Newsletter – Friday 25 April 2008

Our Year 4 / 5 and 6 children will be arriving back from their residential week at Rippledown House this evening at around 20.15 outside the Infant Department building in Avenue Emile Max. If you need a more updated arrival time then please contact me .

Last Saturday’s International Day had the best ever attendance and I’m sure that everyone who was there had a great day. Many thanks to everyone who helped out on the day and everyone who volunteered and visited the school. I'm sure you will agree it was a great day to taste international treats and for families to get together. Special thanks go to all the Country Stall Holders for their time and effort displaying the delicious food and special character of their country.

The ISI inspection team will be arriving in school the week after next. They will be here from Tuesday 6^th May until Friday 9^th May and presenting their written report several weeks after that. You may wish to know that what we shall be saying to the children is simply that ‘we shall be having some visitors in school who are here to see how everything works and then suggest ways of making the school better’. The inspectors will be a three person team and will look at all aspects of how the school functions from teaching and learning to safety and management

Please note that next week will be a three day week as the school will be closed on Thursday and Friday for Ascension and the Mayday holiday.

There will be a PTA Coffee Morning on Friday 9 May at 9:30am. Everyone is welcome, especially new parents. It will be held at the home of Michelle Tong, near Woluwe Park, closest metro station Petillon or bus no. 36. If you need the address, contact Michelle or contact the school office. We hope to see you there.

Parents, mark the date for the PTA Quiz Night on Saturday 17 May, another highlight of the PTA social calendar. This is a fun evening when parents work together in teams to answer questions on a variety of subjects. Doors will open at 7:30pm for an 8:00pm start. More details to follow in the next newsletter.

Please note that the next PTA meeting is on Thursday 15 May.

The next PTA Ladies night out will be taking place on Friday May 23^rd so please make a note of the date now. There is also a coffee morning planned for later in April (date and venue to follow) although ideas are still being canvassed for a Men’s night out for the summer term. Please send in an e-mail if you have any suggestions.

The date for the PTA sausage sizzle has now been finalised and it will take place on Saturday, 14^th June.

This week’s Star of the week winners were

Reception - Timothée for excellent effort in writing.

Year 1 - Saskia outstanding work all week and communicating her own ideas.

Year 2 - Jake F - taking care with hand writing this week

Year 3 - Dimitri for a good explanation text on Sport..

And finally this week’s thought for the week is:-

“When it is not necessary to make a decision, it is necessary not to make a decision”.

- Lord Falkland (1610 - 1643)

Home School Books – April 25, 2008

Home School Book – Nursery

Dear Parents,

Our ‘Bears’ topic is still going strong and we have had bears of all shapes and sizes around the nursery this week. The role play area, has played host to some interesting and imaginative versions of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears, we certainly have some great actors in nursery!

The children had two new stories this week, ‘Brown Bear, Brown bear what do you see’ and ‘Bear’. This was followed up by some great art work, the children painted their own animal that they thought Brown Bear might have seen and they also discussed their favourite comfort toy.

As you will see by your child’s drawing on the opposite page, a favourite toy isn’t necessarily a Teddy Bear! We got a lot of conversation and a varied show and tell box, most importantly children love the connection between home and nursery toys, so if it is not too precious or too big! Please send in another favourite toy next week.

Another discussion in group time this week was about all of the different languages including English that the children in Nursery speak, or hear spoken at home. To extend this further, we would like to make a poster with each child saying ‘Hello my name is....’ in their mother tongue or other languages spoken at home.

We would be very grateful if you would write down the ‘Hello my name is...’ (With the name of the language in brackets) and send it into Nursery on Monday, so we can get our poster underway.

Last but not least, it is Tai’s last day in Nursery today, so please remember to say goodbye. We will all miss Tai in nursery and hope he enjoys his new school.

Remember next week is a short one and the Nursery will be closed on Thursday and Friday, so our next newsletter will be in 2 weeks time.

Enjoy the May break and watch out for that yellow glow in the sky!

Thank you

Alison Davies, Gail Metcalf and Donnell Cross.

Home School Book – Reception

Dear Parents,

This week we began our new topic Dinosaurs. The week started with the appearance of a mysterious ‘egg’, which was found in the woods by Mrs. Prescott and entrusted to our class for safekeeping. We talked about what kind of creature might be in the egg, and decided based on its size and that it must be a dinosaur egg. We discussed what it must be like to be inside an egg, and decided it would be very cosy and dark in there! The children also thought that we should be calm and quiet around the egg and decided to write some signs to keep the egg safe from danger. On the second day, we found a note that said “Please look after my egg; I will be back for it soon.” We wrote back to the dinosaur’s mother and assured her that we would take good care of the egg. This correspondence continued, and one of the children suggested we ask what sort of dinosaur it is so we would know what to feed it when it hatched. Fortunately, we learned from our next letter that the dinosaur is a parasaurolophus which is a plant eater—whew! Finally the egg hatched and out came a lovely green dinosaur. We took a vote and decided to call him “Greenie.” Greenie will stay with us throughout our exploration of this topic. Next week we will be looking at some fact cards about different dinosaurs, and will be painting some of the giant creatures.

