CAIS Connections (Fall 2012)

CAISC O N N E C T I O N SFall 2012

CAIS Chinese American International School 150 Oak Street San Francisco, CA 94102 | Page 1

In August, 2008 I spent five evenings at the Bird’s Nest (鸟巢 niăo cháo) Stadium in Beijing. It was an Olympic year, and I managed to get my fair

share of tickets to watch track and field events in the 80,000-seat venue. I’m a huge track and field fan. Most people probably don’t think about it much, but at a competition like Olympic track and field, there are always multiple events being contested simult-aneously — preliminary heats of the 100 meter dash, the triple-jump, the pole vault. Imagine the logis-tical challenges of organizing such an event; heat after heat of sprinters march into the stadium from the staging area, they strip off their warm ups, run for ten seconds and magically, their warm ups are deliv-ered to them by uniformed volunteer college students (all of whom speak English) before they leave the ven-ue. In the meantime, the next heat is getting into the starting blocks. Several video scoreboards shift from event to event, showing replays of athletes running and jumping and throwing heavy things. I imagine dozens of technicians simultaneously updating statis-tics and posting the scoreboard video displays. Who coordinates all of this? Who? When I wasn’t observing the precise movements of the uniformed volunteer college students between events, I was watch-ing Usain Bolt breaking the world record in the 100 meters in world record time. Really. It was awesome.

So, what does this have to do with curriculum? Well, every several weeks CAIS holds two to three days of

focused curriculum development work that involves just about everyone on the faculty. We have 29 lead classroom teachers, 11 specialists, 21 teaching asso-ciates (TAs) three visiting consultants, three division directors, a Chinese program director and 501 stu-dents. Between 8:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. on the days of our curriculum work, everyone has to be scheduled in a specific time and place to work on a specific cur-riculum development outcome with other colleagues who are similarly scheduled. Sometimes they work in groups according to discipline (humanities, science, language arts), sometimes by division, sometimes by grade and sometimes by language. Like Olympic track and field, all of them need to be coordinated. On the days when students are not in school (our “profes-sional development” days) it is a little less complicat-ed. When kids are in school, then teachers, teaching associates, specialists and substitute teachers need to be coordinated so that the school day can proceed as normal with no disruption to learning. When teachers get together on Sundays — as they frequently do — to work on curriculum, then the coordination is much simpler. You see, teachers — who bear the brunt of the curriculum development workload, are unavailable during working hours — they’re teaching our kids. But the important work cannot be done without them. So, like Olympic track and field at the Bird’s Nest, it’s a logistical feat to get everyone coordinated. And we don’t have any uniformed volunteer college students to help us. (cont’d on page 6)

THE CURRICULUM PROJECT A.K.A. OLYMPICS AT CAIS by Jeff Bissell, Head of School

毕杰夫校长：“奥运式”课程设计——集思广益

Fall 2012 | CAIS Connections

Page 2 | CAIS Chinese American International School

More than 12 years ago Al Adams, former head of Lick-Wilmerding High School in San Francisco, wrote an article stating that private schools are uniquely positioned to make a difference in the public domain, and have not only the opportunity, but an obligation to do more than educate their own students. He gave this concept the term private school with public purpose (PSPP), which today is a national coalition dedicated to building educational partnerships that serve the public interest. Taking a page from Al Adams’s philosophy, CAIS, in conjunction with

the Mandarin Institute, has for the last five years offered a free Mandarin immersion summer camp for students who attend public schools in San Francisco with Chinese programs. Using teachers, the most important resource at CAIS, and coupling it with the school facility that isn’t used to capacity, the summer program is partially funded by a grant from STARTALK, a component program of the National Security Language Initiative. STARTALK seeks to expand and improve the teaching and learning of strategically important world languages that are not widely taught in the United States. Each year the STARTALK Mandarin immersion camp at CAIS has grown in size and popularity, with enrollment topping at approximately 300 first through fifth grade students during two four-week sessions last summer. “It’s really satisfying to see the students’ Chinese language skills grow in a relatively short period of time,” program director Kevin Lee said. “Providing an immersion day camp that also includes free lunch each day is a win-win situation; the students gain a greater understanding of the lan-guage and culture, our teachers gain experience teaching in a different environment, we employ our alumni to help in the classroom as assistants and we open our doors to children that most likely wouldn’t have the means to attend CAIS,” he continued. The day is structured much like a regular school day at CAIS, but with one major difference; the entire day is taught in Chinese. From morning classroom instruction to activities such as arts and crafts, gymnastics and dance, STARTALK Mandarin immersion camp students speak Chinese from the time they step through the doors in the morning until they are picked up in the afternoon. Longtime independent school consultant Steve Davenport put it this way. “Independent schools are like beautifully machined cars; there is no reason to prevent schools from driving those powerful machines through the schoolyard gate and into the real world.” CAIS is engag-ing this philosophy by offering the “well oiled CAIS machine” to 300 students each summer.

