2024年“国家历史日”中国赛传来好消息！

3月中旬，在上海举行的2024年“国家历史日”中国赛传来好消息：

代表启明星参赛的10位北皋校区5年级学生表现出色——其中7位在他们各自的展示类别里都获得了第一或第二的好名次，拿到了6月进军美国比赛的“入场券”！国家历史日是全球权威的中学生人文社科学术活动，始于1974年，每年有超过60万名学生参与其中。

北皋小学部英文增益项目老师Julie Simmons带队参加本年度国家历史日，大家的表现让她特别骄傲：

“拿到第一名，我们特别兴奋！另外在比赛现场，我们也通过其他参赛者的展板、纪录片了解了其他的研究题目和知识，这些也是我们的收获！”5年级学生高小龙说。

本学年英文增益项目的主题是“历史”，参加“国家历史日”比赛是项目的最后一环：学生们选择自己感兴趣的“改变历史的大事”作为研究题目，在增益项目课堂上学习研究、收集、分析和总结的知识，最终以论文、纪录片、网站等形式，把自己对历史大事的研究成果展示在“国家历史日”的裁判面前。比如：

黑死病除了影响欧洲的政治版图，原来也影响到他们欧洲的建筑，因为瘟疫带来的经济凋敝，让之前奢华的建筑风格难以为继；

源于美国的IQ测试被纳粹用于迫害其他族群，这项测试不是被用来测试IQ，而是作为判断某些人是否比较低等的依据；

 ......

这些收获是增益项目学习的结果——孩子们的英文水平在提高，也开始掌握查找文献、撰写参考文献注释和引用资料的知识，他们也锻炼了团队合作能力、公众展示技巧、和别人沟通的技巧等等在更高年级学习、乃至步入社会也需要掌握的知识和技巧。

回顾英文增益项目整体学习带来的收获，5年级学生Matteo Morano和郭光雅反思说：“我想增益项目的意义不只是教授我们英语语言，也帮助我们应对在更高年级和未来生活会遇到的挑战……”

激发学生的兴趣和想法，同时给予他们严格的学术指导——这样的教学思路同样贯穿在北皋小学部的中文增益项目中。

这个学年第一学期中文增益项目的主题也是“历史”，4年级增益项目的主题是“论中国古代帝王”，5年级的是“品中国古代文人”。

柳慧是中文增益项目老师，她为学生们提供书目，让大家根据已有知识和个人热情自由选择感兴趣的人物资料来阅读、研究，最终分别以个人演讲或辩论会的形式展示学习成果。

就拿4年级学生来说，他们的主要阅读资料是《少年读史记——---帝王之路》。孩子们从这本书开始，延展和补充资料，写下很多阅读笔记，在以“历史人物”为杠杆提升中文增读写能力的同时，也因为接触到更多的信息而提升了认知水平。他们意识到可以从更多角度来考察和评判一个历史人物，从而构建起批判性和创新性思维的雏形。

经过多轮讨论，大家选择汉武帝刘彻的功过作为辩论主题。他们把汉武帝做过的大事一一记录下来，分别从帝王管理国家的立场和百姓生活的立场思考这些行动的对错，比如征兵、比如大兴土木、增加赋税等……

柳老师也鼓励学生自己探索和认识辩论：“我没有给他们讲辩论赛是怎么回事，而是给了他们观看2023年“纵横杯”国际学校中文辩论赛的现场比赛。孩子们特别好学，他们反复看视频，然后在课堂上一起讨论、总结、研究，完全靠自学弄清了辩论的意义、程序和每一位辩手的角色。整个过程持续了1个月。”

“在他们身上，我看到了哲学地、辩证地看问题的萌芽。他们一开始是输赢心理，后来渐渐意识到，看待人物和事件的标准都不一定是非黑即白的……还有孩子们突破舒适区，通过在公众面前表达自己，明显自信起来了，连身板都挺起来了！”柳慧老师说。

柳老师说，要把类似的学习体验继续下去。现在，她正在筹划第二学期的中文戏剧，还是在增益项目课堂上，还是以“不同的历史阶段”为大背景，6月下旬揭晓，向同学们和家长们展示！

让我们一起期待吧！

In mid-March, good news came from the National History Day 2024  affiliate contest in Shanghai:

The 10 5th graders from Beigao Campus who represented Daystar Academy did an outstanding job —7 of them placed 1st or 2nd in their respective categories, earning them a "ticket" to the US national contest in June! National History Day is a leading academic event in the Humanities and Social Sciences typically for secondary school students, which began in 1974.

