Par-ce-que j’étais seulement a Cedardale pour quatre jours, a ce point si, et c’est la fin de l’année, j’ai pas eu la chance de voir beaucoup de l’enquête qui est une grande partie du programme IB. J’ai quand même vu quelques grandes enquêtes qui étaient fait  pars les années primaires et j’étais tellement impressionnée par le niveau et qualité de travail que des enfants de cet âges pouvait produire.

The IB program and it’s philosophy extended into every part of the teaching practice at Cedardale. Though I didn’t get to see much of it in action, there was already a considerable difference in the learning style at Cedardale than at other schools I had been in. Each classroom had an inquiry board, or a board of “Nos Enquêtes”. On this board was displayed a list of questions the students had surrounding specific topics of study in their classes.

One thing that really blew me away was that the IB program, and more importantly the teachers and administration at this school were willing to put the time and energy into allowing students to explore topics of interest to them to the furthest extent of their ability. The kindergarten class did enough research to produce a garden for their school that had plants that meant something to them, and were indigenous to the area, and could also tell you the medicinal purposes of all of them. It was amazing to me to see the intelligence and insight that children so young could exhibit when allowed to learn in ways that made them want to learn.

I was speaking to a teacher with a k/1 split, and she was telling me about how her students had started bringing in caterpillars. Instead of just discarding or releasing them, she took this as students exhibiting an interest in a topic, so she asked her students to make habitats for the caterpillars and it blossomed into this wonderful project exploring butterflies, their life cycles, migration patterns and predators.