Primary Newsletter
June 2020
MESSAGE FROM OUR PRIMARY PRINCIPAL - MS. SANDRA KELLEC
Dear AJAC Community,
The year’s end is now approaching swiftly. We have all worked harder, given more, and become more innovative in 2019-20. A world pandemic has been a new experience for all of us, but it has helped us to learn more as a world community. We treasure life and freedom, just a little bit more.
What we have learned is that our community is a strong one and that we must keep pressing on even in adversity. At Ajman Academy, parents worked hand in hand with teachers and students to make sure that they had the support they needed during Distance Learning. We noticed that some students just got on with it, while others had to learn bigger lessons about personal responsibility and perseverance.
We are extremely proud of our students’ efforts and also believe that we as a team of teachers and administrators have given our sincere efforts to provide quality learning experiences that are based on the standards of excellent practice that we will always strive for in our school. We also, as an added pleasure, took pride in seeing our KG2, and Grade 5 students graduate in virtual ceremonies and move on to new phases of their education.
We have had to be adaptable whilst teaching and in finding more effective ways to give feedback to students. As a one-to-one iPad school, on the road to becoming an Apple Distinguished School, we have been in a very fortunate position to be able to lead with our distance learning model.
Now that we are planning for next year, we are excited about how we can continue to use much of what we have learned. Showbie, SeeSaw and Microsoft Teams allowed us flexibility during our Distance Learning period. Parents have been very positive about our platforms and also appreciate Showbie for the archiving of resources, assignments and verbal and annotated feedback for students. Frequent and personalised feedback will always be fundamental to the learning process for all students.
In this issue of the newsletter, you will find highlights and accomplishments that you should be aware of as a parent with a child in the Primary School. In the words of Coordinators and others, you will certainly read one thing over and again. It is the abundance of care for students and their learning at our community school.
As we now move into the summer and eventually a new academic year, we are eagerly awaiting our students return to school and are working hard to provide the very best transition ahead in September.
Once again my thanks to all for your continued support and pride in Ajman Academy and in the education of your children.
My very best wishes for a safe and relaxing summer.
Sandra Kellec
Primary Principal
A message from Ms Rachel, PYP Coordinator
Distance learning has thrown us (parents, students and teachers alike) a whole range of new challenges. As the term has developed, we hope you have seen an ever-increasing range of activities presented to your children where teachers have been adapting to building inquiry approaches into their lessons. We have aimed to keep the learning relevant to them being at home and using things around the house to engage their learning, and we have also tried to encourage children to develop their self-management skills.
Increasingly, the IB approaches to teaching and learning of specific research, thinking, social, self-management and communication skills is proving to be the essential skills of 21st Century learners. At Ajman Academy, we build these skills into the lessons as they are crucial for life long learning. Those of you with pupils in Grades 3, 4 and 5 will have seen this in particular as your children have been working on their Personal Inquiries and their Personal Exhibition pieces. You will notice how the children are being asked to identify a learner profile attribute to work on during their learning, and they are taking something of interest, relevance and global significance and developing their own learning goals and skills alongside developing and deepening understanding.
It is the crafting of such inquiries by our teachers that not only encourages the learning of facts and content but also gives the children the skills of how to learn. How many times have you been asked to research without knowing how to research? We have broken the tasks down to scaffold the steps. We hope that this experience has also given you a greater insight into our approaches to teaching and learning.
You will see how technology is naturally integrated into the learning, how children are being asked to be independent and that each lesson has a clear goal. As teachers, we are continually reflecting on our practice and how to improve our provision. The experience from our side has also helped us further develop our skills; we have needed to be more innovative in the way we deliver.
A message from Ms. Victoria Brown, AEN Coordinator
During this academic year, the Additional Educational Needs Department has introduced a number of support systems to help our students at Ajman Academy. Our department offers support to students, teachers and parents based on the needs of the individual and we have a rigorous referral system to ensure we can identify all students needing support. An in-depth testing system allows us to track pupil progress, so enabling us to provide specific support.
The Additional Education Needs Department holds reading and literacy in high regard and we encourage all of our students to read every day. In school, we have a variety of reading programmes that we offer to support those students who find this area of the curriculum challenging and we are able to work on individual plans to develop those skills.
Despite Distance Learning having been a challenge for all, we have continued to support students through small group and one-to-one lessons by the use of Microsoft Teams. We are also pleased to have been able to utilize the Teaching Assistants to support students with reading using Oxford Owls, Epic and Scholastic Literacy Pro. The introduction of Read Theory for Grade 5 is also a way of maintaining those important literacy skills over the long holiday. Whilst distance learning has been challenging for all, our students have stepped up and worked well with all the Apple applications and the face-to-face meetings via Microsoft Teams. It is the hope of all of the Additional Educational Needs department that we can welcome our students back in September and continue to build on the hard work and progress that has been made this academic year.
