Cherry Blossom Time Welcomes the Spring Book Fair + Many More...

I have always enjoyed Spring!  And I love it in Seoul because there are so many Cherry Blossoms!! Here are a couple of pictures of some of the trees that line the driveway leading up to YISS!  I love walking up the hill from Seoul Bus #405 each morning as I come to school to begin each day!

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With the coming of the Cherry Blossoms, we usually can expect the YISS Spring Book Fair, Spring Music Concerts, rehearsals for the Elementary Spring Musical (this year it is Annie, Jr.), athletic events, preparation for our annual International Bazaar, and the list goes on!  It is a great time and a very busy time!

The Spring Book Fair seems to have been a huge success!  The kids love this time to have the opportunity to purchase books at excellent prices + the PTO and the Library benefit from the proceeds!  It was a wonderful three days!  I love being able to spend time during the Book Fair helping the Librarians assist parents and kids select books!  I love being able to meet more of the parents and get to talk with them.  On the first day of the Book Fair we had a special treat for our Kindergarten through Grade 2 cherubs.  Author Darren Farrell returned to sign the 80 books purchased by the children in K through Grade 2!  He spent about two hours signing each book individually with a nice comment and a mini drawing!  Kids were delighted!  Following are some pictures from the Book Fair and the visit from Darren Farrell:

Some PTO volunteers with some parents and children

selecting books at the Book Fair.

This is one of my delightful friends from 2A! Grace always has a nice smile for me and she was enjoying purchasing books at the Book Fair.

Some more cherubs and parents selecting

some books at the Book Fair!

This is my wonderful friend, Hoonie, from Grade 2D!  He is so intelligent and enjoys reading all kinds of books!  I love to hear him give oral presentations and here he is giving me a detailed explanation (with humor) about Legos!

Our MS/HS Librarian, Mr. Johnson, assisting some

middle school boys as they select books!

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Here are a few pictures with Darren Farrell:

Author and illustrator, Darren Farrell, looking at

the letters and drawings the students in 1A had done

for him.  He was so thrilled and touched that they did 

this.  He spent time as he autographed books looking

at each of their drawings and interacting with them.

These cherubs were obviously very happy!

Some more students from 1A with Darren.  The little girl is such a cutie.  Her name is Katie and she is the middle of three sisters.  She was so excited when Darren made comments about her drawing from Doug-Dennis and the Flyaway Fib!

Here is Darren continuing to talk about each of the

children's drawings.  It was a special time!

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On Wednesday the students, who had earned the privilege of being Principal of the Day and Assistant Principals of the Day during the recent Read-A-Thon, spent most of the day shadowing Mr. Lazor, Mrs. Birmingham and me throughout the day.  They had issued a proclamation on Tuesday afternoon that all students and teachers in the elementary school would have a Denim Day on Wednesday!  As the announcement was made from the main elementary office, you could hear the cheers of joy and delight from students all over YISS!  I had a wonderful day with my Assistant Principal, Ms. Rocher, from grade 3A.  She was so excited to find out a little of what I did each day and shadow me for a good part of the day.

Above is my Assistant Principal of the Day, Ms. Nicole

Rocher.  Nicole loved sitting at my desk and being

very official! :-)

This is Mr. Matthew Garrop, Mrs. Birmingham's Assistant Principal of the Day, seated at her desk!  Matthew was so excited about being the Assistant Principal and then around lunch time he got sick and had a fever and had to go home. :-(

From left to right: Mrs. Birmingham, Mr. Lazor,  

Ms. Catherine Tears (Mr. Lazor's Principal of the Day),

GGG, and Ms. Rocher.  The Principals of the Day also

made the elementary children happy but bringing them

an ice cream to enjoy in the afternoon with their extra recess!

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On one of our walks to visit the Book Fair and several classes, Ms. Rocher and I had the delight of seeing Dominic, the son of our CFO, Dr. Boush.  Dr. Boush and his wife, Sarah, had Dominic dressed in a Hanbok preparing him for his one year old birthday - a very big event in Korea!  Dominic looks so cute.  His family has a very big dog and I usually can get Dominic to smile when I bark like a dog!  The picture below shows Dominic with one of the wonderful ladies in the Business Office, Mrs. Won.  All five ladies in the Business Office were fighting over who was going to hold Dominic next!

Dominic is such a cutie - especially in his Hanbok!

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Thursday was a special event in the Middle School.  The history teachers had each of the 6th, 7th and 8th grade students prepare a written and oral presentation on a famous person in the world's history.  They took over the main gymnasium and made it into a live museum.  I was thrilled to observe the students who were in the elementary school when I came to YISS present as students, teachers and parents came to the "museum" and learned about many famous people in our history!  The elementary classes were invited to come and visit the "museum" and it was fun to watch these historical characters adjust their prepared oral presentation for the little ones.  Great job!

I will let you see how many of the above historical characters you can identify.  Some are more famous than others.

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Friday was a Professional Development Day for YISS staff.  Students had the day off and teachers and administrators spent the day earning CEUs by participating in a a great variety of workshops and seminars.  Our Curriculum Director, Ms. Sevey, did a great job of organizing a great day of learning.  It was also a wonderful time for the 100+ staff to get to have some fellowship together! I enjoyed some technology workshops as well as a workshop on a very unique and complicated cultural issue in Korean schools called Wangta.  Type "Wangta in Korea" into a Google search and you will discover what we have to work with at YISS.  There was also a required seminar on Suicide: Signs and Prevention that all of our staff had to take.

Once again, thank you so much for your faithful encouragement, emails, notes, prayers and support.  You are very special to me.  Please enjoy a great week!

Love, Gregg