While Courses Ending, School Finishing...

Dear All,
We approaching to the final days of the 2007-2008 Academic Year in Turkey. Tomorrow I am going to do my final course at the Yeditepe University. Next week, the courses finish at Boğaziçi Universiy. Ending each term brings in the sadness of departure to us_to the instructors. Whereas, we all know that new doors of the new worlds open before our youngesters. This is a different type of time for them; exciting, motivating and annoying. I wish good luck to all graduates of this year. The girl student in the photo is the one who contributed a lot to my previous book called: A Bunch of In-Class Activities. She was one of the authors. Her name is Duygu Deniz. I still remember her 4-year ago appearance . What a speedy life! She will start working as a "Teacher of English" soon. I wish her "Good Luck"! I believe she will be a very good and creative teacher.
This year is my 32nd year in the "teaching" profession. All these years have gained value through my thousands of students. I have done my favourite job for years and I still go on. If you are doing your hobby as a profession, it means you are really a very lucky person. You never want to leave it even during the holiday time. But I know, I must be among the happy minority. Today it is very difficult, especially in Turkey, to have the profession in your dreams.

19th May is coming. It is a festival day of Turkish Youth presented by great leader Ataturk. I wish happy, successful and healthy days for all the young. With love and peace...
Hayal KÖKSAL

Drama and Collage: Different Colors of Teaching

Dear All,
The approach based upon only pencil-paper and blackboard has already finished its mission and took its place among the dusty pages of the Educational History book. Even though I know that there are millions of teachers who never agree with me, I also have known many teachers who open new horizons before their students and parents through their "innovative" minds. We know that "learning" becomes joy, fun and long-termed how much students involve in the teaching-learning process through active learning and internalize the goals of what they have been doing for their future lives. If you ask me; "How do I know this?" My reply is : "From the outcomes of the projects we conduct for years within the international platforms." We also carry this missionary thoughts towards the curricula of educational faculties on the way of training teachers of the future.

On 26-28 August, 2008 we will share some good samples of these recent approaches with the Turkish and international participants at the Yeditepe University, Kayışdağı Campus with the "11th International Convention on students' İmece Circles". While some circles arer sharing their problem-based project results through ppt presentations, some others will present dramas, debates and compete with other teams about collage, cultural dances, poster and slogan.
The themes of those streams might be seen on the http://www.hayalkoksal.com/en/convention.html . This is a good demonstration of Multiple intelligences and different learning styles into the life. Moreover, some handicapped circles are also expected to take part in the event.

In order to view different collage and drama samples, I went to the Pera Museum and then the Drama-Puppet Show Festival at the Italian Cultural Center yesterday. I have been very impressed by the developments in art and drama. Please guide your children and students toward multi-sided activities. This will add value to their lives.
We are looking forward to seeing different schools and different projects in Istanbul.

I wish you all good luck. Tomorrow I will be visiting the MEF Schools to witness the international projects demonstrated there. Tomorrow I will share my commnets with you. With love and peace...
Dr.Hayal KÖKSAL

We were at the Society for the Blind

Dear Dosts,
As the Center for Quality & Peace (Kalbe Mer) and the Society for the Continuous Improvement (Sü Ge Der) we have been in a great effort to improve the quality level of the community and also to realize the peace within the world, yesterday we visited an NGO; namely "the Six-Dot Blind Association". There we met some blind IT teachers who are busy with the training of the blind people at every age group. They shared their problems and expectations sincerely. We have learned a lot and felt sorry for being so late.

There is no need being a very clever and wise person to understand the needs of the handicapped and feel empathy towards them. We are all aware of the great neglect of the handicapped not only by the healthy and complete (!) persons but also the local governing bodies. There are some special institutions and buildings for the needed ones but not satirsfactory and they feel themselves isolated. The most important thing is to create the necessary awareness among the concerning parties and then share our lives with them within the community without any sign of discrimination. Some NGOs work hard to achieve some improvements but they are only a few. Whereas, everyone of us must be within this important business, for no one knows that when such a luck will hit one and how. Suddenly we can find ourselves within such a situation. So, the greatest empathy should be shown towards the handicapped people.
On 26th August, 2008, we are organizing the 11th Convention on Students' İmece Circles in Istanbul with the participation of 25 countries. We included the handicapped within the borders of the Convention as we did 3 years ago within the ICT Seagulls Projects. We added the most neglected part of citizens within the Case Study presentations. Thus, we believe our İMECE (Collaboration) will be more powerful. While visiting the Blind Society we realized once more that how right we are on this decision! Before, we had visited and invited the spinal Cord Paralyzed people's Association into the event, now the blind. Next week, we will be together with the otistic children. we want to light a candle for the handicapped children who live not only in Turkey but also in other countries. From then on, one part of our projects will be dedicated to the handicapped, for we live and also stand together. Discrimination is the biggest blindness and also the greatest sin on earth. We wish good luck to all handicapped people. We believe they are the strongest human beings of Allah.

Hayal KÖKSAL

From the Aegean Region of Turkey

Dear All,

I have been in the Aegean region of Turkey for 2 days. I am in a small village _Akçay_ to visit my mum-in-law and to rest for a while. The wonderful view of the Kaz (Goose) Mount and also the refreshing climate of here makes us understand once more why people here live longer.

My past weeks were very busy and tiring. We shared the outcomes of our Istanbul European Cultural Capital City Project_Bigg-İst with the media. From then on we will focus on ICT Seagulls Projercts and also 11th ICSQCC.

