Middle Years Program (MYP) Grades 6-10
The MYP Programme
The MYP Programme is designed for students aged 11 to 16 and is given from Gr 6 – 10 at FIS. In the MYP Programme, Grade 6 is referred to as “Year 1” while Grade 10 is referred to as “Year 5.” It provides a framework of learning that encourages students to become creative, critical and reflective thinkers. The MYP emphasizes intellectual challenge, encouraging students to make connections between their studies in traditional subjects and the real world. It fosters the development of skills for communication, intercultural understand a global engagement – essential qualities for your people who are becoming global leaders.
The MYP is flexible enough to accommodate most national or local curriculum requirements. It builds upon the knowledge, skills, and attitudes developed in the IB PYP Programme and prepares students to meet the academic challenges of the IB Diploma Programme (DP) our school offers.
The IB Middle Years Programme:
- Addresses holistically student’ intellectual, social, emotional and physical well being
- Provides students opportunities to develop the knowledge, attitudes and skills they need in order to manage complexity and take responsible action for the future
- Ensures breadth and depth of understand through study in eight subject groups
- Requires the study of at least two languages (language of instruction and addition language of choice) to support students in understanding their own cultures and those of others
- Empowers students to participate in service within the community
- Helps to prepare students for further education, the workplace and a lifetime of learning.
The Curriculum
The MYP consists of eight subject groups:
The MYP aims to help students develop their personal understanding, their emerging sense of self and responsibility in their community. MYP teachers organize the curriculum with appropriate attention to:
- Teaching and learning in context: Students learn best when their learning experiences have context and are connected to their lives and the world that they have experienced. Using global contexts, MYP students explore human identity, global challenges and what it means to be internationally minded.
- Conceptual understanding: Concepts are big ideas that have relevance within specific disciplines and across subject areas. MYP students use concepts as a vehicle to inquire into issues and ideas of personal, local and global significance and examine knowledge holistically.
- Approaches to learning (ATL Skills): A unifying thread throughout all MYP subject groups, approaches to learning provide the foundation for independent learning and encourage the application of their knowledge and skills in unfamiliar contexts. Developing and applying these skills help students learn how to learn. MYP students must develop the following skills by the end of the programme:
- Service as action (community service): Action (learning by doing and experiencing) and service have always been shared values of the IB community. Students take action when they apply what they are learning in the classroom and beyond. IB learners strive to be caring members for the community who demonstrate a commitment to service—making a positive difference to the lives of others and to the environment. Service as action is an integral part of the programme. Each student at FIS is expected to participate in community service that is an extension from the unit studied or as a stand-alone activity.
- Language and identity: MYP students are required to learn at least two languages. Learning to communicate in a variety of ways is fundamental to their development of intercultural understanding and crucial to their identity affirmation.
MYP Assessment
The MYP programme consists of both internal and external assessments, both of which are consistent around the world. Internal assessments consist of both formative and summative assessments. Formative assessments take place throughout the unit in order to monitor student progress, whereas summative assessments are done at the end of a unit. MYP internal assessments – whether formative or summative – include a wide variety of strategies, tools, and tasks that include open-ended, problem-solving activities and investigations, organized debates, tests and examinations, hands-on experimentation, analysis, and reflection.
Assessment in the MYP is criterion-related (A, B, C, D), whereby each subject group in the MYP has a set of four criteria:
Each criterion mentioned on the previous page is split into different levels of achievements that appear in bands. Each band is described by means of descriptor levels. Teachers at FIS follow the level descriptors provided by the MYP to choose levels 1 – 2, 3 – 4, 5 – 6, or 7 – 8. Level 0 is given for students who do not achieve the level descriptors.
As a final mark for each subject group (per year or even when acquiring an MYP certificate after Year 5), students can score a total of 32 marks in each subject group. The MYP has created a set of criteria that converts overall marks to a set of grades from 1 – 7, which are as follows:
Interdisciplinary Teaching & Learning
Interdisciplinary teaching and learning is an integral component of the MYP. It builds a connected curriculum that addresses the developmental needs of students and prepares them for further academic study and life in an increasingly interconnected world. The MYP uses concepts and contexts as starting points for meaningful integration and transfer of knowledge across the eight subject groups.
Interdisciplinary learning can take place between different subject groups and between different disciplines within a subject group to encourage broader perspectives on complex issues and deeper levels of analysis and synthesis. Interdisciplinary connections must be meaningful.
In the MYP, interdisciplinary learning is the process by which students come to understand bodies of knowledge and modes of thinking from two or more disciplines and then integrate them to create a new understanding. Students demonstrate this by bringing together concepts, methods or forms of communication to explain a phenomenon, solve a problem, create a product or raise a new question in ways that would have been unlikely through a single discipline.
At FIS, students in Years 1 – 3 will complete one interdisciplinary unit each year, whereas those in Years 4 and 5 will complete two interdisciplinary units per year.
The aims of interdisciplinary learning in the MYP are to:
develop a deeper understanding of learning skills and apply them in meaningful contexts integrate conceptual learning, ways of knowing and methods of inquiring from multiple disciplines inquire into compelling issues, ideas and challenges by creating products or explaining phenomenareflect and communicate understanding of the interdisciplinary learning process.
IB MYP Course Results & the IB MYP Certificate
For students seeking a formal qualification at the end of the programme, the IB offers eAssessments in Year 5 that lead to IB MYP course results and the IB MYP Certificate.
At FIS, students will have the option to either obtain IB MYP course results or the IB MYP Certificate. In order to achieve these qualifications, students must complete eAssessments, which consist of the following three strategies:
- ePortfolios of carefully defined coursework in language acquisition, arts, design, and physical and health education. These will be marked internally by our teachers at FIS, and then will be sent to IBO
- headquarters for moderation. Moderation is the process whereby IB examiners go over our teachers’ marking system to ensure that all assessments have been marked in a fair manner. The IBO has the right to raise or lower all students’ marks depending on whether teachers have been to harsh or lenient with their marking respectively.
- on-screen examinations (two hours in duration) for selected courses in language and literature, individuals and societies, sciences, mathematics, and interdisciplinary learning. They will be held in FIS between May 11 – 22.
- personal project: a student-centered and age-appropriate extended project in which students consolidate their learning throughout the programme. Each student develops a personal project independently, producing a truly personal and creative piece of work that stands as a summative review of their ability to conduct independent work. While other eAssessments are optional (depending on whether students would like to acquire the IB MYP course result or the IB MYP Certificate), all MYP Year 5 students must take part in a mandatory personal project eAssessment.
MYP Course Results: Students aiming for completing MYP course results, should complete either ePortfolios and/or on-screen examinations for selected subject groups, along with completing a personal project, and participating in community service.
IB MYP Certificate
Students aiming for acquiring an IB MYP Certificate must meet the following criteria:
- five on-screen examinations (language & literature, mathematics, sciences, individuals & societies, and interdisciplinary assessment)
- one ePortfolio from a course of study in language acquisition
- one ePortfolio from a course in physical and health education, arts or design
- the personal project
- fulfilling FIS’s expectations for community service