Weekly Highlights 01/11/2024

Mr. Simon Higham, Principal

Dear Parents

Welcome back to this week’s edition of the Weekly Highlights. Thank you for taking time to engage and connect with our school community to celebrate the many successes across our school community.

School Photographs – Picture Day

On Wednesday this week, all parents received a letter from me regarding details of our upcoming whole school photographer visit.

This year, BVIS will be using the professional company ‘Picture Day’ to take the individual and class photographs for our school. They currently work with our sister school, BVIS Hanoi and have their Head Office in Vietnam.

Dates in School: Monday 11th November until Friday 15th November

Venue:  BVIS Sport’s Hall on the 3rd floor

After all photographs have been taken, you will be sent more details on how you can purchase photographs using most debit and credit cards for local and international payments, made directly on their website or by bank transfer.

Direct contact details for Picture Day are: 
• Email: hello@pictureday.asia 
• Hotline: 0243 717 3588 (Monday-Friday, 09:00-12:30 & 13:30-16:30). 

Support is available in English and Vietnamese for your convenience.

Nord Anglia Education Celebrates World Children’s Day

What is World Children’s Day?

World Children’s Day is UNICEF’s annual day of action for children, by children. This month, the 20th November 2024 marks the publishing and adoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, also known as the UNCRC.

From climate change to education and wellbeing, young people are raising their voices on the issues that matter to their generation and calling for adults to create a better future.

Theme: Future-Change Child

When you think back to your childhood ask yourself the following questions and I encourage you to share them with your children:

• How much has technology changed the world? 
  
• How easy were the opportunities to connect with people across the globe? 
  
• How has our climate changed? 

Additionally, I ask you to reflect upon what you imagined the future to look like, when you were a child.

At BVIS and across Nord Anglia, we are encouraging children to look at different trends that need their (and our) attention right now. These include how to responsibly use technology, including AI and social networks, how our actions make a difference on the environment around us and how the ways we treat others, creates inclusive societies and communities.

Over this weekend, take time to talk to your children about your reflections and use the material below to generate further discussion.

For Families with Early Years and Primary Aged Children

Watch these videos to introduce your child to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (video 1, video 2, video 3)

Talk to your children about why their voice matters.

Ask your child about the rights that are most important to them but remind them that they have access to all their rights.

For Families with Secondary Aged Students

Watch these videos to introduce your child to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (video 1, video 2)

Use the Child Friendly version of the UNCRC to talk to your child about their rights. Have an open dialogue with your child about using their voice – Why is it important? What happens when they do not use their voice?

Effective dialogue to help celebrate World Children’s Day will help to start change. No topic should ever be the problem - only the personal interpretation of the issue and the lack of willingness to communicate will hold us back!

As always, I’d love to hear about your discussions and next steps.

Welcome to our New Teachers

Mr. Nathan Fingleton - Secondary Science Teacher.

Qualifications

- Bachelor of Science in Biology, Manchester Metropolitan University (2015)
- Postgraduate Certificate in Education (2017)
- Qualified teacher status (2017)

Nathan is an experienced Science teacher who began his career in 2016. Originally from Manchester, he spent four years teaching in the UK before deciding to teach internationally. For the past four years, he has worked in our Nord Anglia School in Shenzhen, China, as a Science Lead and Assistant Head of Secondary School. During this time, he also completed his Master's Degree in International Education and Leadership. In his free time, Nathan enjoys cooking, travelling, and playing ultimate frisbee.

Contact Us

Should you wish to contact your child’s Class Teacher(s) or Form Tutor directly, we encourage communication to be written in the language you most feel confident to use. 

Parents may also find it useful to contact their child’s class teacher(s) or form tutor directly for all individual queries about their academic work/social and emotional wellbeing in school.  Individual contact details can be found in the Parent's Handbooks or via our Primary/Secondary Receptionists.   

On behalf of everyone at BVIS, I wish you a very enjoyable weekend ahead.

Mrs Mary McAloon, Head of Primary

Thank you to our ‘Friends of BVIS’

The Halloween event last Friday was enjoyed by over 400 members of our community. To prepare and organise for this exciting evening, our ‘Friends of BVIS’ group collaborated with the school’s events team, decorating the hall and most importantly, the ‘Halloween walkway’ where students bravely conquered the spooky sights and sounds of the evening on their way to the ‘best-dressed’ competition. The competition judges carefully considered the creativity, craftmanship, stage performance, overall impact, attention to detail and theme.  There were three categories where the highest scores were awarded with prizes. The costume winners went to siblings Anh Khang (Year 5) and Nha An (F2) for the ‘Best Family costume’, Thao Nhien (Year 3) for the ‘Scariest costume’ and May An (F3) for the ‘Most Creative Costume’. Thank you to all participants and congratulations to the winners of the competition. A special thanks goes to the team members of ‘Friends of BVIS’ who orchestrated the whole event.

Project Curiosity

For the last 4 weeks, Upper Primary students have been focusing on a topic of their choice, exploring, researching and then summarising their leaning to share with others in a presentation – we call this ‘Project Curiosity’. Students completed this project at home and spent time at school each Monday to share and discuss their progress with their teachers and peers. This is an annual research project that is in place to encourage enquiring minds and develop positive learning habits for students at home. The final outcome serves as an opportunity for students to build confidence to present to an audience and also summarise a significant amount of learning in a concise and cohesive manner.  

