Reflective Learning In Year 5
The Year 5’s started off the year excited and ready to learn. After enthusiastically greeting old friends and welcoming new ones, we got down to the business of learning.
One of the fantastic things about Cambridge learning is that it is reflective. The students are actively engaged in their own learning, building knowledge rather than simply receiving it. The Year 5’s implemented this right from the start of their learning, starting a KWL chart about the topic we are covering this term – Space! A KWL chart makes notes of what we Know, what we Would like to know and what we have Learnt.
Did you know that Jupiter has 79 moons, but only 53 of them have names? Or that we currently know of about 100 billion galaxies in the universe? Jupiter is the planet that spins the fastest, and Mercury is very hot during the day and very cold at night. These are some of the interesting facts that we shared in our first Science lesson!
As we go through the term, we’ll keep adding what we learn to our chart, watching our knowledge build throughout the term. We’ll look at the questions we had at the beginning, and see whether they have been answered, or whether we still have more research to do. Who knows – perhaps this is where some budding astronauts start their flight!
We look forward to seeing all our students fly high this year!
Hannah Kirkaldy
Year 5 Teacher
From the Principal’s Desk, 9 October 2020
Dear Parents
One of the best feelings is the glow of satisfaction that comes with reaching one’s goals. As a school we have been consistent in our hygiene and safety protocols. Whether it be the regular temperature checks and sanitizing throughout the day or continuous reminders about the necessity of social distancing, we have worked hard to keep our staff and students safe.
This week I was busy with my report on these protocols and it is with relief and satisfaction that I can report that, thus far, we have not had one positive case amongst our students. It is such a great relief to know we are all in good health! Our school is almost at full capacity and it is therefore essential that we follow the protocols with rigorous attention.
Student well-being is important to us. When they are emotionally healthy, they have the necessary foundation for academic stability and success. It is thus important that we as educators, as well as parents, are mindful of their wellbeing.
Here are a few ways we can promote student well-being:
- It is important that parents and educators check in with students and allow them to vocalize their feelings.
- Journaling their feelings is a good way of expressing how they feel, especially if they are not naturally talkative or open to sharing their feelings.
- We should equip them to be able to make choices. By allowing them to make choices, we are allowing them to take responsibility of their choices. This creates accountability in return.
- The old saying of “children should be seen and not heard” is a total no go! Children should be allowed to have a voice and express it. As adults we should teach them it is how they say things that is as important as what they are saying. Respect is key.
“Every day may not be good, but there is something good in every day!”- Author unknown
Have a wonderful weekend ahead.
Warm regards
Edna
Welcome to Term 4
The fourth term is always a busy and important one for both staff and students. Our Year 10, 12 and 13 students began their IGCSE and AS/A Level external examinations on the 29th of September 2020 with second language orals. We wish all our students the best of luck with their examinations.
It is also an important term for the rest of the High School as they will be writing their final internal examinations in November.
We wish everyone a productive and successful term.
Julian Harrison
Head of Academics High School
BIS Interact Club 2020 – Thank You
As the outgoing president of the Blouberg International School Interact Club, I would like to extend my gratitude to the BIS family. Despite the years’ immense regulations and restrictions, the support that we received from the staff, the parents and the students remained constant, if not increased.
At the start of the year we had a specific goal in mind: to support and empower people and children in need. It is no secret that 2020 has been an especially difficult and unfavourable year, and often in more ways than one. In spite of this, and because of this, we received hundreds of generous donations in aid of our initiatives.
The BIS Interact Club had 3 drives this year, the Bring-a-book Civvies Day, the second hand clothing drive as well as the sanitary pad drive. With the support of everyone in the school, we managed to collect over 1000 books, almost 800 items of clothing, 70 pairs of shoes and a box full of sanitary pads, diapers and underwear.
The books, that we collected earlier this year, were donated to the Vaatjie Moravian Primary school and the Sunshine Educare organisation. The proceeds from the clothing and sanitary pad drives were split between the Blouberg Rotaract Club and the Table View United Church for use in their outreach programs.
Good luck to the new Interact Board for the year ahead and please continue to support the Blouberg International School Interact Club in the coming years.
Katherine Lott
Secretary/Treasurer and Interact representative of the SRC 2020
BIS Interact club President 2020
The Final Week of Term 3 And A Special Thank You
One cannot help but wonder what happened to Term 3… the days and weeks have flown by so quickly. On Tuesday, 15th September 2020, we held our online Valedictory Service in which we celebrated the Year 12 class of 2020. The challenges of the recent months have perhaps been most taxing for the Year 12 class, and we recognise their resilience and determination. Congratulations to all the prize winners as well as our newly elected Student Representative Council.
Lastly, I want to express my sincere gratitude to you all. I want to thank each and every student, parent and teacher for all the hard work and effort that was put into this term. Without your dedication and hard work this wouldn’t have been possible.
Please look after yourselves during this holiday and we are looking forward to welcoming you back to the last term of 2020.
Julian Harrison
Head of Academics High School
(Photo: Class of 2020! *Masks removed for photographs only)
Is it a noun, or a verb? NO, it’s…
As a school student, I hated English Grammar. I mean, did we really have to know if the verb was in the past simple tense, if it was an irregular verb or an auxiliary verb? Then there is the question of definite and indefinite articles. Most of the children who have been in my class, will tell you that Mrs. Coetzer says “English is a crazy language: For every spelling rule, there is an exception. What about two sounds which sound the same but are spelled differently? Then there is the matter of homonyms and homophones.
In all sincerity, English is one of the most difficult languages to learn and yet it is used universally, and we use these parts of speech without even realizing it.