In maths this week, we have been exploring sand. For one lesson, we went outdoors and using a sand timer estimated and tested how many movements we could make in one minute. The next day we looked in the sand tray for buried "treasure". The children found some beads and were able to exchange red beads for 1 coin and yellow beads for 2 coins. They had to count each colour and the total amount of money earned in the exchange! We also traced wooden numerals onto paper, painted them with glue then dipped them in sand to make 'sandy numbers'. We will continue our mathematical explorations with sand into next week.

In literacy this week we looked at the initial sound 'z' and also reviewed all other initial sounds previously taught. The children are getting more and more confident at reading short words, and have been enjoying playing 'cvc fooball'. Next week our sound table will feature the sound 'ch '

In French with Mrs. Scharf, We're reading and role playing "Boucle d'Or et les 3 Ours" (Goldilocks and the 3 Bears). It is a beautiful story that the children know and like it. Moreover, in French it is an excellent source of vocabulary and expressions.

In EAL this week, we continued our mission to catch up on some of the initial sounds that had been missed due to late arrival in the school year. So far we have we have looked at the sounds a, e, o, s, t, d, h, c and d. We practised saying the sounds that they make, looked at objects that begin with their pure sound and formed them correctly with a pencil. Finally to reinforce this, we played some games and sang a few songs. It was wonderful to work with such a keen pupil.

I wish you a lovely weekend,

Shirley Cassidy

Home School Book – Year 1

Dear Parents,

Today we said goodbye to Tama and mum brought in some cakes which we all enjoyed with him together.

We’ll all miss him and it will be strange without him but we won’t be lonely for long; Abhirup from India will join us next month.

But for now, we wish you good luck Tama and take care. ________________________________________________________

In Literacy, we ended our current non-fiction topic with some monumental dinosaur facts posters. Earlier in the week we practised making a labelled diagram with caption, we did research using the books and the internet and then we tied up all the threads to produce the posters. The children were really inspired by this and the work was excellent as is all their work right now and we should all be proud.

I’d also like to say that the children’s behaviour to, from and at the swimming pool has been superb. Well done. And also thrilling is the progress being made in the 2^nd group; terrific work being done in the pool by Diane and Gaynor. The poolside team is doing a cracking job too. Thank you all.

In Numeracy, we learnt how to make symmetrical patterns and then how to add multiples of 10.

In Science, some of the children’s seeds planted in the first week are being to appear while we considered why plants are so important.

In History, we concentrated on the similarities and differences between beach holidays in the past and today. The children saw some vintage footage and photos on a BBC video.

In ICT, we made a pictogram about our favourite type of holiday; skiing and seaside coming out on top!

In Art we continued sculpture with some nice seaside collages which may well have come home already.

In Geography, we started ‘Passport to the world’ by looking at where we all live in Brussels, where some of its famous landmarks are and how someone might get there.

For geography in 2 weeks time, could the children please keep 5-6 food labels which include the product’s country of origin. This is so that we can map where they might have come from.

In EAL this week, we did some research on dinosaurs for a poster; it proved to be a very popular topic and produced some excellent discussion work. While the notes were being written, I emphasised that we were trying to get our thoughts down on paper and that worrying too much about precise spellings might put us off at this stage. You can always go back and check them later.

In French with Mrs Gorgia this week we started the third story of our book called “Un coucou dans la pendule”. We introduced the characters: Lucie and Monsieur Lampion. We talked about la nuit (the night), la lune, les étoiles and we also learned the song “Monsieur Lampion est en retard”.

And that was our week.

This week’s Star Of The Week was Saskia for outstanding work all week and communicating her own ideas.

Best Wishes

Tim Stedman

Next week’s Show and teller’s: Abdullah, Hiroki, Alex and Alexa.

Home School Book – Year 2

Dear Parents, 

This week started with a glance at some children’s television websites looking for useful things that are included to allow the user to find information. Colour, pictures, captions, menus, links all were seen and used. We wrote some sentences (remembering capital letters and full stops) to describe what our favourite programmes are about. We made posters to match the plan of a webpage glossary for our programmes, remembering to put the programme titles in alphabetical order. We listened to some ‘ear’ words finding those that sound like a ‘tear’ drop, and those that sound like a ‘tear’ in the page. These words made up the list of spellings. We also reminded ourselves of words with other letter blends in the middle.

Doubling and halving numbers up to 100 allowed us to remember how to write ½, and how to say, for example, 2+2=4 in different words. It also allowed us to ask how we knew, say, 16 is half of 32. We used doubling and halving with amounts of money and with distances, checking we could read numbers written in words, spelling these words (e.g. http://www.sums.co.uk/playground/n2a/playground.htm) We also began to use ‘symmetry’, ‘symmetrical’ and ‘lines of symmetry’ with 2d shapes we drew or cut out. We have also been working through pages in our Abacus books to practice work from earlier in the year.

We read about Roly Poly toys built on a rainy day for a pet cat. This lead to us looking at vehicles with wheels to see what was required to set them rolling. The result were sketches, some interesting Connex constructions, and some discoveries about differently-sized wheels, axles and curves. Slopes, forces and wheels were investigated in Science – what makes the vehicle roll well, further, faster?

