Farewelll for the Moment

What is happening fellow IBers!!

Sorry that we've been taking our time writing this post. But we have had quite a lot of work to do especially with one of the four musketeers gone to the other side of the world. For good.

We've had a busy summer with Extended Essays and Internal Assessments and the workload increased even further after the school started. Finalizing IAs and doing FOAs has been our top priority in the last couple of weeks. Apparently some students on the national side have been taking time off from school due to stress from their final exams. BUT we’re still standing tall (as tall as one can stand seeing their height) without taking any unnecessary holidays.

But good news! We have finally finished our Extended Essays! 

So, the EE Day, the day we were all very anxiously waiting for. For starters, the EE day is a day that all students in IB2 present their Extended Essays to teachers as well as the other IB students. From our group of the four musketeers minus one, two of us wrote our EEs on Biology and one in Finnish. I've got to say, the EE day was nerve wrecking thinking of how you’ll be able to answer the questions thrown at you by the teachers and be able to explain your EE as the expert you are.

The future doesn't look too bright for us. We still have A LOT of sleepless nights ahead of us with several IAs and orals still to come. Not forgetting about the MOCKS and Finals which we are approaching quite fast.

Due to all of this work, we will not be doing anymore blog posts at least for now. You never know what the future holds. Maybe someone will continue in our footsteps when doing their CAS.

10 Study Tips

Yo homies!

This week we are going to enlighten you on the topic of study tips! Hopefully you will be able to put at least one of these into practice, even if it is just for a short period of time. We have tons of experience in this matter, for we have tried it all and have honed down only the best and most useful tips for you to use. Excellent, isn't it?

1. Make Flash cards. Write a question or a word that you need to define and the answer on the other side. These are very handy for remembering small facts. 
2. Laminate some note cards and plant them around the house (even the shower). Plant the cards in places where you will have to read them inevitably at some point, like the mirror when you comb your hair or brush your teeth. Another great place for these handy things are on the fridge door - a place we IB:ers love to visit. You can write down equations or points of information you feel necessary to know. 
3. Reward yourself with food or other incentives after reading a certain amount of pages in your textbooks. For example, you can buy a bag of chips, candy or a healthier option (generally avoided by us) and reward yourself with one after every page. Some people also like to paint one nail with nail polish after every chapter - we recommend you boys instead of girls to use this tactic surprisingly, because it will take you longer to add and remove the nail polish which means more study time!
4. Have one notebook for notes in class and another for notes at home from your textbook. Often your notes in school can be confusing and too simple, which may cost you later in the final exams. If you keep one study notebook at home you can study the topics studied at school again at home and write them down in a clearer manner, that you can study from later. 
5. Use your 'dead' time wisely. Dead time as in bus or train rides, skip lessons, queues etc by reading your notes, textbooks or flash cards. This enables you to use up all your extra time productively! Sometimes it is nice to spend your dead time being 'dead', though..
6. Practice past paper exams on the internet. This one is quite self evident and always a smart option before your actual tests. Especially with mathematics, no matter what level. 
7. When studying and making notes, use the syllabus guide as a reference - found on the internet. The syllabus guide gives you exact information on what you need to know and not know - this may not always be made clear by teachers during class. 
8. Use the No Procrastination- app while studying on the computer. This app doesn't let you enter sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube etc (whatever you add on the list) for a certain time period of your choosing. If you don't have the willpower to not visit these sites without a little help, this is the app for YOU. 
9. Take a five minute break after every 30 minutes of studying. This allows your brain to process all the information you have gathered during the studying period. It may also eliminate the chances of getting extremely frustrated! 
10. Make a To-Do List. Always an excellent idea! It's a good feeling after doing something and being able to cross it off the list with a feeling of accomplishment. 

Internal Assessments: B&M and an A-Language

This week we are continuing on the subject of Internal Assessments; we have quite a few under progress now and we are all ready to discuss them all with you! This is all to ensure you will not have any surprises when you walk into the real deal IB Diploma - or if you already are and finding about all this now, well, you have bigger fish to fry. 

Anywhoozles, today we are talking about the Internal Assessment of Business & Management and an A-language which in this case will be about Finnish once again. 

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A Literature: Finnish (HL)

In Finnish, we have started working on our Written Assignments (again, these are not called Internal Assessment, but work as the same thing). It is an essay based on a translated book read in class which has to be around 1200-1500 words. 

So far, we have chosen the topics for our essay and had our teacher approve them. Now we will have to start planning and writing the essay since the first draft is due in already a month. After we've given our first drafts to the teacher, she will read them through and sit with each of us individually, giving us feedback. 

Teachers are not allowed to write anything down on them so the feedback has to be done orally. Our teacher said that in the past, some students have written down the feedback and many students have recorded it. This is the only chance that your teacher can revise your work, so make sure that you write a proper first draft and listen carefully to the feedback you're given!

Here are the basics just in case:

1. Students submit a reflective statement and literary essay on one work studied in Part 1
2. The reflective statement must be 300–400 words in length.
3. The essay must be 1,200–1,500 words in length.

