
KISU Primary Newsletter
Number 517....................................2nd April 2022
Director's Message
It is always fun to eat
Some of the Advisory Board
Even more eating
End of term
Sensory and Messy Play
The details are on the flier, as is Ms Dima's email address. Please get in touch with her if you are interested in bringing along your toddler and please spread the word to friends and family. This new group offers a great way for adults to meet and come together, as well as helping your child's emotional, physical and social development.
KISU PTA
Librarian's message: Reading is so much more than decoding text!
Why reading is important for babies and young children
Sharing stories, talking and singing every day helps your child’s development in many ways.
Reading and sharing stories can:
- help your child get to know sounds, words and language, and develop early literacy skills
- learn to value books and stories
- spark your child’s imagination and stimulate curiosity
- help develop your child’s brain, ability to focus, concentration, social skills and communication skills
- help your child learn the difference between ‘real’ and ‘make-believe’
- help your child understand new or frightening events, and the strong emotions that come with them
- help your child learn about the world, their own culture and other cultures.
Sharing stories with your child doesn’t mean you have to read from the book.
Just by looking at books with your child and talking about them, you can be a great storyteller and a good model for using language and books. Your child will learn by watching you hold a book the right way and seeing how you move through the book by gently turning the pages.
Reading stories with children has benefits for grown-ups too. The special time you spend reading together promotes bonding and helps to build your relationship with your child
Reading and storytelling with babies and children promotes brain development and imagination, develops language and emotions, and strengthens relationships.
Sometimes you can read. And sometimes you can look at picture books, sing songs or tell stories from your culture.
Babies and young children often enjoy books, songs and stories with good rhyme, rhythm and repetition.
Anytime is a good time for a book or story! Try to share at least one book or story each day.
Storytelling and songs
Reading isn’t the only way to help with your child’s language and literacy development.
Telling stories, singing songs and saying rhymes together are also great activities for early literacy skills – and your child will probably have a lot of fun at the same time. Sometimes your child might enjoy these activities more than reading.
You and your child might like to make up your own stories or share family stories. Your child will learn words and develop language skills from the songs, stories and conversations you share together.
Reading to your child in other languages
You can read, sing and tell stories with your child in whatever language you feel most comfortable speaking. Using a language you’re comfortable with helps you to communicate more easily. It also helps to make reading, singing and storytelling more fun for you and your child. Your child will still learn that words are made up of different letters, syllables and sounds, and that words usually link to the pictures on the page.
Don’t worry if English isn’t your child’s first language. Being bilingual actually helps your child learn English when they start playgroup, kindergarten or school. Dual-language books are a great resource, and many children’s books are published in two languages. If you speak a language other than English at home, reading dual-language books with your child might also help you become more familiar with English. Another option is to read a book aloud in English or listen to an audio book and then talk about the story with your child in whatever language feels most comfortable.
Check out the following website ‘Storynory’ for fantastic free audio books. A great range of genres on offer here for children of all ages to enjoy.
ECA Clubs
Polite reminder: Please ensure children are collected at the end of the day by 4:30pm. In the event that you will be late, please phone the primary office on 0752711904 or myself on 0752711881. After such an eventful, packed day, tired children need to be home on time, fed and well rested for their next exciting day - as do all the teachers and coaches!!! Thank you for your support.
Cheerleading club kicks off
Learning the moves
Making the props
Football friendly
We already have basketball games arranged for this season against other schools. Watch this space for more details of when and where.
Outdoor Education Trips
Award winners this week...
KG1/2 - Edwin and Ishan
KG3 - Riva
Reception - Philipp
Year 1 - Liesel and Hussein
Year 2 - Isabella
Year 3 - Josh
Year 4 - Diane and Nyambol
Year 5 - Madeleine and Johan
Year 6 - Yoab
Primary French Speaker of the week: Myra (Y5)
Primary Musician of the week: Kirabo year 6 - For staying focused and working with no distractions. She has explored rhythms on the boomwhackers and recorder with enthusiasm. Well done Kirabo!
Year 5 news...
The Year 5 class was all business this assessment week. We tackled the four different assessments throughout the week with tenacity and enjoyed some learning games and silly read aloud stories when in need of a break.
With assessments in the rearview mirror, we look ahead to a week of consolidating learning, review activities, and fun house team events to end the term.
As part of our healthy eating push, we are in the middle of a healthy snacks challenge. Students were tasked with eating only healthy snacks for the final two weeks of the term to remain in the challenge. Those still in the challenge by our class party on Thursday of next week well enjoy special treats from the teachers as a reward! Happy snacking!
How many ways to use a pipe cleaner?
Step 1: Outdoor art, tree study
Step 2: Branching out
Step 3: Add a backround
Next Week...
Next week you will receive your child's Term 2 report. This is an interim data report that summarizes your child's academic attainment in the core subjects of Maths, Reading, Writing, Spelling and Grammar. The report compares your child's outcomes to where we expect a KISU pupil to be academically at this point in the year. Teachers still need to cover Term 3 content which is not taken into account when looking at this data so this information is on how your child has performed based on what they have been taught so far. If you have any questions please reach out to your child's Class Teacher by their email and they will be happy to hear from you.
Parent Overviews:
The beginning of a new term sees the beginning of a new topic and Class Teachers will share with you the new overview for Term 3 which will go home via email next Thursday 7th April. This insight into next term's teaching is so that you can engage in conversations with your child about their subject learning across different aspects of the curriculum and support and encourage them at home. New topics include blasting off on a 'Mission to Mars, 'Going on Safari' and sadly, 'The Vanishing Rainforest' among others.
Last Day of Term:
Mr Polan has kindly put together a timetable for Thursday next week which involves inter-house sports activities and basketball games for all of Key Stage 2 children. With a focus on raising the House Team profile, we aim to have many more interhouse competitions and in school activities planned next term. PLEASE WEAR HOUSE T-SHIRTS ON THURSDAY 7TH APRIL. Thank you Mr Polan!
Year 2 Showcase
P.S. I loved dropping into the Year 2's Literacy lesson this week to learn all about the features of a Non-Chronological report. The children learnt about many features, identified them within a text and then colour coded given reports on spooky spiders and scary sharks whilst teaching me everything I need to know about what should be included in a non-chron report! I am looking forward to seeing their own written reports with titles, sub-headings, pictures, captions, paragraphing etc next week as part of their topic exit point.