Samuel Pepys’ Diary inspired us to begin a five day diary for Year 2. It also made us think about how big nine year’s worth of a diary would be, and what it’s like to be an eyewitness of something like the Great Fire of London. (Memories recalled that would have been in their diaries included a poem recited by a baby sitter in a storm, and the use of an anaesthetic mask used before some tonsils were removed.)

This week in French with Mrs Gorgia, we started reading the French fable “Le corbeau et le renard” (The crow and the fox). We did vocabulary activities and we worked on the creation of a small album based on our story.

In EAL this week, we have had ‘writing boot camp’! We worked really hard on transferring our phonetic skills (which are already paying dividends with reading) to our writing. Of course in a second language this is more of a daunting challenge but one has to take a ‘leap of faith’ and just go for it! By the end of the week it was starting to pay off slowly.

Kind regards,

Tim Gill

Home School Book – Year 3

Dear Parents,

This week we have profited from the lovely warm days and our PE session was lovely. We got it in just before the thunderstorm.

In Numeracy we have been looking at subtraction by counting on, consolidating this by doing many varied and interesting activities. We have also been looking at story type sums (the basis of our homework)

In Literacy we have been looking at sports and have researched a sport, either in a group or individually, which we are going to use in order to make a class information book on sport. Most of us have already done our pages on the computer and have illustrated them.

In Science we looked at where rocks come from and how they are formed. I would ask for any good rock specimens to be sent into school for a small display.

In Geography we looked at Mari and how she spends her day. We contrasted this to how we spend our day and I think the children can see how lucky they are.

In ICT we had fun adding colour to a little poem and we able to experiment using different shades and fonts.

In PE we took a step back from hockey with a lesson devoted to bean bag games and skills. We enjoyed the activities and particularly the game at the end (I wrote a letter to my love…….)

In EAL this week, I went into the class during two literacy sessions on researching and note taking. They chose a sport and then took notes in response to a prompt sheet of questions. We paid attention to minimize the use of connectives and any unnecessary words when taking notes. Then, once this was done it was written up as a report and we worked on sequencing the information, good sentence structure and the correct use of tenses.

In French with Mrs. Scharf, We're learning to read the time and although it is a rather difficult project for some, the children have enjoyed all the exercises we've been doing on the web. We've also made our own paper clocks and we'll be practising more next week.

During the time that I have been on duty at first break I have noted with a good deal of pleasure how nicely the class have been playing together. It is good to see them playing games (not football) without segregating out into boys and girls.

Have a good weekend and stay safe.

Valeria Vetter

Our Year 4/5/6 classes are away from school for this week at Rippledown.

Newsletter – Friday 18 April 2008

Tomorrow is International Day, and it will be held between 12.00 and 15.30 in the Infant department building in Avenue Emile Max. People can come into school to set up their stall from 10.30 onwards. Many thanks to all those people who have already had a chance to put their name on the volunteers’ rota sheet at the PTA notice board at the entrance of the Infant school. We are also looking for volunteers to help on the day at the PTA refreshment stall, ticket stall or to help with games and clearing up afterwards. If you can help out on the day please contact Christine Cook, if you would like more information. We look forward to seeing all of you tomorrow as it promises to be another great day.

Please note that our Year 4 / 5 and 6 children who are going to Rippledown House next week are meeting on Monday morning at 06.00 outside the Infant Department building in Avenue Emile Max. We will inform parents when they arrive safely on Monday and also keep everyone informed of progress through the week. If you need to contact the group in an emergency please first contact me .

One of our parents needs a part time office manager for their young company specializing in “search” technology. The person should be able to communicate in French, but the working language will be English. An interest in communications/marketing is helpful but not compulsory. It is expected that the position will be for 15-20 hours a week and start/end time and days worked are flexible. See www.attentio.com/blog for more information.

The next PTA Ladies night out will be taking place on Friday May 23^rd so please make a note of the date now. There is also a coffee morning planned for later in April (date and venue to follow) although ideas are still being canvassed for a Men’s night out for the summer term. Please send in an e-mail if you have any suggestions.

The date for the PTA sausage sizzle has now been finalised and it will take place on Saturday, 14^th June.

If there is a parent who would like to help co-ordinate the ordering of books in the future for the school via the Red House Books organisation then perhaps they could send in an e-mail. For this term there is an opportunity to learn about the process by assisting Claire Ridyard, who is co-ordinating the activity once again.

Parents may wish to be aware of an Exhibition by Joelle Robinet taking place at St John’s International School performing arts center next week on April 18^th (preview 19.00 – 22.00 contact joellerobinetpaintings@hotmail.com for invitation) and 19^th April (exhibition from 10.00 to 20.00). Entrance is free.

This week’s Star of the week winners were

Reception - Louisa for excellent effort in writing.

Year 1 - Alexander L-B for great thinking in art

Year 2 - Anete for working so hard at her Dinosaur poster

Year 3 - Fadi for much improved reading.

Year 4 - Jonas for being very mature in class and always willing to try new things.

Year 4/5/6 - Marc for settling back into school so well after his holiday.

And finally this week’s thought for the week is:-

“If you don't learn to laugh at trouble, you won't have anything to laugh at when you're old”.