PRIVATE SCHOOL WITH PUBLIC PURPOSE 私立学校 • 服务大众

CAIS Chinese American International School | Page 3

CAIS Connections | Fall 2012

NEW FACES AT CAIS 中美新面孔

She doesn’t recall a lot from her own preschool days, but Pre-K is now much different for Britta Pells, the new Early Childhood Division Director for CAIS at the Waller Campus. With a B.A. in Early Childhood Education (ECE) and an M.A. in Language Acquisi-tion for Second Language Learners, Britta brings to the Pre-K campus a robust educational background, professional teaching and leadership experience and passion for ECE. She strongly believes in a holistic and age appropriate development for early childhood education. When asked what goals she has set this year, Britta quickly responded with, “I’m prioritizing a push for early literacy, which is devel-opmentally appropriate reading and writing goals for all of our students. The kids love to tell their own stories, and it’s the first of the many steps in early literacy,” she continued. “Examples of early literacy can look like anything from scribble writing to kids telling their own stories during circle time.”

Britta has felt warmly welcomed to the community and is grateful for all of the support in her new role by both her colleagues and CAIS families.

Early Childhood Division Director

Director of Finance

and Operations

THOMAS PARK BRITTA PELLS

He says his first few months at CAIS have been like yoga. “I’m immersed in a variety of projects that are stretching me in many directions,” said Thomas Park, the new Director of Finance and Operations, “and I like it.” With a B.S. in Engineer-ing and an M.B.A., Thomas carries a resume with a variety of international experience in sales and marketing, small business, engineering and even some teaching. His most relevant experience, how-ever, stems from spending five years as Finance, Operations and Facilities Manager at a school in Barcelona, Spain. With his new role overseeing the business office, Thomas is working to better un-derstand how to leverage CAIS’s resources for stu-dents and families. “I want to help carry [founding head] Shirley Lee’s vision to the next milestone,” said Thomas. “There’s lots of momentum already pushing the school forward so if I could state a goal, it would be to make it all happen sooner. My role as an administrator not only has to do with CAIS’s financial well-being, but also with providing the best support to students and families and taking care of our most valued resource: our faculty and staff.”



ALUMNI NEWS 校友动向

Turkey in Chinese is火鸡 (huŏ jī), and this year we are serving up an extra 火鸡 for you!

This Thanksgiving sea-son, we are starting a tradition to invite all alumni and their parents to join our annual CAIS Thanksgiving luncheon. Come celebrate com-munity and family as

we feast together!

ALUMNI...YOU’RE INVITED! PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Please RSVP to [email protected] with your name, graduating year, guest count and any dietary restrictions.

“As I look forward, I’m very optimistic about the things I see ahead.” – Bill Gates

The school year just started, but our alumni staff is already thinking about the summer! This summer 2013, CAIS looks forward to bringing professional development opportunities to all alumni.

INTERNSHIPS

VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES

WORKSHOPS

NETWORKING EVENTS

For interests participating in any of these opportunities, please contact [email protected], or stay tuned for the next Connections for more details.

Friend us on Facebook to connect with our CAIS alumni network! www.facebook.com/caisalumni

Wednesday, November 21

12:00 p.m.

Oak Street gym



The second fall event - the LEADERSHIP DONOR RECEPTION – was held at Yank Sing restaurant to celebrate a successful year in giving at CAIS and to thank the many families who gave generously to the school’s annual fund drive during the 2011-2012 school year. The event also served as a kick off for the 2012-2013 annual fund campaign.

Every year, parents, faculty, staff and friends of CAIS raise mon-ey for the school’s operating budget by giving to the fund. These donations make up the difference between what tuition covers and the actual cost of a CAIS education.

Because of our generous community, we far surpassed the annual fund goal. Thank you to everyone who gave in the 2011-2012 school year. We appreciate your continued support of our programs.

Two fall events helped usher in the new school year and brought families together to celebrate the culture of giving at CAIS. The first event, SOLICLUB’S

ANNUAL FALL BENEFIT CONCERT, “Interlude of Melody,” featured a variety of music, including operatic classics as well as a few Chinese favorites. The concert, attended by alumni families, friends and CAIS administrators, raised funds for CAIS and the American Red Cross.

Van Ly, parent of CAIS alumna Alexandra Nguy (class of 2001), has been instrumental in creating a strong relationship be-tween SoliClub and CAIS. She is a member of SoliClub and a wonderful performer. Her combined passion for music and CAIS has inspired her to host this annual benefit concert.

Founded in 2000, SoliClub is an ensemble comprised of soloists who meet regularly to improve vocal and performance skills under the instruction of founders, Benjamin and Elsie Hsieh. In addition to performing in various concerts in California and Hong Kong, SoliClub has presented “Interlude of Melody” vocal recitals for the past 11 years.

FAMILIES COMING TOGETHER FOR TWO FALL EVENTS 校友及学生家庭共同参与秋季活动



(Continued from page 1) Luckily we have Chinese pro-gram director Kevin Chang and middle school director and assistant head of school Elizabeth Larose. With the help of Carol Xie, Kelly Scott and many others,

they are able to coor-dinate our curriculum work so that it runs as smoothly as the Bei-jing Olympic games. These people deserve a gold medal. So what kinds of things are our Olympic athletes (i.e.,

teachers) working on? I can tell you, it is much more complicated than running a race or throwing a javelin.