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Business & Management (HL)

In Business and Management, we have started on our Internal Assessments already about a month ago. We had to start thinking about our research questions - which is extremely difficult and time consuming, believe you me. It is vital for you to have a good and answerable question to get a good grade in this Internal Assessment and just saying, your first questions will probably not be the ones you will be researching by the end of the summer break. This is what we have done this far:

As you all know, IAs are written in every subject and thus, Business & Management is no different. The IA is 25% of the final grade (surprise surprise…) and it consists of a 500 word research proposal and action plan as well as the 2000 word written report (go over, and you will be penalized by minus points!). 

So for the IA you have to choose an organization that is facing some kind of an issue, BUT the organization should have the following characteristics:

1. Must be a real organization
2. Issue or decision under discussion must also be real
3. Must be able to collect primary data (surveys, interviews etc.) HL ONLY!

Here are a few tips for finding a good Research Question - when the time comes. 

• It's relevant to the business going forward (not a question that has already been resolved or likely to be resolved)
• It should take the form 'Should____ in order to____?'
• Facilitates itself to a quantitative and qualitative cost/benefit analysis
• Can also be a decision between two options 'Should___ or ___?'
• Do a lot of research and ensure you have enough data to make something out of your research question! This is where most questions end up being thrown out and replaced with new ones (At least in our cases) 

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That is all for this week's post, tune in next week for more tips and information!

Two Written Tasks And An Investigation

Well hello there fellow IBers!

This week our topic will be on current subjects that we are heavily occupied, which indeed are the Internal Assessments. We have been quite busy as have the second year IB students with their MOCKS exams, which we will enlighten you on sooner or later. The featuring IA  speeches today and next week are on English, History, Finnish (a mother tongue language) and Business & Management. 

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English HL

If you are well acquainted with the IB system or you have been reading closely to our blog posts when we were discussing subjects, you will already be thinking that hold on, I thought we didn't have any IAs in English? Well, we are here to tell you that it is indeed correct that we do not. However, we do have to make up for this in other means such as the FOA (Further Oral Assessment) and WRITTEN TASKS. We write up four of these pesky little things which will be then sent to the IBO for grading. During the past few weeks we have been working on our second Written Task 1, where we get to invent a story (a diary entry, article, blog etc) where we discuss issues we have been learning about. All in all, it is quite a creative task. 

Written Tasks divide into two categories: Written Task 1 (WT1) and Written task 2 (WT2). You will write up at least two of each; if more you will get to choose the best ones that will be sent to the IBO. There are fundamental differences to Written Task 1 and 2: 

• Written task 1 is an 'imaginative piece' in which you demonstrate your understanding of the course work and a type of text. You can write a journalistic review of a speech, a letter from one character to another or something else that is relevant to your studies. 
•  Because the possibilities are endless, it is easy to write irrelevant work. Therefore it is important that you look at several samples and several tips for guidance on the Written Task 1.

• Written task 2 is for HL students only. It is a critical response to a text or texts, written in light of one of six prescribed questions from the IB Language A: Language and Literature guide. These questions can be answered using texts from all parts of the syllabus.

Now, just to start with the Written Task 1 for it is relevant for the moment being and we can freely speak from experience we are going to lay down the groundwork for you guys. So without further ado, here are the Written Task 1 basics for our IB dummies:

1. Written task must be 800-1000 words long (SL & HL)
2. You must write a rationale of 200-300 words, explaining the decision making process behind the task. (SL & HL)
3. While general feedback may be given, the work must be the student's own. Teachers cannot prescribe the task at hand, only facilitate to good ideas. (SL & HL)
4. SL students must submit one WT1 from their portfolio. 
5. HL students must submit two WT1s from their portfolio

...And here are the basics for Written Task 2s (HL ONLY):

1. Also between 800-1000 words long. 
2. A critical response to a text that answers one of six prescribed questions
3. Can be based on texts taken anywhere in the syllabus. 
4. Each task must be accompanied by an outline, which must be written in class. The outline contains the prescribed question chosen, title of the text(s) for analysis, the part of the course to which the task refers and three or four key points that explain the focus of the task.

And Bob's your uncle! That is all you need to know about Written Tasks, they are not difficult at all when you get into it, we guarantee you. 

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History HL/SL

The history IA is actually called ‘Historical investigation’ since one is not writing an essay to explain why something happened and why. The best thing about a historical investigation is that you have the right to choose any topic in history that you want to write about and you don’t have to fixate on a topic you don’t like from the teacher. For the IA, the total word count is 2000 words this may sound scary but from experience, you’ll get used to it in fact, you’ll probably have more words, well maybe.

A historical investigation consisting of a written account of between 1,500 and 2,000 words and it is divided into six sections: plan of the investigation, summary of evidence, evaluation of sources, analysis, conclusion, and bibliography or list of sources.

