The Halcyonite

By Ezra ‘25

With Reporting and Editing from Tom ‘25

On the 18th and 19th of January, Halcyon hosted its first ever IDU days. Each MYP grade took the two days off their regular schedule to travel London with their peers and practice interdisciplinary learning through a first hand experience that connected with their topics.

Grade 6 explored relationships between animal behavior, mathematics and habitat design by discussing zoo improvement in an interdisciplinary between science and math.

Grade 7 looked at crime and punishment by investigating how prisoners are treated based on societal perspectives and relationships, an interdisciplinary study between Individuals & Societies, English, and Design.

Grade 8 examined how something simple can be repeated to produce complex patterns in an interdisciplinary study between science and math.

Grade 9 examined Spanish and Chinese cultures and art in an attempt to express the perspectives of characters in historical conflicts.

Grade 10 explored artistic impression of a character’s in an interdisciplinary study between Language A and Visual Arts.

The IDU days are an entirely new way of tackling the interdisciplinary unit for Halcyon. In the past, the work was done in school, during the specified class time, often over the course of a few weeks. We interviewed three students that participated in the IDU, asking them to discuss their experiences with the program.

Grade 7 students pictured studying the differentiated treatment of prisoners due to preconceived notions

Calder, in Grade 8 said his IDU allowed him and his classmates to explore how “simple steps can evolve into complex patterns.” 

“It was really, really interesting,” he said. “We did a walk through the park and looked at all the little things in nature that repeat, like how leaves all have stems, and trees all have branches…. Everyone got super engaged.”

Calder explained how this year’s IDU far outstripped last year’s for him and his classmates. “[Last year’s IDU] was okay,” he said,but I think this one was much better, especially because we had two IDU days.”

Calder hopes that next year the school will follow a similar path. “I hope that we have two IDU days next year as well,” he said.

Zoë in Grade 9 told the Halcyonite over email about how her grade made videos based on famous Spanish or Chinese artwork “that described how a character in this scene felt.” 

Zoë is a student who has been at the school long enough to have completed a variety of IDUs in the past, and she firmly contended that the new program is a successful one, saying that “I think this was a productive day for the majority of students. Some people struggled with group placements or illness but I think most people were able to get something positive out of this day.” 

She further explained how the school’s previous approaches to the IDU had involved issues that were easily solved with the new IDU day initiative. 

“I think this way of doing the IDU is a lot better than how it was done previously,” she said in an email. “In other years it has been a massive struggle to coordinate between the different subjects and classes.” 

Zoë particularly struggled with IDU’s involving languages, as she found it difficult to get the help she needed, due to most language classes consisting of multiple grades; now, teachers and students were able to focus on the IDU together, at the same time.

meaning that teachers were too busy teaching their students in other grades, doing IDU’s in different subjects and times, to focus on teaching their interdisciplinary. 

“in previous years the language teacher wasn’t able to focus on the students completing the IDU as they had to teach the rest of their class.” 

This year however, Zoë reports a successful IDU, one which included language as one of the interdisciplinaries. Nonetheless, she does wish that she was given slightly more time, as “During (the) IDU we were slightly rushed though the process because of… time limits.”

Robin is a student in Grade 10 and he explained how they went to the National Gallery where students used music to express how they connected with a chosen painting from the gallery.

Robin is not new to the IDU, and likes the new model, explaining how “it was fun… we got to get out, physically choose our paintings, and walk around the museum.” 

He claims that the IDU days were productive for him and his classmates, and in the future he’d “like to see more excursions they were] fun and entertaining!”