The last homework that Oliver had to complete was to create something that summarized his year of learning. He has just completed Year 1 at BISS. He received a fabulous end of year report (so did Isabelle!) and they have both really accomplished so much in the year. We are so proud of them. They scored top marks for effort in every subject which means they are trying their very best at everything – can’t ask for more!!
Oliver did a great job on his final project:
Oliver’s year 1 at BISS!
We have just watched an amazing performance from the Junior School at BISS. When I say, Junior School, I mean ALL of the Junior School! Over 200 childrend, (every single student in Year 4 and Year 5) had a part to play. All 200+ children were on the stage, (and in front of the stage!) for the final song. The professionalism from 8 ,9, 10 year olds completely astounded me. The vast majority of the performance was done without microphones, yet every child who had a speaking or singing part was clear, loud and articulate. Their confidence was brilliant to watch.
Bugsy Malone Program
Isabelle’s name in print!
This was a massive co-ordination effort and has taken months of planning. The play was directed by Steve King (Head of Junior School) and you could see the pride and joy written all over him at the end of the show. He gave thanks to all the children and the teachers who had worked so hard to deliver such a flawless performance. In fact, the show was originally only planned for 2 nights, but the demand for tickets was so high, that the school had to offer a Matinee performance in addition!!
Isabelle and her teacher, Mrs Suzanne Sinclair. This was drop off time prior to curtain up!
All made up and ready for the stage. 🙂
Isabelle was part of Fat Sam’s Dancing Girls. She came out with a huge smile on her face and it didn’t leave her face. She sang beautifully and all the girls did a very professional dance routine.
Beautiful singing and dancing
Huge smiles from all the girls.
In synch and in step.
BISS is a very diverse school with students from all over the world. This was, of course, represented in the cast. In addition, 2 very talented pianists from year 5 played all the music for the show.
Bugsy Malone and Blousey Brown – both perfectly cast!
Starting to bring all cast members out for the finale. Isabelle is still smiling.
Finale
It was the first time I had been to a school production where the audience gave a very extended standing ovation. Every child had poured their heart and soul into their performance. It was wonderful and very moving.
Isabelle and Oliver both had their Sports Days at BISS this week. They are in the Li House (used to be called Dragons) and the sports are organized by house. Each student is competing for house points and there are no individual winners for first place in the activities. I do like this approach at the younger age.
Oliver’s Sports Day was Tuesday May 20th and Isabelle’s was Thursday May 22nd. We have had quite a bit of rain this Spring/Summer, so I think that everyone was relieved that we had dry days for the competitions!
The competitive areas were set up in the center of the field, with each station taking 2 or 3 minutes to compete. The emphasis is on the team to score as many points as possible so everyone is cheering each other on. The parents can walk around the outside to watch their children as they move from station to station.
Getting ready for sack race.
Jumping as high as he possibly can while getting encouraged by the coach!
Oliver was pretty good at hurdles!
Made it to number 5!
Half time snacks for the Infants. It is a wonder they could compete after all this good (sugar loaded!!) food.
For the Junior’s, they also add some individual competitions, but again, you are winning points for your house and not for a first place prize. So, long jump, shot put, 100m race were all additional activities for Isabelle!
Isabelle was good at hurdles too!
They achieved a record for the relay station!
There was a rest station after every 4 or 5 activities. When you reached the coaches rest station, they picked 1 person to ring the bell to start and stop the 3 minute timer. Here is Isabelle ringing the bell!
Running her very best in the 100m
Much to Oliver’s delight, Li House won in the Infants Sports Day (Year 1 and 2). Li House came 2nd (out of 4) for Junior’s – Year’s 3, 4 and 5.
As many hands as possible trying to raise the cup for winning the Sports Day cup for their house. Li House won the day for Infants!
All the kids got a chance to pose for photos with the cup. Here is Oliver – so proud that his house won!
I was very proud that both of my children were obviously trying their very best at each activity. We emphasis effort, willingness and spirit. No-one can be the best at everything, but everyone can try their very best. That is what we expect from Isabelle and Oliver. And, on both of these Sports Days that is exactly what they did!!
Oliver’s topic at school for the last few weeks has been on Pirates. He has really enjoyed this and was excited that his class assembly was going to be all about Pirates. He came home with the script and we practiced his lines – first he would stand by the front door and recite them, and then he would race upstairs to his bedroom and recite them. He was very loud and very clear! He told us that he would be holding a microphone too. The morning of the assembly dawned and we all went in to school together. We dropped Oliver off at his classroom and saw all the cool costumes laid out ready for them to change into. Owen and I went to the Theatre to wait for the production to begin!
