1. Al Yasmina School Primary Newsletter
17 January 2013
Issue 14
Dear Parents,
Dates for your Diary
Thursday 24 January - School closed – Prophet Mohammed’s birthday (PBUH)
Wednesday 20 March - Spring Concert
Message from Head of School – Mr Gale
I wish to highlight now that the format of the primary newsletter will be more in line with our
secondary school‟s newsletter, The Secondary PARTnership. The „new look‟ will be launched after
February half term. We need to have greater synergy and alignment as we are one school.
Assistant Head – Curriculum, Data and Assessment – Ms. Davies
Unbelievably, I am in my 5th year at Al Yasmina! How time flies when you‟re
working hard and having fun!
I am proud to say that I am one of the „originals‟ who joined Al Yasmina in
August 2008, when the school first opened. At that time, the building was
completed (well…almost completed!) but there was no paved car park
and to begin with, the staff had to walk precariously along planks,
balanced over mounds of sand and trenches in order to reach the front
entrance. Quite an experience!
However, despite some of the trials and tribulations of those first few weeks
of Al Yasmina, I can honestly say that I have never looked back!
I have been teaching for 21 years and 15 of those years have been spent at
various schools in the Middle East. I have taught at schools in London, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman,
Spain and last but certainly not least, at Al Yasmina.
In between the overseas „tours of duty‟, I have managed to flit back to the U.K for a few years, to
keep up to date and also to re-enforce in my mind just how good life is in the Middle East!
I am very excited to be the Assistant Head responsible for Curriculum, Data and Assessment.
As part of my role, I will be responsible for developing a creative and skills curriculum. It is my role to
analyse assessment data to secure rapid pupil progress.
That means I will be looking at assessment results with the Heads of Year and looking at exactly how
we can intervene to develop children‟s progress within their year.
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2. It will give us a chance to pinpoint groups of learners that are on the cusp of making great progress
and ensure that they get the support and are taught the exact skills needed to ensure this does
happen.
I will line manage the Primary Curriculum Team leaders (who are leading Literacy, Maths, Science &
ICT) and co-ordinate the curriculum, ensuring that there is progression and development of skills
across the whole Primary school. The Curriculum Team Leaders and I will ensure that there is
consistency & progression in the development of the skills and knowledge learnt by all children at Al
Yasmina, from FS to Year 6.
As you can see from all of the above, this new role will certainly be a challenge; but one that I am
looking forward to. I am also looking forward to working closely with the delightful students in our
school, as well as the superb team of teachers here at Al Yasmina – all of whom work tirelessly to
ensure our school and our students grow from strength to strength and to achieve the very best
possible for our students.
I will also be working closely with our Secondary department, to use their specialist expertise to help
us further challenge those students who show exceptional prowess in any subject. Later in the year, I
will be working with colleagues to ensure that we can create a smooth and enjoyable transition from
Year 6 into Year 7.
If you have any questions regarding these areas, please do e mail me at: KDavies@alyasmina.sch.ae.
Friend of Al Yasmina (FOY)
FOY are looking for volunteers!
It's that time of year again when we need to start thinking about the BALL. The annual Ball is to be
held on the 3rd May 2013 and we are looking to form a committee to organise it.
If you are interested in getting involved in the organisation of the ball this year, please email
janineloftus@hotmail.com.
House Athletics days are coming up in February - 7th Year 1 & 2, 12th Year 3 & 4 and 14th Year 5 & 6
and we would like to have a Tea/Coffee stall on these days.
The Aldar Olympics will be held again this year on the 28th February and FOY would like to hold a
BBQ etc on this day. I
If you are able to help out at all at any of these events please contact janineloftus@hotmail.com.
Car park
We kindly ask parents to park in the designated parking areas.
We have repeatedly asked for consideration in the car park.
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3. From the School Nurses
This morning, some of the Year 1 pupils received their booster
vaccinations of MMR and / or varicella. All of the children were very
brave indeed, with only a couple of tearful children (who were very
quickly comforted and surprised themselves that the vaccination
wasn‟t as bad as they‟d thought!). The vaccination was over so quickly
the children couldn‟t even count to 3! These children will be coming
home with a note giving the lot number of the vaccine and date given
and a letter explaining possible side effects of the vaccine and how to
relieve them. Please update these vaccines in your child‟s vaccination
card. See the attached photos of a few of the brave children!