- Edgar Watson Howe (1853 - 1937)

Home School Books – April, 18, 2008

Home School Book – Nursery

Dear Parents,

We have enjoyed many activities this week involving the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

The children's work included this week is a blanket for the Baby Bear. The idea was to produce a repeating pattern and to cut the piece of paper to a good size for the Baby Bear's bed.

Recognising and developing pattern is one of the areas of Mathematical Development that we focus on in Nursery.

The children have also been asked to re-tell the story of the Three Bears using pictures and words and many of them have been stunning with this task! We have made high Baby Bear sounds with instruments and low Daddy Bear sounds. This has been very popular Next week we are going to talk about old teddies and favourite toys that the children may have had when they were a baby. If you have anything like that which your child could bring in to school that would be great.

We had a new boy starting this week-Ruben so welcome to him!

There are many reasons why we need to have spare clothes in school. Please can you make sure your child does have spare clothes in their drawer, especially trousers and that they still fit!

We hope to see you at the International Day this weekend.

Best Wishes

Alison, Gail and Donnell.

Home School Book – Reception

Dear Parents,

The children have been enjoying the role play area very much this week, and have been traveling the world! The passports are now nearly finished except for their photos which we will try to finish today. We have finished our topic on transport now, but I will leave the airport intact for a while as they are still getting and lot of enjoyment out of it as well as lots of opportunities for speaking and writing.

We continue to work on some short writing tasks to help the children gain confidence in sounding out whole words using their phonic knowledge, and use proper word spacing. We just completed a task If I had one wish…I was very impressed with the results. The children are writing with much more confidence now.

We have been trying to make the most of the sunny weather this week and have done quite a bit of outdoor play, including sand and water play. Perhaps you could bring in an extra shirt for your child to keep in their tray in case they get over enthusiastic with the water!

We have been working hard on the sound ‘th’ which is a very difficult sound to pronounce. The children have been practising saying ‘th’ words by placing their hand in front of their mouth as they say the words. If they feel air on their hands they have pronounced the sound correctly. We will continue to work on this. Next week our sound table will feature the sound ‘z’.

In French with Mrs. Scharf: We finally got to the end of the first story of our French method and not only did the children enjoy it, they also learnt a lot of new words and expressions. We will slowly start our second story. We also read a story called "M'Toto", a little girl saved from drowning by a crocodile that happened to be vegetarian. A beautiful story about differences which the children loved.

In EAL this week, we looked at some initial sounds that have already been covered in the class. We worked on them orally and then we played simple games to reinforce them. We also read some stories and sang songs that involve repetition.

I hope to see many of you tomorrow for International Day.

Have a lovely weekend.

Shirley Cassidy

Home School Book – Year 1

Dear Parents,

Putting the monsters in order

If you hadn’t noticed at home, it was dinosaurs this week.

In Literacy, we looked at a whole swamp of dinosaur non-fiction fact books and also websites on the laptops. We practised using the index to find words in the text, tried our hand at skim reading and then, we put dinosaur words in alphabetical order.

In Numeracy, we reminded ourselves how to make 10c, learnt how to give change from 10c, made numbers bonds to 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 and also revisited sorting 3D shapes.

(We also warmed up one day with this activity.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/laac/numbers/ch3.shtml)

In Science, a new topic of Growing Plants was started with a sketching session of plants found in the playground. We then put our sketches on a map inside and learnt where the roots, stem, leaves and flower are on most plants.

In History, we continued our new topic, comparing seaside holidays in the past to today and making a time line with various beach photos over the last 100 years.

In ICT, we made a pictogram of the transport we use to get to school.

Art saw the start of another new topic: What is Sculpture? and the children really got into this. Many of the class had super ideas for possible future sculptures and I would like to ask everyone at home to start collecting bits and pieces for a sculpture for 4 weeks' time.

At swimming everyone did excellently. We had lots of strong kicking, brave floating, smooth strokes and high effort.

In Geography, we learnt about Alexander Lapsley's trip last weekend to see old fashioned trams and then Walibi's Aqualibi.

Also worth mentioning is Circle Time which drew up some very interesting and quite moving comments. We had to say who we missed and why and how we felt when we missed somebody. Children missed grandparents they'd never been able to meet, children they went to kindergarten with, to hardworking parents late home, to friends abroad. (And someone even missed a toy they'd had to say goodbye to in the morning!)

In French with Mrs Gorgia this week we finished the reading of the Fairy Tale “Les Trois Boucs Bourrus” (The Three Billy Goats). We practised reading, we created an album and we also acted out the main scenes in the story.

In EAL this week, we read a story together about a boy who discovers a dinosaur footprint. The story had previously been read in the class, but we looked at it again to consolidate comprehension and to find alternative words for common adjectives such as sad or large. We also discussed how to put a list of similar words into alphabetical order.

Best Wishes

Tim Stedman

Next week’s Show and teller’s: Kanna, Alexander L-B, Divij and Ishika

Home School Book – Year 2

Dear Parents,

We have spent this week using “Contents” pages, an Index or two, and Glossaries to help produce posters about Dinosaurs. We used the Internet to find pictures and information (for example, www.nhm.ac.uk ), some of us typing information using a word processor. In phonics and spelling we used words with the same sound, some spelled with ‘ou’ and some with ‘ow’ – crown, clown, cloud, shout, for example. Handwriting saw us practising the first join again.

