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Newsletter M ESSAGE
FROM T H E
Januar y 2022
EXECUT I V E H EAD
I SF has been awarded CI S accreditation! I SF is delighted that we have been awarded Council of I nternational Schools Accreditation (CI S). T he accreditation process has taken 5 years and it has included 3 visits to help continual school improvement. I SF has been rigorously assessed in 8 domains: Domain A: Purpose & Direction
Domain B: Governance & L eadership
Domain C: Curriculum
Domain D: Teaching & Assessing for L earning
Domain E: Well-being
Domain F: Staffing
Domain G: Premises, Facilities, Technology and Auxiliary Services Domain H: Community & Home Partnerships I n addition, CI S looked at our school finances and sustainability. I n each Domain, there are specific standards to meet.
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I n total there are 59 standards. I am proud to announce that I SF met all standar ds and in 5 cases exceeded them!
T he accreditation process has been a team effort and l would like to thank all members of our school community including students, parents, volunteers, administration & maintenance staff, teachers, leaders and the school board for working together as one team, being accountable, transparent and being open to change and self-improvement. T hank you! L et the celebrations begin!
We will be singing our praises on social media please share with your contacts and ¨ like¨ each post- we are very proud of our achievement and we want everyone to know!
Belinda Yates Executive Head of School
"I SF can be justifiably pr oud of their facilities and pr emises [ ...] both campuses ar e well-equipped to implement cur r iculum and suppor t the guiding statements" (CI S, 2022).
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FROM OUR LEADERS - HEAD OF CAMPUS Adding to the exciting news of our Council of I nter national Schools (CI S) accreditation, we are also proud to announce that while working towards our CI S goal, we have also in tandem been busy with our Council of Br itish I nter national Schools (COBI S) accreditation. We are delighted to inform our community that we have also successfully achieved this prized accreditation, firmly placing us as the only small school in Brussels to hold both of these crucial certifications, acknowledging the very high standards of care and education offered at I SF. W hat does it mean to be COBI S accredited? -
Accreditation offers excellent quality assurance to our community regarding our high standards of education and safeguarding against a strict set of standards Staff can access high-quality professional development and a professional network in 75 countries world wide Students have access to a wide range of events, awards, competitions and friendship opportunities globally I SF can welcome newly qualified NQT teachers I SF joins the collaborative community of over 250 British international schools of global quality around the world, sharing resources and support
Our CI S and COBI S accreditation demonstrates I SF?s commitment to delivering high-quality education to our students and safeguarding the welfare of our entire school community. We are very proud of our achievement and would like to thank the whole school community for their hard work and commitment to this process. Órla Mc L oughlin - Head of Campus
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FROM OUR LEADERS - DEPUTY HEAD Well, we got there in the end! T he students managed to perform their ?Winter Show? on Friday, 14th January, after so many setbacks and disappointments. W hat it demonstrated was resilience in abundance. T he students were determined to perform the production ?Star Warts: T he Umpire Strikes Back? and to enjoy it to the full. We had some make-shift costumes and understudies for some of the parts; including teachers. Even Mrs Órla made an appearance!
T he students sang the songs enthusiastically and Pre-school, Pre-Primary and Years 1 and 2 delighted everyone with their dance routines. T he ?Umpire? stole the show with her mesmerising performance and, thankfully, decided to change her ways and not take over the Universe! Miss Tahlia would have been extremely proud of everyone. W hat a wonderful way to begin the new school year. Julie Boyd Deputy Head of Campus
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EARLY YEARS AND FOUNDATION STAGE Pr e-School made a roaring start to their new I PC unit, ?A nimals?. All of the children dressed up as an animal that lives in the jungle or in a zoo. We played a game to guess who was dressed up as which animal by giving clues about what they look like, where the animal lives or what they eat. T he children then had a chance to tell everyone what facts they know about the various animals. After that we pretended to be animals and had great fun roaring like lions, buzzing like bees and neighing like zebras!
