FOUNDER’S NOTE
W
hen I entered 7th grade in Singapore back in
1984, I was selected into a 4 year secondary
program where 100 students – 66 boys and
34 girls – were put into a separate curriculum. The
program was so new back then that the governmental
department that created it didn’t have a proper name
but it was just called the “Special Project Unit.” During
the four years, while we did spend some time on the
usual school subjects, the majority of our time was
spent on personal projects that emphasized on creating
things. We chose what projects we wanted to do (my
favorite project was building a solar cooker) and figured
out how to make things work with our teachers as a
guide. As there were many gaps within our knowledge,
we had to do a lot of our own research.
Two amazing things happened after this. First, the
100 of us were among the top academic achievers in
the entire nation when we graduated. Second, while
Singapore traditionally churns out financiers, doctors,
and lawyers from its educational system, within our
group we had professional chess players, historians,
and entrepreneurs.
This really shaped two of my deeply held beliefs in
education. First, everyone has different strengths, and
we’re all meant to do different things. A good school
should help the child discover for themselves what that
is. Second, learning is most effective when we empower
students to choose what they want to learn.
At our Ivy Kindergartens, one of the things that our
teachers are passionate about and skilled at is helping
students figure out how they are smart. We provide
them with a powerful tool – the multiple intelligences
theory, which gives our teachers a deep understanding
into different intelligences, and help students leverage
that to build up competency in other areas.
Empowerment is also a powerful concept in learning that
we utilize in our classrooms. We try to incorporate our
young learners with as many opportunities as they can
to choose what they want to learn. In the classrooms,
we provide many learning corners where during free
choice time, students decide what they want to do. We
are also piloting the “I Can” initiative at our Sanlitun
campus whereby children decide on their own how they
will change the world, and devise strategies to make it
happen. Incredible things happen when we believe in
and empower our children!
Sincerely,
Jack Hsu
CEO and Founder of Ivy Education Group
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