1

May 2014 Fifty Ninth Edition

GUIDING STATEMENT OF

THE BRITISH INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL ISTANBUL

The British International School Istanbul provides a caring

international environment, fostering cultural diversity. Individual

students achieve their full academic potential, inspired to become

lifelong learners and responsible citizens of the global community.

BISI COMMUNITY NEWSLETTER

YOUR COMMUNITY! YOUR NEWS!

2

Message from the Pre/Primary School

May opened with the Year 5 children visiting Space Camp in Izmir. The children had an amazing time learning about the planets and the force of gravity. They loved building rockets and participat-ing in the other activities organised for them. Thank you to the Year 5 teachers for arranging the trip so well. For Maths Week, we encouraged the children to develop their mathematical investigative skills. They had to investigate a problem for the week and present their findings at our assemblies at the end of this special week. Thank you to Mr Malik for shaping this week so well. Last month’s sporty theme continued into this month. The EYFS children really enjoyed their EYFS Sports day. They relished riding the bikes, throwing the balls onto the parachute and participating in the obstacle race. They all received a medal for their hard work. We appreciated the hot dog barbecue organised in the Botanic Gardens by Miss Ozlem and her staff. Thank you to Miss Yana and the PE department for all their hard work to organize this enjoyable day. We waved goodbye to our Primary COBIS Team; they set off to Abu Dhabi last Wednesday. They are competing with 12 other international COBIS schools in the sporting disciplines of basketball, football and swimming. Thank you to Mr Huegel, Mr Boardman and seven mums for accompanying our children. Good luck to our team! Thank you to all parents who have supported our Fun Day Fridays this month. We have collected second hand games, wrapped sweets and tombola prizes this month. We have one Fun Day Friday remaining; please send in a cake for the PTA Cake Stall. The Fun Day will take place on Saturday 7 June from 11:00- 15:00. Please come to enjoy the bouncy castle, spider slide, stalls and games in the Botanic Gardens, and many food stalls. The amphitheatre will be full of performers all day. All profits will go to our three chosen charities. And finally, congratulations to our Year 13 students who graduated this week. The Graduation Cer-emony passed beautifully, very hot, but perfectly accomplished. We hope you enjoy this month’s Newsletter. Best regards Amanda Ilhan Richard I’Anson Pre and Primary School Deputy Director Pre and Primary School Director

3

Every morning during our Health Week we started the school day by doing ten minutes of exercises. We enjoyed stretching and warming up our muscles before getting their hearts beating quickly doing star jumps, running on the spot and lots of different exercises. Alison Guzel

Alkent Campus—Health Week (from April)

4

We all had great fun searching for the eggs hidden all over the playground. We had to search

high and low but eventually we all enjoyed eating the delicious chocolate eggs!

It was an egg-cellent start to the holidays!

Alison Guzel

Alkent Campus—Spring Egg Hunt (from April)

5

Alkent Campus—Year 2 Trips

The two Year 2 classes recently went on two exciting visits.

First we visited Rumeli Hisari fortress to explore the place where Fatih Sultan Mehmet II prepared to attack

Constantinople.

And the following week we all visited the 1453 Panoramic Museum. This has a fantastic display explaining

what happened during the battle for Constantinople. We also went to study the old walls of Constantinople.

We all had an exciting time and learnt lots of interesting information!

Alison Guzel and Sian Prior.

6

Etiler Campus—Preschool

Last week, we went to a farm with Monkey Class. We saw horses, rabbits, goats, ducks, chickens, sheep, cows, a peacock and a Turkey. We even saw a pony that escaped into the playground! We had a really fun day out. We had a picnic, played in the play-ground and went on a school bus.

By Caterpillar Class

7

Etiler Campus—Maths Week

Maths Week - May 2014 In the primary school, Maths Week was based around the theme: 'Real Life Problems'. Children through-out our Primary school solved problems based on real life situations. There was also an addition competi-tion held in Year 1 and a multiplication challenge in Years 2 to 6. The aim of the week was to highlight the importance of maths in everyday life, as well as improve basic number facts knowledge held by the pupils. Assemblies in Alkent, Etiler and Zekeriyakoy celebrated the children's work from that week. There was a whole range of topics presented including handling data, money, time, word problems, perimeter, area, volume, business accounting, angles and coordinates. Asif Malik - Primary Maths Co-ordinator

2G solving word problems

Hae Lin Kim calculates the sur-face area of a football

Minna Seo measuring the perime-ter of Etiler's playground

2P solving word problems

8

Etiler Campus—Year 3 Trips

Etiler Year 3 went to visit two mosques this month. We went to see primary sources of information to learn

about life and famous people from 16th century Istanbul. We looked at, sketched marveled at the architec-

tural beauty and purity of the Sulemaniye Mosque and its grounds.