The schools who would like to participate in the Convention have had different possibilities to attend:

Case study presentations, Poster and Slogan making, Debate and also drama competition. To learn more, please tick the logo on the right. Wew recommend you to apply at once to make the early preparations.

ICT Seagulls teams also finalize their web page designs. After the preliminary assessment, the peer- and judge-assessments will come. Wish good luck to all.

Have a nice weekend.

Hayal Köksal

Happy Children's Day

Dear all,
Turkey has a very special celebration occasion: 23rd April!

It was the opening day of the first National Assembly in Ankara by the great leader Atatürk and his friends. Believing that the formers and leaders of the future are children; Atatürk presented that day to children as a gift. His aim was to make them the owners of the future concerning all the national issues. That is why the celebration of today has had a very great importance not only for our nation but for all the nations in the world. That's why Turkish Broadcasting company (TRT) organizes an international Children parade every year in Istanbul and Ankara. In 2004; we had hosted a team of City Montessori School with a great proud.

I wish a happy and cheerful "Children's day" for all the world children.
With love and peace...


Hayal Köksal

The Sharing & Caring Day of our 2010 Istanbul European Cultural Capital City Project

Dear All,
We had a wonderful sharing day at "Sepetçiler Kasrı" yesterday. More than 100 participants (Administrators, parents, teachers and students) were together to learn the developments about our 2010 İstanbul European Cultural Capital City project: "An ICT İmece; From Past to the Future Istanbul". From five different schools of secondary and high schools of Istanbul , seven quality / İmece Circles came together and presented what they did until yesterday.

They follow the PDCA philosophy and through ppt, they shared their interest areas. The steps were based upon the past of a monument (research methods), the present problems of the monument (problem solving skills) and the future of it (creativity). The names of the schools and the monuments / historical buildings were as follows:

1. Moda Elementary School Circles: Haydarpaşa Train Station and Mahmut Muhtar Paşa Pavillion,
2. Saint Pulcheri Foundation, Private New Generation 2000 Primary School: French Archway,
3. Vehbi koç Foundation, Private Koç Primary School: Sandal Covered Bazaar, Amcazade Hüseyin Paşa Waterside Residence,
4. 30 August Primary School: Lady's Tower and,
5. Levent Girls' vocational School: Kethüda Bath.
Two Associations concerning handicapped people participated in our event with three members to be a partner of the project. A university students' club was also with us. My students who are working for the Education and Research Clug (EREC) of the Educational Faculty of Bosphorus University decided to support the young participants with their technological and translation sides.

Oki Printing Solutions ve AMBA Printing house supported our sharing and caring day. we are grateful to them. Nilgün Ören' participation from the Organizing commitee of the 2010 Platform powered us. Mrs. Tülay erünsal from the Istanbul Municipality was among the followers. We felt happy with the great support of the administrators, teachers and parents as well.
We also presented the projects of the Association for Continuous Improvement (Sü Ge Der) which was founded by Prof.Dr.Filiz Karaosmanoğlu, Prof.Dr.Ümit Serdaroğlu, Şeniz Ciritçi, Dr.Erol İnelmen, Hayri Dereli, Servet Köksal and me. The signature Day of my last book: "ME_ The Continuous Learner through the Child within me" was the final part of the event. The income of that book will be given to the Associaiton mentioned above. You can see the photos and the project ppts of the event on our web page soon: http://www.bigg-ist.com/ .
With love and peace...

Hayal Köksal

News from the Convenor

Dear Colleagues,

I woul like to salute all of you with love, respect and admiration from Istanbul. The spring is on and all the birds are singing the song of "Quality and Peace" for the upcoming 11th Convention on Students' İmece Circles. Our efforts continue with a great enthusiasm on the way of realizing a good and efficient convention for all participants and contributers.

The co-founder and the honorary president of the Turkish Center for Schools of Quality; Prof. John Jay Bonstingl will be with us for the convention. This makes us very happy and proudful.

2008 Nobel Peace Award nominee school's (CMS) founder and general manager Mr. Jagdish Gandhi, my sister_ the founder principal of CMS; Dr. Vineeta Kamran, Dearest Dost Prof.Dr. Syed Ali from John Hopkins university, a great quality leader Mr. P.C. Bihari and TQM-Head of CMS Mr. Dheeraj Mehrotra have been with us from the planning steps of the Convention.

It It is also lovely to hear that our dearest colleague Prof. Dr. Mary Stuart_vice rector of the Kingston university, UK_ will be with us with her keynote paper titled; "Student Engagement". Again Hillary Hunt with her Quality and Peace Education workshop will take place within the program.

Schools from India and Mauritius have started to register. It is a great honour for us to host a multi-cultural "PEACE & QUALITY" event as Turkey. We hope the ties and bridges between the groups will be strengthened through this collaboration (=İMECE). Please visit our web page to download the informative pages and also to register: http://www.hayalkoksal.com/en/convention.html

Today is the 68th opening anniversary of the "Village Institutions" which used to be the leading schools of Ataturk's Enlightenment Period. their life lasted very short but their incomes still effective upon the community. I would like to send my best wishes to their founders; Atatürk, Yücel and Tonguç. Related to the philosophy of the Village Institutions, I conducted 9 imece circles alst year at 2 different universities. This year there exists 9 more. Our responsibility is to carry the qualified approaches to the next generations.

Have a nice day. With love and peace...

Hayal KÖKSAL

The Convenor