Each section has different word counts and also different points:

A. Plan of Investigation: up to 150 words (3 marks)

B. Summary of Evidence: 400-500 words (6 marks)

C. Evaluation of Sources: 200-350 words (5 marks)

D. Analysis: 600 - 800 words (6 marks)

E. Conclusion: up to 200 words (2 marks)

F. Bibliography: (3 marks)

Total word count: 2000 words maximum

Here are some points of how you can plan your Historical investigation:

1. Start by identifying a general area of interest.

2. Narrow it down to a specific question/area of investigation.

3. Choose a working title that may be changed/refined at a later stage.

4. Make sure you can obtain sufficient resources for your planned investigation.

5. Read widely around the area of study and note down resources used.

6. Review your thesis question and refine it if necessary.

7. Take notes from your chosen resources, including exact references.

8. Complete section A and show it to your teacher.

9. Re-read your notes and decide where they would fit into the sections of the investigation.

10. Complete your investigation, according to the IBO guidelines.

From experience, choosing the right topic has not been easy but the your teacher will help a lot so no worries, be happy!

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Next week we will be hearing more about the Finnish and B&M (Business & Management) Internal Assessments. Be sure to check it out just in case you will pick up on some excellent tips!

Theory Of Knowledge & EE

Yello!

 

Today's post is about the subject going by the name of Theory of Knowledge and its importance of it in your IB diploma programme and the Extended Essay that has been mentioned quite a few times but yet not to be clarified in depth.

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T.O.K.

 

The majestic language of our minds.. Theory of Knowledge (a.k.a T.O.K. because its badass). It's basically this awesome subject is here to help you understand as well as challenge your surroundings as a learning student in the IB. It's actually a very fun subject indeed because you get to let your thoughts and opinions out on things and talk about contradicting issues that are debated even today like what is the meaning of life and all that cool and thoughtful stuff.

From Theory of Knowledge you are able to gain 1.5 points for your final grade by essays, tests and we guess just class behaviour all in all. So be on your best behaviour, it is not a class for slacking off!

Now, this is what IB wants you to get out of T.O.K. so listen up:

1. Learn to reflect critically in all sorts of ways of knowing and areas of knowledge. (sounds complicated, right?)
2. Gain awareness of different cultures and others in the whole wide world we got going on here.
3. To strengthen your thinking skills (thinkers) and to understand the complexity of knowledge
4. You should become aware of the interpretative nature of knowledge with personal assumptions, regardless of whether, ultimately, these assumptions are cut down, revised or down right rejected.
5. The ability to apply your knowledge with greater awareness and credibility - this shows in our IB books when some of them have little side notes of 'TOK sessions'.

In addition, TOK is composed almost entirely of questions with the most central one being

"HOW DO WE KNOW?!"

that we know, that we know.. how to create a mind?

This all may sound a little boring to you, however, we at least have a very knowledgeable and fun teacher so we also get do really interesting things like brain teasers and debates on various subjects. We will put a few of these brain teasers for you so that you can get a little taste of 'jogging' your brain for a change!

In our opinion, debates are a lot of fun after a long day of academic studies. We can let our minds run free and think outside the box and maybe come up with some philosophical ideas. We've had a role-play debate in history with characters such as  Woodrow Wilson, Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin. We've also done some other smaller group debates on issues with morals, language barriers and culture. All in all, it's all good.

For the brain teasers!

Puzzle:
Shown above are 4 men buried up to their necks in the ground. They can not move so can only look forward. Between A and B is a brick wall which can not be seen through. They know that between them are 4 hats, 2 are black and 2 are white, but they do not know which color they are wearing. In order to avoid being shot one of them must call out to the executioner the color of their hat. If they get it wrong, everyone will be shot. They are not allowed to talk to each other and have 10 minutes to fathom it out.

Question: Which one of them calls out ?

Question: Why is he 100% certain of the color of his hat ?

Tune in next week for the answer! (if you gave up, that is..)

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Extended Essay

The best part of the IB is writing a 4000 word essay during your summer vacation while all of your friends are on the beach enjoying their time off. However you can make this experience enjoyable and outdoorsy if you choose your topic wisely. To get over with the formalities, essentially "the Extended Essay is a in-depth study  of a focused topic chosen from the list of approved Diploma Programme subjects", to quote from the Extended Essay guide from the IBO site.

 ...The important facts for you to know are the following:

• YOU ALL HAVE TO DO THIS ESSAY!!
• It will be sent away to the IBO hub to be assessed
• The EE and TOK together will contribute up to three points to the total score of the IB Diploma
• You will be supervised by an IB teahcer in your school
•  As said before the essay is 4000 words long (if you go over the word limit you will be doomed or in other words you will lose points)
• The legend says it will take approximately 40 hours of work, but we have been warned that it will take more
• At the sweet end you will have a short interview with your supervisor



So far we have been choosing our topics and reading the 20 page Extended Essay Guide. Though we haven't quite started our own essays yet we have been given one important tip:

START EARLY!!!

