos, resource sections and other tools that makes the class alive and exciting! “Heart Tours” are activity books about all the different cultures and geography around the world. Ms. Barbara used Google 3D Earth to create this series, along with the knowledge she gained from living in over 20 different countries teaching children and working on humanitarian projects. Miss Calloway presented a Google Demo Slam showing everyone a humorous way to use Google. Both teachers were privileged to learn a great deal of useful new information about how Google products (most of which are freely available) can be used to enhance their classrooms, and improve the educational experience for students. This included instruction on how to create websites, spreadsheets, surveys, student portfolios and other useful tools; a demonstration of Nexus, the new Google tablet, and so much more! AIS hopes to put their knowledge to good use in the future and eventually become an official “Google School.”

Our newest teacher joins us from Texas by way of London to begin teaching grades 1 and 2 for the third term. We hope she will remain with us for many years to come! Below, she introduces herself in her own words: My name is Nina Messenger. I grew up in south Texas and completed my BA in linguistics from The University of Texas at Austin in 2010. During my undergraduate career, I had the opportunity to study abroad in St. Petersburg, Russia and I received my minor in Russian language and cultural studies. After completing my bachelor’s degree, I took a job as an ESL teacher at a private school in San Antonio, Texas where I taught beginning up to advanced levels of English to students aiming to attend university in the USA. After working there for over a year, I decided to pursue a master’s degree focusing on the Scandinavian languages. I began studying at University College London in 2012 and received my master’s degree in language and translation studies in 2013. Whilst studying in London, I taught English and Maths part time to junior high students. I love being a student and I hope my enthusiasm for learning is evident in my teaching.

The AIS family grows!

Photos clockwise from top left: Heart Tours by Ms.

Meinel, Miss Calloway ready to learn, downtown Sofia, AIS president Vladimir Mulaj with AAS president Jim Urquhart & Ms. Meinel, Ms. Meinel & Elisabeta

In the United States of America, Black History Month is a celebration of the contributions African American and black American people have made to American society. “African American” is a term that refers to any black person whose ancestors originally came from Africa. However, there are many black people in the U.S. whose families originated from the Caribbean, South America, Central America, or even Europe. It started in the U.S. in 1926 as “Negro History Week,” but only a few states actually embraced the idea of teaching students about the history of black people in the U.S. In 1970, it was expanded to an entire month. In 1976, the federal government recognized it as a national celebration. Then President Gerald Ford urged all Americans to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.” Black History Month is also an officially celebrated event in both the U.K. and Canada, which seek to honor the accomplishments of black people in their countries. February was originally chosen for this celebration because U.S. president Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglas were both born in February. Lincoln famously freed the slaves in the U.S. during the Civil War, and Douglas was an escaped slave who spent his life writing about his experiences as a slave, and traveling the world to teach others about how wrong it was to enslave others. We celebrate Black History Month here at Albanian International School in order to expose our students to an aspect of history they might otherwise never explore. It’s important for them to realize at a young age that people of all colors helped shape the world as we know it today. We hope this will give them an appreciation for diversity and profound inspiration that will last them the rest of their lives.

Black History Month

Welcome Back to the Pre-K Class! Ms. Barbara Meinel

January was a very exciting month for our class. We have started to write our names and other smaller words on our own. Each morning I set out 3 activities for the children to choose from: The Moveable Alphabet, Storytime Puppet Show, or a Math activity. I open up the moveable alphabet and each child picks several picture cards. We talk about the pictures, I write the word on a card and the student looks into the box to find the magnetic letters to form the word. Then they use their markers to write the word onto their note cards. It’s loads of fun! ! We are practicing “The Three Pigs” story for a puppet show in February. Niki and Luke helped make the Pig's houses out of sticks, straw, and blocks. We will let you know when the show will be ready to attend. ! We are setting up two science corners in our classroom: One for “Our Universe” and another called “On the Farm.” In the afternoons we have been cutting, gluing and getting glittery fingers while making a rainbow collage for our wall in the second room. Come by and see it! ! February will include our Valentine mail delivery activity. During January, We’ve been planning what we will be making for everyone at school . . . so when you hear that knock on the door, don't hesitate — open it up, because here come the Preschoolers with a secret envelope for you!