From the Music Department
Well done to this week‟s Musicians of the Week:
Alex Vliegen (Key Stage1) and Faris Al Hajiri and
Elliott Pollendine (Key Stage 2). Alex (Year 2
Spoonbills) displayed a very good knowledge of
note reading when he played a short excerpt of
music reading from the stave in class. Fares and
Elliott (Year 5 Mynahs) were super-successful when
they displayed their knowledge of the Blues riff by
playing 12 bar blues on xylophones. Well done to
all of you!
We were entertained by some beautiful violin playing this morning in
assembly, when Maryam Hanashi played a solo piece. Maryam has just
passed her Grade 4 on the violin, which is a huge achievement. Well done to
Maryam and all the other talented musicians who have recently passed
instrumental exams.
Date for your diary:
March 20th Spring Concert
From the Arabic Department
‫قام طالب الصف األول بدراسة حرف النون بكافة أشكاله و أصواته القصيرة والطويلة وقد استمتع الطلبة بنشاط البطاقات من خالل العمل في مجموعات‬
Useful website:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWVXDhfx3as
From the Finance Office
Just a reminder that all Term 2 fees were due on Sunday, 6 January 2013. The Finance office working
hours are Sunday to Thursday from 8am – 3pm.
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4. Maths Open House
Thank you to all the parents who attended our Maths Open House on Sunday. The teachers and the
children thoroughly enjoyed seeing you. We hope you got a good understanding of how Maths can
be fun as well as challenging.
We look forward to seeing you at our next one – watch this space for dates!
Under 8’s Al Ain Champions – Quins on top!
On Saturday 12th January, 9 boys from year 3, travelled to Al Ain to play in an Annual Rugby
Tournament. Abu Dhabi Harlequins under 8‟s played their hearts out and walked away with ALL of
the silverware, they couldn‟t have had a better result. Good luck to the boys for their next
tournament in Dubai on the 25th January.
Back row: Axel Facey, Barnaby Wells, Tyler Goyea, Callum
Dooley-Culliname.
Front row: Thomas Goodwin, Charlie Stanley, Liam Vorster, Luke
Gilroy.
Daniel Florence
Foundation Stage 1 (FS1)
Brrrrrr! It‟s been cold in FS1 this week, that‟s because we‟ve
been learning all about animals that live in Polar Places! We
started the week looking at Arctic animals, with help from our
friend Peter the Polar Bear. Children enjoyed the story of
„Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What can you hear?‟ and were able
to retell the story and play games using the repetitive
language. During our math open morning, we played a dice
game to build our own group polar bear. Later in the week
we had our „cold day‟- the classrooms turned arctic cold and
we talked about what we could do to keep warm. Thank you
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5. to parents who helped their children bring hats scarves and gloves to school to make this day super
exciting .We made silly shape Penguins using 2D shapes and then yummy marshmallow igloos to
finish the week.
In the shared area we loved playing in the fake snow, describing how it felt and watching it fall. We
couldn‟t wait for the blocks of ice to melt so we could see what number was frozen in the middle.
Outside we talked about the cold weather, pretended to be penguins looking after eggs and
dipping our hands into the icy water.
In phonics, we have learnt 4 new sounds- p, n, c/k/ck and e and even began blending sounds and
segmenting words. Please continue to practice these sounds at home with your child.
Next week we will be diving down into the aquarium and learning all about the special fish and
creatures that live under the sea. Don‟t forget to help your child learn a special or interesting fact
that they could share with their class.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Our super stars of the week are (from left to right):
Khadija El Nadi Yellow Class, Julian Bruenjes Gold Class,
Adam Harcup Red Class, Lalit George White Class,
Mahra Al Khouri Blue Class, Aditya Ghandi Green Class
Foundation Stage 2 (FS2)
We had a wonderful start to the week on Sunday, when we welcomed parents into our classrooms to
join in with our maths activities. Thank you to all those parents who joined us, we hope you had as
much fun as we did! After our busy maths morning we became explorers with Peter the polar bear!