Now, last but certainly not least! Below you can see marking range with your T.O.K studies and the Extended Essay. Be sure to read this through!

Alrighty then! See ya's next week!

The Made-Up Social Lives of IB Students

Welcome to the fun part of IB!

Ah, the wonderful world of CAS (also known as Creativity, Action and Service), the heart of the IB programme

. If all the work the IB already gives you does NOT take up all your time, this certainly will. Not only that, CAS ensures that your two years of IB will be filled with joy and activity keeping you busy at all times. Including holidays. And summer. And pretty much every waking moment you have.  We will proceed an try to enlighten you on the subject of CAS and show you how to get the most of this 'burdening' workload by reflecting on our own experiences. Hopefully. Indeed it is a lot of work on top of all the work we are already doing, but you just have to bite your lip and make the best of it. After all, go all the way or go home, that is what IB is about.

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C.A.S 

..? 

To begin, you will be obliged to do just about 150 hours of CAS during your two years of IB, in which you will have to do approximately 50 hours of each activity (Creativity, Action and Service). Even though this work will not be graded and will not affect your final points after the finals, you will not receive your diploma without successfully completing all your CAS hours. Including a CAS project with three or more students, which we will talk about soon. However, you will still be receiving your diploma if you are under the 150 hours by a small amount, it is not that strict.
There is this site these days called ManageBac where you can record your activities and your progress by writing up reflections. When completing your activities, you will need a supervisor at all times who is over 18 years of age and is not a relative of yours. At the end of your activity, he or she will be required to write a supervisor's report or letter on your behavior and performance. Your activity will not be completed before your CAS coordinator receives this report and you will have to write several reflections that show your learning outcomes that are the following:

 Now, choosing your learning outcomes doesn't sound too hard does it? Because it's not. What's hard is writing a few paragraphs on each one and picking your brain for the little details you did each time you went and completed a few of those hours you had earned. That my friends, is the difficult part. Below you can find a good diagram to help you get started with CAS when the time comes:

If you still feel like you have nothing to do to get you CAS points/hours, we thought it would be a good idea to show you what we are doing at the moment in order to earn CAS hours. It's always good to wonder when you are starting a new hobby or for instance, helping out your school with something, whether you can get CAS hours from this. This is the question we ask most frequently in the IB programme. Just saying.

We're going to introduce ourselves individually and tell you about our own CAS experiences.

First of all we, the Four Musketeers, have one thing in common when it comes to CAS: we are all writing up this blog as our CAS project which is obviously a great and creative solution to have as a CAS project. Simple too and doesn't require too much research.

Hello, my name is Heidi and I'll be the first to discuss my CAS activities. Hopefully this helps you when choosing your activities.

1. I participated in EYP (European Youth Parliament) which lasted for three days. From this activity I gained several hours for all activities (Creativity, Action and Service). I recommend you to participate in these types of things if you are interested in issues facing the international community.

2. Another activity that I did was being Santa's Little Helper in a "Christmas World" which was a small market held during the Christmas holiday. I helped with organizing the small cottages in which differnet products were sold. Of course I was not allowed to sell anything because I'm a minor. But it was still cool being there and helping out. Something like this is great for gaining hours for Service as well as for Action. It's not too hard is it?

3. I was one of the in-school organizers for our annual International Show with Tilda Rose, one of the Musketeers. We planned and executed an amazing show for our school in exchange for a few Service hours. However, this is probably the first and the last time I'm going to plan any show in school due to some inconveniences. This just goes to show that ´CAS can't always be a fun experience but you can still learn from this.

4. I'm also planning on getting some of my Action hours from my hobby; ice hockey. Hobbies are always something you can fall back on if you can't think of anything better to do.

5. Another good way to learn something and profit from CAS is going to driving school- of course if you are of age to do so. This is what most IB students here in Finland do in order to get some Action and/or Creativity hours.

6. Next summer I'm planning on helping at an elderly care center. This is actually a perfect way to gain CAS hours and impress your CAS coordinator.

Well, that's all for me for now.

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Alright, so, I am Tilda Rose and I'm gonna give you guys some more examples on CAS from my own experiences:

1. First of all, I participated in an art course a while back to get my Creativity hours up and learn something new since I'm building up a portfolio to apply to an Art College in the States. It's good to use this CAS to find your interests and to improve your skills and passions and maybe even increase your chances in getting into a university or college of your choosing. The picture on the right is one of my creations during that class: accounted for about four hours of CAS. Pretty sweet. 

2. I went to an elderly home for a day and got some good Service hours from this, giving me great reflections that impressed my CAS coordinator - I think.. This is always an important aspect to CAS.


3. As Heidi just mentioned, I was also an in-school organizer for the International Christmas show with her, and my outcomes of it were pretty much alike to the ones made by Heidi. 


