Welcome to our school! - Open House again!
Just two weeks ago, it was the second Open Day of this school year for our international school here in Germany! As previously, the grade 11 students, i.e. my classmates and myself, were to provide extra help in showing guests around the school campus and facilities, as well as explaining the International Baccalaureate to potential new-comers.
Activity Planning
With our CAS coordinator, we arranged and allocated shifts to each pair in order to form an organised scheduele that allows tour guiding time and leisure time on the following Saturday morning. The whole planning phase was identical to the one of the first Open Day Tour Guiding activity which we accomplished several months ago.
The next morning, we were ready for action! We wore our representative badges and looked forward to a half school-day of voluntary work.
Reflection
Whilst some of us were on duty, the rest were studying silently in class. In the midst of our productive session, we were surprised by a visit from a fellow student’s father in our school. Initially, we thought the poor man was lost but as he introduced himself to us, we learned that he was eager to know about our experiences with the IB so far and the science behind it since his child will be growing up to be a grade 11 student in a few years time! We collected ourselves and began sharing our subject choices and views on the course so far. My classmates and I worked to bring the best possible interpretation together.
Overall, I believe it went quite well although it certainly would have been more professional if we were prepared for possible class visits. For improvement, next time we will remind each other to be ready at all times since life can throw random situations when you least expect it!
On this Open Day, there was unfortunately not as many visitors as we had estimated and so the majority of my shift was spent discussing with a teacher, who was with me on duty at the main entrance, about my future plans for university. We had a productive conversation although one hour and forty minutes later, I was only able to offer warm greetings to visiting parents of students in our school.
Despite the lack of tour guiding this time, I was still able to learn from this CAS experience. Firstly, when doing a CAS activity (or be it any activity at all), always be aware for the chance of surprises as they may turn out to be a useful and valuable lesson. Secondly, everyone in the team must be ready and willing to replace a shift in case of an absence which was unfortunately the case on this Open Day. After we were informed of this, my shift partner and I offered to take the empty slot. Soon enough, our classmates decided to accompany us which made it more enjoyable. Lastly, I was still able to achieve my objective of improving my people skills as I actively engaged in a conversation in German with the teacher.
To summarise, I have achieve the following Learning Outcomes:
① Improved my ability to engage with others, i.e. people skills.
② Extended and continued a previous CAS activity.
③ Planned and arranged shifts suitable for my classmates and myself to be tour guides.
④ Worked collaboratively with my classmates organise tour guiding and being ready to replace absences.
⑤ Showed perseverance and support for one another as we explained the IB and shared our experiences so far.
⑥ Engaged with a very important issue of our local school community!
⑦ Discussed issues with the teacher in German which included: importance of after-school activities, paper costs and saving in our school etc.
⑧ Further improved people skills and foreign language, i.e. German.
Evita ☺
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