Primary News - 25. april 2022

Dear Parents and Students,

As part of the Science Block, various educational and fun activities, competitions and projects have been planned for students across the school. Students can showcase their artistic and writing skills by creating a rocket, a piece of art or an essay on environmental issues. This week, students talked about Earth Day during their assembly and how all of us can take action to support climate and other environmental changes. The second-hand clothes collection at BISL has been organised to promote awareness.

Please see more information on how to take part in the sections below. Next week, primary and secondary students have the opportunity to meet different exotic animals, learn about them and even touch them if they wish, which we are looking forward to with great excitement.

Next week, students will be taking their class photos that will be published in the Yearbook along with students’ personal pieces of work and other fantastic events of this year. The Yearbook will be available in digital version to all of the BISL community. Dates for the photos will be announced in the weekly emails home from your child’s Class Teacher. Please double-check that your child is wearing a full uniform and looks smart.

International Day celebrations are coming up in 20 days! See our website for more information on this and other events. Events will take place on the 12th and 13th of May and include an opening parade, an outdoor fair organised by the PTA, and various performances from students as well as visitors. If you would like to get involved and represent your country, please contact the PTA at pta@britishschool.si or through Classlist.

Last, but certainly not least, we wish to bring attention to the article to celebrate the excellent English provision at BISL, which enables students across the entire school from EY to Year 13 to successfully develop their English. With over 90% of our students having English as an additional language, we can be incredibly proud of their success from joining with sometimes no/very little English to confidently building friendships, interacting with others, participating in class and becoming independent learners.

Please see the sections below for more exciting news from classes and subject departments. As always, you can keep up with the latest News and Events, including the Update from the Principal for important weekly updates.

Have a great weekend.

Kind regards,

Katarina Železinger, Head of Primary

Early Years

Our Early Years students have had a fantastic week!

The children were learning to describe their favourite minibeasts while creating minibeast pictures using natural materials and practising new vocabulary in the insect garden small world. Looking for bugs in the playground area has undoubtedly been one of the favourite activities for many early-year students. It was exciting to see so many kinds of minibeasts crawling, flying, and creeping around through our garden.

We have learned about how important it is to take care of our gardens, hence we did a litter pick around the outside area to make sure all the minibeasts stay safe. For all creepy crawls in our garden, our carrying students built a minibeasts hotel made out of natural resources found on the playground..

Ms Kukovica

Year 1

This week we had a look at another fantasy story, Aliens in Underpants Save the World. We spoke about using adjectives or wow words to describe the aliens in this very silly story. In Math lessons, we have been using our counting friends the spider and the fly to add and subtract 10,11 and 12 from 2 digit numbers on the number square.

As you can see from the pictures, we became quite the investigators this week! We placed cress seeds in three different conditions to find out where they will grow best. We check them every day and can hardly believe how quickly they grow! We also had a brilliant time during the game Miss Klara prepared for us!

Ms Miklavec

Year 2

Another great week in Year 2! In English, we have written our own fantasy stories and there have been some excellent ones.

In Maths, we have been looking at capacity and did some fun water experiments outside to really learn about millilitres and litres. In Topic, we have looked at water bodies in Slovenia.

We are very sad to say goodbye to the wonderful Miss Klein, our student teacher this week. She has been fantastic and we are all going to miss her.

Ms Harris and Mrs Fordham

Year 3

This week Year 3 went exploring in the rain rainforest… from the comfort of our classroom, to make some great observational drawings of fruiting plants.

Did you know that even lemons and peppers originated from the rainforest? We do!

Ms Blundell and Mr Kokalj

Year 4

EXPLANATION TEXTS IN YEAR 4

Students in Year 4 have been learning about Explanation Texts as a genre of writing - how or why a process occurs (or how something happens). They have been looking at the features of a good Explanation Text: catered to the audience, catchy title, introduction to grab the readers' attention, scientific vocabulary, causal language, present tense, time connectives, diagrams with arrows to show how the process happens (this could use, a series of logical steps, a reversible step, more than one cause, cycle).

To celebrate Earth Day, the Year 4 students have created Explanation Texts on "How we, as a race, are destroying our Earth", and what we can do to save it. What will you do to help our planet?

Mrs Charlesworth

Year 5

Year 5 has had a great week. The children planned, took part, and evaluated many Science investigations. They tested both air and water resistance to see which had the most impact with different vehicles. The class also celebrated Earth Day and researched sustainable energy.

The class also said goodbye to Mr Knechten who has been a big help in class for the last 9 weeks. We wish him lots of luck in his future.

Mrs Thomas

Year 6

Year 6 students have started planning their short films this week. They will be writing their own screenplays, filming then editing the movies, which will be shown to primary students, and an awards ceremony will take place as student votes are collected after the viewings.

We watched last year's high-quality films produced by the Y4 students to provide motivation for this year's film production crews.

Needless to say, the class is bursting with excitement about this new project, and I can't wait to see the final films in Block 7.

Mr Bishop

Slovene

Years 1 and 2 have been learning about Slovenian landmarks through a wide range of activities. Their favourite one was guessing the landmarks drawn by several classmates. Students liked this guessing game indeed and I liked the fact that they were able to memorise landmarks so quickly, especially gora (mountain) and slap (waterfall).

