Developing good partnerships between home and school within BIS community

Dear Parents,

Developing good partnerships between home and school is really important to us and it is our vision that all parents will feel a sense of belonging to our British International School, Hanoi community. There are a number of ways BIS staff are fostering these relationships this term. Firstly, by teachers sharing some of the ways they teach and aspects of the curriculum covered, parents can work in partnership with the school to help their child’s learning. Our Meet the Parents sessions in Primary this week were very well attended and provided the forum for parents to find out more about the year ahead in their child’s class. Teachers will continue to communicate information about the curriculum via shared learning sessions, parents’ workshops, our school blogs, the school app and through the BIS website.

Our next parent workshop will be held next Wednesday at 11 am and is an introduction to a new and exciting opportunity for our children, the chance to study for the ABRSM (The Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music) qualifications, the exam board of the Royal Schools of Music. Our Performing Arts leader, Ms. Laura Rea, will give a short presentation about what ABRSM actually is, why it’s important and its benefit to our students. We will also enjoy several live performances by some of the talented teachers who offer music lessons here at BIS Hanoi so it would be lovely to see many of you here. Also on Wednesday, at 5pm, parents are invited to attend a presentation by the participants of the recent Gold Duke of Edinburgh awards. The presentation is part of the assessment for the final award and it would be great to have an audience from our community.

Secondly, our parents sharing with teachers their child’s learning at home is really valuable so that we can celebrate achievements and also get to know your children even better. As the year progresses, we will be asking for parent contributions to year group blogs which will celebrate community projects.

Thirdly, we really want to encourage parents to become part of our community of learners. In the Meet the Librarians sessions this week, our new librarian, Ms Hull, shared her love of books and talked about how we want to open up our library facilities to our parent community. This is a new initiative for the British International School, Hanoi. A parent ECA is being offered this year for English conversation and will be held in the library. Watch out for future, family oriented ECAs which will be advertised later this year too. This will provide shared reading activities for families.

Finally, we would like to encourage parents to join in and organise social events. Ms. Fitzpatrick and Ms. Mi led the way this week by offering a trip for new families to explore the Old Quarter here in Hanoi and sample Vietnamese foods. The positive feedback received showed how enjoyable and informative this event was. Next Friday, Mrs Wild is hosting a further social event, our New Families BBQ. We are interested in your ideas too so please let Ms. Fitzpatrick know if you would like to suggest or organise further events.

Ms Sue Hill, Principal