Primary eNews – August 22, 2019

Check out upcoming events at the BIS Events Calendar

There are lots of interesting news for our Primary families in this fortnight’s eNews. Please share any feedback about our eNews to primaryprincipal@baliis.net

 

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) 

Thank you to all families that are supporting our new Bring Your Own Device Programme, it’s been great to see such a high rate of buy in at this early stage with some classes have all students bringing devices.  Our Grade 2 – 5 students have had the opportunity to work with our IT Staff this week to set up their devices so that they can access the school’s WiFi network and are able to access school email accounts and  other online learning platforms. Teachers are planning meaningful learning engagements which will take advantage of the increased access to technology that our students now have. We’re especially excited to be starting with the SeeSaw digital learning journals next week. In the next three or four weeks, we’ll share SeeSaw details with parents so they can start accessing their child’s digital learning journals and get a greater insight to the wonderful learning that happens in our school every day. We will organise another setup session with our IT staff on Monday and Tuesday for any students who didn’t bring their tablet devices this week or did not have all of the requested apps downloaded. We have discovered that You Tube Kids will be a more suitable app that You Tube for our students to use at school. Please replace You Tube with You Tube Kids at some stage in the next few days. Families are also welcome to opt out of this programme.

Common Sense Media Digital Citizenship . 

Next Friday will see our Grade 2 – 5 students begin their Digital Citizenship lessons. We began implementing this programme last year and are looking forward to a full implementation in the classrooms this year. Common Sense is a non-profit organisation that provides education and advocacy to families to promote safe technology and media for children. The digital citizenship curriculum helps our students inquire into and learn about media balance and well being; privacy & security; digital footprint & identity; relationships & communication; cyber-bullying & news & media literacy. The homeroom teachers will share details of lessons taught and Family Activities on the class blogs throughout the year.

Why children should be taught to build a positive online presence

This is a timely article that was shared with me recently that I thought parents might be interested in reading.

Rather than just teaching children about internet safety and reducing their digital footprint, we should also encourage them to curate a positive digital footprint which will be an asset for them in their future. Click here to continue reading.

Inclusive Education at Bali Island School 

Bali Island School is proud to be an inclusive school. Our mission is to engage and empower globally-minded, confident learners to reach their utmost potential in an active, creative and respectful learning community. Our school embraces children of all nationalities, all colours, all languages and learners at all levels. Bali Island School is inclusive because we believe in nurturing children who are respectful, kind, empathetic and accepting of others. These values are demonstrated each day by our students in the classroom, on the playing field, at international competitions, and in the community.

Inclusive education is when all students, regardless of any challenges they may have, are placed in age-appropriate general education classes that are in their own neighborhood schools to receive high-quality instruction, interventions, and supports that enable them to meet success in the core curriculum (Bui, Quirk, Almazan, & Valenti, 2010; Alquraini & Gut, 2012).

Inclusive schools benefit all learners:

• Inclusive education is successful when everyone is a valued member of the community. Inclusive schools foster an environment where students are embraced for who they are.
• By using a wide range of instructional modalities, opportunities are created for diverse learners to receive differentiated learning opportunities, and be assessed in a variety of ways, side by side, in the same classroom.
• Academic specialists including teachers, learning support specialists, English as an Additional Language specialists and speech therapists collaborate to provide a supportive environment for all learners.

All additional support staff working at Bali Island School have been interviewed by our HR Manager, Primary Principal and Student Support Team. They are also subject to the same employment requirements as all other Bali IS staff including referee checks, police checks and, when required, providing evidence of appropriate visas. If you have any questions about additional support staff working in the Primary school, please see Ibu Jackie or Mr. Eldred.

Jackie Wyncoll

Primary LS/EAL Teacher

 

BSSA Soccer 

Our 9 – 10 Girls Team had a 0 – 2 loss to Dytamika 1 and a 2 – 0 win to Dyatmika 2 on Wednesday afternoons. A great effort by the girls in the two consecutive matches with goals scored by Sienna and Tahlia.