The welcome screen on the stage.
The class made the Jolly Roger boat.
Ready for showtime!
We had asked permission for Isabelle to come and watch and so she joined us in the Theatre just as Assembly was getting started. (Assembly is for Infants so it was all the classes in Year 1 and 2.) After some announcements and recognition for “Stars of the Week” it was on to the main event.
The class started by introducing themselves – with their Pirate names. Oliver’s was Long Blue Pete.
“My Pirate Name is Long Blue Pete” His teacher, Mrs Finan, is at the front.
As the show went on, Owen and I were amazed to see Oliver performing more than we had practiced. All of a sudden he was also the Pirate King!
The Pirate King, AKA Long Blue Pete, is on the right delivering a birthday present to the Pirate Queen.
It was a wonderful performance by a lovely group of 5 and 6 year olds. They all sang beautifully, remembered their lines and obviously enjoyed being on stage. Oliver closed it out at the end with his 2 lines that we had rehearsed. Mrs Finan told us right after that the original Pirate King was sick and she needed somebody to stand in. As Oliver had done such a good job learning the script (plenty of help from Isabelle too) she had asked him to “save the day”. He did brilliantly and we were so proud of him. You would never have known that he jumped in at the last minute.
“Thank you for watching and hope you enjoyed it!”
All the parents took lots of photos at the end:
Chloe (Oliver’s special friend!), Oliver and Lucy.
What is really under a Pirate’s eye patch? Oh – it is an eye!!
Arrrr, shiver me timbers, are you ready to walk the plank?
Happy that it is over and happy that we were there 🙂
As well as practicing for the Assembly, Oliver also had a homework project to create his own Treasure Island. We had fun finding things at home to make this – he had toilet roll and tissue paper palm trees, a jewelry box as a treasure chest, painted little pebbles for gold, brown sugar for sand, a volcano, pirate ship and pirate. The finishing touch was a selection of Oliver’s shells that he has collected from our various trips abroad. He worked so hard on this and the end result looked fantastic.
Oliver’s Treasure Island homework project.
BISS has been celebrating books all week. One of the highlights of the week has been DEAR – Drop Everything And Read. A teacher will pop their head into a classroom and shout DEAR. Whatever class is going on, it stops and they all start reading.
They also had a book fair and all the kids had plenty of opportunity to spend their money on a wide selection of books. Both Isabelle and Oliver found a couple of books that they liked!
Friday was Book Character dress up day. Isabelle decided to go as Rolly (one of the 99 puppies in 101 Dalmations) and Oliver was Cat in the Hat for the day.
Isabelle’s costume was so easy as she borrowed some pj’s from a friend and I just painted some spots on her face. Oliver’s was a little trickier. I had originally decided to make a pop-up Dr Seuss hat, but after 2 attempts of following the instructions, it ended up as a normal hat. Even so, it was well after midnight on Thursday before I had finished!! I made him a bow tie, had some furry fur sewed onto a black hoodie and white gloves finished the look. He was so reluctant to have anything (make-up/face paint) on his face, but I persuaded him that the look would not be complete without a black nose and whiskers!
The Infants (Year 1 and 2) had a costume parade and Oliver was thrilled to win the Boys prize for best costume! Guess the late night was worth it!
Cat in the Hat and Rolly AKA Oliver & Isabelle
Oliver was a little grumpy because he didn’t want the “make up”on!!!!
Oliver – winner of the Boys Best Costume posing with his girlie counterpart! Glad to see he is smiling this time. Photo is courtesy of BISS.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged 101 Dalmations, BISS, Book Character Dress Up, Cat in the Hat, DEAR, Dr Seuss, Kids, Rolly, World Book Day
Saturday March 1st was THE social event of the year at BISS (at least, for the girls!)
The invitation
Daddy Daughter Ball 2014 and it was a masquerade event this year. This was Isabelle and Owen’s 2nd ball and the excitement level was high (at least, for Isabelle!) As like last year, the girls have all been talking about, anticipating, discussing dresses, hair styles, nail color and shoes for weeks. Also like last year, Isabelle designed her dress and right before Chinese New Year we again went to the Fabric Market to have it made. She envisioned a purple creation of wonderfulness and was thrilled with the results. We had spent hours looking at all sorts of dresses on the Internet to give her extra ideas, but her original description of what she wanted was pretty much what she ended up with. (She does say that being a Dress Designer is one of her future career options!!)