We are beginning to count into the hundreds using Place Value (www.crickweb.co.uk/assets/resources/flash.php?&file=Toolkit%20index2a), thinking about the difference between, say, 217, 172 and 712. We practised number bonds for 20, beginning to look for patterns in multiples of 10 (e.g. 10-7 = 20-17 = 30-27, and so on). We began to subtract across the ten, for example by jumping back to a ten and then completing the calculation (23-7=16 which is the same as 23-3=20 and then 20-4=16).

Last week we thought about ‘Push Pull and Twist’ using www.bbc.co.uk/schools/scienceclips/ages/5_6/pushes_pulls.shtml to help us after we had looked at drills, bottle openers, prams, toy buses and similar things. This week we thought about how to find out which material in a collection might be the stretchiest, and why that might be useful.

Using an interesting collection of hats we created scenes to view through the viewfinder, giving the scene a name which we typed up on word processors. ‘Hot Holiday’, ‘What do you think you are doing’ and ‘Chinese Policeman’ were three of the results. The photos and their titles were then stuck onto sheets created to look like the back of a digital camera. We also thought about what it would be like to be blind, unable to keep a Global Eye on things around us.

We continued to ‘Aim, Roll and Catch’, and to ‘Aim, Bounce and Catch’ with our hands, adding ‘Aim, Pass and Stop’ using our feet. We began to create new games using these new skills.

This week in French with Mrs Gorgia, we finished our unit on time. We learned the hours of the day, we read the book “Quelle heure est-il?” and we did many vocabulary exercises on www.lepointdufle.net

In EAL this week, we researched some facts on a particularly ferocious dinosaur! Then we formulated them, along with some illustrations into a poster. We also spent time focusing on reading for meaning and the segmentation of big words.

Have a great week end,

Tim Gill

Home School Book – Year 3

Dear Parents,

This has been a busy week for us. We have learnt many things and had fun doing it. Isn’t that what school is all about?

In Literacy we finished our unit on Rowena and the trees with a class effort in producing an alphabetically ordered text. We researched and wrote these in rough and then typed them on the word processors. We have now started our next unit which is on sports. We looked at a CBBC sports site from which we learnt about sports we had never heard of before. Did you know there was a sport called octopush? Click here for more details http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_4990000/newsid_4998100/4998142.stm

In Numeracy we have been looking at time, trying to use stopwatches, working out word problems and adding more than one number mentally. We continue with our speed tests and the progress there is steady if a little slow for some children.

In Science we have learnt that rocks can be classified into 3 main groups and that some rocks undergo a change to move from one group into another. We learnt that soft limestone can turn into marble, for example.

In Geography we finally began looking at Chembakolli. We have found out that it is in southern India and is situated in the Nilgiri hills. We watched a video and did a photo investigation as well.

Our ICT lessons this week were investigative ones where we looked for information and did some typing.

PE on Wednesday was a bit longer than usual due to the many lessons we have missed and the fact that we were having so much fun playing our hockey match. We did practise some passing skills before the match.

In French with Mrs. Scharf: We've been working on animal related vocabulary and also within the same subject we practised to say "j'aime" et "je n'aime pas". In grammar, we learnt the negative answer to the question: "Est-ce que tu as un chien à la maison?" " Non, je n'ai pas DE chien à la maison". We are now working on reading the time.

In EAL this week, I went into the class during a literacy session on Birds of Prey, in which the children compiled factual alphabetical lists about them. We also looked at a story that had been previously read in class to check for understanding and an awareness of homophones (words that sound the same but have different meanings.)

Tomorrow is International day and I hope you will all attend this wonderful function.

Valeria Vetter

Home School Book – Year 4

Dear Parents,

We seem to be always busy in class and the end of the week and a new newsletter comes so quickly. Everything is prepared for the visit to Rippledown and the children are really looking forward to the trip next week. It will be such an adventure for the Year 4’s as it is their first time to visit Rippledown. I just hope the weather is kind to us.

Last week’s visit to the sewer was extremely interesting and a great success. It opened the eyes of the children to some of the things that are happening below their feet. For some of the children just going on the tram was a new experience. Thank you to Claire Picaud and Diane Pedersen for taking the time to accompany us.

In literacy we have been looking at stories with dilemmas and the children have written about what they think they would do in a tricky situation. We have also been practising finding the key points of the story and have written a summary using these key points. I will not give the children new spellings this week as we will be away next week and the following week is a short 3 day week.

In Maths we have been looking at easy doubling and halving that the children should know and have done quite a lot of work on written problems. These are always tricky for the children to work out and I have been trying to encourage them to make a picture of the problem.

We have introduced our new topic of ‘The Aztecs’ and the children practised their note taking while watching a video. I am pleased to say that the children are becoming quite adept at this task.

For design and technology the children were investigating toasters and had great fun testing the quality of toast that they produced. After they have completed their homework assignment they will be designing their own toasters and making advertisements for them as part of their work on persuasive texts.

Still looking for a parent who would be willing to go to tennis on Thursdays to be with the children while they have their tennis lesson.

In French with Mrs. Scharf: We've been working and practising on the passé composé and also on "l'accord de l'adjectif qualificatif". We also did a dictée préparée.