A message from Ms. Clare Eastwood, Pre-KG Grade Leader
Wow! What a year it has been. Even though it has been a strange and different academic year to usual, we are so proud of how fantastic our children in Pre-Kg have progressed and developed with their learning, both at school and home.
During the course of term three, children have completed and sent in some wonderful activities, pictures and videos with the help of our fun-filled resource activity packs. Our little superstars made some amazing science experiments such as; building a pond, creating small world gardens and even placing a jellyfish in a bottle! All of the children have progressed in their mathematic skills; we saw the children go on a 3D shape hunt around their house, create their own patterns using a variety of materials and recognise numbers up to 20 with fun online number games and tasks.
Throughout distance learning, children thoroughly enjoyed all the stories that were read by the teachers and have now started to build their own stories using various props around the house, which helped develop their English language. All of the teachers have enjoyed watching and seeing the children attain their goals and outcomes, and this could not have been achieved without the fantastic guidance and support from you, our wonderful parents and families.
Through these recent challenging times, you have helped us uphold the best education for your child through your dedication, hard work and collaboration with us, teachers. Forever we are grateful for this. Well done to all of our students for all that they have achieved this year. It has been a pleasure and an honour to teach them.
We will miss you all so much but look forward to seeing your children as we are passing through the corridors in AJAC.
Have a brilliant summer, stay safe, take care and enjoy that well-deserved rest.
GOOD LUCK IN KG1!
A message from Ms. Coba Burger, KG1 Grade Leader
The beginning of the academic year seems so far in the past. Teachers were working on getting everything ready for the first day of school, students settling in and forming new friendships. The months went by with our students learning, playing and enjoying being at school, until, one day in March when we heard that we needed to move from school-based teaching to online learning.
This seemed to be a gigantic hurdle that we needed to overcome. ‘How will it work?’ ‘Will our students be able to cope?’ ‘ What progress will our students make?’ These and many other questions were what the KG1 teachers were wrestling with.
As teachers, especially working with the younger students, we know and value the last term. This is the time when everything that we have been working on during the year seems to fall in place, and the students show amazing progress in all areas of their learning.
Now, the beginning of Distance learning seems to be so far in the past. Our KG1 students have shown us that they are resilient human beings, who with the fantastic support of their families can continue their learning using technology.
Our students, through the use of Seesaw, had the opportunity to use resources found at home to continue their learning. Science-based projects such as discovering the properties of different objects, to baking biscuits and cakes to learn about time, are examples. Students used their knowledge of phonics to develop their reading skills and moving on to do some inventive writing. Learning about the different habitats for our Unit of Inquiry sessions allowed the students to discover that we can gather information from various resources such as books, videos related to the topic, internet searches as well as knowledge from their parents and family members. The Chilli challenges assigned to some of the activities allowed the children to further their learning and application of their knowledge and skills.
The introduction of Microsoft Teams for virtual meetings was something that many of our students looked forward to—connecting not only with their teacher but also with their friends and teacher. This was an excellent way for us as teachers to see what our students learnt during the week. Using screen share to play virtual games based on our learning outcomes was also successful.
And now we have reached the end of the academic year. Our students have surpassed our expectations for online learning. They have achieved so much during this time, and we are proud of all their efforts and are humbly thankful for the incredible support that they received from their families during this time.
KG1, you have proven to us that you can accomplish much more than anticipated, and we know and trust that you will continue on your learning journeys with the same enthusiasm as you have shown during this year.
A message from Ms. Hayley Beresford, KG2 Grade Leader
Our last term at Ajman Academy was completed online through Seesaw. The teachers created interactive and stimulating activities for the students for all subjects, and they were then given constructive feedback on their completed tasks. A big focus was on continuing to develop the students’ phonetic awareness through Read, Write Inc. lessons twice a week as well as structured reading and daily writing challenges. The students made good use of their own items in their home environment within their learning, especially for Mathematics and for Unit of Inquiry lessons, which they captured in videos and photographs. So many students kept active and enjoyed our brain breaks and health and wellness challenges too. Additional support was provided to students, who required it, through Microsoft Teams ‘virtual’ meetings. Microsoft Teams was also used to reconnect teachers and students during this online period. The teachers have missed the students so much, which was evident when making their virtual graduation. We would like to wish our KG2 students all the best as they transition into Primary school.