In the afternoon we went to Maddie’s house and waited for Phoebe to arrive to paint her nails. Purple, of course! Then, we rushed around the corner to our local hairdresser’s to have her hair done. Last year she had french braids and curls, and this year she chose to have 2 french braids joining at the back and then very straight hair. Home to get dressed and put a little bit of make up on! I did some glitter eye shadow for her and pink lip gloss.
Nail Painting with Maddie
Her beautiful french braid (wish she would sit still long enough for me to practice on her – then I wouldn’t have to pay $3 to have it done by a professional!)
Owen was also getting ready, super-stud-Bond-like in his tux and matching bow tie. My hubby and daughter looked amazing. At 5:45 they left to enjoy the fun of the evening.
My handsome hubby and gorgeous girl.
Isabelle was very specific about the detail on her dress!
Oliver was testing the various masks we have at home and couldn’t resist getting in a few photos!
With masks on! Isabelle is ready to go with her lovely furry cape.
Even Tetley got in on the action.
This was the plan for the night:
The evening agenda
I think Owen was a little bit relieved to also see this sign:
YEAH!
The Dance Floor
Once Daddy and Daughter had left the house, Oliver and I got ready to go to Katrina’s house. 10 lovely lonely ladies (plus 6 sons!) met to share some nibbles and cocktails while the D&D’s were dancing! Oliver had fun with some friends while the Mums were enjoying adult girlie time. At 9:30 the party goers returned and we continued it for another couple of hours. Initially there was lots of action from all the kids, but this is what it looked like after about 30 minutes:
Movie and chillax time!
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Tagged BISS, Daddy Daughter Ball, Kids, Masquerade Ball, Owen, Party
Isabelle has quite the big, giving heart. Earlier this year she (and Ava) held a very successful bake sale and donated a big amount of money to a local orphanage. Last weekend, Isabelle and her friend Sarah held a Toy Sale. For 2 hours on Sunday afternoon, they sold as many of their gently used toys and books as they could to raise some money for the survivors of the Philippines Typhoon Haiyan.
Isabelle and Sarah had been planning this for weeks, sorting through toys, books and dress up clothes that they no longer wanted, had outgrown or just did not want any more. We had quite the collection of items to sell:
A driveway full of toys and books!
Following a neighborhood wide email communication and then a reminder flyer in each mailbox (Isabelle was determined to make this as successful as the Bake Sale!) we had a few good customers and the girls made some good sales.
Isabelle and Sarah. Open for business!
I was so proud of both of them as they managed to sell 660RMB worth of items and decided to give 350RMB to the Typhoon Relief effort, and then divide the rest between them as pocket money. There is quite a lot left over, so we will be repeating the sale in January hoping to target all the new people who will arrive over the Christmas break!! 🙂
Isabelle and Sarah gave their donation to Mr King at BISS (Head of Juniors) who then wrote me an email to say he was going to recognize them during the assembly for the week. Luckily, I was off on Wednesday and so it was a privilege to see my lovely daughter and her friend called up and spoken about in front of all the Junior School.
The backdrop to Mr King’s comments.
Sarah, Mr King and Isabelle.
Isabelle comes up with ideas on how to help others all by herself and is very focused on the underdog. I am so proud of this spirit in her and wish for that to grow deeper over time. She is so caring and so empathetic. Mr King was also proud of them both – they both represented values that the school are trying to nurture.
This video clip is 2.19 long – the assembly highlight of Isabelle and Sarah and their philanthropic event:
Isabelle has been learning all about Vocabulary, Connectives, Openers and Punctuation this term as part of her Literacy circulam.
They put on a fabulous end of year show complete with a song to the tune of Village People’s YMCA – VCOP. FANTASTIC!!
Maddie, Isabelle, Ava, Sophia, Saskia and Sarah
She had 1 line to say and also to introduce the VCOP song with Ava. (2.38 minutes long.)
It was a fun show and a great showcase of talent across the whole class.
Isabelle, Ava, Sophia, Saskia and Sarah.
As both children get ready to finish the school year, they have just been informed of their classes for next year. Isabelle will be moving into 4B with her new teacher Mrs Sinclair and Oliver is moving into Year 1 with Mrs Finan. About a month ago all the children were asked to complete “top 5 friends list” for consideration of class placement for next year. Both of my children are happy that they got 3 out of their 5 for classmates for 2013/14!
