Thank you to everyone who came to the Middle Years Programme (MYP) Introduction Workshop on Tuesday, September 8. Please refer to the slides here.
The morning covered three things: what the MYP is built to do, how your child's work is assessed, and how you can support at home.
What the MYP is built to do
The IB Learner Profile sits at the centre of the programme and everything else wraps around it. Your child studies all eight subject groups every year, and those subjects are connected on purpose rather than taught in isolation.
Four things run underneath every unit, in every subject. Big concepts such as change, systems and relationships, meet again and again across different subjects until they stick. A global context, so the answer to "why do I need this?" is built into the unit. Approaches to learning skills, which are taught rather than assumed. And service as action every year, leading to the Personal Project in the final year of the programme.
How MYP assessment works
This is the part that looks least familiar, and it is simpler than it first appears.
Your child's grade is not a percentage. Every subject is marked against its own four criteria, each scored from 0 to 8. In each subject the four add up to 32, and the IB’s published grade boundaries convert that total into a final grade from 1 to 7.
It is not an average either. The IB rules out averaging marks across the year, and rules out weighting classwork, homework and tests against each other. Instead the teacher decides which written descriptor best fits the work. Those descriptors are published in advance, and the criteria names are the same ones that appear on your child's report.
Two documents to keep
The MYP Curriculum Guide covers every subject in every year: what your child studies, and how each subject is assessed.
The MYP Assessment Guidance Handbook has the full assessment criteria and grading guidance for every subject, so you can read the exact descriptors behind any grade.
Both are worth bookmarking now rather than looking for in November before the 3-Way Conference.
How you can support at home
Homework runs at about an hour a night in Years 7 to 9, and about two hours in Years 10 and 11. If it is regularly taking much longer than that, please email the subject teacher.
If something is not working, start with the subject teacher, then the Learning Advisor. Please do not wait for a report. The earlier we hear, the more we can do.
Bookmark your child's assessment calendar. Each year group has one, and it shows every summative task for the whole cohort rather than one subject at a time, so nothing lands as a surprise the week it is due.
▎Y7 Assessment 2026-2027: https://bit.ly/3LU4RRl
▎Y8 Assessment 2026-2027: https://bit.ly/453bM0W
▎Y9 Assessment 2026-2027: https://bit.ly/44ZAgs6
▎Y10 Assessment 2026-2027: https://bit.ly/3ZoNL3s
▎Y11 Assessment 2026-2027: https://bit.ly/45ZyAAc
Your home language is an advantage, not a compromise. Build the understanding in whichever language gets there fastest, then attach the English or Chinese terminology afterwards. A strong first language gives new learning something solid to sit on. Your part in this is not the teaching. It is the conditions.
Dates to put in the calendar
- 3-Way Conferences: 23 and 26 November
- Learning Advisor conferences: 2 December
- Reports: 4 February and 21 June (in Ding!)
- 3-Way Conferences: 3 and 6 May
For anything about your child day to day, start with the Learning Advisor. For a specific task or grade, the subject teacher. For the MYP curriculum itself, or if you are not sure who to ask, you can email Ms Yang at yangy10@dc.edu.hk
