Is it a noun, or a verb? NO, it’s…
As a school student, I hated English Grammar. I mean, did we really have to know if the verb was in the past simple tense, if it was an irregular verb or an auxiliary verb? Then there is the question of definite and indefinite articles. Most of the children who have been in my class, will tell you that Mrs. Coetzer says “English is a crazy language: For every spelling rule, there is an exception. What about two sounds which sound the same but are spelled differently? Then there is the matter of homonyms and homophones.
In all sincerity, English is one of the most difficult languages to learn and yet it is used universally, and we use these parts of speech without even realizing it.
Thankfully, the grammar taught in Year 2 is still fairly simple. To explain the importance of learning what a noun is, I asked various students to me bring me a ‘thingy’. Obviously, they were totally confused and kept bringing me different items in the classroom, with me rejecting each one. They caught on quite quickly and asked me to name the items I wanted. I tried another experiment and read them a story, leaving out all the adjectives and adverbs. They all agreed, it was a boring story. After I read it again, with the adjectives and adverbs, they told me they could imagine the story in their heads.
So, it appears that these parts of speech do play an important role in the English language, after all. As I always tell my students, we need to paint a picture with our words.
Kim Coetzer
Year 2 Teacher
Nursery Creepy Crawly Fun
The Nursery class had so much fun learning about Creepy Crawlies and loved discovering and exploring the Creepy Crawly world.
This week:
- We learned about spiders, whilst enjoying singing “Incy Wincy Spider”.
- We also discovered that caterpillars turn into butterflies! We enjoyed reading the “Very Hungry Caterpillar” at story time.
- A great class activity was finding different insects hidden in the sand during their Sensory play this week and trying to name them all.
- For Art we made Butterfly handprints! They found it so funny and exciting to have their hands painted.
- We also enjoyed going for a walk out in our special garden to find insects.
Nursery Teacher
From the Principal’s Desk, 18 September 2020
Dear Parents
We have come to the end of term 3 and are looking forward to our holiday. On Wednesday, we had a great time having dinner with our Year 12 students. It was a privilege to end the term off celebrating them this week, with a Valedictory service as well as treating them to a dinner at the Gorgeous George hotel in the City Centre.
We finished our term having some fun recording the Jerusalema dance and what great fun we had, from the youngest year group to the teachers joining in.
I realized again how wonderful it is to be part of the Blouberg International family. As we prepare to take a break, I wish you all a wonderful time spent with family. May all the staff enjoy their break and come back refreshed and ready to finish the last term well.
Thank you for all your hard work and support throughout term 3. We look forward to welcoming you back next term.
Regards
Edna
WATCH: Jerusalema Blouberg International School
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Design & Technology – The Importance Of Mock-Ups
Designers often come up with new ideas or create new products for clients or consumers. An important part of the syllabus for IGCSE Design and Technology is to be able to produce a new product or improve an existing one that was created by a need.
Once students have designed possible solutions or ideas, the next step is to make mock-ups or models. This is an important part of the design process as it allows the student to visualise their product as well as get a better understanding of its functions and capabilities. Importantly, mock-ups allow the students to test mechanical functioning of the product.
During this important process, students gain an understanding of construction techniques, the different materials available, sizing and proportions and assembly details, just to name a few.
Our Year 9 students recently did an activity where they had to design a chair and build a model from a single A4 page. This was a successful activity and putting their models to the test proved a lot of fun.
Julian Harrison
Design and Technology Teacher
From the German Classroom – Hallo BIS!
*Wir lernen Deutsch zusammen! Das ist einfach wunderbar! *(We are learning German together! That is simply wonderful!)
In January this year all the students were welcomed to German with a new workbook that is made up of a curriculum in the form of a programme that has age appropriate teaching materials specifically for German as a foreign language. These programmes are based on the levels from the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) which are “guidelines used to describe achievements of students of foreign languages and provide a method of learning, teaching and assessing which applies to all languages in Europe’’. The CEFR levels are for grading an individual’s language proficiency focusing on the areas of understanding (listening & reading), speaking (spoken interaction & production) and writing skills.
In Year 1, 2 & 3 we started the Hallo Anna workbooks, a Level A1 (CEFR level) introduction for ages 5-9.
This edition is specifically for children who are learning to read and write an additional language other than their mother tongue or 1st language. Therefore, it gently introduces German as a foreign language and concentrates on learning German mainly through listening and speaking in Year 1 and then the skill of reading and writing are gradually introduced in Year 2 and progress in Year 3.
These skills are taught using various methods including songs, comics, audios, experiment and a colourful workbook with lots of creative ideas.
The students are taken on an adventurous and exciting journey with the 2 main characters Anna and her friend Benno in the city of Munich in Germany.
These adventures take place at school in the classroom, with topics including my greetings, my day, my likes, my classroom and stationery and at home with my family and celebrations in Germany. The students enjoy seeing the characters come alive in the workbook and the interactive online programme I use in class.
In Year 4, 5 & 6 the students were introduced to the Wo ist Paula (Where is Paula?) range of workbooks and programme.
It has especially been created for the over 9-year olds and has a progression from book 1-4 to acquire the Level A1 (CEFR level) and then allowing for an easy transition into High School (Year 7) and the Cambridge curriculum.
The programme is set up to motivate participation using interdisciplinary teaching across subjects and a multilingual approach, perfect for a school with an international perspective.
It includes language training and vocabulary, various topics, songs, videos, learning about Germany and Europe, it has differentiation tasks for extension learning, revision and the students have opportunity for self-evaluation to see their progress.
