Year 4 students showing Mr Foyle their work
All of the high quality staff we have invited to join us have made the decision based on BISS Puxi’s excellent reputation and the security and professional development opportunities that working for NAE offers. We will shortly be adding the profiles of these new staff to the staff section of our website to keep you fully updated and informed.
In the meantime it is wonderfully reassuring and gratifying whilst I am away, to be regularly updated on the excellent work that continued during my absence. A great deal of time and effort has been devoted to ensure that we welcome the 118 new students and their families to our school community. The PTA New Parents Programme has played an important part in this process. A combination of direct and indirect feedback has also confirmed that the wide variety of communication between home and school and the accessibility and approachability of staff have been very well received and embody our promise of a warm welcome.
Equally in evidence are our other two promises of exciting experiences and academic achievement. The themed learning topics in primary provide just one good example of the many exciting learning experiences that are happening day in and day out. I had the pleasure of meeting six of our Year 4s who gave a delightful insight into the work they have been doing with Mr Jones and his team on earthquakes and volcanoes. I was shown examples of the models they had built to explore how to make structures that are earthquake resistant. They also demonstrated the experiments they had conducted to perfect a chemical volcanic eruption using vinegar and baking soda and I was also shown some examples of the lino cut volcano prints the students had learned to create. What came through was firstly how impactful the use of cross curricular, themed learning is at Key Stage 2 and secondly, how much the students had enjoyed the challenging investigations and the extent to which it had motivated them to go and find out more and more about this absorbing topic.
Preparations are now well advanced for a rich variety of events and themed learning opportunities that make up our celebration of the most important festival of the year here in China, the Chinese New Year.
Looking ahead there are a number of exciting events taking place at BISS Puxi over the next couple of months. We presently have the ACAMIS Basketball Tournament taking place in school. In March we are hosting the FOBISIA Maths Challenge, we have the secondary school play Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and the international week.
There are also two important dates for your diaries. Firstly a change of date for the much enjoyed PTA International Food Evening which will now take place on Saturday 14 March 2015 thus avoiding a clash with a major concert and a couple of other non-school social events. And secondly, if you have not done so already please put into your diary the 10th Anniversary Garden Party, which is an event for the whole community that will be taking place at school in the afternoon of Saturday 18 April 2015.
Finally, we saw a very successful BISS Has Got Talent last night where 15 acts from across the school performed for the judges, all helping to raise money for the Tanzania trip that students are leaving for at the end of February. And don’t forget that next Monday at 6:30pm there is an information event for a very exciting opportunity coming to our school this summer: Manchester United Soccer Schools are running a camp from Sat 27 – Mon 29, one not to miss.
- Kevin Foyle, Principal