Julie Simmons, English Enrichment Program teacher at Beigao Elementary School, organized the students attending the contest. She was especially proud of the students' performance:

"We are so excited to win the first place, and we also learned about other research topics and knowledge when we looked at the exhibition boards and documentaries of other contestants, which are also our gains!" said Lego Gao.

This school year's English Enrichment Program focuses on history. And National History Day is the final part of the this program for this school year: students of the program choose "The Turning Points in History" that interest them as research topic, learning about research, information collection, analysis, and summarization, and ultimately presenting their work in the form of a paper, documentary, website or exhibition in front of the judges of National History Day. For example: 

In addition to affecting the political landscape of Europe, the Black Death turned out to affect the European architecture as well, as the economic depletion brought on by the plague made it difficult to sustain the previously lavish architectural styles.

The IQ test that originated in the US was used by the Nazis to persecute other ethnic groups. The test was not used as a test of IQ but as a basis for determining whether certain people were inferior.

 ...

The students' achievements are the result of Enrichment Program learning: their English skills have improved, and they have begun to master the knowledge of searching for literature, writing reference notes and citing materials, and they have also exercised their teamwork skills, public presentation skills, communication skills and other knowledge and skills that they need to master in the future.

"I think the meaning of the Enrichment Program is not only to teach us the English language, but also to help us cope with the challenges that we will encounter in higher grades and in our future lives ......" reflected Matteo Morano and Elise Quek, Grade 5 Enrichment Program students.

Respect for students' interests and freedom is also reflected in the Chinese Enrichment Program of Daystar. 

For the first semester of this school year, the theme of the Chinese Enrichment Program is also history; the 4th grade Program's theme is Ancient Chinese Emperors and the 5th grade's is Ancient Chinese Literati.

Liu Hui, the Chinese Enrichment Program teacher, provided the students with bibliographies and allowed them to freely choose character profiles to read, research, and ultimately present their learning in the form of speeches and debates, respectively.

In the case of the 4th graders, their primary reading material was "Shaonian Du Shi Ji". Starting from this book, the students extended and supplemented the information, wrote a lot of reading notes, used "historical figures" as a leverage to improve their Chinese language skills, and also improved their cognitive level because they were exposed to more information, learning how to understand historical figure through different perspectives.

After several rounds of discussion, the group chose the merits and faults of Liu Che, Emperor of Han Dynasty, as the theme of the debate. They recorded the great things that Emperor had done one by one and thought about the rights and wrongs of these actions from the standpoint of the emperor's management of the country and from the standpoint of the people's life, such as conscription, such as the great construction of the earth ...

Ms. Liu also encouraged her students to explore and understand debates on their own: "Instead of giving them a lecture on what debating competitions are all about, I gave them a link to watch the video of the Zongheng Cup Chinese Debate Competition. They watched the video over and over again, and then discussed, summarized, and researched together in class, figuring out the meaning of the debate, the procedures, and the roles of each debater. The whole process lasted 1 month."

"On these students, I see them looking at things philosophically and dialectically. They started with a win-lose mentality, and then gradually realized that the criteria for viewing both characters and events are not necessarily black or white ...There are also students who break out of their comfort zones, and by expressing themselves in public, they are visibly more confident!" Ms. Liu said.

According to Ms. Liu, she wants to extend learning beyond classroom. She is now planning a Chinese drama for the second semester, still in the Enrichment Program classroom, and still with "history" as the backdrop, to be unveiled in late June and presented to parents!

Join us in anticipation!

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