BIC Sa Porrassa Primary Weekly News (3/19/21)

Dear families,

We are delighted to invite you to our next upcoming BIC Connect webinar for parents about Internet Safety on Thursday 25th March at 5.30pm. It is known that internet safety around young people has become a concern in recent years. At BIC we are committed to protecting our students and providing them with knowledge and understanding of the online environment, to keep them safe and to make them aware of the positive as well as negative effects of its usage.

As part of this programme, the school has organised an afternoon for all our students in school, which includes important activities that will give them different perspectives and will teach them how to use technology correctly.

Our parents' collaboration in this is vital, and we trust that you will work together with us to keep our children safe. The aim of this webinar is to talk about how best you can support your sons and daughters in understanding the impact of technology and to give you useful advise on different tools and systems which will enable your children to be protected whilst surfing.

At the end of the webinar, we will be holding an interactive Q&A session where you will be able to ask any questions you may have as well as share ideas that you think may help.

In order to register for the webinar please click here: A Parent Webinar - Internet Safety

We look forward to welcoming you all.

Kind regards

Next Thursday afternoon the whole school will be pausing the curriculum in order to focus our attention on safety, the internet, student wellbeing and kindness.

There are an array of awareness activities arranged and we are really looking forward to an impactful and thought provoking experience for all our students on such important topics. Children will need to bring some ´´cosy socks´´ to school on that day ready for the afternoon!

A parent webinar will be held after school so please join us to find out more about online safety and how you can support your children from home.

Following on from the success of Book Week, Year 3 students wrote to our visiting author, Clive Pig to thank him for his virtual visit. We were so pleased to receive his reply!

A reminder that on Monday 29th and Tuesday 30th March we will host virtual Primary Parent Teacher Meetings. This is an opportunity to discuss your child's academic learning so far this year with their form and specialist teachers.

Appointments, which will be virtual, can be selected from 4.10 pm and will run until 6.10 pm. As it is a video conferencing system it will limit you to an 8 minute appointment. It will not allow you to overrun, and at the end of the time slot, the teacher will ´move´ to their next appointment.

You can book appointments, from now, for your preferred times on the following portal:

https://balearesinternational.schoolcloud.co.uk

You will need your Parent Portal user account to login to make a booking. Please contact parentportal@balearesint.net for any technical issues.

Once you have logged in you will see the option to book appointments with your child's teacher. Once you have booked your appointment you should receive an email that includes a link to the event. Details on how to make your appointments are attached.

Aside from our set parent meeting dates, all our teachers and myself are available at any time to meet with you to discuss your child. Please email the relevant teacher to make an appointment.

Ms Compton

Head of Primary

In Year 1 the children have been working hard to shape and create character descriptions. The children were also very interested in finding out about our local area when we went on a trip to see what is in the area around our school.

This week in art, Year 2 started preparing for Easter by making sun-catchers and creating Easter Baskets.

We were very lucky with the weather and enjoyed sport in the sunshine. The children love suggesting warm up activities and showing off their skills.

During Circle Time, Year 2 have been using emoji dice to talk about feelings. We enjoyed trying to pull the same face as the one it had landed on, before talking about a time when we felt that way.

Year 2 have been learning about absorbency in science this week. They carried out an investigation in which they had to mop up a puddle of spilt water. They had to test a number of different materials to see which were the best at mopping up the water. As a result of this investigation, they found out which materials are absorbent and which are non-absorbent.

In Mrs Bakes’ maths group, the children went shopping! They had to buy a number of items around the classroom which were labelled with different prices. They then had to find out the change they would receive from 10€ and 20€. Please encourage your child to help you work out how much change you should receive next time you go shopping!

In science, Year 3 are learning about fruits and seeds and how seeds are dispersed.

Firstly, we examined a range of fruits and identified the different seeds. We had fun using a magnifying glass to take a closer look at the samples.

Next we matched up images of a range of fruits and trees with their corresponding seeds and then classified them into seeds we eat and seeds we do not eat.

We then went on to complete observational drawings, identifying the skin, flesh and seed for each fruit.

In English this week we have continued to learn about letter writing.

On Monday, we learned about formal and informal letters - comparing examples and highlighting the different language used in each letter.

Then, in the following English lesson we listed ideas for and against the school uniform which we used to support our writing of a persuasive letter to Ms Colwell. Some students argued for school uniforms and others against. Watch this space to find out more!

On Monday, it was Pi Day so we completed tasks to explore what makes a perfect circle. Mrs West’s maths group have been learning about right angles and the children used a monster angle measurer to find perfect corners around the classroom. We have also been sorting 2D shapes based on their properties.

...and last but not least we also finished off our weaving art project. Year 3 were very impressed with how they turned out.

We started the week with International Maths Day and thoroughly enjoyed learning about diameter and circumference and investigating patterns within circles.

