Al Sedra Newsletter 23

28th February 2019

Jumping To It YOUR WEEKLY UPDATE ON ALL THAT’S GOING ON AT THE GULF ENGLISH SCHOOL

28th February 2019

INFANTS Infant Learning Support Department This term in Learning Support, we have continued to develop our number, reading and writing skills and have had lots of fun along the way. In addition to this, we have also become more confident in our own abilities and now have a ‘can do attitude’, where we are not scared to have a go.

Our Reception and Year 1 students have been learning rhymes to help with remembering their phonic sounds and are beginning to use them when writing simple words. We have been using our phonic knowledge to sound out and read simple captions, such as a red rug, and get off the bus.

We have also been learning to use finger spaces when writing simple captions to match pictures.

Our Year 2 students, have followed verbal instructions to paint a handprint flower and have used this experience to help with writing instructions.

We talked about the features of instructional writing and used these when writing our own instructions. As well as instructional writing, we also loved listening to a story all about a rainbow fish and wrote descriptive sentences using adjectives.

We were so proud of our writing that we helped to create a wall display!

28th February 2019

JUNIORS Year 3 students have been stepping back in time, visiting the land of the dinosaurs with their investigation into fossils and how they are formed.

The children each made their own fossil using clay and modelling tools and, I’m sure you’ll agree, the displays look very realistic. They are now learning all about rocks like where they are found and how they are formed. The children have been using some wonderful resources from the library to help with their learning.

This term’s writing lessons have been all about instructions and the students are becoming experts at writing instructions for making magical potions to create mythical creatures. As they prepare for the music concert, there has been singing all around the school. All of Year 3 are learning songs from different countries and staff are really looking forward to hearing these performed soon.

As the weather has improved, we have been excited to see many football events taking place; Year 3 have been playing matches against Year 4 and taking part in penalty shoot-outs to raise awareness of the importance of physical fitness and a healthy body.

It has been a busy few weeks for everyone and there is still more fun to come!

28th February 2019

SECONDARY The Secondary Science Department are anticipating British Science week this year, which takes place between the 8th and the 17th of March. The theme for this year’s British Science Week is ‘journeys’, encouraging young people to think about the different scientific journeys that happen every day and how they can discover science through their own lives and experiences. It is also a chance for young people to consider how journeys can help us experience more of the world around us.

Using this as our foundation, we are considering how scientific knowledge flourished during the Golden Age of Muslim civilisation. One thousand two hundred years ago in Iraq, a chemist called Jabir ibn Hayyan was confident that he could improve the process of distillation. After much experimentation, he developed the alembic still – this extracted the essences more effectively than primitive apparatus. Over the two hundred years which followed, physicians and scientists such as al-Kindi, al-Razi and alZahrawi perfected the alembic still. As well as extracting essences for perfume, they used it to distill alcohol for use as a hospital disinfectant, extract essences for new medicines, and separate lamp oil from crude black oil.

As a Science Department, we believe it is important for students to understand that their educational journey is one which should be celebrated each day, as they grow in their own knowledge. Through Science Week, we have an opportunity to show students how Science has shaped the world around them.

We would be grateful if you can take the opportunity during this week in March to celebrate Science, but also the role of Muslims in scientific progress throughout the years. If you are looking for ideas, www.1001inventions.com is a website which celebrates the role of Islam in Science with documentaries, experiments and information to share with your children.

28th February 2019

CONTACT The Gulf English School PO Box 2440, Doha, Qatar Main School: Tel: +974 44578777 Main School: Fax: +974 44861256 Infant Unit: Tel: +974 44886791/90 +974 44886201/93 Infant Unit: Fax: +974 44876821

Email: info@gulfenglishschool.com

Website: www.gulfenglishschool.com