The students have been introduced to using the audios to improve their listening and speaking skills at home anytime via CD, downloads or an app. I use the Blink digital educational platform to show the videos, audios and pages from the coursebook and workbook in class.
The students in Year 4, 5, & 6 are on a journey with Paula the tortoise with various topics including: answering questions about myself, name, age, where I live and come from, my family, my classroom, stationery, my hobbies, telling the time and what I do in my day.
“With 100 million mother tongue speakers, German is the most widely spoken language in Europe. A new survey has shed light on where people are learning German around the world. Some 15.4 million people are learning German as a foreign language all over the world” and you the students at Blouberg International in Cape Town South Africa are very much part of this growing number.
*Deutsch ist cool und genial! Deutsch ist International! *(German is cool and awesome! German is International!)
*Song lyrics from the Hallo Anna programme. See the Year 2’s singing the song Hallo Anna Hallo Benno filmed in Term 1.
Auf Wiedersehen, bis bald!
Frau Kerstin Pani
German Teacher Primary School
Year 3 Creating Masterpieces!
The year 3 classes have worked very hard over the last few weeks to interpret symmetry and its relevance to adventure. After being able to apply the concept they created perfectly symmetrical frogs and beautiful tessellation patterns.
The year 3’s also created beautiful Chinese Dragons, silhouettes and the cutest caterpillar hats that displayed their knowledge of fractions.
The bright colors and exciting projects has given Spring a warm welcome!
Sasha Rajah
Year 3 Teacher
Teaching Fractions In Year 2
The Year 2 students have started to learn about fractions this past week and wow, the teachers were blown away at how quickly they have picked up on this concept. We decided to use a more tactile approach, therefore making the fractions lessons more enjoyable.
Teaching fractions can be complex and confusing, but understanding fractions is a necessary skill for young students to learn, in order to benefit them when they get older. Fractions are known as building blocks for other mathematical skills, therefore it is of great importance that students understand and feel comfortable and confident when practicing them.
There are many opportunities in a child’s life where one can help them understand the concept and show the importance of using fractions. Using fruit, cutting a cake, following a recipe with measuring cups, drawing a pizza and separating the slices, are just a few examples of ways in which one can bring in fractions to a child’s life in an interesting and fun manner.
We hope these little tricks will benefit both the parents and the students as Mathematics can be quite daunting for both.
“Life is a math equation. In order to gain the most, you have to know how to convert negatives into positives.” – Anonymous
Year 2 Teacher
Weekend News
In Reception year, we focus a lot on the importance of reading, and it is always such a pleasure to see the smile on a little one’s face when he or she mastered a new skill in reading or writing.
Every Monday, students come to school excited to share their weekend news with their friends, and now as their reading and writing skills have progressed, they also write down their weekend news in their writing books.
This year has been particularly challenging for our students, but despite this they have made tremendous progress in learning to read. It is wonderful to see the progress from week to week, as students gain more confidence in their own abilities.
We would like to share some of our weekend news with everybody:
Tilda Rohlandt (6) “I watched Peppa Pig on TV”Kirby Melvin (5) “I went to the strawberry farm.”Juliana Baruti (5) “I went to the shop. I went swimming.”Dora Wang (5) “I ride my bicycle.”
Reception Teacher
From the Principal’s Desk, 11 September 2020
Bringing Back The Normal.
The most important year for any student is their matric year. Not just academically, but it is also the last time they will participate in school sporting events, productions, prize-giving and most importantly, the Matric dance.
Due to the pandemic our Year 12’s have missed out on so many of these traditions. However, as soon as we were moved to level 2 we began planning for a few important events this term. We are holding our Valedictory service next week and although parents cannot join us they will be able to stream the event online. We have also organised a Matric farewell dinner and the Year 12 students are extremely excited to dress-up for the occasion.
Although there were a lot of setbacks for schools all over the country and the world, it also opened doors of “first time ever”. For the first time ever, we held our Student Representative Council (SRC) voting online. Our IT department created a platform where the High School students were able to view prospective SRC candidates’ videos and then cast their votes on an online ballot. The new SRC will be announced at the Valedictory service.
In the Primary School we had our verbal feedback meetings and we trust it went well for all parents. The Primary students are also practicing hard their Jerusalema dance. Keep an eye out for this exciting video
Wishing all our families a restful weekend.
Julian Harrison
Head of Academics High School
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From the Principal’s Desk, 4 September 2020
Dear Parents
If like me you were expectantly waiting for spring to arrive, you must be sharing my disappointment at being stuck in a winter wardrobe. We have much to be grateful for and, despite the bitter cold of the past few days, it is still wonderful to hear the voices and laughter of our children back at school.
This week we opened our Aftercare facility again and I wish to thank you for adhering to the protocols so diligently. Your conscientiousness makes the work of the teachers and aftercare staff much easier and we appreciate your cooperation with collection times. We have also reintroduced the holiday care program as we are acutely aware of the need for such a facility.
Next week our staff will be doing verbal feedback meetings. I trust you have managed to schedule some time with your children’s teachers as the feedback from these meetings is crucial for both parties.
We are celebrating Mrs. Avril Lai Wing this week and wish to honor her for the daily tasks she is doing so gracefully. She is always available to our students and receives them with a big heart. Secretaries are the first face you see as you enter the building and the welcoming smiles to our children. We are blessed to have her as part of our team.
“Spring is when you feel like whistling even with a shoe full of slush.”- Doug Larson
I wish you a happy weekend and may it be filled with sunshine and no rain!
Regards
Edna