4. To add to the blog we are doing here right now with the Four Musketeers, I also have my very own 'art-oriented' blog for Action and Creativity, which is pretty cool for me and I can share all my interests with the world. If you want to check out my blog and see what I'm talking about, here is the address -> http://whereisyour-mind.blogspot.fi/ Feel free follow... ;-) This is a great and free way to get CAS hours, just talking about the things you love which is kind of my hobby since I don't have an actual one anymore.


5. As for Action, I'm planning on starting working out with my good buddy, just turned 18 years old, for a few months. So there are always creative solutions to gaining CAS hours when you are running out of options. Not to say that I am!



6. Like Heidi, I helped out in a school event as a guest 'welcomer', when our school turned 50 years old. I gave out slips to ALL those people you see on the right. MOST OF THEM. It was quite painful but worth it. So those thing always count for some hours or points- don't hesitate to ask your CAS Coordinators!

Hope this helped! 

Heyoo, I'm SusanMoreen and here are my CAS experiences.

1. I went to EYP (European Youth parliament) along with Heidi. It was a three day programme where we learned about Europe and participated in debates. This covered all aspects of CAS; Creativity, Action and Service.It was and is a good idea for CAS as well as extra curricular activity for insight as well as experience to resolve global issues. It's a global organization for youths and most countries have it so you can also choose to participate, as a plus you get great reflections on this!

2. I helped out in an elderly home every Saturday for a month. It was interesting because i got to work with the elderly and learned a lot from them. It's a good opportunity to work along with others as well as do something for the community. However, after all the work you will have a guaranteed smile on your face.

 

3. I thought it was a good idea to learn Finnish since i'm living in  Finland,  i attended a Finnish language course at our school to expand on my my Finnish skills and vocabulary. My outcomes were positive since i'm now able to speak more and with confidence. You should definitely try this if you live in a foreign country and don't speak the language too well or if you love to expand on your language studies. It is know that studying different languages can help in other aspects of studying and brain activity. 

4. I'm also planning on volunteering to work with the Red Cross . I love volunteering in different places and most of my summers were spent volunteering instead of actual work. If your town has an organization of some sought, you should go ask them if they need assistance and i assure you they appreciate all the help they can get.

When I choose my CAS activities, i try to choose something that i'm interested in and would have fun doing it and not to just get CAS points. Some of the CAS activities we do can also have an influence on my CV as well as help when applying for Colleges or Universities.



Hi! I'm Nelli and I've had to do CAS since the 7th grade so it wasn't a new thing for me coming into the IB. 

1. I've been doing a lot of baby sitting lately. It's a good and fun way to get CAS hours (especially Service, that's a tough one), but remember, it doesn't count for CAS if you get paid for it!!

2. In the autumn, I joined a 9th grade trip which lasted for four days. I got plenty of hours for all of the activities in CAS from helping with organizing activities, cooking and taking pictures. 

3. Like Heidi, I've gained many CAS hours from hobbies. I play basketball so I get a lot of my action hours from this. I stopped playing the clarinet a few years ago which I now regret since it would have been a great way to get some hours for Action. 

4. Unlike the other three Musketeers, I'm taking part in the Wanhojen Tanssit, which is kind of a prom like event for the second year upper-secondary school students to take part in. It's a fun way to get Creativity, Action and Service. 

And that is the run down by all the Four Musketeers. 

Next week we will be diving into the deep subject of Theory of Knowledge and might be introducing you into the magical world of the Extended Essays. We shall see next week, won't we... See ya's next week!

More Languages!

Hello you busy bees!

This week we are going to continue on languages, hope you don't mind. We are still yet to cover French and German as an B language and Self Taught (an independent subject, whaaaat?). We will also probably cover Visual Arts and Chemistry, but because our class weren't fortunate enough to get these classes we will have to interview some fellow IBers soon. Of course, these are not THE only IB subjects, but these are the ones that are offered on our radius. You can always find out more on the IB site -> www.ibo.org.

B-LANGUAGES: FRENCH

We're just gonna start now with French B as a language choice of the two you are obliged to pick. Actually, this choice really does mingle well with studying English Literature, believe it or not. We were too unfortunate not to be offered this subject as on a Higher Level, but we will try our best to supply you with the information you need. Three of our Four Musketeers; Tilda Rose, SusanMoreen and Nelli,  have French B as an Standard Level subject and we have to say, it is not a bad subject to have at all not to mention that it is indeed the diplomatic language, which is always good to know. Basically, the Higher and Standard Levels are different only by the recommended teaching hours, the depth of syllabus coverage, the required study of literature at Higher Level and the level of difficulty and requirements of tasks and criteria. 

We have three required core themes: communication and media, global issues and social relationships which is quite a nice balance, don't you think? Oh, and in addition, at Standard and Higher Level, teachers will pick two more themes from five options that are given to them and finally, two works of literature are studied at Higher Level only. All this actually applies to all B languages that you can choose, we only chose French here because it seemed relevant and we can talk about it from experience.