Afterwards, they were ready to create their own postcards with a meaningful message and a lovely photo of their favourite landmark on the other side. Who knows to whom they will address these postcards ...

Zelo dobro 1 and 2. Kar tako naprej.

Ms Košec

Slovene Advanced

Year 2 students were working hard this week, exploring time sequences. Students looked at different pictures and observed what happened before, now and later. After that, they had to make sentences about different events. They showed some great knowledge about dandelions, fruit and vegetables.

Ms Kotnik

PE

Throughout our PE lessons this week, we continued to develop our technical and tactical understanding of our designated sporting units. Years 1 and 2 were introduced to the concept of moving an opponent into space when playing nitroball/lobster ball, whilst Years 3 and 4 explored formations on the pitch when playing football, when both attacking and defending. Years 5 and 6 continued their floor hockey unit, looking at the techniques involved when shooting and then implemented them in competitive game scenarios.

PE Department

We are halfway through the Science block and with so many things going on we wanted to summarise them for you, all in one place.

Here is a list of projects and competitions students can get involved with:

1. Art in Science - Submit a piece of art (drawing, painting, photograph, sculpture..) for the art exhibition titled “Does art imitate life or does life imitate art?” Hand it to your class teacher by Monday 25th April.

1. Rocket competition - Design a rocket that can fly up into the air. Try to use your imagination to create a rocket that not only reaches a high altitude but also looks fantastic. Hand your signed rocket to your class teacher by Monday 9th May. The competition will take place during the morning break on Tuesday 10th May.

1. Earth week essay competition - Write a one page essay or comic titled 'The Role of Technology in reducing climate change' or 'Saving planet Earth'. Hand it to your class teacher by Friday 6th of May.

1. Second-hand clothes collection - This week we are celebrating Earth week and therefore we are inviting you to get involved in the second-hand clothes collection. If you have any clothes/shoes/jewelry at home that you don't wear anymore and are still in good shape, bring them to school any day before Friday 6th May. Leave them in the designated box next to the main entrance. We will then donate all collected items to Društvo verjamem vate (you can read more about them here).

Fun for the whole family:

You can find a number of fun science and engineering practical challenges here. New ones are published every week so we invite you to try them at home and send us pictures or videos.

Events:

We have two very exciting events coming up:

1. Amazing animals are coming to our school on Tuesday 26th April when all students will be able to meet some more exotic animals in person.

1. We will have a Solve the Puzzle challenge for all classes happening in Week 5.

Please get involved and celebrate Science with us. Well done to those who already have! Also, don't forget to share the photos of exciting moments with us - we would love to see them.

Science department

International Days - Mark Your Calendars

One of our biggest family events, organised in partnership with the PTA, this year’s International Days will take place between Thursday May 12 - Friday May 13.

On Friday May 13, from 12 noon, there will be a variety of cultural and educational activities, stalls, traditional dress, flags, international cuisine, games and performances for our community to enjoy.

For details, please click here.

Year 1 Production

Our Year 1s are excited to invite you to their upcoming production of The Goblin Next Door on May 11 from 15:30 in the Performance Theatre. Mark your calendars!

BISL Summer School 2022

With summer just around the corner, registration is now open for BISL Summer School 2022!

Click here for details.

Library Book Donations

In partnership with the PTA, we are accepting donations of books to our library throughout block 6 and encourage everyone to bring in their used books - in any language - and drop it off at Reception.

Dear Parents,

We are at the end of week 3 already! - the summer term is in full swing.

As our Primary students have finished their Spring concerts, we have a lot to look forward to with our Summer Performance, Sports Day, International Days, Graduations, Adventure Days and much more planned for the final two blocks of the academic year! - lots to get excited about and to get involved in.

At the other end of the school, we wish our Year 11, 12 and 13 students all the best as they depart on study leave today to sit their IGCSE, AS and A Level examinations. This is the start of a six week period that mixes subject revision, preparation and sitting external exams at BISL. We wish everyone involved good luck and take a moment to pause and say how proud we are of each and every single student before they even take the first paper!

Thank you to all staff and parents for going above and beyond with your help and support with the students during this time, it is very much appreciated.

We have our first on site Open Day on Wednesday 4th May for the first time in a long time, please feel free to come along and pop into lessons. It is a great opportunity to see our students and teachers in the classroom and experience what they do so well on a daily basis.

Following the international recognition of our English provision, please have a look at an interesting article on how we assess and support our students at BISL. We received the highest rating for EAL (English as Additional Language) provision with an 'Exemplary' outcome.

From the start of May, we welcome new families joining BISL as our school continues to grow. I was very proud when we passed the 260 mark and we continue to increase. This directly creates more for our students to enjoy with team sports, competitions, group activities and much more. It's the strongest our community has been and I am very grateful for this. Thank you for welcoming new students and families into our caring and positive community.

Hopefully the rain holds and we can all have a nice weekend ahead, I look forward to finishing my gardening and relaxing with a coffee. With summer approaching and lots of beautiful changes outside with the trees, flowers and wildlife, it is a wonderful time to enjoy what Slovenia has to offer. We are very lucky to live in such an amazing country with these opportunities and surroundings.

Please read my full Update from the Principal here for details.

Have a lovely weekend!

Kind regards,

Paul Walton, Principal

All upcoming events and details are available on our website.