We were excited to find out all about the Polar regions and discovered the types of creatures, such
as polar bears, seals, arctic foxes and penguins, that live in the Arctic and Antarctic. To help imagine
the frosty living conditions, we froze coloured water to make ice-cubes, then looked at the pretty
patterns they made when they melted.
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6. We also froze toy animals in ice, and predicted which ice blocks would melt the quickest. We all
thought of ways to speed up and slow down the melting process, and recorded our results.
Next week we shall be continuing our topic „At the Zoo‟, and finding out about creatures in the
Aquarium. We shall be going on a deep-sea adventure to find out which animals live under the sea,
and then doing some writing about what we found. We will be exploring patterns and textures on
shells and fossils, and looking at symmetry in maths.
If you are visiting the beach this weekend, it would be helpful if you could collect some shells for the
children to bring in to school on Sunday.
You can help your child at home by:
Talking about the different types of creatures that live underwater.
Research information on aquarium animals on the internet or in books.
Look out for symmetry in the home, and while you are out and about this weekend.
Phonics focus:
This week we are practicing our ee oo oa ar or sounds.
Phase 3 tricky words will, that, this, then, with, them, see, for, was.
Helpful website:
Your child might enjoy watching some of the „BBC Blue Planet‟ clips on „you tube‟ to help their
understanding of underwater creatures. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fzT6ifrhL8
Maths: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/numbertime/
Phonics: http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks1/literacy/phonics/play/
Thank you to those who have already returned the consent form and 70AED for the trip to Emirates
Park Zoo. This promises to be an extremely worthwhile trip as we are fortunate to have lots of extra
things to do when we get there, such as feeding the animals, animal lectures, and small animal
shows. If you have not already returned the consent form, please do so on Sunday.
Please speak to your child‟s class teacher, if you have any questions or queries
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7. Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Alice Treloar-Jade Class, Murtaza Ghadially-Orange Class, Alex Fordree-Purple Class, Mabel James-
Amber Class, Isabella Wilcox-Ruby Class. They all made an extra special effort to try hard in the first
week of term to impress their class mascots! Thank you for helping your child keep a diary of their
weekend with the class mascot, we all love sharing the experiences back at school.
Year 1
Wow! The end of another super busy week for the
children and staff in Year 1. Our Jungle topic is certainly
kicking off with an almighty ROARRRRRR! We are loving
learning about the jungle. The children and even the
teachers have been dancing and moving to the Animal
Boogie ask your child to teach it to you, don‟t forget the
link so you can do it at home.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25_u1GzruQM. We
promise you will have lots of fun doing it. Check us out
having a boogie woogie!
Next week promises to be even MORE exciting if that‟s possible! Our Zoo
opens in the shared area! So BEWARE of the slippery snakes and the
ferocious lions children.
In Literacy we will be looking at the book „Monkey Puzzle‟ by Julia Donaldson one of our favourite
authors. Do you know any other books by this author? I will give you a clue; he has a poisonous wart
at the end of his nose and purple prickles all over his back???
In I.C.T we will be making posters to help protect endangered animals. During Geography we will
take a deep look inside the jungle to see what it is really like, what do you think we might find? And if
that wasn‟t enough we will be creating our own jungle masks.
In Numeracy we are practicing our key skills which will help us develop our mental
maths. We are learning to add and subtract with numbers up to 20 independently. Can
you help us at home? Here is a good website for you to try
http://www.crickweb.co.uk/ks1numeracy.html. Play the digit work out and don‟t forget
to tell your teachers how you got on.
We hope you are all having fun working on your projects and we very much look forward to see
them in a few weeks.
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8. Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Congratulations to our Stars of the week, what a super achievement. I‟m sure the class mascots have
had a fun weekend with you all. Well done Gadiel Breidi in Doves class, Zaina Ansari in Robin‟s class,
Evangeline Fahmy in Sparrow‟s class, Annabel Murphy in Cuckoo‟s and Abdullah Al Rashedi in Larks.