Happy 2014! Kindergarten has been off to an exciting start this year, with the new year bringing great things with it, the most exciting being that we got to welcome our newest student to the class, Ali! It’s great to have him with us as we move into February and begin some of our most exciting lessons yet! First, the “Listening and Learning” strand of our Language Arts unit will be taking us back into the world of plants, a world we first visited during a science unit a few months back, but which we will get to explore from a new angle this time around! While we review important elements of plants, such as plant needs and plant parts, we will get to listen to stories about plants, such as “The Gigantic Turnip” and “Johnny Appleseed.” It will be interesting to see how our understanding of plants will play into these stories and how plants relate to other important people and narratives. Meanwhile, in the “Skills” strand of our Language Arts unit, we are now wrapping up all of the letter sounds that we will be covering before using next month to begin moving past simple three-letter words that we’ve been reading up until now, and beginning to introduce more complicated 4-letter words with initial or final consonant clusters. It has been so exciting to watch as the students begin reading new words on their own, and this new challenge will only bring more excitement as we move closer and closer to students being able to begin reading short stories on their own! In math we will be applying what we’ve learned in previous lessons to real-world problems, for example using the concept of ordinal numbers to help put things in order depending on length, or using skip counting to better understanding the concept of money and learn how to pay for items using these skills. Finally in science, we will wrap up our unit on weather and the four seasons and begin our unit on matter! We will learn about the difference between solids, liquids, and gases, including how matter can change forms, which will include looking at concepts of weight and temperature topics, which will be revisited in future units.

they’re learning instead of just memorizing a bunch of facts. ! In CKLA, all of our classes are deep into non-fiction Domains for the Listening and Learning Strand. Grade 3/4 is studying animal classifications in amazing depth, learning vocabulary terms that most students aren’t even exposed to at the university level. Grade 2 is studying Early Asian Civilizations, starting with the first civilization to spring to life in the Indus River Valley and the religion, culture and folklore that came along with it. I can’t tell you how impressive it is to hear 8-year-old children, after their first exposure to Hinduism shout (during Science class!) “I am Vishnu, lord of the universe!” They love what they’re learning, and it shows! In the Skills Strand, Grade 3/4 is in the middle of Unit 4, “Stories of Ancient Rome;” Grade 2 is on the verge of completing Unit 3 “Kids Excel” and Grade 1 is nearly done with Unit 2, “Gran.” ! Finally, Math continues to be a bit of a gleeful chaos as each student advances according to his/her comfort level. The fourth grade students just started a new book, third grade students are dealing with exponents for the first time, and second graders are beginning to add double digit numbers and deal with more advanced geometry. This is the last month that first graders will have math class with Miss Tamara in the kindergarten room.

Albanian International School February Newsletter Page 3 Kindergarten News

Miss Tamara Rahoumi

Grades 1-4 News Miss Keelah Rose Calloway

January has been a jam-packed month for Miss Calloway’s class! Social Studies rapidly became nearly everyone’s favorite subject as we began to study ancient history, starting with the civilization of Mesopotamia. Each student made their own cuneiform tablet, compared Mesopotamian culture to medieval culture from December’s unit, and learned how Hammurabi’s Code shaped modern laws. Now we’ve moved up in time to ancient Egypt and we’ll soon be learning hieroglyphs, before moving on to the civilizations of ancient Greece and India. ! Science Unit 3 was all about Animals. The first grade students will linger there for several more weeks, until they’ve fully internalized the distinctions between different classifications of animals. Everyone else is moving forward to Unit 4: Plants! We kicked things off on the last day of January by heading outside to plant the seeds for individual student plants. These kids weren’t afraid to get their hands dirty! As they learn about plants, they will embark on a long-term project and raise their own plant from seeds, using their own time and their own knowledge to make it grow and thrive. A dead plant means a failing grade, so each student knows to take this seriously. It will really help them focus on the practical applications of what

