A message from the humanities department at EF Academy Torbay
“Don’t become a mere recorder of facts, but try to penetrate the mystery of their origin.” Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936)
What is “humanities?” Well, the clue is in the word…it is about humans, it is about the culture and societies and the places in which humans live, the psyche of the human mind, and the rules by which humanity lives. These things are just a tiny proportion of the subjects under humanities, yet these are the ones of most interest to us, as they are the ones that we study and teach here at EF Academy Torbay.
By writing this blog, I want to tell you about the exciting things that happen in our classes as well as some some of the achievements of the students at EF Academy Torbay.
Success is often measured simply by achievement; success is often in the detail and these details make up the greater successes of our lives.
Anyway, back from the philosophical to the literal…
At EF Academy Torbay, psychology, sociology, law and geography make up the humanities department.
The lovely, if not slightly stressed IB Year 2 psychology students are working on the completion of their internal assessments which, honestly, they are making amazing progress on, especially Hailey (Hoi Ching Chun) who was the first to submit a first draft. At the end of their first year, they carried out their first psychology experiment on human participants.
The IB Year 1 psychology students have been inducted into the realms psychology and are beginning to realize that they won’t be able to read other people’s minds – they were a little disappointed!
In sociology, Inez (Gemi Sari Nastiti) has always stood out. Her teacher Lesely Hyde reports that she is one of the most excellent, hardest working and insightful sociology students she has met. She has achieved high grades in all of her work in a subject in which this is so hard to achieve.
The longest word in English – pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis, an invented long word said to mean a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust, (Oxford dictionaries, 2016) – popped up this week by Elisabeth Foss, in the IGCSE Year 1 videos about volcanoes. Students showed off their editing, acting and creative skills in geography by making news videos about volcanoes around the world.
Year 2 IGCSE students have been exploring the future of how we are going to continue to feed the growing global population by using sustainable methods, as well as looking at past events and current situations in LEDC subsistence farms. Amy (Wenyi Shen) and Angelina (Ziling Yang) have stood out by producing some excellent classwork and showing great maturity in their study skills.
To add to the excitement, the humanties faculty has initiated a mentoring scheme in sociology where the A-Level students are supporting the IGCSE students in their knowledge and understanding of key concepts and theories of the subject.
Till next time…