A message from Ms. Karima Chaouch , Primary Arabic Studies Coordinator
السادة الأفاضل أولياء الأمور الكرام …
السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
بدأ الطلاب الفصل الثالث من العام الدراسي بداية موفقة، حيث استخدموا الكتب الوزارية الإلكترونية وفقاً للمنهج الجديد، مما سهل عملية التعليم والتعلم عن بعد. وقد تم تفعيل منصة Microsoft teams للحصة الحية والمناقشة بين الطلاب ومعلميهم، كما تم إضافة منصتي Seesaw لمرحلة الروضة وShowbie لطلبة الصف الأول حتى الصف الخامس لأداء الأنشطة والواجبات المقررة، كما أنهم استخدموا منصة كتبي للقراءة الاثرائية واكتساب المفردات اللغوية لتحسين مهارة التعبير وكذلك منصة ألف للصف الخامس ومنصة الأبجديات من الصف الثاني إلى الصف الرابع.
أظهر الطلاب اهتماماً كبيراً بحضورهم للمواضيع المقررة في الدراسات العربية، واستجابوا معها مؤدين الأنشطة الصفية بيسرٍ. تعلموا طرقا وأساليب جديدة في التعلم عن بعد، كما أصبحوا متواصلين و مترابطين أكثر ببعضهم البعض من خلال التعلم الافتراضي والتي كانت تجربة ناجحة.
ثابر الطلاب خلال هذه الفترة وأظهروا كفاءتهم من خلال التقييمات التكوينية التي تم إنجازها.
تعلم الطلاب الاعتماد على النفس، والأداء الجيد خلال هذه السنة، راجيةً من الله عزّ وجلّ أن ينيرَ عقولهم ودربهم في كل أعمالهم.
التربية الإسلامية / Islamic
قام معلمو التربية الإسلامية خلال فترة التعلم عن بعد بالاعتماد على تطبيقات متعددة بغية إيصال المعلومات للطلاب بأسهل الطرق، ففي الصف الخامس اعتمدوا على منصة ألف بشكل أساسي، وهي منصة تعليمية تفاعلية جذابة للطلاب، وفي دروس القرآن كانوا يسجلون دروساً تتيح لهم التدرب على التلاوة عند سماعها من خلال تضمين الفيديو تسجيلات من برنامج القرآن المجيد، ثم يشرحون السور باستخدام التفسير المصور، ثم يتيحون الفرصة للطلاب بالتعبير عما فهمومه من خلال حل بعض الأنشطة، كما قاموا أحياناً بشرح الدروس خلال اللقاء الحي مع الطلاب على برنامج Microsoft Teams، وفي بعض الصفوف أثروا المنهج بدروس خارجية ترتبط بما درسه الطلاب في المنهج الوزاري، وكلفوا الطلاب بمهام بحثية تظهر مدى فهمهم لما تعلموه.
A message from Ms. Emma Philip, Primary Literacy Coordinator
We have been working hard over the course of the term to further develop our language teaching to ensure our children are receiving the highest level of English education possible.
Behind the scenes, we have been working on our curriculum and have developed a thorough programme of reading for comprehension, running from KG2 through to Grade 5. Each grade will have specific texts, related to their units of Inquiry which will focus on developing their understanding of English. Once the mechanics of their reading has been established, pupils will be learning how to predict, question, summarise, clarify and visualise text. We have also added a wide range of award-winning literature to each and every grade so that children will experience a rich variety of stories and language in their journey through the primary school.
We have also implemented a more structured approach to writing ready for the next academic year. All of this will be embedded within our units of Inquiry. The
key to language is vocabulary, and we have also worked to create professional development for teachers and activities for children to really develop their vocabulary. We look forward to sharing more with you about our language programme next term.
We hope you have enjoyed the reading platforms of Oxford Owls and Epic. Please be aware that Kutubee also has a wide range of digital reading material available in English for your children to continue to access books over the holiday. We urge you to encourage your children to read as much as possible as reading ability and a wide vocabulary is an excellent indicator of future academic success. In this digital world, and through this time of isolation, we know that there is no real replacement for face-to-face contact and as such, no actual replacement for ‘real books’. As we have all been in the business of dramatically changing our habits over the past months, the habit of regularly sharing a book with your children is extremely beneficial, and we urge you to do this, particularly with your youngest children who learn so much through stories. Reading in any language is beneficial.
A message from Mr. Zane Pottow, Maths Coordinator
We have come to the end of another academic year at Ajman Academy, and it is essential for you all to know the changes that have taken place throughout the last year and a half.
The last year and a half has seen many changes in how Maths is taught in the
classroom. A lot of time has gone into revising the IB Scope and Sequence and aligning it to the UK National Curriculum Standards in Mathematics. By doing so, we have been able to introduce a standards-based collaborative grade level PYP planner and a curriculum framework using the National Center for Excellence in The Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM). Teachers have clear and specific outcomes for each year group, attached to the Units of Inquiry and matched to the UK National Curriculum Standards.
Teachers were also introduced to an 8 point lesson framework which is designed to increase engagement and learning in the classroom. I was also appointed as the Primary Maths Coordinator to oversee Maths and further implement changes that need to be made.