Thankfully, the grammar taught in Year 2 is still fairly simple. To explain the importance of learning what a noun is, I asked various students to me bring me a ‘thingy’. Obviously, they were totally confused and kept bringing me different items in the classroom, with me rejecting each one. They caught on quite quickly and asked me to name the items I wanted. I tried another experiment and read them a story, leaving out all the adjectives and adverbs. They all agreed, it was a boring story. After I read it again, with the adjectives and adverbs, they told me they could imagine the story in their heads.
So, it appears that these parts of speech do play an important role in the English language, after all. As I always tell my students, we need to paint a picture with our words.
Kim Coetzer
Year 2 Teacher
Nursery Creepy Crawly Fun
The Nursery class had so much fun learning about Creepy Crawlies and loved discovering and exploring the Creepy Crawly world.
This week:
- We learned about spiders, whilst enjoying singing “Incy Wincy Spider”.
- We also discovered that caterpillars turn into butterflies! We enjoyed reading the “Very Hungry Caterpillar” at story time.
- A great class activity was finding different insects hidden in the sand during their Sensory play this week and trying to name them all.
- For Art we made Butterfly handprints! They found it so funny and exciting to have their hands painted.
- We also enjoyed going for a walk out in our special garden to find insects.
Nursery Teacher
From the Principal’s Desk, 18 September 2020
Dear Parents
We have come to the end of term 3 and are looking forward to our holiday. On Wednesday, we had a great time having dinner with our Year 12 students. It was a privilege to end the term off celebrating them this week, with a Valedictory service as well as treating them to a dinner at the Gorgeous George hotel in the City Centre.
We finished our term having some fun recording the Jerusalema dance and what great fun we had, from the youngest year group to the teachers joining in.
I realized again how wonderful it is to be part of the Blouberg International family. As we prepare to take a break, I wish you all a wonderful time spent with family. May all the staff enjoy their break and come back refreshed and ready to finish the last term well.
Thank you for all your hard work and support throughout term 3. We look forward to welcoming you back next term.
Regards
Edna
WATCH: Jerusalema Blouberg International School
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From the Principal’s Desk, 21 August 2020
Dear Parents
As I was looking back through the school calendar for 2020, I was reminded of all the events we have missed over the past few months. We missed the Interactive Curriculum Morning in April, a bi-annual event where parents participate in an interactive learning experience in the classroom. This was also the first year we did not have our Grandparents/Someone Special Day. No school photos were taken in July and the SRC of 2020 had little chance to enact any of the plans they campaigned for.
However, do not despair! We are not going to let the rest of the year pass by without enjoying some of our annual celebrations. Planning is underway for a special Valedictory service for our matric students and even though the matric dance cannot follow the traditional format, that does not mean we don’t have something exciting up our sleeves! We also launched our first Virtual Open Day last week and this week, our very first Virtual Talent Show! We look forward to many entries for this competition as we know how creative and talented our students are.
There is always something to be grateful for and always something to look forward to! Where there is no vision, people perish. Blouberg International staff, students and parents are not without hope, vision, or innovation.
To our matric and year 10 students who started their prelim examinations this week, we wish you all the best and success ahead.
I wish you all a wonderful weekend filled with family time and much laughter.
Kind regards
Edna
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Das ist Deutsch = That is German
In German this term, the students in Year 1, 2 & 3 were welcomed to online learning each week with a greeting video and lesson. The students were able to feel right at home with the familiar animals who are always with me when I travel to their classroom at school. Anton der Affe (the monkey), Gerti die Giraffe (the giraffe) und Diddl die Maus (the mouse).
The greeting video included all the songs to say Hallo (hello) Guten Morgen (good morning) and Guten Tag (Good day), and to ask and answer the question Wie geht’s? (How are you?).
I asked the students each week to check the video to see if they could find anything new on the screen and to draw it on a piece of paper as a record of all the weeks. Then I would tell them all about the item from the previous week’s video.
Here are some of the items they found in the video; a shoe, a German soccer shirt, pens, rulers, pencils, Pritt glue stick, Aromat, pizza and a packet of sweets. These items introduced the famous German companies such as Adidas, Staedtler, Faber-Castell, Henkel, Knorr, Dr Oetker and Haribo. All products that we can buy in our local shops that are German.
We discussed celebrations in Germany around this time; Easter in Germany and made an Easter craft from the Hallo Anna Workbook. We learnt about the Maibaum (Maypole) festival that is celebrated in Germany to say goodbye to the winter and discovered that the Maikäfer (May Beetle) and Marienkäfer (ladybug) are all symbols of hope in Germany, that the summer and warm weather is near.
We were surprised about the fact that Fanta was invented in Germany and that the word originates from the words Fantasie (imagination) and Fantastisch (fantastic) and we were disappointed that Nutella and Kinder chocolate are not produced by a German company, but yet are part of the German culture. The chocolate even has a German name Kinder meaning children.
As a task to end the term, I asked the students to send in a picture that they had made or a photo of themselves and any of the German products. Thank you, it was Fantastisch to see your smiling faces and the German products. I could see that Dr Oetker pizzas, Aromat on popcorn and Haribo might just become a favourite in your home.
At the end of every lesson we sing Auf Wiedersehen (Goodbye), bis bald (see you soon) to all the animals. We have learnt that the words in German do not just say ‘Goodbye’ but that it always has a hope in it that we will see each other again, and I hope Klasse (Year) 1,2, & 3, that I will see you again soon. I am really looking forward to it.
Auf Wiedersehen, bis bald!
Frau Kerstin Pani
German Teacher Primary School