Alright, so here are a few things you should know about B Languages and how you will be assessed during the two years:

1. Your interactive, productive and receptive skills will be honed through contextualized study of language of your choice, texts and themes.
2. You will be exposed to a variety of authentic texts and you produce work in a variety of communicative contexts
3. Your key goals will be intercultural understanding and plurilingualism
4. You will be assessed both internally and externally
5. External assessment at Standard Level consists of exercises to demonstrate understanding of texts
6. External assessment at Higher Level consists of exercises to demonstrate understanding of texts based on the core themes, two writing exercises and one based on the core and the other based on the options, and finally a written assignment based on one of the literary texts
7. Internal assessment at both Standard and Higher level tests your abilities in listening and speaking in a conversation format: consisting of an individual oral based on the options and an interactive oral based on the core ( three classroom activities assessed by your teacher )

Now. The Finals slash exams. From the previous post on Languages, the overall percentage of the Final exam was 25%, the same goes for French once again. Just as in all the other languages, in the subject of French we have two papers; Paper 1 and Paper 2 and also an Oral assessment  that will be performed

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The Oral assessment is recorded via cassette tape recording or digitally via a CD recorder. You are expected to speak for 3 to 5 minutes on a subject of your choice the followed by a question period between your teacher and you for about 2-3 minutes. The question period has been made as a way for you to show your level of depth in the French language, so that's pretty cool. The best tip for this oral assessment that we can come up with is to practice your French accent, but indeed that is not all; choosing a topic related to the French Culture would be most helpful for your assessment grade and additionally a topic that is of your keen interest, something that would make you enjoy and have fun while talking about it ‘in French’. Naturally.

Paper 1 is intended to test your reading comprehension and the time given to you is approximately 1.5 hours.  Basically the test consist of a text and exam questions of about 50 questions, some are true or false questions, fill in the blanks or matching synonyms. Having a strong understanding of French vocabulary and grammar is good because, obviously it really helps your understanding of the text. For example, we just had a test a few months back and we had this reading comprehension test, oh my goodness we tell you. We hadn't practiced too much of the everyday vocabulary and we did not understand much what the texts were talking about. These tests can be pretty tricky and we cannot emphasize how much it helps you if you read columns or articles in French during your free time just to get yourself adjusted and ready for these things. Everything you need to know is not necessarily covered in school, especially vocabulary. 

Paper 2 is also a 1.5 hour performance and  basically, it tests your writing skills, a very important skill for you to master in the IB French system. A list of choices is given to you and you must choose only ONE and write a minimum of 250 words on it the topic of your choosing. You can always write a bit more, maybe 100 more but keep in mind that you can be penalized for too many extra words or the examiner may choose to just assess your work until the word limit, in which case maybe he or she will not read your conclusion which is one of the most important parts of any essay that you write. So, just keep that in the back of your brain during the Paper 2 exams. 

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SELF-TAUGHT.

Next up we are going to talk about Self Taught as an independent subject which is an A language of your choice and you cannot choose this as a Higher Level subject. Of course you have to be quite fluent in this language because this is a demanding choice especially because you are doing it independently. However, it doesn't have to be your mother tongue, for instance one of our beloved classmates has chosen Mandarin Chinese even though he is a full Finnish citizen but he has lived in China for a long time. If you choose this subject you have to read literary works throughout the two years, write all assessed components and perform oral examinations. And these works obviously have to be done in the language you chose as a self taught subject. Even though this subject may be quite difficult at times, we are sure it will pay off later especially if you enjoy this language and want to excel in it. We encourage you not to forget your -possibly- mother tongue so that it has a strong presence in the rest of your studies. Maybe it will give you a new twist to studying, who knows?!

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 Last up we thought it would be a nice idea to put up this demonstration of the groups you have to choose your subjects from, even though this is given to you in almost any IB-related talk or meeting but anyway, here it is. 

And a few links for you to lighten the mood a bit and give you a good and solid- maybe slightly blown out of proportions, not by much though - idea of what you are getting yourself into. This all is to encourage you to be an international and knowledgeable student!

Some facts about being and IB student.. -> http://www.buzzfeed.com/jessicamisener/27-sure-signs-you-were-in-the-ib-program

That's all for now and next week we are going to dig deeper into the subject of Theory Of Knowledge (a.k.a TOK), all the little thing that comes with it like the Extended Essay and possibly we will we talking a little more about Visual Arts and Chemistry. 

Sayonara,

Tilda Rose, SusanMoreen, Nelli & Heidi

First languages: Finnish and English

Good morning fellow IB students!!

As you may know by now one third of the Diploma is language oriented. This basically means that you have to study at least two languages which may include English and some other language like the language spoken in the country where you are right now. Of course, if you are a keen linguist like our Nelli here, you can opt for a third language resulting in a 50% language component.

Today we will start by talking a bit about the language spoken in Finland which is.. any guesses? Yes, you know it. Finnish!! Unfortunately, only two out of four Musketeers study this mentioned and by all means, pleasant subject.

