The IB Curriculum

Carmel School is an IB World School authorised for and currently offering the IB Primary Years Programme (PYP), IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) for Grade 6 to 10 and the IB Diploma Programme (DP) for Grade 11 and 12.

The curriculum framework is based upon the fundamental concepts and objectives of the International Baccalaureate (IB) programme, which is a highly regarded, internationally recognised educational standard, providing access to the best in tertiary opportunities around the world and creating lifelong learners who aim to make a difference.

Parents at Carmel School play an integral and supportive role in the education of their children. Families are kept up to date with each child's progress through regular communications, school information sessions and other opportunities to meet with teachers, staff and fellow parents. Formal feedback on progress comes in the form of twice-yearly written school reports, yearly interim reports and parent-student-teacher conferences.

The IB Continuum

Primary Years (PYP)

The Primary Years Programme aims to create a curriculum that is engaging, relevant, challenging and significant for learners in the 3–12 age range. The curriculum is transdisciplinary, meaning that it focuses on issues that go across subject areas. The PYP is organised according to:

The written curriculum, which explains what PYP students will learn
The taught curriculum, which sets out how educators teach the PYP
The assessed curriculum, which details the principles and practice of effective assessment in the PYP.
Click to see the our PYP Programme of Learning

The PYP prepares students to become active, caring, lifelong learners who demonstrate respect for themselves and others and have the capacity to participate in the world around them. It focuses on the development of the whole child as an inquirer, both within and beyond the classroom. For more information, please visit the official IBO website.

The Five Essential Elements of the PYP Curriculum

Knowledge

The PYP identifies a body of knowledge for all students in all cultures, in six principal subject areas: language, humanities, mathematics, science and technology, the arts, personal, social and physical education. Wherever possible they are taught within the context of the six trans-disciplinary themes, which are:

Who we are: an exploration of the nature of the self; of our beliefs and values; of personal, physical, mental, social and spiritual health; and of our families.

Where we are in place and time: an exploration of our orientation in place and time; of our personal histories; of the discoveries, explorations and migrations of humankind.

How we express ourselves: an exploration of the way the way we discover and express our nature, ideas, feelings, beliefs and values through language and the arts.

How we organise ourselves: an exploration of human systems and communities; of the structure and function of organisations; of societal decision-making; and of economic activities and their impacts.

How the world works: an exploration of the physical and material world; of natural and human-made phenomena; and of the world of science and technology

Sharing the planet: an exploration of rights and responsibilities in the struggle to share finite resources with other people; and of access to equal opportunities, peace and conflict resolution.

Concepts

The PYP curriculum is structured around eight key concepts which enable students to inquire and explore powerful ideas:

Form:	What is it like?
Function:	How does it work?
Causation:	Why is it like this?
Change:	How is it changing?
Connection:	How is it connected to other things?
Perspective:	What are the points of view?
Responsibility:	What is our responsibility?
Reflection:	How do we know?

Skills

Attitudes

Action

An explicit expectation of the PYP is that successful inquiry will lead to responsible action, initiated by the student as a result of the learning process. This action will extend the student’s learning, or it may have a wider social impact, and will vary within each age range. PYP schools can and should meet the challenge of offering all learners the opportunity and the power to choose to act, to decide on their actions and to reflect on these actions in order to make a difference in and to the world.

Middle Years (MYP)

The Middle Years Programme is a challenging framework that encourages students to make practical connections between their studies and the real world. The MYP aims to develop active learners and internationally minded young people who can empathise with others and pursue lives of purpose and meaning.

The programme empowers students to inquire into a wide range of issues and ideas of significance locally, nationally and globally. The result is young people who are creative, critical and reflective thinkers. The above information is taken from the official IBO website. For more information, please visit the official IBO website.

Diploma (DP)

The Diploma Programme curriculum is made up of six subject groups and the DP core, comprising Theory of Knowledge (TOK), Creativity, Activity, Service (CAS) and the Extended Essay. Through the DP core, students reflect on the nature of knowledge, complete independent research and undertake a project that often involves community service.

The programme aims to develop students who have excellent breadth and depth of knowledge – students who flourish physically, intellectually, emotionally and ethically. For more information please visit the official IBO website.

Service Learning

Across all three campuses, there is an attention to service, both within and beyond the school community, since it is through such service that students are able to ground their knowledge in real-world experience and develop both personally and socially, as well as demonstrate the attributes of the IB learner profile.

Whether it takes the form of Action in the PYP curriculum, Service and Action in the MYP curriculum, Community, Activity, Service in the DP curriculum, or any other project embarked on by Carmel students, the role of service learning is always front and centre. Every year, students across Carmel are involved in the design and organisation of a variety of community and/or charity based enterprises, and it is through such action that our community of students develops meaningful connections across the world.

Our Educational Visits to Cambodia, Israel, Poland, Shanghai, Thailand, New Zealand, Yangshuo (and many other locations) have as their core component a commitment to service, and to always leaving a place better off than when we arrived.

The IB Learner Profile

Each of the IB's programmes is committed to the development of students according to the IB learner profile. The profile aims to develop learners who are:

Inquirers
Knowledgeable
Thinkers
Communicators
Principled
Open-minded
Caring
Risk-takers
Balanced
Reflective

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