Last Thursday and Friday were transition days for their new teachers and classes. Thank goodness they came home very happy to come back after the summer holidays as they liked their new teachers! This is a good thing as their current teachers are FANTASTIC and have managed to inspire them both to be the best that they can be, work hard, love learning and have fun while doing all of that!
Oliver has been learning all about Mini-Beasts this term. Anything from worms to spiders to ladybirds has been been discussed and di-sected this term! We have had some fabulous dinner conversations about all sorts of animals, insects and flying beasts. Oliver has really enjoyed this subject! The end of this term subject resulted in an end of year show on “mini beasts”. Oliver had 1 line to practice to say:
He was the best at delivering his line (because Owen and I had him practicing saying it from his bedroom at the opposite end of the house – loud and clear to us in the living room!!)
His class were divided into Spiders and Ladybugs. Oliver was a Spider and had made his own costume! He loved this topic and every night was full of stories and examples of all the different “mini beasts” that he had learnt about!
I love my Spider mini beast costume!!
I made all this myself
Oliver made a spider cupcake for Owen to enjoy!
All the kids also made “wiggly worms” for the adults to enjoy!
What a fantastic end to Reception for Oliver. He is sooooo ready to move into Year 1 now!
It is Sports Day season at BISS. The school groups the competition days into groups and Tuesday May 7th was Isabelle’s sports day at BISS as part of the Year 3 and Year 4 grouping. There are 4 Houses at BISS: Dragons, Monkeys, Panda’s and Tigers. Siblings are always placed in the same house – Isabelle and Oliver are both Dragons who are represented by Red T-shirts. There are many “House” events during the year and all the students take great pride in earning house points for their respective allegiance. Both children also have the opportunity to earn points throughout the year for excelling in the school values and outstanding efforts. This is a great motivator!!
The Athletic Field was set up with different stations that each team rotated through. The parents walked around the outside of this area to cheer on their child. They spent 5 minutes on each activity as a team to try to earn as many points as possible on each one.
The Dragons: Ava and Ethan are also Dragons! Lined up ready to win as many House Points as possible.
Action shot over the hurdles.
Running and balancing the ball on the tennis racket.
Relay time! Run, Isabelle, Run!
Long jump – she had several go’s at this one and got better with each attempt.
Isabelle was very fast at this one. Plus her teacher, Mrs Scrymgeour, was running this activity so she worked extra hard at this one!!
Potato and spoon
Shotput
The event included many different activities: relay, balancing the ball on the tennis racket, hurdles, bean bag balance on heads, long jump, potato and spoon, balance bars, sack race, shot put, running and a water transfer race. Isabelle said that she enjoyed the water race the most, but the rest station was her favourite part of Sports Day!! All of the children were out playing competitively from 9:00 – 12:00 so it was a long morning of sports. Monkeys came first for this year grouping, but the Dragons second place was only by 3 points! (Not bad when you are in the 1000’s of points……)
Cheering each other on. “I am so happy to do Sports Day with my best friend”
Wednesday May 8th was Nursery and Reception Sports Day. This event was only for 1 hour as they do 2 minutes on each activity. It is set up in the same way with different stations on the Athletic field that the parents walk around to cheer. Oliver had 3 team mates in his class that are Dragons: Seren, Ben and Emma. All of whom he really likes and plays well with. This little team displayed fantastic team spirit throughout the entire event. They were continually cheering each other on, helping with the transitions and generally wanting to win. They all displayed huge competitive spirit, and the parents of these children were just as competitive as we were very loudly shouting and cheering for the Dragons!!
Hurdles (it was a little chilly to start off) Very unseasonable for Shanghai!
The hurdles was one of Oliver’s favourites. We were so proud of him because he very obviously put his heart and soul into every single event and tried his very best at each one. He wears his heart on his sleeve and you could clearly see when he was happy with his performance and when he was disappointed in himself. We were also very proud of his team spirit as he was so supportive and encouraging of his team mates.
Run along the balance bar and then jump into the hoop passing it over your head, then run very fast back! This was another favourite of Oliver’s
Over the head!
Throwing the bean bags in the hoop (point for each). Oliver is delighted with his efforts!
The Dragons team here have just found out that they won the last round which was bean bags in the hoop!
Balancing the ball on the tennis racket.
Oliver was very creative with this one as he discovered that it would go further if he kicked it rather than push it!
Balancing the hoop on his head.
Excellent result for Dragons today as the combined scores for the Dragons in Nursery and Reception meant that they had won the trophy. Oliver, Ben, Seren and Emma were over the moon with excitement and delight!
Dragons won!
osiochina 