By Chloe Z., Grade 10
Imagine yourself as a new student at MIS——What kinds of problems will you face? Lost in the humongous campus, unable to find your classrooms; starting your course in the middle of a chapter that you have never learned before…
These problems become especially serious when you missed the new student orientation at the start of the semester and arrived late for several reasons. Me, as a new member of MIS (who arrived 2 weeks after the orientation), went through all of these situations above in my first few days. It was hard figuring out the questions on my own and the experience being a new student is what led me to write this paragraph——the tips for new students at MIS.
I will organise my problems into three parts and talk about them one by one. The first issue we have here is the Administration and Organisation of MIS. Installing the applications, figuring out how OneNote and Teams work, having problems finding where to take your quizzes and to submit your homework…There might be multitude of things that you are not familiar with, not mentioning the problems you might have with finding your way to your homeroom or classrooms. I know it is a huge challenge to find all the answers, so here is a list to make it a little clearer for you:
- Finding your classrooms:
The first step is to look at your timetable, it usually has all the times and places of the classes you are going to take. L stands for the LADC, S stands for the senior school building while J stands for Junior and M for middle school, and the PE class is in the FAB (Fitness & Athletics Building). The first number of the sequence stands for which floor it is on, note that the ground floor is written as 1 rather than 0 or G. If you still cannot find your way, feel free to ask a teacher or a student for help.
- Installing your applications:
Your first choice is always your classmates, they are the ones who really use them every day and know about the applications best. If your classmates have no idea, what you should do is to ask the IT (Information Technology) support for help. Here are some of the questions I had and would like to share:
- Editing pages on OneNote: Copy this specific page to the “My notes” folder and edit your works there. It is also an effective way to analyse all your work.
- Where to submit your homework: Depends on your teacher, but most of them should be submitted on Teams in the assignment area or handed in on paper.
- Tests/Assessment: Depends on your teacher. Maybe a form on Teams or on Assess prep etc. Your best solution is to ask your teacher.
- About the learning progress:
Stay calm, the teacher will help you keep up with the lessons. If you are arriving late, use your spare time to work on the previous lessons you missed——they are all on OneNote, try the exercises out and remember the basic concepts. If you have any questions, write them down on your calendar (Or whatever way you use to keep things in mind) and ask your teacher after the next lesson. If you find that there is an important test containing knowledge that you have not learnt before and you do not have access to, please inform your teacher as soon as possible. They will give you solutions. Especially if you are joining MIS in 10th or 9th grade, the MYP and E-assessments could be the main challenge for you, and we all want to do our best.
- Completing different kinds of homework and scheduling your time:
Another obstacle for new students might be the varieties of homework. It is always necessary to schedule your time to make sure all the long-term projects are finished before deadlines. Mark all the deadlines on your calendars, estimate the time you need to finish each project and do them as soon as possible. If you have any issues you cannot deal with, write emails to your teacher, or ask them in class.
There are a lot of other questions you might face, but, as you hopefully can see from my article, sometimes when you list things out, you will quickly get on to your path and start working. This is a great school with a lot of helpful students, I really hope that you enjoy your time here. It might be hard for you to get along at first, but with a clear mind and a kind heart, I am sure everything will work out.