This week in French with Mrs Gorgia, we finished the evaluation test that we had started last week. We reviewed the main grammar points and we focused on the most common mistakes made by the children. We also continued on our reading book “Le Trésor de la Marie Galante”. The children attempted to write the script, in dialogue, of the chapter we read.

In EAL this week, we finished off some work on The Tortoise and the Hare. We have looked at it because it is a popular story in many languages and gave us the chance to appreciate each others home languages. The children sequenced the story in English, and the translated it into their own languages. It was a fascinating exercise for all concerned.

Have a good weekend, but don’t forget that we will have an early start on Monday morning. We will be expecting the children at 6.00 am as the bus must leave sharply at 6:30 from in front of the Infant Department building.

Christine

Home School Book – Year 4 / 5 / 6

Dear Parents,

Our week has been very busy, and we have slowly been getting used to the new building. It really is lovely for the children to have so much more space in our classroom. They have been helping to personalise it by creating headings for our displays using our brand new laptops. They have a different look and feel to our previous

laptops and the children have impressed me with how easily they have adapted to the change.

In Mathematics we have focussed on division. This is an area that children can find very difficult, but by relating it to our times tables knowledge and learning a structured method for written calculations, everyone has had a great success in maths this week.

In literacy we have continued our topic of persuasive texts. We held a formal debate about whether ball games should be allowed in the new playground, presented individual speeches about a topic of our choice and examined the purpose of advertising and some of the strategies that companies use to try to get us to part with our money! The children were not very impressed with the idea that some companies might make exaggerated claims of the qualities of their new products!

In French with Mrs. Scharf: We've been working and practising on the passé composé and also on "l'accord de l'adjectif qualificatif". We also did a dictée préparée.

This week in French with Mrs Gorgia, we finished the evaluation test that we had started last week. We reviewed the main grammar points and we focused on the most common mistakes made by the children. We also continued on our reading book “Le Trésor de la Marie Galante”. The children attempted to write the script, in dialogue, of the chapter we read.

In EAL this week, we finished off some work on The Tortoise and the Hare. We have looked at it because it is a popular story in many languages and gave us the chance to appreciate each others home languages. The children sequenced the story in English, and the translated it into their own languages. It was a fascinating exercise for all concerned.

In EAL this week, we focused on using the present tense with the auxiliary verb ‘to be’. For example I am jumping. We also looked at spelling rules that apply and did a lot of oral and written exercises, with the emphasis on repetition.

We are of course all extremely excited about the trip to Rippledown House next week and I would like to thank you all for ensuring your children brought in everything that was required in time.

See you bright and early Monday morning!

Kate

Newsletter – Friday 14 March 2008

Please note that for tomorrow’s Spring Family Day there will be no parking in Avenue Emile Max and surrounding streets because, as luck would have it, tomorrow is also the 75^th Anniversary of the local scout troop from a few doors along. They are hosting a major celebration with access and parking controlled by the police. Therefore families coming to BISB tomorrow for the crafts activities and the Talent Show should either travel by public transport or park in the large car park adjoining Rue Colonel Bourg on the other side of Boulevard Reyers near the motorway junction.

For the talent show tomorrow the first performance will start at 3:00pm promptly and is only for pupils and their families from Reception to Year 2. The second performance for pupils and families of Years 3-6 is scheduled to commence at 4:00pm promptly. This first Talent Show is a learning experience for everyone where the performers and audience should enjoy it and and have some great fun.

While the Talent Show is on, there will be many crafts to make including Japanese origami with demonstrations. We will also have a PTA Cafe and welcome any donations of baked goods which you would like to contribute. Also the PTA is looking for volunteers to help sell tickets, supervise crafts and help at the cafe. If you could spare one hour on the day, it would be greatly appreciated. Contact Judith Currie (Finn's Mum) We also need people to help clean-up afterwards as “many hands make light work".

Elita Beere a lady originally from Zimbabwe and a grandparent of children formerly at our school, came into school for our Key Stage 2 assembly this week to explain to the children how the money raised from the BISB Valentines cake sale in early February would be spent by the children’s charity back in Zimbabwe. Our children all listened very carefully to how the children less fortunate than themselves were being helped.

As next week is the last week of term, there will be no after school clubs operating next week on any of the days. The school minibuses will therefore be departing shortly after 15.30 on each day except for Monday (when the minibus service will be practically the same as all Mondays because of the regular Monday staff meeting). Please also note that Thursday is the last day of term as the school is closed on Friday.

We have had an outbreak of Fifth Disease in school (sometimes called ‘slap cheek virus, see http://kidshealth.org/parent/infections/bacterial_viral/fifth.html for more information). As always in any medical situation please consult your doctor for advice if required. Could we also ask that, as we have had several children off school this week with a viral infection causing diarrhoea and sickness, parents must ensure that their child is well enough to return to school by waiting at least 24 hours after they have shown symptoms? Otherwise the virus is simply passed on to the other children, which is obviously very unfair.

From Monday we shall be asking that all children arriving at school late after morning registration be signed in via the school office. This is part of our recent review of safety features throughout the school so that we have a precise idea of who is present in school in case there is an emergency requiring the building to be evacuated or if we have not been informed about a child’s absence. Could we also therefore repeat the request that we be informed if any child is not in school for any reason? Thank you in advance for your co-operation.