Years 5 and 6 had their showcase event this week. Family members were welcomed into school to learn about a variety of topics such as, dogs, music and tennis. Next week we look forward to the Year 4 students’ showcase event and will share a final summary of the project in the Weekly Highlights.

EYFS Parent Workshop – Meaningful Interactions and Managing Emotions

On Tuesday Ms Rebecca, Ms Jacinth and Ms Khuyen invited EYFS parents into school for the second installment of our ‘Helping at Home’ workshops. This week’s theme was on meaningful interactions with young children and understanding their emotions. The workshop gave an opportunity for parents to share and explore the challenges of supporting young children when they face ‘big emotions’ such as frustration, upset and anger. The EYFS team introduced parents to the approach used at school called, ‘Zones of Regulation’, which encourages children to share and discuss their emotions and endorses each one of those felt. The key message is that it is ok to feel each emotion and it is important to understand why they feel this and what strategies they can use to help. In addition, the workshop delved deep into the importance of conversation and shared top tips on how to encourage open dialogue with a child to help develop their critical thinking, imagination, vocabulary and confidence.

I would like to thank those parents who attended the workshop this week. Workshop three in the series is scheduled for Tuesday 3rd December at 08:30am. We would love to welcome as many of our EYFS parents and family members as possible to this event.

Upcoming Events

1. 04/11/24-08/11/24: SISAC Championship Week
   
2. 11/11/24: Club block 1B begins
   
3. 11/11/24: Parent Workshop: Lower Primary Design and Technology and STEAM Part 1
   
4. 11-15/11/24: School Photographs – please see ClassDojo for your child’s individual schedule
   
5. 25/11/24: Parent Workshop: Lower Primary Design and Technology and STEAM Part 2
   
6. 29/11/24: Y1 Starts Christmas at BVIS!  Ticket only event for Y1 families
   
7. 03/12/24: EYFS Helping at home Parent Workshop: Routines, boundaries, and challenging behaviour
   
8. 06/12/24: Y2 Production – Y2 families invited
   
9. 14/12/24: Christmas Fair – ticketed event

Mr Toby Bate, Head of Secondary

Monash University visit 

Last week, Monash University brought some of its staff members to BVIS representing the faculties below:

- Art, Design & Architecture
- Humanities and Social Sciences
- Engineering
- Information Technology
- Education
- Law
- Medicine, Nursing & Health Science

Through discussions with these faculty members, students gained valuable opportunities to explore what it's like to study these subject areas and what each faculty can offer at Monash. Direct interactions with the university representatives and academic staff will have benefited students in making decisions for their long-term learning journey. 

To read the alumni interview series, please go to University Ambassador sway

BVIS Battle of the Bands

This year's Battle of the Bands was another fantastic show of musical talent. Our three bands, Cheese Boys, RootSix and The Bittersweet, battled it out using Lady Gaga, Bruno Mars and Chillies to share their passion for music-making with the judges. Audience members of all ages, including friends, family and teachers, thoroughly enjoyed the performances.

The judges, Ms Heather Rugile (Primary Music Specialist), Ms Rebecca Robinson (EYFS Phase Leader and Music Teacher) and Mr Denis Agafonov (Secondary Music and Drama Teacher) were given the very challenging decision of deciding who should win KS4/ 5 winners and Overall Winners.

The overall winners will go on to represent BVIS later this academic year in the city-wide Battle of the Bands competition against other International Schools. Performances were judged based on musicianship and technical ability; originality and creativity; stage presence; and audience reaction. Particular highlights included RootSix’s jokes and audience response, The Bittersweets vocal harmonies and the crowd-pleasing Cheese Boys with ‘Vùng Ký Ức’.

A big thank you to all who helped make the event such a success, including Chip (Y12) and Cam Phong (Y13) for compering. All performers did an exceptional job but there could only be one overall winner. Congratulations go to... The Bittersweet!

House Sways 

The links below display the House Sways, which are put together by our House student leaders. As the term progresses different posts and updates will be added displaying the relevant news for each of the Houses. 

Dalat - Dalat House News 
Hanoi - Hanoi House News  
Hue - Hue House News 
Saigon - Saigon House News 

Sparx Maths Champions 

The Sparx Maths Weekly Champion is the student who is the top XP earner in each year group. 
 
Students earn XP by completing tasks in their Sparx Homework 

• Compulsory Tasks earn 60-80XP 
  
• XP Boost Tasks earn 120-150XP 
  
• Target Tasks earn 120-150XP 
  
• Independent Learning Tasks earn 100XP 

Students reach a new Sparx Level every 10000XP 

Huge congratulations go to our Top XP earners this week, who are:

Bedrock Champions  

This week’s bedrock champions are:  

Year 7 - Nham Gia Hung 
Year 8 - Le Hong Minh Quang  
Year 9 - Kosuke Yamamura
Year 10 - Nguyen Chi Hieu
Year 11 - Ngo Khanh Ngoc  
Year 12 - Tran Khanh Nhi

Congratulations to all the above students who came up on top in their respective Year groups. A special well done to Mraz (Le Hong Minh Quang) who achieved the highest Bedrock points total across the whole of Secondary! 

Champion of the week

This week’s champion is...

Congratulations and well done Cherry

Champion Tutor Group

This week's Champion tutor group is...

Congratulations to 10V, well done!

Housepoint Totals

Dalat overtake Hanoi to claim the lead and last year’s winners Hue now sit in 4th place

Upcoming Events