BIC Sa Porrassa Primary Weekly News (5/28/21)

Dear families,

Last week we celebrated and showcased all the excellent outside learning that went on during Outdoor Classroom Day. So inspired were our staff and children that we are going to continue this as often as possible! We have long held lessons outside whenever we can here at BIC, making use of our extensive space and the warm weather, but we are now formalising this with "Fresh Air Friday", when each week we will endeavour, weather permitting, to teach outside for much of the day. As Ms Hodgson wrote so powerfully about last week, research supports how learning outside not only provides wonderful opportunities for learning across many subjects, but also, "supports children's holistic development. Outdoor learning is used in various formats to support children's personal, social and emotional development." As outdoor learning environments are less structured and formal than classroom environments, it allows, "more physical activity and it has been shown to impact children's educational attainment positively." Talking of the outside, our wonderful pool should be ready for use any time now and we intend to celebrate its opening! Secondary students are now also eating their lunch outside, a move that went down extremely well with our young people. Let's hope all this talk of the outside doesn't tempt fate and bring rain!

As we approach the end of the school year, inevitably some colleagues may move on. We will be sad to say farewell to Mr Cunningham, who has decided after 5 years at BIC to take on a new challenge in a school that is closer to home - the imminent arrival of his first child has aided this decision. As babies are unpredictable, we wanted to bid him a fond farewell sooner rather than later, as he could be dashing off any day to start his paternity leave! However, I am delighted to tell you that we have managed to make two outstanding appointments to fill his dual sets of shoes. The reputation of the school and the calibre of our staff meant that I had a lot of extremely strong applicants for the history and politics role we advertised. Gilli Hawksworth who you can read about further down comes with an outstanding CV and experience, teaching in one of the UK's best performing schools. In addition, to continue the teaching for students for whom English is an additional language, I am absolutely delighted that Lucy Cruttenden will be joining the teaching team full time next year. Lucy is a fantastic teacher, whose versatility and skills have been much appreciated over this year, and who, like Ms Hawksworth, has an outstanding record in teaching in prestigious schools in the UK.

Wishing you a happy weekend,

Alison Colwell

Principal

Dear families,

As you will have read in Ms Colwell´s piece this week, following on from the success of outdoor learning day, we will continue to further children's outdoor experiences and learning with ´Fresh Air Fridays´. We are pleased that all our learners but especially younger children spend plenty of time outside whilst continuing with high standards of teaching and learning.

Learning outdoors has also inspired my theme for our primary assemblies this week as so many students were fascinated by watching ants at work on our grounds. I myself am still fascinated by ants dragging food more than ten or twenty times their size across varying terrain and obstacles! I often think they will give up, however, they keep going, sometimes pausing or stopping working individually or until another ant steps in to support. Their persistence is fascinating and I shared with the children some life lessons we can learn from some of the smallest creatures on Earth.

Firstly by focussing in more detail on our surroundings and being reflective . In particular we discussed the following ´´ant qualities´´ that we look for within our students at BIC:

• hardworking

• strong

• motivated

• good at planning and organising

• good team-workers

• persistent

This week the Head of House and the Sports Director have been working hard to make the final arrangements for Sports Day. It is going to be a fantastic fun filled day for all. Next week the Head of House will meet with their teams to complete the sign up sheets for the different events.

The children really enjoyed researching about a different county to find information for making their own travel guides.

In science this week Year 2 carried out an investigation to see which conditions were the best for growing cress seeds. We thought very carefully about how to make this a fair test.

In art we have finished off our vases; we are very proud of them. Our final layer of papier-mâché included maps of the world and photos of the explorers and adventurers that we have been learning about in our humanities lessons. We then filled them with beautiful tissue paper flowers and sprayed them with perfume to make them even more realistic.

In English, Year 3 used drama to explore the characters in our class text ‘Stone Age Boy’. The children created short scenes exploring the inner emotions of the boy, who was transported into the Stone Age.

In PE this week we have been practising relay races ready for Sports Day. We had lots of fun racing in Houses and cheering for our team.

Have a look how Year 3 have been studying the fossils during Science!

3W loved their cave painting experience this week. They have learnt about different Stone Age animals and they tried to replicate them with paint, whilst immersed in a cave setting.

This week in topic 3X learned about carved idols. We studied the Shigir Idol which is the oldest known wooden sculpture in the world, made during the Mesolithic period, shortly after the end of the last Ice Age. The wood it was carved from is approximately 12,000 years old. We then designed our own carved idol inspired by the Shigir idol.

As we continue with our English text, The Witches by Roald Dahl, we have learned more and more about “real witches”. Did you know they are bald creatures that wear terribly itchy wigs, hence their need to scratch constantly? Apparently they can wear normal clothes and work in normal jobs! Their square feet necessitate wearing pointy shoes, just like many of the teachers. The children had a lot of fun writing interview questions for a witchophile - a witch expert. We then role played them to see if they felt informative enough. Some of us are clearly destined for jobs in front of the camera! In the process, we learned about closed and open ended questions too. Take a look at some of our future TV talent in their videos.

The children were “buzzing” with excitement as we progressed further through our science unit on electricity. After some “illuminating” discussion about electrical safety, they then moved onto the practical element of science; testing real circuits with light bulbs, switches and buzzers. So lovely to hear squeals of excitement as they light the bulb or make the motor turn!

Music is also a much anticipated lesson. We continue to grasp the chords of the ukulele and we have now learnt 3 chords. We are beginning to sound more tuneful! Practice makes perfect.