It was time for our next topic in science too, Sound! A sound walk around the school grounds encouraged us to really open our ears and listen. Paper ear trumpets helped too and we were able to identify loud and soft sounds.

In class, we have been identifying the different learning styles that suit us best (visual, auditory or kinesthetic) and so those of use with a preference for movement while learning particularly loved acting out how sound travels through our ears.

Our studies in English have taken us to the magical world of myths and legends and we have loved listening to and reading stories from each category and learning the differences between them. Acting out a legend from China, The Magic Paintbrush, was lots of fun and helped us to appreciate the structure of this type of story.

This week, Mrs AM´s maths class enjoyed learning how to read and plot coordinates. They created a giant coordinates grid on the playground and, in teams, collected points hidden under the coordinates. A great way to practise how to read coordinates.

Year 5 thoroughly enjoyed Pi Day, using string to investigate the relationship between the diameter of a circle and its circumference and discovering lots of other amazing things that can be done in circles.

The students were excited to put their parachutes to the test, launching them from the landing to investigate air resistance and drag. They were surprised which ones took the longest to land - not necessarily the ones they predicted!

Icy Antarctic landscapes and the fascinating biography of the intrepid polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton

Year 6 had a wonderful transition morning experiencing the delights of Secondary school. They were so excited to participate in exciting lessons on democracy, business, Shakespeare and many other fascinating subjects. They were especially thrilled to wear a lab coat and partake in some amazing experiments.

As part of their classification topic, the students have been learning about unicellular organisms. Yesterday they enjoyed making predictions about bacterial and fungal populations. Our results will be published next week!

To celebrate Pi Day on Monday, we enjoyed drawing, measuring and calculating with circles. Check out our fantastic art when joining lines of different lengths inside a blank clock face!

Our fantastic Year 2 students have been learning about the parts of the body in Spanish. They have mastered the topic through visuals, written activities and songs. At the end of the topic they have done a closed book test with amazing results -accurate grammar and impressive spelling ¡Excelente!

This week we are excited to see entries coming in for our current competition ´The Movie Competition´. We can't wait to see what your favourite films are and how you choose to recreate a scene! Remember - the challenge is to recreate one scene in one minute with no editing or special effects - we want to see you using your creativity. For each student there are 2 House points to gain for entering, as well as 5 points for 3rd place, 7 for second and 10 for winning. That is per student - so if you choose to work with other students in your House you could make a huge difference to the leader board by winning!

I am so pleased that this week I was selected to be part of our popular ´teacher feature´. Even since moving into school leadership, I am and always will be a teacher. Working with students or teachers to develop and improve is my passion and, since a young age, it was one of the only two careers I wanted to do. My second choice was joining the army, something that my school supported me with through attending a cadets training program and even taking me to jump out of my first ever aeroplane just after my 16th birthday!

To be sure of my decision I decided to leave the very small farm I grew up on in England and see the world, actually the other side of it! I was offered a job to spend a year in New Zealand as a learning support assistant and after one week I knew this was for me. I returned to England, attended university and completed my PGCE teacher training. For several years I trained and worked in home schooling programmes for children with autism and inclusive British education has always been extremely important to me.

Many of you know I joined BIC from Shanghai, China where I was working in the leadership team of a prestigious international school with over 1000 students. This was a wonderful experience. However, on the day I flew over from China to Mallorca and remember the moment when I visited the school, I knew it was the place I wanted to continue my career. My international experience in Thailand, China and Spain (Valencia) has given me many opportunities and ideas to share here at BIC. Even though we have had a short pause due to the global pandemic I am so proud to be working with such an experienced group of teachers and leaders with our goal to make this the best school on the island.

I loved and continue to love school, and the challenges it brings, and I am sure that like me you also remember and have never forgotten those teachers who shaped and inspired you. This is my commitment to you and your children that we continuously work to ensure they also have a love of learning and a school experience to prepare them for a bright future, to be the best version of themselves and to achieve greatness.

Looking to the near future, my husband Vicente and I are very excited and really looking forward to the birth of our son this June, and would like to thank all the families and students for their kind messages and support.

We are delighted to share with you further information about our collaboration with Cineciutat Nins, located in the heart of Palma.

https://www.cineciutat.org/en.

- We are a cinema and sometimes theatre. We are a school and we are memories. We are ideas and innovation. We are culture. We are non-profit and self-managed by its members. #morethanacinema - Cineciutat -

Following last term's success, Cineciutat will be holding another Movie Morning for all of our parents and children next Sunday 28th March at 11:00. The screening will be "Snail and the Whale + We're going on a Bear Hunt".

We kindly invite you to join us for this fantastic concept and to share with your family and friends.

• Sunday 28th March at 11:00am - Snail and the Whale + We're going on a Bear Hunt – Tickets available HERE

Tickets are available online under the following link: Tickets available HERE

We look forward to seeing you all there.