In late September 29 students from St. Andrews Green Valley attended one of the many ‘Exceptional Learners’ events provided by the first & only school on the Eastern Seaboard awarded ‘Gold’ by independent inspectors (CfBT) & ‘Outstanding’ in all categories.
“It was a great opportunity for my children to take part in G.A.T.Eways festival in Bangkok. They discovered a new world of science and creative thinking,” Inthira Srihawan (Parent at SAISGV)
Students get hands on at the G.A.T.E.ways Festival.
The G.A.T.E.ways Festival of Workshops in Bangkok is aimed at providing opportunities for highly able and gifted children with special educational needs. Like-minded students participate in programs that will challenge them intellectually and help develop their individual talents. The G.A.T.E.ways workshops link up; experts in a given field with teachers knowledgeable about the special needs of gifted children, how they learn, and how to provide a differentiated curriculum for these children. The workshop was attended by the other top international schools in Thailand with St. Andrews Green Valley, NIST, ISB and Patana providing the vast majority of the students at the event.
G.A.T.E.ways programs are inquiry based, with lots of hands-on activities, problem solving, higher order thinking skills. Programs are designed to take children well beyond the regular curriculum. For example the St Andrews Green Valley Year 3 and 4 students attending the ‘Bumbling Blunders and DNA Discoveries’ workshop learned about plant cells, gained some basic chemistry and applied scientific method to both design and conduct a protocol to extract DNA from a kiwifruit.”
The day is designed to really push students intellectually.
Other workshops included ‘Climbing the Faraway Tree: The Magic of Enid Blyton!’ for years 1 and 2, ‘Voyage into the Heart of the Silicon Computer’ for years 7 and 8, and ‘Physics Funatics – Take It to the Limit’ for 5 & 6’.
“The G.A.T.E.ways trip was amazing! Learning how to turn lego pieces into a controllable robot was a lot of fun. Knowing how to measure the temperature, pressure and light dazzled me. The time I spent with friends learning was an experience of a lifetime,” said Arnon Wu (student at SAISGV).
