Primary Newsletter 15/03/2024
Dear Parents and Carers,
It was wonderful to see you all on our open morning last weekend. Thank you for joining in the activities and sharing some of the learning experiences with your children. We had some very positive feedback on the day and we feel it is important for our community connections to be strongly maintained.
On the 29th March you are invited back into school again. This time for your children to share their impressions of their own learning. What they have enjoyed, what has been a challenge and some areas to work a bit harder on. This is a very beneficial process for the students. Reflecting on their learning helps to make the process clearer to them and reinforces the growth mindset that is essential for successful learning.
Recently we have been able to send staff on some additional training. 2 members of staff were able to attend an e-twinning conference in Brussels where they were able to share their experiences and network with other schools. Two members of staff also travelled to Den Hague in the Netherlands for additional training in behaviour management and de-escalation.
As some of you will know, I am the Chair of the Primary Heads Leadership Group, where the heads of all the international schools in and around Belgium can come together to share exciting new developments in education and to support each other through some of the trials. I am pleased to say that the group is very successful with new members asking to join each term. It is through this group that some of our students get the opportunity to visit other schools, work with other students and generally enhance their confidence and learning experiences. In May we hope to take part in a music festival hosted by St Johns in Waterloo and that is just one example of the sort of event offered.
At the end of this academic year I will be transferring the chair position to another school leader but it has been a great experience for me over the last few years and helped build the awareness and reputation of our school around the country.
Two weeks ago class 3 presented an amazing assembly all about Electricity. They did their own research, created their own presentation slides and prepared their own scripts. They did a wonderful job telling us all about electricity, circuits and safety. Well done class 3 and thank you Ms Jenny for supporting them.
Last week the Primary student voice led the assembly and told us about launching the ISBe games, a fun series of games that students can participate in every Thursday for the next four weeks. Yesterday the first of the games took place. It was the lime and spoon race, and each house and class had a team participating. The cheering was very enthusiastic. The first event was a great success, we look forward to more over the next few weeks.
The whole of the previous week was our literacy week where the focus was on exciting lessons relating to speaking and listening, reading and writing. Classes were working on drama, poetry, story writing, comic writing, reading to each other and generally having a good time while they learned. Some of the students had golden crowns and received a gem for each day of the literacy week that they completed, others had literacy bracelets. EY also enjoyed a puppet show and then the children made their own puppets and performed with them.
At the end of the week we had book character day when students dressed up like a character in a book they have read. There are lots of fun photos to see – thank you to everyone who sent their child in a costume.
I look forward to seeing you all again at the Student led conferences on the 29th.
Sharon Short
Head of Primary
Safeguarding Lead.
primaryhead@isbedu.be
+32 (0)3 271 09 43
www.isbedu.be