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We, Heidi and Nelli, chose Finnish as one of our subjects because we only read books and do essays on them. So no grammar taught anymore. If you like reading consider choosing First Language option. But if you are not keen on reading then this is not a subject for you. For Higher Level there are 13 books to read and for Standard Level there are 10 books. And these books are divided into four categories: Translated Literature, Literary Genres, Novels and finally, Themes. We don't have an actual IA on this subject but we do have a similar writing task.

Let's start with Translated Literature. This is 25% of your final grade. Higher Level students read three books and Standard Level students only have to read two.  Some of our books are actually easy to read and interesting unlike the English books which you will read about soon. Of course this is only our opinion, you make your own later. One of our books was The Kite Runner. The writing task we mentioned is on the Translated Literature and it is 1200-1500 words. This is less than the IA word limit which is around 2000 words. We had to do  two short analyses on each book we read.

The next category, Literary Genres, include 3 literary pieces for Higher Level and 2 for Standard Level exactly like with Translated Literature. These pieces will consist of a novel, poem and a play. Standard level students only have two of the mentioned pieces, so your teacher will most likely choose the ones you will have to do. Unfortunately, you cannot choose. Additionally, out of one, or even all of these pieces - if it truly is what you want - you will be obliged to do an oral test (it is like a discussion analyzing one or more of the pieces) which will be recorded and sent to the IBO. We bet that the recording part of the whole process sounds the most scary to you, but don’t worry!  You’ll have had a but-load of practice discussions in class. This recorded oral test will sum up to be 15% of your grade, which isn't too bad. We imagine this will be just about the same in your school, whatever country you are in at the moment.

The third and the most important category is the Novels- category. Now if ever is the time to pay attention.. Higher Level students have the honor of reading four novels and Standard Level students have to settle for a lousy three novels. Your final exam essay question will be based on these books. So it’s advisable for you to buy at least these books for yourself if not the others. One of our novel in this category is a Finnish classic: The Unknown Soldier by Väinö Linna. You should check it out if you are into Finnish... culture... or something. This category sums up to 25% of the final grade so do remember to read up your books. 

The picture is quite accurate, representing us in the battle against the IA’s and EE’s.. ;-) 

For the last but certainly not the least will be the Themes category. Both Higher and Standard Level students will have three books on which you will have to do a presentation. Again. Not too much else to say about this than that it will affect your grade by 15%.

In the subject of IB Finnish, we have to keep a reading notebook and we do advise you to get one too if you are planning to study Finnish or some other language your school provides. In these notebooks, we make notes on the books we read, so that when the time comes to start studying for the final exams, instead of reading all the books again and again, we can just revise by reading our notes. It may consume some time from hanging out with your friends, but we assure you, when it is final exam time you will not be sorry. That is why we recommend putting a lot of effort into making proper notes that you can still read after a year's time, since they will really pay off when you are studying. 

So we get to the lovely topic of the final exams in IB Finnish. The exams include two pieces of writing: one of them is a comparative essay on the books from group three, the second piece of writing is a long 'comment' on a text that you will get when the exam begins, so there will be no time to prepare for that one. The long comment will come up to be about 20% of your final grade. Also, you will have to write as much as you can in the given time for there is NO WORD LIMIT. Bummer.

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Now, its English time, which all of us are indeed studying and are obliged to study. Well, who wouldn't in the IB? As you know, English is THE most important language that one needs in IB - or maybe even around the globe - and the main reason why so many students attend this programme! This is a mandatory subject in the IB either at Standard Level or at Higher Level. All of us Four Musketeers and pretty much our entire class has HIGHER LEVEL English because we are just cool like that. Just kidding.. Or are we?

Jokes aside, English consists of a lot of  reading, analyzing, writing tasks as well as presentations. Right now we are preparing our FOAs - which stands for Further Oral Assessment - where we are allowed to choose between a debate or a presentation on language in a cultural context. Every students has to speak for five to seven minutes which means that a group of three would have a fifteen to twenty minute presentation approximately. We are not allowed to go over seven minutes per person and will only be assessed for that time. We will have two of these FOAs during the entire two year programme, the first one will not be recorded but the second one will and will be sent to the IBO. Additionally, we will also have to do our own individual oral presentations... Scary, huh?

By now, we have finished one written task on a fictional novel (do not call these books, this is prohibited in the IB!) called 'The Great Gatsby'. It was a fun and an easy-going experience all in all, we got to release our creative side and write a fictional piece continuing the story or just writing an article on the events that occurred in the novel. Of course, you'll probably not be studying this novel or the novels/plays we are about to read because they vary from school to school since the teachers get to choose the what will be read and what will not. We actually won't be having Internal Assessments on this subject due to the fact that we FOAs and written tasks so, these compensate for them quite nicely.

In test conditions we will have two papers in Higher and Standard Level; in Standard Level, Paper 1 consists of a comment on one of two texts within one and a half hours and in Higher Level, a compare and contrast text on one of two pairs of texts within two hours is required. In Higher and Standard Level, passages for analysis may be complete pieces of writing or extracts from larger works. There is also the possibility of commenting on a visual text or an extract from a longer piece. Possible text types for analysis include: advertisements, opinion columns, brochures, extracts from memoirs, or travel writing.