Our 9 – 10 Boys Teams played brilliantly with our A team beating Taman Rama International School, 5-0.  The boys B team were also able to walk away with a win, defeating Dyatmika’s B team, 2-1.  It was great to see all the players high-fiving one another after both games and giving thanks to the referees. 

Just a reminder that there will be no 9 – 10 BSSA next Wednesday 28th August due to  EOTC camps for our 9-10 year olds. The 9 – 10 Boys next match will be at BIS on 4th September 4th.  The 9 – 10 Girls next match will be at Dyatmika on 4th September. We would love to have parents join us at the games to cheer our players along. 

The 6-8 year olds playing mini soccer will play at Dyatmika on Thursday the 29th of August from 3:00-4:00pm.  Families with students at this level are required to arrange their own transportation to and from the venue. These games are to promote participation and enjoyment and no scores are kept.

All players in our  6 – 8 mini soccer and 9 – 10 BSSA soccer should wear their PE uniform on game days.

 

 

World Literacy Day @ BIS on Friday, September 6th 

In 2 weeks, BIS will celebrate World Literacy Day (officially celebrated across the globe on Saturday, September 7th but with no school on Saturday, we adjust). We will have a few things going on…

– PeriPlus bookstore will setting up a book fair in the Library all day, selling books for all ages and genres throughout the day (please bring cash or cards if you are interested in making some purchases). Mr. Marshall has vouchers that can be used to purchase books and will be giving them out over the next 2 weeks to students (and parents) who are seen practicing literacy and using the library in a responsible way. 

– There will be a school-wide “silent reading” from 7:45am – 8:15am on the Primary field on that Friday morning. Parents are of course invited to bring reading material and read with their child that morning; pray for dry weather. 

– Students are encouraged to dress like their favourite book character that day; feel free to have children emulate their favourite (or just one they enjoy and are familiar with) by dressing up in a costume or a distinctive, recognisable trait of that character. 

As World Literacy Day draws closer, we will continue to promote this….please contact Mr. Marshall in the library with any questions or for further information.

The Grade 4 Learning Space 

Establishing classroom community and routines is an important beginning to any school year.  Here in Grade 4, we dedicated our first two weeks to this process: establishing our Learning Space. 

This year, Grade 4 teachers and students trialled a collaborative approach to classroom design. In addition the practice was a fabulous provocation to springboard our first Unit of Inquiry: children worldwide encounter risks, challenges and opportunities.

Students arrived at school to a disarranged (purposely!) environment, where desks, chairs, furniture, materials and spaces were there, though not yet defined. Walls were blank and it was not long before the questions started. “Where do I sit?” “Which is my desk?” “How will we…?”.  Perfect, a class full of young inquirers 😁

From here, students were invited to think about personal experience, classrooms that worked and didn’t work, challenges and opportunities they have experienced in other classrooms, year levels and schools. They shared with their own thoughts with a partner before compiling a list of key and agreed upon inclusions.

Armed with whiteboards, scrap paper, post-its and pencils, students worked in groups to design a labelled floor plan of the Grade 4 Learning Space. When completed, these were displayed around the room for a whole group reflection. At this time, we could move around to view, discuss, value and vote on others’ ideas before creating our collaboratively designed Learning Space. Physically creating our vision was fun too!

Grade 4 has continued to use this format of including student voice: thinking independently, sharing with a partner and reflecting as a whole group, in the design of our Essential Agreements and learning space routines.

Thank You For The Music is coming to BIS!

During the final week of Semester One (the week of December 9-13), the Primary Students will be performing our very own musical! It is the story of a time traveller who is writing a book about the history of music. Each time period the traveller visits will be performed by a Homeroom class or a small group of students. The Primary Production ASA group are currently hard at work developing the script, costume ideas, songs and dances. We will be sharing more details later this term with information about costumes and exact performance dates and times. Lock it in your calendars now!

Ibu Heather, Ibu Alice and the ASA Primary Production Team.