In history class, the arrival of the textbooks was greeted with enthusiasm. The students showed some interest in the expansion of the U.S. across the North American continent, so we will continue to examine the history of Americans as they colonized further west with a focus on their relationship with the Native Americans (Indians, according to Columbus) and the role that improvements in transportation had in making expansion easier. In science, we started out the new term looking at steam engines and theorizing how they function. My own attempts to create a steam engine have been hampered by events and a lack of materials, though some students have volunteered to bring in some components that we could work with. While that’s on the backburner, we started looking an investigation of the stickleback fish, with its lessons on evolution, and how real scientists do real work. In math we’ve started looking at fractions and their relationship with the decimal system, which is one of the more complicated concepts in 5th and 6th grade. This has a number of uses, the first of which we’ve started looking at is using weighting as a way to calculate overall grades. In addition, we’ll continue to work on word problems (important for all subjects!) and also continue to explore graphing techniques, which will involve using Excel on the computer in the next few weeks. Art News

Miss Ida Metaj

Albanian International School February Newsletter Page 4

French News Mr. Michel Ramond

Music News Miss Veisla Mucaj

Grade 5/6 News Mr. Alex Semerjian

Songs are a very important part of history. They tell us a great deal about people of the past — how they worked, how they entertained themselves, and what their daily lives were like. The analyzing of these songs helps us better understand the attitudes, feelings, and beliefs of people from the past. As we celebrate the “Black History Month” the topic of this month will be the African American songs during the period of slavery and how their songs affected American and modern music all over the world. Today, slave music is usually grouped in three major categories: Religious, Work, and “Recreational” songs. Each type adapted elements of African and European musical traditions and shaped the development of a wide range of music, including gospel, jazz, and blues. Songs could serve many purposes. They could provide rhythm for repetitive chores, such as working in the fields. Songs could also celebrate important events, helping people remember their history if they did not have a written language. Songs could also express emotions, in the same way that poetry and drama do. ! For Africans who wanted to escape slavery, songs had another important purpose as well. They could be used to communicate. Their songs, which are sometimes called spirituals, were passed from one group to another — and along with the songs came the code. For example the song “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” was actually a code slaves used to communicate about escaping to Canada. Some of them would change the lyrics to “Swing Low, Sweet Harriet” — a reference to Harriet Tubman, leader of the Underground Railroad. So along with learning the songs, students will work together in groups to describe the songs and analyze what they reveal about the deeper thoughts and feelings of enslaved Americans and recognize the difference between those songs.

Lift every voice and sing, till earth and Heaven ring, Ring with the harmonies of liberty; Let our rejoicing rise, high as the listening skies, Let it resound loud as the rolling sea. Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us, Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us; Facing the rising sun of our new day begun, let us march on till victory is won. Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod, Felt in the days when hope unborn had died; Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet Come to the place for which our fathers sighed We have come over a way that with tears has been watered We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered Out from the gloomy past, till now we stand at last Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast. God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, Thou Who hast brought us thus far on the way; Thou Who hast by Thy might, led us into the light, Keep us forever in the path, we pray. Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee. Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee.

GRADES 2-6: In December and January, we studied:

• Opinions — how to express likes & dislikes • Saying “Why/Because” • Asking questions • Words for people & objects • Grammar — articles, pronouns, adjectives, “tu & vous”

These lessons were rather technical and difficult, but we tried to keep things interesting and we made good progress. We had two tests and all the students did generally well! To reward the students for their hard work & efforts, we had short videos (parts of Tintin & Ratatouille). Sibora made another beautiful poster on France, which is displayed in the grade 5/6 classroom. ! Next month we plan to study:

• Introduction to verbs in the present tense. • Reflexive verbs • How to make sentences negative. • Introduction to future tense.

We will continue reviewing the two lists of spelling words. We’re also planning to incorporate word games & quizzes (on the topics currently studied), and if they do well and time permits, watch more short videos in French. I also plan to have a few special presentations related to French culture, which should help make the course more well-rounded.

Pre-K/K Good progress with the reading method and flash cards. We’re working on short sentences, meeting & greeting, being polite, etc. We are also adding new flash cards with a set of new vocabulary words on greetings & polite expressions. Having a new student from Kindergarten joining the little class has been a good addition. She’s a well-behaved, attentive little student!

PRE K This month full we’re going to learn about paint: how to paint, & how to prepare the materials. Once we learn all this, we’re going to make beautiful paintings and explore the world of watercolors, tempera and pastels. Plus, we have a lot of letters to learn, and crafts to make!