For Paper 2 in Standard and Higher Level, you will have to answer 1 out of 6 questions, Standard and Higher Level students will receive the same six questions. Easy enough? We think so too. In Standard Level exams, you will have 1.5 hours to complete Paper 2 and in Higher Level exams you will receive an extra half an hour to complete. Each paper will count for 25% of the final grade, which doesn't sound too harsh. So the test score will be only 50% of your actual grade. Don't worry about it too much! Another good tip for good exam results in Paper 2 is to remember quotes!! According to our teacher, you cannot receive a top grade unless you have explained a few quotes in your text/analysis.

Well, that's something for you to process for the day and we sure do hope you learned something. Next time we will be discussing the Arts and B languages like French, German and self-taught. We will be looking forward to it!

Mathematics

 

Top of the week to you hard workers!

 

 

In the past week we've been quite busy coming up with our - just about final - Business IA questions and coming up with a FOA (Further Oral Assessment) for English. We will also be talking about this in the future. Instead of that, today we will be talking about Mathematics, which is an obligatory subject in the IB system.

 

To make up a short introduction, you can choose between four different levels of Mathematics: Further Mathematics Level ( Most schools do not offer this ), Higher Level, Standard Level and Standard Studies Level. At this point, it is worth to consider your plans in the future, whether you actually need to take up extra time for your math studies. For instance, if you are planning a career in the business world, HL, SL or studies will all suffice. Of course this all will depend on your choice of university and you should research this before choosing your level. Also, if you are planning to study arts, law or languages then Math Studies is more than enough. It is known that in the United Kingdom, most universities will not accept you if you are studying Math Studies, so that is also worthwhile considering. If you want to study physics HL or SL in the IB, you will need Standard or Higher Level Mathematics. However, there are always exceptions to the rules depending on your school.

 

IN HIGHER LEVEL AND STANDARD LEVEL MATHS: IN PAPER 1, YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO USE CALCULATORS. IN PAPER 2 YOU CAN!

 

Now, to dig deeper into the subject we will start with Higher Level Mathematics. Some people within the system consider this the most difficult and demanding amongst all the subjects. However, we don't really agree with this, because we believe Higher Level Physics is way more demanding. We are not saying that Higher Level Mathematics will be easy, it will most certainly not, it is indeed highly time consuming, demanding and just doing your homework will not be enough to survive in this subject. Not to scare you guys, but in this subject, being smart will not suffice anymore, you need to practice, practice, practice. Or be a genius, whatever you like. It is not impossible, we assure you, but it will need enormous amounts of commitment and interest, just like Higher Level Physics. It is good to have Higher Level Mathematics if you are planning to study maths in the future or pursue a scientific or architechtural career.

The ground we cover in HL Maths is greater than what is studied in Standard Level and basically we just dig a little deeper into the subjects such as Calculus, Algebra, Trigonometry etc.

 

YOU CAN ALWAYS DROP DOWN A LEVEL BUT YOU CANNOT CLIMB UP.

 

Standard Level Mathematics is somewhat easier than Higher Level Maths, but it still requires effort and contionous practice. So don't think your getting away easy, you're not. This is a good choice of level, because it will be accepted in univrersities around the globe and provides a good basis for your future studies. We recommend you to choose this, if you're not quite sure what you are going to study in the future and feel as though Higher Level will be too much for you to handle. We do recommend you to aim high though! There's not much else to be said on Standard Level Maths, as the title says it is standard level. No rocket science involved.

 

YOU CAN DROP EVEN FURTHER DOWN IF NECESSARY, IT IS POSSIBLE! BUT AGAIN, NO CLIMBING UP.

 

 

If you feel as though Higher or Standard level mathematics is still too much and you do not see yourself needing mathematics in your future studies, this is the choice for you. It is not math for dummies, as it is often perceived as. This level is not provided in every school, for instance, in 2013 this level was implemented in our school. Before it, people had to survive with Standard Level. The basic concept of Mathematical Studies is to learn the every day mathematics what you can implement into your daily life. The same topics are covered but in less detail, which is great for people who aren't interested in mathematics. In test conditions, you can use calculators in both papers; paper 1 and paper 2.

 

 

 AFTER THIS, THERE IS NO DROPPING DOWN OR CLIMBING UP. IF YOU ARE DROPPING DOWN YOU ARE DROPPING OUT, FOR GOOD.

 

 

In test conditions for all these levels, it is good to know that one point = one minute. For Paper 1 we have 90 minutes to complete the paper and 90 points to score. Use your time wisely, if you feel as though you're not going to solve the question, skip ahead so that you don't waste your precious time. Don't think too long!

 

For us, during the second year of IB, we will start on our Math Explorations where we will have to come up with an equation of some sort and prove it in everyday conditions. Of course, for different levels there will be different requirements. But that's a given.