celebrated Christmas before the Winter Break. We set up a Christmas tree and decorated it with Christmas balls and tinsel and we also baked some Christmas cookies. First we had to sieve the flour into a large bowl and add sugar and a pinch of salt. With a whisk we mixed it and added the egg yolk. T he butter was cut in small pieces and were added to the mix. Eventually we had to form a dough ball with our hands. We laid out the shapes and decorated them with chocolate chips. W hen the cookies came out of the oven, we had a taste! And they were delicious! Pr e-Pr imar y
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LOWER PRIMARY Year 1 Weekly visits to the library at I SF is a highlight of the week for the Year 1 students who love to visit the library. Students have the chance to learn about the structure of a library and about basic rules. T he most important is to stay quiet in the library so we respect the readers and the other students. We learn to take care of the books we are reading so someone else can have the chance to read the same book and that all books have their assigned shelf so if we mix them, books might get lost. Year 1 students have been broadening their reading skills so now they really enjoy reading books with more difficult texts. Although books with pictures and interactive pages are still everyone?s favourite!
Year 2 joined Year 1 for the I PC topic ?Seeing the light?. We have been learning about the importance of light, shadows, opaque and transparent materials, and understood how it can be night in one part of the world and day in another part. We also talked about light sources, we walked around the school looking for different light sources and identifying them as natural light or artificial light. We took pictures of them and afterwards we recorded our findings in our school map. Another exciting experiment we did: we planted some seeds and recorded our predictions on how plants grow under various conditions. We have been nurturing the seedlings to ensure they grow. We had lots of fun!
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UPPER PRIMARY Year 3-4 - For our I PC unit ?Active Planet?, our students have been learning about natural and man-made disasters, forces of nature and the sheer power of active volcanoes! We have been learning about the different types of volcanoes, how they are formed over time and that the temperature of lava is over 1000 degrees C! We have also had a chance to make our own 3D models of volcanoes and discuss the parts of a volcano. We have even been learning about the work of Volcanologists, and how exciting and
dangerous this work can be.
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UPPER PRIMARY
CI S stated in their report that I SF is "a war m and fr iendly school with integr ity." (CI S, 2022)
Year 5 - During the second half of the Autumn Term, Year 5 learnt all about the amazing plants and animals that have adapted to survive in extreme habitats for their I PC unit ?Extreme Survivors?. T he students had a great time investigating how these amazing flora and fauna have evolved to live in some of the coldest, hottest, deepest, darkest and highest environments on Earth. T he students also learnt about how these environments are changing as a result of global warming, and the effects that these changes have on the plants and animals that live there. One of our investigations included looking at the effect of temperature on the rate that ice melts, and the effect that this might have on the polar ice caps. For their ?Extreme Survivors? Exit Point the Year 5 students learnt all about the COP26 conference that took place in Glasgow recently and how different countries and organisations around the world are all working together to achieve a common goal. T he students then came up with ways that we as a school can work together to ensure that our I SF community plays its part in protecting the local environment.
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UPPER PRIMARY Year 6 - To complete our ?Making New Materials? unit, as an ?Exit Point?, the Year 6 students created large group artwork incorporating papier mâché made from flour, water and paper. T hey used layers of card to produce 3D effects and covered these with the new material. T hey soon realised they had created a new material which was irreversible as it dried. Students worked on the frames in groups and others worked on the centre-pieces.
Fr ench - Year 5 and Year 6 completed a big project last term. We took a time machine and went back to
T he collaboration and thought processes, working out their
the Middle Ages.
designs, was a delight to see. Careful constructions and thoughtful images were placed and discussed; often being moved and re-positioned for effect. To complete the artwork, they painted over the surfaces and thought carefully about shadows and contours. T he result was certainly eye-catching and makes the classroom look amazing. I t just goes to show, when the students work together they can produce great things and the process itself was rewarding for all involved.
We made our castle, imagined our lives in the past and then presented our castle to guests (oral presentation). We used the vocabulary and conjugation we had studied (past tense-future simple and present tense) Students are very imaginative and we visited some wonderful castles!