Summer 2013 - The Independent Schools' Modern Language ...

port and this in turn creates strong bonds of loyalty between new staff and
the school.
The school doesn’t only reach out to teachers, however. My observation is
that it also acts as one of the focal points for expat families new to Singapore,
often without a significant support network. Parental involvement here
is thus extremely high and there is a vast array of events organised for children
and their parents each week. In fact, parents are frequently seen about
the school site and can be observed meeting their children at break time, for
example, in one of our cafés. Everyone is monitored upon entry and the
campus feels both extremely safe and relaxed as a consequence.
Auxiliary Staff: in a culture that has ever-increasing amounts of childprotection
legislation, one may frown at the idea of parents milling around on
the school site. No such fear with us: thanks to our large security team, everyone
is monitored upon entry and the campus feels both extremely safe and
relaxed as a consequence.
Large numbers of auxiliary staff is not exclusive to security and there are
nearly 200 staff members plus 50 teaching assistants working around the
clock to assist teachers in their professional lives and also, as seen above,
their personal lives. This is an impressive number for a day-school! Reprographics,
displays, trips, technology for learning and ICT support: it all works
like a dream. This really does make a difference to teacher’s lives because
one is left to focus on the important aspects of teaching and learning and to
build professional relationships with students and colleagues.
Pastoral Care: turnover of students is high in all year groups, with the exception
of Year 10 and Year 12, because parents’ jobs require often moving
around the international job circuits, e.g. Tokyo to Shanghai to Hong Kong to
Singapore. A very special attention is thus needed to ensure all new members
to the school are made to feel welcome and the ethos of the school
must, by necessity just as much by strategy, be centred on an openness that
can brook such fluidity of its student body. Expat-child syndrome (ECS) is
also a very prevalent issue unique to international schools that must be taken
seriously by all members of the community.
Modern Foreign Language Teaching
A multitude of tongues: there are more than 40 nationalities amongst pupils
and this creates a cultural dynamism amongst the student body that
forms the basis for many unique opportunities to a MFL department in an
international school. In a recent survey, 25% of students in Year 11 were
found to speak another language as their mother tongue, in addition to
speaking English fluently (a requirement of the school). This is generally replicated
in other year groups and such linguistic diversity provides for ample
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