There will be a PTA Coffee Morning on Thursday 20 March at the home of Genevieve Sauve (Maxime's Mum in year 2). This will be straight after school drop off. It will be a good chance to catch up before the Easter holidays and everyone is welcome, particularly new parents.

We look forward to seeing many of you at the mid year Parents Evening on Tuesday, March 18^th. Everyone should already have received an appropriate appointment time between 16.00 and 19.00. Please note that the Parents evening for our Nursery children is taking place on Wednesday afternoon, March 19^th.

Please note that the deadline of 90 days for giving written notice of departure at the end of the academic year is Saturday 5^th April and that this falls during the Easter holidays. Accordingly if you know that your child is leaving at the end of this academic year in July 2008 then we would be pleased to receive notice as soon as possible to keep parents who are enquiring about places for next year informed of the changing situation.

Last week’s participation by children, parents and staff from BISB raised around 800€ for the Lions Heraldic Swimarathon ‘Splash 2008’. This is a fantastic amount and we would like to thank the many people involved in the swim and especially Vee the father of Thomas and Sara who co-ordinated the school’s participation. The funds raised will go towards two charities designed to help children who are spending time in hospital. Please see the websites http://www.neuroplanet.com/ and http://www.kuleuven.be/uzschool/pages/english.html for more information.

The highlight of the PTA social calendar is International Day to be held on Saturday 19 April 2008. For those families new to the school, it is an opportunity to experience different cultures from some of the 30 plus nationalities at the school. Families and teachers can host a stall to introduce their country through food, drink, music, displays or national dress. We also have performances from different countries. Families returning to their home country during the school break might like to bring some national items back with them. So, reserve the date for a fun afternoon and start thinking how best to show off your country. Please complete the Information Sheet sent home last week to let us know of your country's participation. Contact Christine Cook if you would like more information. We hope to have as many countries represented as possible to make for a great BISB International Day!

This week’s Star of the week winners were

Reception - Lily-Rose for excellent effort in speaking English

Year 1 – Ishika for keeping an excellent topic book this year and making an outstanding house by herself.

Year 2 - Jake D for behaving so much better on Tuesday than Monday.

Year 3 - Asrin for conscientious effort in all areas of school

Year 4 - Najib, for his kindness and working quietly and conscientiously

Year 4/5/6 - Victorine for her wonderfully presented written work

And finally this week’s thought for the week is:-

“Concentration comes out of a combination of confidence and hunger”. –

Arnold Palmer (1929 - )

Home School Books – March 14, 2008

Home School Book – Nursery

Dear Parents,

This week started with the theme of green and the story of Jack and the Beanstalk soon proved to be an inspiration to the children.

The children have been motivated by the story and have produced beanstalks made from paper, stickle bricks, blocks and play dough.

We have been able to use the giant as a theme for many physical activities outside such as What's the time Mr Giant?

The children have all planted a bean and we are growing a giant beanstalk of our own in the classroom.

A big thank you to Lina and her mummy for making everyone a green jelly on Thursday.

Next week we are going to focus on Easter activities.

We look forward to meeting with many of you on Wednesday afternoon and if you cannot attend please suggest an alternative meeting time that suits you.

We know that some children are going away for the Easter break and may be leaving before the end of term so we hope you have a great trip and holiday.

Kind Regards

Gail, Alison and Donnell

Home School Book – Reception

Dear Parents,

We continue with our topic on transport, this week we were looking specifically at air transport. We generated a list of all things used to transport people through the air, and one child even suggested a Barbie Horse since it has wings! I found this a perfectly acceptable and very creative answer since I had not specified real or imaginary transport!

We continued working on the poem A Train Journey this time focusing on rhyming words. We also read a non-fiction book about air travel, a wonderful story about a rescue helicopter named Budgie, and a story called Roaring Rockets. Next week we will focus on water travel. Our sound table will feature the sound ‘y’.

The children really enjoyed learning about Europe this week. We went out into the library to admire the European map done by the Year 2 class and I was impressed by how much the children understood about geography. Many of the children can identify Belgium’s flag and that of their home country. Throughout the week we participated in several activities on a different aspect of Europe. We enjoyed tasting olives with years 4, 5, and 6; tea with year 3, a quiz with year 2 and of course breakfast with Reception and Year 1. Thank you very much for your contribution to our breakfast…it was delicious!

In French with Mrs. Scharf, because of European week, we've been talking about Belgium and what the children knew and liked about it. They drew beautiful pictures of the king and queen of Belgium eating either chocolate or gaufres, some drew pictures of the Atomium and some drew beautiful tasty "frites"! We also talked about the Belgian comic strips characters like the Schtroumpfs (Smurfs - yes they are Belgian!), Tintin et Milou, Marsupilami etc. Again, the children drew fantastic pictures of these characters. Très très chouette !!

In EAL this week, we spent some time getting to know each other initially and then we followed some simple instructions, went over basic colours and numbers to ten and some simple classroom vocabulary. We also sang Heads Shoulders Knees and Toes and If You’re Happy and You Know It Clap Your Hands.