Keep up your wonderful work.
Year 2
This week in Year 2 we have been continuing to discover more
about popular landmarks in Abu Dhabi in preparation for our
Click Photography Safari. We began using maps of Abu Dhabi
to locate and recognise key landmarks and attractions in and
around the city. We also devised a questionnaire for the children
and adults around the school to find out what attractions they
like to visit. Next week we will be collecting further information
within the classroom and then will be displaying our findings in
diagrams and charts.
Year 2 enjoyed a visit from Mr Watkins, a professional
photographer from „Watkins and Sons Photography‟. He showed
the children some wonderful photos of scenes and attractions
from Abu Dhabi as well as portraits and close up images. The
children learnt a lot about taking the perfect picture!
Next week in Literacy the we will be looking closely at the
wonderful photographs and illustrations created by Chris Van
Allsburg using these as a stimulus to writing stories.
Request- Please can you send in some photographs of your
child into school next week. They will be using them to create
new pictures so will be cutting them up! Therefore please only send in photos that you do not wish to
be returned. Photographs printed on paper are fine.
Reminder- Homework is to be completed every week and handed in on a Monday. Last week an
extra reading activity was sent home to help support your child with their school reading book.
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9. Please can you ensure your child chooses one activity each week to complete in their homework
book. Most of these activities can be done independently but may need an adult to check it at
home.
Spellings- Next week we will be changing our spelling routine in school. On Sunday a new spelling
booklet will be sent home with your child. The Spelling booklet will include 4 weeks worth of spelling
words. Only practice one week of spellings at a time. The children will then have a week to practice
their spellings as they will now all be tested in class the following Sunday. Please can we ask for your
support in ensuring your child practices their spellings and then returns the booklet each Sunday.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Last week‟s Star of the week were Mia Dastoor, Lavinia Pollendine, Mahmoud El Moursi, Fraser
Donald, Julia Baig and Hamad Abushahab, who was Star of the week before the Winter break.
Year 3
In Literacy this week the children have read “Are we there yet?” a diary about a family travelling
around Australia. They have then written their own diary entries.
In Numeracy the children have continued learning about telling the time and then applying this
knowledge to read and work out timetables. As you can see from the photograph we had a fun time
in the Maths open hour. This week the children have been sorting and classifying rocks and
explaining how they were formed and a warm welcome to Olivia on her first week at Al Yasmina.
Next Week‟s learning focus will be:
Literacy- We will be reading a variety of Australian myths-“The First Sunrise” and “How the Magpies
raised the sky” and then planning and writing our own myth.
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10. Numeracy- This week we will be rounding numbers to the nearest 10/100/1000 and also partitioning 2,
3 and 4 digit numbers.
Science- The children will be planning and carrying out an investigation into the permeability of
rocks.
Eco Workshops
Please see the attachment about the eco workshops. This ties in with our recycling topic and would
definitely enhance the children‟s learning and understanding. However places are limited and so
you will need to contact Manarat Al Saadiyat at 971 2 657 5800 or email manaratalsaadiyat@tdic.ae
quite quickly if interested.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Well done to the Stars of the week! Jood Al Mukhtar, Joshua
Richardson, Jack Fenwick, Fatma Al Otaiba and Hasan Ali.
Year 4
Another busy week in Year 4!
We started the week with a visit from Mums and Dads during our Math‟s Open House Morning on
Sunday 13th January. It was fab sharing our problem solving skills with our families and watching
parents puzzle over frogs, missions and cube challenges! Thanks to those who joined us!
In literacy, we built on last week‟s knowledge of the Romulus and Remus legend by finding out all the
features of play scripts and planning our own version of the story in play form. We can‟t wait to write it
and we‟re even more excited about acting it out! In Math‟s we‟ve spent the week working on
written methods of addition and subtraction. After much puzzling and practicing we‟re well on the
way to being super mathematicians and having clear methods to solving problems using up to 3 digit
numbers!
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11. Our topic just gets better and better. This week we had an influx of genuine (well, OK, replica)
artifacts. Our homework was to create something, and the shields, swords, clay pots, poetry and
paintings were stunning. Our classrooms are looking like museums! We‟ve found out all about
invaders and settlers and why the Romans wanted to conquer other areas of the world.