This week Year 5 have begun their project based learning on their chosen aspect of the humanities subject ´Changes in the Twentieth Century´. Project based learning is an inquiry-based method in which students learn by actively engaging in real-world and personally meaningful projects. The pupils have thought carefully about how they will research and present their findings, some have focused on the science perspective and others on the art.

Year 6 have continued with their fantastic work on plate boundaries. They were asked to show their creativity by videoing a demonstration to showcase their understanding.

This year is the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo and we will be marking the event by having our very own BIC Olympics. It will take place during the week commencing 14th June and all of our students across school from the very smallest to our very oldest will have the opportunity to take part.

Throughout the week there will be an opportunity for students to compete in their Houses across a range of sports. Each event will gain House points to decide which House is the overall BIC Olympic champion. The marquee event of the week will be the athletics which will take place on the school track on Thursday for key stage 1, and throughout the day on Friday for key stages 2, 3 and 4.

Students are encouraged to come to school on the day of their event wearing their normal PE kit but with a t-shirt in the colour of their House.

We are looking forward to showing you all of the brilliant work done by our students during the week in the newsletter on Friday 18th June.

Rainy P.E day consisted of fitness activities, getting our students’ heart rate up and they loved every minute of it!

Students got the opportunity to use a combination of fitness tests from accredited programmes to track their fitness level throughout their elementary experience. It can also help students understand how healthy they are and learn to set goals to improve their health-related fitness. We found it a fantastic method to explore their self-motivation through short, unique physical activities.

Great work everyone!

WE ARE DELIGHTED TO SHARE DETAILS OF AN EXCITING OPPORTUNITY FOR YOUR SON/DAUGHTER TO TAKE PART IN KIDS RACE, HALF MARATHON MAGALUF 2021.

ON FRIDAY 25th OF JUNE, STARTING AT 6.30PM ON ATHLETICS TRACK IN MAGALUF

Online free registrations to the race until 24th of June 11 pm. https://sportmaniacs.com/es/services/inscription/kids-run-hmm-2021

• Day: 25th of June
• Place: Athletics track Magaluf

Schedules:

• 6.30pm Collective warm-up

• 7pm Race starts

Distances:

Online free registrations to the race until 24th of June 11 pm here: https://sportmaniacs.com/es/services/inscription/kids-run-hmm-2021 .

ATENTION: On-site registration can be done 1 hour before the start of the races, as long as the registrations are not sold out.

GENERAL INFORMATION FOR THE KIDS RUN HALF MARATHON MAGALUF

A fun race that aims to promote the practice of physical activity among children in the municipality of Calvià and the surrounding area. Sport allows us to promote values such as effort, social integration, solidarity, collaboration, fair play, respect, among others, without forgetting the intrinsic social component it has.

It should be noted that this race is part of the Half Marathon Magaluf 2021 event.

FEATURES:

Gifts and prizes for all the participants

All the athletes will have race insurance.

Athletes up to 6 years old must be accompanied by their parents.

To enter this fantastic creative project we are asking you to use your creativity and produce a unique piece of art that reflects the natural world. This could be drawing, painting, sculpture, craft. If what you produce is not possible to bring to school. No Problem! Simply bring in some photos of your finished piece! The closing date for entries is the 9th June, when all entries must be brought to school. Winners will be chosen from EY and KS1, KS2, KS3, KS4 and KS5.

Good Luck!

I am incredibly excited to be joining the team and international community at BIC in September.

Currently living in Switzerland, I graduated from Liverpool John Moores University with a BA (Hons) in Human Geography and a PGCE in Secondary Education from the University of Sheffield. I have spent most of my career teaching in Devon and was a well established History teacher at Torquay Girls’ Grammar School. I am passionate about the role humanities subjects play in the school curriculum, enabling students to understand their local and global communities and equipping them with the skills to become active and responsible citizens. I can’t wait to meet the students at BIC next term and discover what inspires them to be great learners.

I will be moving to Mallorca with my family and our German Pointer. We look forward to being part of a diverse international community and making the most of all the island has to offer. Having lived in Devon for many years, I am a keen paddle boarder and love being near the sea, although I’m looking forward to it being several degrees warmer!

I´m known to many students already at BIC as I´ve been teaching EAL, business and languages this year and I'm delighted to be continuing in a full-time role next year! I hold a BA(Hons) from Exeter University and a Maîtrise from Grenoble III. I have spent most of my career teaching in the UK, but have also worked in France and run my own business. Having moved to Mallorca last year, I'm fully aware of the challenges our EAL students face on a daily basis as I`m trying hard to make progress in learning Spanish! When I`m not in the classroom I love to spend time with my family making the most of the fantastic walks in the mountains or relaxing at the beach.

Dear parents and guardians,

It is with mixed feelings of sadness, and excitement for ‘pastures new’, that after my paternity leave in June, I will not be returning to BIC in September. It has been a real delight and honour to have been a part of the BIC community these past four and a half years, and I leave with many fond, lifelong memories of your children, yourselves, and my astounding, hard-working colleagues. It has been a pleasure, and a very humbling experience to know that I have helped your children grow as individuals; nurturing them, helping them, guiding them in this stage of their lives, in the knowledge that hopefully, they will one day be the change in the world, seizing the opportunities that lie ahead, in which myself and BIC have prepared them for. I truly do wish yourselves, your children, and the school all the best for the future and I leave you with my own school motto - Ad Vitam - to life.