Have a lovely weekend,

Shirley Cassidy

Home School Book – Year 1

Eurocentric

This week we embraced our Europe Week.

Our European Breakfast yesterday was a success (thank you to all those who kindly contributed), we learnt to say goodbye in several languages from the EU (and not just the 6 languages spoken in our class), we mapped the countries of the EU and had lots of fun on this website:

http://europa.eu/europago/welcome.jsp

In Literacy, we boldly went to the Moon, writing facts and then a story about our permanent satellite. ‘Whatever Next!’ by Jill Murphy served as a stimulus. And this week the children really proved that they’re all Space Cadets ;-)

In ICT another group of children added text to photos of planets on the laptops.

In Numeracy, we solved ‘real life’ problems using coins and in particular finding change from 20p or 20cents. We also returned to counting up and back in 10s from any number.

These two sites were used extensively:

http://www.ictgames.com/moneypayer.html

http://www.wmnet.org.uk/wmnet/custom/files_uploaded/uploaded_resources/850/Buy2items.swf

In Science, the children loved looking into light boxes with torches to uncover what was hidden in them. Some of the children were able to explain that objects are easier to see in brighter light.

In DT, the children made some splendid houses and some are still in construction.

A big thank to Saskia, Alexa and Charlotte in particular for their material as this help meant that all the children were able to enjoy the task.

In Geography, European flags, maps, landmarks and national anthems ruled.

This week’s Star Of The Week was Ishika, for keeping an excellent topic book this year and making an outstanding house by herself.

In French with Mrs. Gorgia this week we celebrated Europe. Our theme was famous European painters: Van Gogh, Matisse, Picasso and Magritte. We talked about their countries, we saw many of their artworks and the children reproduced and described one painting from each artist using French vocabulary! We put all this work in a beautiful album.

In EAL this week, we discussed what it would be like to go into space and what equipment we might need in order to survive once we got there. We found out a lot of interesting facts in a book about astronauts staying at a space station. To consolidate work from last week, we read and then carried out some simple oral comprehension exercises on the book I Don’t like Peas. I was extremely pleased with the results.

Please note this is a homework weekend and also do think about any issues that you’d like to discuss next week at Parents’ Evening. See you on Tuesday!

Have a good weekend.

Best Wishes

Tim Stedman

Next week’s Show and Tellers are: Saskia, Shreya, Paul and Nathan.

Home School Book – Year 2

Dear Parents,

Flags, Maps and Europe – we looked at them all this week, writing about the story behind the Union Jack, and finding out about some other flags too. We enjoyed breakfast provided by Reception and Year 1 on Thursday, but were not so keen on Year 4, 5 and 6’s Olive Fest. We devised a quiz for other classes who were going to visit us on Friday, and wrote down instructions for some flag games. Our spellings included words with the ‘ur’ sound in, and we also practised the fourth join in our handwriting. Group reading on Wednesday saw four groups sharing a book, challenging some to recognise sight words, and to practise strategies for reading unknown words. Some of us had to remember to look at the beginning the middle and the end of words for familiar letter blends, and also to find smaller words in the longer ones.

Counting back and forth in 10s helped us develop some strategies to estimate easily and then accurately count large numbers of cubes or coins. We grouped cubes into tens and then counted the numbers of tens, adding the other cubes that hadn’t made a ten to this total. We estimated the value of a pile of coins and then counted them using this strategy too, at the same time noticing Euros and cents can counted in a similar way. Are they worth the same as pounds and pence, we asked. We also continued to work from certain pages in our work books practising additions, subtractions, multiplying and dividing.

We have the outing next week to the Eurospace Centre which will link well into the work we have done this term on stars and space. Friday’s Science saw us thinking about this trip and what to expect.

In Design we have almost finished our models of the lighthouse, cottage and pulleys to deliver the Lighthouse Keepers lunch to him. Next week we will be finishing this, and evaluating the results of our work. They are looking good, but will lunch be delivered? We also finished ‘The Diary of a boy in a Castle’ piecing together what he did using when he did them. Falconry, scrubbing armour and having dilute beer for breakfast all contributed to differences between now and then.

This week French with Mrs. Gorgia was dedicated to Europe and its grand artists. We talked about four countries and four painters: Da Vinci for Italy, Picasso for Spain, Van Gogh for Holland and Matisse for France.

We talked about their work, we described one important painting of each artist and each child created an album on “L’Europe et ses peintres”.

In PE we began to join patches (back, front, side), points (shoulders, elbows, toes) and ways of stopping (sinking, growing, freezing) together into interesting sequences which we then performed to each other.

Have a great week end

Tim Gill

Home School Book – Year 3

Dear Parents,

European week has been a great learning experience for us all. The children have really been enthusiastic about it.

In Literacy we researched our country (for the Europeans) or another European country (for the non-Europeans) and wrote a report. We then typed this on a word processor and printed it out onto a special sheet of paper. We coloured in our country’s flag and these are up in the classroom for you to see next week. We have also written poems about Europe – the children asked to do this.

In Numeracy we have concentrated on our speed tests and the 3 times table.

We hosted the school to tea on Tuesday and put on a great spread. Thank you so much to everyone for contributing to this tea. It was wonderful and the children were very proud of their wares.