Let’s take the humanities as an example. Chinese and English language teachers from Pre-K through middle school meet together for several collaborative ses-sions. They come to consensus on Big Ideas in the humanities that are consistent with our mission and will serve as organizing principles across grades and languages. An example of a big idea in the humani-ties is “global citizenship.” Then, for each of the big ideas, our faculty negotiates Enduring Understand-ings — important takeaways that we want students to remember, always. They endure after the small details of what students learned have been forgot-ten. These enduring understandings are applicable across languages from Pre-K through eighth and are addressed with differing levels of sophistication at different grade levels. They are transferable to new situations. Here’s an example: for the big idea, “global citizenship,” an enduring understanding in humani-ties at CAIS is that “A responsible global citizen un-derstands his/her place in and impact on the world,

through investigating, respecting and engaging with diverse communities.”

Then, at each grade level, teachers write grade ap-propriate Essential Questions. Essential questions help students reach an enduring understanding. There is no single right or obvious answer to essential questions; they tend to provoke other, related ques-tions. Sometimes, both Chinese and English language teachers in a given grade will ask the same essential questions. For instance, in the eighth grade, students will study immigration in both Chinese and English hu-manities. An essential question in the integrated unit on immigration will be, “How do people from one cul-ture negotiate the presence of people from another culture?” Of course the specific content will differ somewhat across languages; in English humanities, students will learn about the history of immigration in the U.S. In Chinese humanities, learning will focus on the Chinese immigrant experience in San Francisco. Chinese teachers will need to spend time on instruc-tion in the language skills and vocabulary necessary to learn about immigration. But in both languages, the essential questions in the immigration unit will sup-port the enduring understandings related to “global citizenship.” Other instructional units may be com-plementary but not so closely integrated, and Chinese and English language teachers will develop separate essential questions. But even though the questions are different, they will be guided by the same big ideas and enduring understandings. And so it goes, vertical-ly — across grades — and horizontally — across sub-jects, for every grade, every subject and in both lan-guages. It is a lot of work, more like a marathon than a 100-meter dash.

(continued on page 7)

THE CURRICULUM PROJECT A.K.A. OLYMPICS AT CAIS “奥运式”课程设计：集思广益



(continued from page 6)

MID-AUTUMN MOON FESTIVAL STUDIED AND CELEBRATED“与师长共度中秋”系列活动：展现中华文化特色

And like the Olympics, there is more than just track and field. There is assessment — this year we will use a common, running assessment for reading. There are writing skills across all disciplines — our faculty is implementing a common approach to teach-ing and assessing different forms of writing across the grades, subjects and languages.

There are the social emo-tional skills that were in-troduced earlier this year. Actually, this work is more like the Ironman Triathlon than the Olympics. FYI, in Chinese “Ironman” is 铁人三项 (tiě rén sān xiàng). This is important to know, actually, because all the work we do, we need to do it in both languages.

Of course the beneficiaries of this work are the CAIS students. It is our children who, as a result of the hard work and collabora-tion of our Olympian teachers, will embrace Chinese, become their best selves and create their places in the world.

Many thanks to the anonymous donor whose generosity has enabled us to go for the gold.

Although Chinese New Year is more publically cel-ebrated in the West, many argue that Mid-Autumn Moon Festival is the more culturally significant of the

two holidays. Taking place on the fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month, the round shape of the moon is significant as it represents a full, closed circle of family members who tradi-tionally come together to celebrate the year’s harvest. The meal is called tuán yuán fàn 团圆饭; the three characters literally mean “together, round and full (like the moon), meal.” On the evening of the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival, families come together, celebrate the harvest, seated at a round table, underneath the full moon, eating round moon cakes.

The CAIS family celebrated the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival at school in a variety of ways. In Kindergarten and first grade, students learned about the legend of Chang’e flying to the moon, Wu Gang cutting down the mystical tree and Chang’e and the magical rabbit. In first grade, students took what they learned about the legend and sketched pictures of their in-terpretation of the story on iPads and sat at round tables and drank tea, talked about fam-ily and ate moon cakes. Additionally, many students submitted their work for a Mid-Autumn Festival book that was printed and published by the CAIS Chinese department. Every student was invited to contribute a drawing, poem, short sto-ry or photography that communicated what the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival meant to them. The result was a beautiful col-lection that reflects the personalities of each student. Zhù nín zhōng qiū jíe kuài lè! 祝您中秋节快乐！

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SCHOOL M I S S I O N

OCTOBER 31 - NOVEMBER 2Parent-Teacher Conferences

(No School - Childcare Available)

NOVEMBER 21Thanksgiving Luncheon

(Early Dismissal)

NOVEMBER 12Professional Development Day(No School - Childcare Available)

NOVEMBER 22 - 23Thanksgiving Holiday(No School - No Childcare)

DECEMBER 23(Early Dismissal)DECEMBER 24 - JANUARY 4

Winter Break(No School - No Childcare)

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CAIS Connections (Fall 2012)