Primary School News - Block 1

What a brilliant start to the school year! This first Block has been packed with action and excitement for everyone to take part in, including our many new students, parents and staff that have joined BISL this year.

The theme of this block focused on Maths, with lots of activities and competitions being set up across the whole school to promote and encourage mental maths, problem solving, estimation and many other mathematical skills. Creative skills were put to the test through tessellations - reflecting patterns - found in the school, created by students. Students and teachers were also eager to eat some Pi (or was it Pie?), which they baked themselves during our fantastic Mega Maths Morning.

This year, BISL students will have a chance to be involved in the unique, global, multi-award winning MyMachine project, an initiative that fosters creativity in education. Our students will participate in the project through Science clubs, as well as through project-based learning as part of the curriculum throughout the year. We look forward to seeing our students' inventions develop from ideas to designs and final working prototypes, with the help of partnering technical colleges in Slovenia.

Early Years concluded the block with a student-led presentation for parents to show the songs, rhymes and dances they have been learning. For some of the students, it was their first time performing in front of a big audience and they did a fantastic job.

Our Year 1 students helped the C4C with their efforts to clean our environment by investigating waste from their everyday snack boxes and creating 4 separate classroom bins to reduce, reuse and recycle their everyday waste.

Treasure was the topic in Year 2 and students were able to explore treasures as Pirates, looking at a range of designs on coins and having a go at creating their own designs, ready for their treasure chests.

Year 3 created their own islands as part of their topic learning. The project involved understanding topographical and human features of an island, fabulous creative and artistic skills, and tonnes of teamwork.

Our Year 4 students finished their Trade topic by organising a market with student-led business stalls. A veritable cornucopia of goods and services was on display: including homemade soap, face masks and jewellery. Jokes and magic were also on sale to cheer up any weary customers.

The Year 5 class read and learned about Myths during their English lessons, while comparing the system of government in Ancient Athens and Sparta as part of their topic learning. Some acting skills came handy in inferring personalities of different characters from the text and the students created a comic book strip of the Persian War too.

Our Year 6 classes investigated ways in which to promote books and make a best-seller during English. For their Geography task, students conducted research about their local land: buildings, landmarks, maps and notable features, such as bridges and rivers. One of our students initiated contact with the city council, which provided some good links and old pictures from WW1 to help with the writing assignment.

The Primary EAL Programme is up and running and students are eagerly expanding their English skills, helping them to integrate into the mainstream classes. Improving writing, speaking and listening skills has also been the focus for other language departments: French and Slovene. The European Day of Languages was celebrated on 26th September to highlight the advantages of learning in a multicultural environment and the importance of lifelong language learning.

In aid of supporting World Clean Up Day on the 21st of September, the Primary C4C (Caring for the Community) cleaned up the litter around the school grounds. They talked to all students about the importance of recycling and cleaning up our oceans and our Year 1s designated 4 separate bins to reduce, reuse and recycle their everyday waste!

The Music Department kept our ears in tune through the ‘Guess The Tune’ competition. Well done to all the winners in the first block.

In Block 2 we look forward to the Ljubljana Marathon on the 26th October, in which students, parents and staff will participate to promote the school and cheer those that take on the challenge of completing 3.150m Fun Run!

For upcoming events, please see ourcalendar, or browse through our weekly newsletters for details.

With best wishes,

Katarina Železinger

Head of Primary School