KINDERGARTEN We’ll study sculpture! Still sculpture! Totem poles! Bas relief, high relief, and different media until they’ll be sculpture specialists. We’re going to use and explore the clay and make beautiful things with that!

GRADE 1/2 Texture: Students will experience both tactile (texture in natural objects) and visual texture (works of art). Native American Baskets: how to create a basket with real grass. Still life: introduce children to the terms we use to describe different kinds of paintings. They’ll be able to recognize still life, murals, portraits and self-portraits .

GRADE 3/4 Color theory we still have to learn a lot about the large world of the colors: warm and cool, color value, chroma, the hue chart, double primaries, the color wheel . . . lots of work, lots of colors.

GRADE 5/6 We’ll keep studying the Renaissance: painting, (portraits, frescos, Madonnas), sculpture, and artists like Sandro Botticelli, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael. In studying the works of these artists we specified, and in creating their own art, students should review, develop and apply concepts introduced in previous grades , such as line, shape, form, space, texture, color, light, design and symmetry.

MIDTERM REPORT CARD: FEBRUARY 14TH Mid-Term 2 grades will be ready for pick-up by parents or sent home with students.

BLACK HISTORY MONTH CELEBRATION FEBRUARY 28TH, 1:00PM

This special presentation will combine performance, music and poetry to both inform and entertain our audience about some noteworthy moments in African American history.

OTHER IMPORTANT DATES TO REMEMBER: February 14th — Valentine’s Day March 14th — Summer Day: No School March 31st – April 4th — Spring Break: No School

A l b a n i a n I n t e r n a t i o n a l S c h o o l : Dream bigger. Learn better. Shine brighter.

24 Rruga Elbasanit Tirana, Albania 1001 ! 042 273 488

Albanian International School February Newsletter Page 5

Important Events:

Use the letters L O V E B I R D S instead of numbers to complete this just like a normal Sudoku puzzle. The first three students to do it win!

Students of the Month

Natalie & Sibora

.

NATALIE was nominated by Ms. Barbara and Miss Lorina due to her rapid progress in learning English and her classroom behavior. She not only behaves well herself, but helps other students by reminding them of the rules! Well done Natalie! SIBORA was nominated by Mr. Semerjian and Miss Calloway because she listens well in class and in Black History Month rehearsals, makes good use of her library time and started off the new year doing some excellent work. Great job, Sibora!

The first three students to figure out all 16 words correctly from the clues

below and return the list to Miss Calloway will win a prize!

1. A Valentine’s color that rhymes with bed:____________ 2. A Valentine’s color that rhymes with sink:____________ 3. An archer of love that rhymes with stupid: ___________ 4. Something you give that rhymes with yard: __________ 5. Something you receive that rhymes with sift:_________ 6. What cupid shoots that rhymes with go: _____________ 7. An emotion that rhymes with above: ________________ 8. What couples go on that rhymes with late: ___________ 9. A long, long time that rhymes with clever: ___________ 10. A Valentine’s symbol that rhymes with art: __________ 11. Something yummy that rhymes with dandy: __________ 12. What couples do that rhymes with miss: _____________ 13. Strong emotion that rhymes with fashion: ___________ 14. A wonderful feeling that rhymes with boy: ___________ 15. A way to hold someone that rhymes with bug: ________ 16. The taste of chocolate that rhymes with heat: ________

Student Spotlight Sibora Berisha, Grade 5

Before Christmas Break we saw a movie and ate pizza because we brought a lot of bottle caps. After that we played Mafia. It was a lot of fun. Then we went to the room where we would do the Christmas show. The room was awesome. We sang a lot of songs and the show was perfect. After the show we ate a lot of delicious food. ! In history class we got the history book! Those books were wonderful. The first lessons were a little bit hard to understand but if you work a lot you could understand everything. We had a test on these lessons. After that Mr. Semerjian gave us a little paper so we could write if the test was fair or not and what we didn’t understand. I thought that the test was fair because we spent a lot of time reading them and saying the lessons. Even though we presented the lessons with our own words, we had to practice at home for the test. ! In French we are learning a lot of new things. We are also learning about France. On the last test, all of us did very well. French is fun and I love it. Mr. Michel is a great teacher. To learn French with Mr. Michel is wonderful and I thank Mr. Anderson that he decided to have Mr. Michel as our French teacher.