With all the changes in the curriculum having taken place, teachers needed a way to track progress and understanding of students. We have introduced Baseline assessments at the start of the year to give teachers a data profile for each student. This data profile continues to develop as the year progresses. We introduced Pre-unit and Post-Unit assessments across Grades 1-5 to give teachers a starting point for each topic, and it has allowed teachers to see the amount of progress that is made from the beginning to the end of a topic. Teachers can see definitive progress, which can be recorded and compared in numerous ways.
The Weekly Mental Maths test was introduced across the Primary School and allowed our students to get used to completing mental calculations within a specific time limit. These weekly tests are challenging for students, but we could see the improvements being made once we started analyzing the data.
A significant implementation for this year has been the introduction of End-of-Term assessments for Grades 1-5. The assessments are an excellent way for students to revise the concepts covered throughout the term. It has also allowed students to feel more comfortable with assessments as they move on up through their schooling career and into Secondary later on.
It is evident that Ajman Academy is moving into a more data orientated approach with Maths, the sole purpose of which is to improve the standard of Maths across the Primary School and give your child the best advantage in life.
All of these changes have been possible thanks to the great support from parents and staff, who kept sharing ideas and suggestions on how we can improve and give each student the level of education that you have come to expect from Ajman Academy.
Please enjoy your summer holiday, and we look forward to welcoming you back in the new academic year.
A message from Ms. Samantha Bhogal, Primary Science Coordinator
Science through digital learning has provided an exciting challenge for our Primary teachers as it is a new and innovative way to teach our Science objectives.
Each grade has ensured that all of the Science objectives (taken from the National Curriculum for England) have been covered so that children have the subject knowledge that they require for the following academic year.
Additionally, children have completed investigations that prove their ability to be scientists, and we have been very impressed with the children’s responses to these investigations.
We would like to thank all parents for their fantastic support in ensuring that their children can complete these challenges, thus supporting their Working Scientifically skills. It has been wonderful to see so many children immersed in their Science Inquiry and also collaborate with their families to answer scientific questions.
A message from Ms. Maysoon Ali, Primary PE Coordinator
Coronavirus has made Ajman Academy switch to distance learning. We are lucky because we already had a solid foundation in technological teaching platforms such as Seesaw and Showbie. These allowed us to communicate easily with the students and provided students and parents with materials and information. As a primary PE teacher, I was able to find out how each student was doing and watch them learn something new or enhance a skill or knowledge that they already had.
It was a pleasure to watch students learning PE at their own pace and actively participating in the class discussions. They enjoyed recording themselves while doing different games and activities. Our aim in the PE department was to provide a variety of fun, physical activities.
A key element that contributed to student success was taking care of their health and wellbeing. Health and wellbeing is a state of health in both body and mind. I would like to stress on the word “ mind “ as PE helps your children be better thinkers and to succeed in the other subjects. PE at Ajman Academy provides your children with the opportunity to reach their fullest developmental potential.
During distance learning PE lessons, we advised the students to wear appropriate clothing and footwear, to drink a good amount of water, to stretch their bodies for better flexibility, and we taught them the right ways to breathe during workouts. We also spoke to them about how to stay fit and healthy during the holy month of Ramadan to help them learn and grow successfully.
Physical education is an integral part of your child’s education and contributes to his/ her growth and development. It is the PE department’s goal to give your child a positive PE experience and to help him/ her gain an appreciation of the importance of staying active.
Here is the path to your children’s health and wellbeing over the holiday:
• Start the day with a healthy breakfast. It refuels the body and provides energy for the day.
• Let them plan and prepare one healthy meal each week.
• Eat together as a family.
• Eat more fruits and vegetables.
• Eat more grains.
• Avoid sugar.
• Drink plenty of fluids. Choose water and milk.
• Exercise for 30 minutes, five days a week.
I always say to our students; Don’t tell me how talented you are. Tell me how hard you work!.
Continue to work hard and to exercise over the summer holiday.
You demonstrated so much determination during distance learning, and you will keep moving forward.
It’s kind of fun to do the IMPOSSIBLE”
A message from Mr. Bob Pateman, School Librarian
As we move into summer I would like to offer some reading suggestions for the weeks ahead. First, however, here is a suggestion for everybody, including teachers and parents!
Every time I read a book I make a photocopy of the front cover and on the back, I write the opening sentence and then a couple of my favourite lines. It only takes a couple of minutes, but leaves a wonderful record of a lifetime of reading!
Here are three examples – does anybody know where they come from?
1.“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose."
2.“Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
3."I'll just go down and have some pudding and wait for it all to turn up ... It always does in the end."
Answers
1. Oh, the Places You’ll Go! by Dr. Seuss
2. Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There by Lewis Carroll
3. Harry Potter The Order of the Phoenix