Next Week: Literacy will involve a Roman themed text so we can think about the historical setting of
the text. In math‟s we‟ve just got the multiplying and dividing to sort out now – oh help! Next week in
our topic sessions we‟re looking forward to finding out about the Roman army.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Wagtails – Luke Morgan, Pipits – Hamad Al Mosa, Warblers-
Jordan Card, Wheatears- Saif Al Ali (absent), Sandgrouse- Alisa
Avdic.
Year 5
Another action packed week at Al Yasmina saw the F1 come to school. It
was an opportunity for the Formula one teams to go head to head and
test their racing car‟s performance on the 15 metre track. Not only did it
record the fastest cars but also the individual with the fastest reaction time.
The results were as follows:
FASTEST CAR REACTION TIMES
TEAM TIME [SECS] NAME TIME
1. VIPERZ 1.358 [SECS]
2. BLAZING 1.362 JANA ARMOUTI / 0.188
FLAMES ADAM TIBI 0.190
3. SPEED OF 5 1.372 EDEN FLETCHER 0.201
Well done to all the Year 5 teams. Watch out Lewis Hamilton!
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12. The week also saw our first Open Maths Morning of the school year. Thank you to all those parents
who attended. We hope you enjoyed the Numeracy sessions and could see how Maths can be both
fun and challenging at the same time. During Science the pupils were able to investigate how
temperature can change the state of matter. In particular, we looked at the reversible change of
chocolate from solid to liquid and back to a solid again. Unfortunately for the pupils, eating the
chocolate wasn‟t part of the experiment! The pupils are really enjoying Michael Morpurgo‟s book ‟
The Butterfly Lion‟. The story tells of an orphaned lion cub rescued by Bertie. They become
inseparable until Bertie is sent to boarding school and the lion is sold to the circus. Bertie swears that
they shall see each other again…but will they?
Next week we will be looking at another of Morpurgo‟s novels, „Kensuke‟s Kingdom.‟
In Numeracy we will be focusing on the properties of 2-D and 3-D shapes whilst continuing with
number work. The pupils will become familiar with vertices, edges, faces and the terms parallel and
perpendicular. In science we will investigate the process of condensation and evaporation. In topic
we will continue to learn about the varying coastlines around the world and how they are formed.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Congratulations to the „Stars of the Week‟.
Left to right
Nicholas Hallett Mynahs, Alexandria Jeffery-Edwards Swallows,
Christiane Nahu Sunbirds , Haziq Mohamed Rasidin, Night Jars
Halimatum Ahmed Taslem, Parakeets.
Year 6
It‟s week two and the children have not lost their momentum
that they returned with after the holidays. Still bright eyed and
rearing the go, the students have had a busy week involving
report writing, conducting experiments and writing scripts for
their first ever news broadcast in which they will record for ICT.
This week, the children have taken a closer look at our Topic on
Natural Disasters and have been investigating, questioning and
looking at earthquakes and tsunamis. In literacy, they have
been writing newspaper reports using direct and reported
speech for a natural disaster. Their reports have developed the
skills that they learnt the previous week. The outcomes of their
newspaper reports have been nothing less than amazing.
In numeracy, Year 6 have continued to develop their understanding of fractions, decimals and
percentages with links to real life experience. It was great to see so many parents on our Math‟s
open morning.
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13. Science was a treat as the students got
down and dirty filtering muddy water
through a filter they made in groups. The
children were presented with a problem and,
working in groups, they made a filtering
system that allowed them to filter the muddy
water. It was a hit and enjoyed by all.
Next week, Year 6 will be moving on to data handling with links to our topic, report writing, rehearsing
and recording our news broadcast as well as designing and creating our earthquake proof building.
Congratulations to our Stars of the Week
Riccardo Ricci, Matilda Noble Ditchfield, Rashid Wardeh, Louise
Hate, Mohammed El Barky
Al Yasmina School
Tel: 02 501 4888
email: jhupalo@alyasmina.sch.ae
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