NUACHTÁN PREPA CELTA | May 2022

From the desk of Claudia Molleda | Director of Prepa Celta

Dear community:

Time has gone by very fast, and we are already at the end of the semester, even though there are still a few weeks to go, we realize that our 12th graders are about to leave for college, our 10th graders will no longer be the youngest and will soon start POP, and that this year has brought us a series of changes that have made us practice resilience constantly.

We thank each of you for your comments, which are always welcome, as they help us to improve every day and to provide you with a very high-quality educational service. We also appreciate the positive comments regarding our teaching practice, as this motivates us to give the best of ourselves every day. The Prepa Celta team is very grateful for all your expressions of affection.

This month we will have, for the first time, the external evaluations of the Professional Orientation Program. The 12th grade students enrolled in this program will be taking the evaluations on May 16 and 17 in the subjects of Language and Literature and Information Technology in a Global Society.

Regarding POP subjects, we are very happy, soon we will implement two more subjects with validity for certification, this forces us to prepare ourselves more every day and to be at the forefront in all academic aspects to offer a better service with more options.

Next, I leave you the sections of the Newsletter so that you can get to know the work that is being done at Prepa Celta.

The Impact of the Middle Years Program (MYP)

From the desk of Maria Mayela Sosa Rodriguez | Personal Project Coordinator

The MYP is a program that challenges students in academics and in the development of communication, social (collaboration), self-management (reflection, organization and affective), research (information management, media literacy) and thinking (critical, creative and of transference) skills, which are fundamental for the lives of students between 11 and 16 years of age. At this stage when students are establishing their identity and consolidating their self-esteem, the MYP can motivate them and help them achieve the best results in their academic and daily life performances. It also allows them to continue to develop their skills and face challenges in subjects in which they may not excel. The MYP offers students the opportunity to develop their potential, explore their own learning preferences, take appropriate risks, and develop and reflect on a strong sense of personal identity.

The MYP is guided by three principles that are inspired by the IB mission statement: holistic learning, intercultural awareness, and communication. These fundamental principles provide a solid foundation for teaching and learning in the MYP.

Holistic learning, intercultural awareness and communication are implicit in or are part of the IB learning community profile, especially in the attributes «balanced», «open-minded» and «good communicators».

As teachers working with the MYP, we focus on how best to meet the needs of adolescents, who face an enormous variety of often bewildering choices in a complex and ever-changing world. Attention to the development of higher-order thinking skills offers students opportunities to explore their concerns and their growing awareness of themselves and the world in ways that enable them to develop good judgment.

In the MYP, the center of the model is the learner and around the learner are described the program features that help learners develop disciplinary (and interdisciplinary) understanding, which are:

• Approaches to learning: key component of the MYP for developing skills for learning.
• Approaches to teaching: emphasize MYP pedagogy, which includes collaborative learning through inquiry.
• Concepts: emphasizes the use of a concept-based curriculum.
• Global contexts: demonstrates that the best way to learn is in context.
• Inquiry-based learning can lead to student-initiated action, which may include service within the community.
• The MYP culminates in the Personal Project (for fifth graders).
• The MYP organizes teaching and learning through eight subject groups: Language and Literature, Language Acquisition, Individuals and Societies, Sciences, Mathematics, Arts, Physical and Health Education, and Design.
• In many cases, within a subject group it is possible to teach and assess several separate or integrated disciplines, for example: Geography or History within Individuals and Societies, or Biology, Physics or Chemistry in the Science group.
• The distinction between subject groups is blurred to indicate the interdisciplinary nature of the MYP. The subject groups are also connected through global contexts and key concepts themselves.

International Baccalaureate (2022). The Middle Years Programme: from principles to practice. Available at: https://resources.ibo.org/data/m_0_mypxx_guu_1405_5_s.pdf

Sofía Soto Brien

From the desk of Víctor Hugo Valencia Peña | Student Activities Coordinator

The Faculty of Natural Sciences of the Autonomous University of Querétaro (UAQ): a new alliance for Prepa Celta

From the desk of Tania Angélica Peña Guerrero | Coordinator of Psychopedagogy and Vocational Guidance

«Have we ever wondered where and how the things we use every day come from?»

With this question began the informative talk by Alma Angélica Navarrete Carrillo, professor of the Faculty of Natural Sciences of the UAQ, who kindly came to the facilities of the Prepa Celta, to give a lecture to the students of 11th and 12th grade, about the new career that is being offered in the FCN:

Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Geography

But what does it consist of?

It is a mixed disciplinary science, which addresses social, physical and natural problems with a spatial reference. It studies human-nature interrelationships in order to describe and understand the impact on the environment and the modification of space.

What is the social impact of this degree?

There are problems that only professionals trained in geography can solve, in order to focus their participation in research on the changes produced in the landscape by the man-nature relationship, as well as the study and differentiation of space to understand the relationships that arise in them generating critical positions that contribute to understanding the different areas of study.

What are the contributions of the people trained in this degree program?

The link between geography and the environment has gained importance because it strengthens the awareness of the global world with the following contributions:

• Raising the social collective’s awareness of the problems confronting humanity.

• Contribute to the study of land use.

• To study the impacts of human activities on nature.

• To help understand environmental complexity from a socioeconomic, historical and spatial perspective.

• To analyze projects of conservation and use of natural resources.

• To structure critical explanations about space and its dynamics.

• In addition to analyzing the landscape and access to resources.

«Have you thought about the ecological footprint you want to leave in this world?» was the second powerful question in this fruitful talk, this time by Dr. Tamara Osornio, who, as a conclusion, invited young people to join the professional field of environmental ecology to do something for our environment, an idea that fully agrees with our IB program.

For more information, find attached direct contact details:

Coordination: Dr. Tamara Osorno Sánchez

E-mail: geografiaambiental@uaq.mx

Link for invitation: https://fcn.uaq.mx/docs/Convocatoria-GAM-2022-1.pdf

Phone: 01 (442) 1-92-12-00 Ext. 65441 y 65214