Primary Newsletter - 16th December

Dear Parents and Students,

We have come to the end of Term 1 and it has been an exciting week, full of festivities, competitions and performances for the whole BISL community to enjoy.

After two student performances, the Peter Pan cast dazzled the parents on Monday with another wonderful performance. Thank you to all the cast involved for putting together such amazing entertainment.

The Y4 students and parents practised some dance moves and put together a fun Xmas dance routine this week, displaying talent across generations!

Thank you to all parents, students and teachers for the BISL Xmas Fayre on Thursday, with lots of activities, games and goodies to eat and enjoy. Santa came to visit and was pleased to find out how good everyone has been this term.

The Library Club organised a bake sale and raised some funds for the library resources, with students providing home-baked cupcakes. A huge thank you to all.

We concluded the week with a Primary Assembly to celebrate student achievements this term. Well done to all students for their hard work and a special congratulations to those receiving special awards for their exemplary work in the class, as well as, progress and contribution to specialist subjects and the Bebras competition.

The Parent-Teacher Interviews have been organised and information sent out on how to make your bookings via the School Cloud. Please read the interview guide carefully, as logging in requires specific information.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all the families a Merry Christmas and all the best for the New Year! Don’t forget to listen to the BISL Does I wish it could be a Christmas involving students and staff. We look forward to seeing you back on Wednesday 4th January 2023.

With best wishes,

Katarina Železinger Head of Primary

Early Years

In the Early Years, we concluded our learning about homes and houses in style! The students have created an enormous house that fits all the children. First, they taped together the cardboard boxes and then hardened them with the paper mache technique.

The Reception student used their knowledge of letter formation of sounds they have learned through the block and wrote a letter to Santa. To send more than one letter, students created a mailbox that would be sent directly to the north pole.

We understand that Santa is a very busy man, so the Early Years students learnt different techniques to wrap a present depending on the size and shape of the toy to help Santa.

Our youngest students decorated a Christmas stocking template that they hang under the window, which will hopefully get filled with our favourite sweets over the holidays.

Ms Kukovica

Year 1

Year 1 started the week off by making Christmas decorations with the help of our parents! In English lessons, we continued with instruction writing for making a toast and then got into some imaginative writing about a snowman. In Maths, we continued to practice making different amounts with euro coins. In Topic lessons, this week we focused on getting our game of ‘pin the nose’ ready for the Christmas Fayre. We even had a Secret Santa exchange, listened to a festive story read by our principal, Mr Cox and took part in the Christmas Fayre.

Ms Miklavec

Year 2

The children have reaped the rewards of all their hard work this block in English. Every child in our class has written their own Limerick utilising their skills in understanding rhyme, rhythm, syllables and the structure of limericks. We are currently showcasing Year 2’s writing skills on our display board for all in the school to see.

Ms Torrington

Year 3A

This week for Topic lessons, children created a 3D Island Diorama in teams. They used a range of materials: paper, cardboard, feathers, tissue paper, newspapers etc.

They then proceeded to tape, glue and place the materials to form a Volcanic, continental, or artificial island.

Ms Blundell

Year 3B

Year 3B had a very busy week. Every spare minute was used to create - decorations, ornaments, games, posters, and an island diorama. Children worked on the Christmas fayre preparations, while working on their final Topics projects. Occasional outbursts of acapella Christmas singing kept the mood high and the crafting going.

Ms Spangl

Year 4

Year 4 had a fantastic week. We really enjoyed celebrating Christmas and all of the festivities. On Tuesday, we had a dance workshop with parents, we had so much fun and we loved having the parents in school join us in dancing.

We were able to create some Christmas crafts with Eva, our year 6 prefect, which was great. To end the week, Year 4 led the Primary assembly, where they recited their poetry and sang 'Jingle Bells'. We had a great week and we are looking forward to what's in store for next year.

Ms Harris

Year 5

Wow! What a festive and fun week.

The children have had fun making Christmas cards and preparing for the Christmas Fayre which was a huge success. Thank you to everyone who helped with the stall. The class loved exchanging their secret Santa gifts and playing games at our Christmas party to end the week. On Friday, Year 5 were in their festive spirit and enjoying their last day of school I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Mrs Thomas-Hayes

Year 6

As the end of term one approaches, the year 6 students at BISL have been busy in their literacy lessons, learning about how to create powerful arguments. In recent lessons, we have discussed the use of pejorative language and the importance of avoiding bias in our arguments. For the end-of-term assignment, we asked the students to imagine a world where animals are in charge of running things and to come up with powerful arguments speaking on their behalf. This interesting and thought-provoking assignment has already generated some great ideas, and we can't wait to see what the students come up with next. As we look forward to the end of term one and the start of the holiday season, we wish everyone at BISL a happy Christmas.

Mr Kokalj

PE

Across primary PE this week we concluded our different sporting units with some competitive gameplaying scenarios. Year 3 and Year 4 took part in a volleyball tournament, focusing on being able to compete fairly in teams. Year 5 and Year 6 finished their invasion games unit with competitive Swedish handball and football games.

The PE department would like to wish all BISL students a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

PE Department

Slovene

What an inspirational and creative end of Term 1 for Year 5 and 6 students at the Slovene Foundation group! The same as last year, our students are collaborating with the Slovene public school OŠ Šmarje pri Jelšah. Students made and wrote Christmas cards to each other, where they introduced themselves and wished "vesel božič in srečno novo leto". We all are looking forward to our next projects!

Ms Drofenik

Y3/4 were busy this week with making Christmas cards.

Each student also added a thank you note to their parents. Some tears are around the corner!

Ms Kotnik

EAL

EAL this week was all about using adjectives. Younger groups practised adjectives opposite adjectives by listening to the song Open shut them and then connected the adjectives to their opposites by cutting and pasting.

Mr Siter

Creative arts block:

PETER PAN:

This week the students who participated in Peter Pan performed their final performance to parents on Monday, which was a roaring success, even though sadly some members of the cast were off sick. The cast did an amazing job and should be super proud of themselves.

Students who participated were treated to a special cake to congratulate them. Well done to all of those involved, from students to teachers, admin and parents. Here are some of the amazing pictures from the day.

In other news, the whole school Christmas video ‘I wish it could be Christmas every day’ will receive its debut in the Friday assembly.

See the video here.

A big thank you to Mr Hulse for his hard work and to all who participated to make it a success. Keep your eyes and ears peeled for its public debut.

Thank you to Ewa for performing at the Christmas Fayre and to Kristina and Ewa for their performances in the Christmas assembly.

Performing Arts Team

Library Club

Thank you to the amazing Library club and some helpers from Year 6 who organised a bake sale and raised 55 euros for some new books for the Library.

You worked so well as a team and you always do your best to keep the Library nice for the whole school.

Mrs Thomas-Hayes

We made it to the end of the term!

We hope you enjoyed the Christmas fayre on Thursday. The children and the teachers did an amazing job representing their classes at the event, we saw so many fun activities in both assembly halls. And the BISL/PTA tombola was a big hit, with some of you winning super prizes like Swarovski jewellery, ‘Meet your favourite animal at the zoo’ ticket, headphones etc. We want to thank everyone that donated items for the event, and a special thank you from the PTA team to Tjaša and Katja from the admissions office, we couldn’t have done it without you! And, of course, a big thank you to all the PTA volunteers who made it happen. We wish you all merry holidays and we hope to see you soon at a PTA coffee.

Your PTA team