Then we moved on into the hurly-burly of the market area where the Rustem Pasha Mosque is to be found.

There we oo-ed and ah-ed at the gorgeous Iznik tiles that adorn every imaginable space. When asked to

choose one pattern to sketch, most children could not choose and sketched many.

Carolyn Guven

9

On Monday May 26th, the Year 3 students

from Etiler Campus set off on our highly an-

ticipated overnight trip to Iznik. Our mission

was to learn about Iznik tiles and the history

of the area.

After a tour of the Iznik Foundation, all the

children made their very own beautiful Iznik

tiles. Next we had a go at Ebru, with some

brilliant results, and sketched the Green

Mosque.

The fun didn’t stop there though. We went

swimming in both a pool and a lake, played lots

of games and to top it all off ate a delicious

ice cream. Lots of fun was had by the children

and adults alike and the children represented

the school fantastically. Well done year 3!

Paul Pembridge

10

EYFS Mini Sports Day

A fun filled day where parents’, teachers and children together had a lot of fun. The chil-

dren all came together for the warm up with Miss Yana and then we were all “wowed” as we

watched some very talented Gymnastics students do a display on the field.

Our super DJ Miss Bell got the music started and we rotated around the field participating

in a water relay, obstacle course, bike race, parachute game and hurdles. The children were

very excited to watch the running races, especially the mums and dads races. Mr Richard

and Miss Amanda presented all participants a medal for their fantastic efforts on this day.

We finished off with a delicious barbecue in the gardens. A big thank you to Miss Yana and

all those that helped in preparing for this fun day.

Miss Tamarisk

Early Years Co-Ordinator

Run Boys Run!

Run Girls Run!

11

Listen to my heartbeat.. Boom Boom

Parachute Fun!

Run Parents Run!

12

Etiler Campus

Maths Week EYFS

Sorting by colour-The younger children enjoyed sorting the animals into colours. Which colour has

the most animals?

Parachute Fun! Miss Hollys and Mrs Dedeoğlus class played some mathematical games using the para-

chute.

Outdoor Investigations- How tall are our sunflowers? Children used tape measures to find out and

recorded the data to make comparisons.

13

Problem Solving- How many children

does it take to stretch all the way

across the Alkent Playground?

The children participate in

obstacle courses and are

using prepositional lan-

guage, “under,” “over” and

“on”.

They enjoy filling up water

bottles, which container

has the most water? They

understand the concept of

“full” and “empty”

The hopscotch mat comes

out, the children have fun

counting the numbers as

they hop and jump along

the mat. “What number is

your age?”

14

Ahoy! The Monkeys class

are adding numbers togeth-

er using the dice. How

many pieces of gold and

treasure can the pirate

collect?

Owls Class learnt about shapes and measuring as they folded their

Origami boats. They look like great hats too!

It was a fantastic week where children used their own creativity and thinking to solve problems in the

school environment.

Within children’s play math’s is happening every day in many different ways, from designing their own

obstacle courses to carefully constructing a railway track.

The children learn through these real life challenges and have a lot of fun too!

Miss Tamarisk.

Early Years Co-Ordinator.

15

Zek Campus— Year 3

Hats off to year 3! Many members of staff have received an individually designed hat made especially for them by a student

from Year 3.

For this DT project they were interviewed about their favourite colours, activities and secret ambitions and

then the hat was made to reflect this.

They look pleased with the results!

Jill Parker

16

Etiler & Zek Campus—Year 5 Trip

Space Camp Turkey

Recently all Year 5 in the BISI travelled to Izmir to learn about space. We took a flight to get there. We had to remem-

ber our passports otherwise we couldn’t take a plane! Miss Holt told us the day before ‘Do not forget your passports.’

The next day Joshua almost forgot his passport. Once we had taken off, we ate a small snack to keep us going till we

landed.

When we got there, we got our badges and got to know what team we were in. Year 5 also got books about space,

shirts and new hats, which were red. The first thing we did is seeing the experiments that one of the counselors did. He

blew up a balloon and set it on fire, it exploded and made a loud noise!!

The girls dormitory was not dark there was lights everywhere, so none of the girls could sleep so when it was time to

sleep all the girls were going crazy and giggling. Eventually, we calmed down and got some sleep!

The food at breakfast, lunch and dinner was delicious. It was Beatriz’s birthday on the last day, so the cooks made a

banana and kiwi cake.

The simulators were really cool and amazing to go on! The zero gravity wall was extremely good and so was the mis-

sion control. In mission control we had to control a shuttle that was about to take of.

In the telescope we got to see the moon so close it seemed just like we were actually on the moon. In the telescope we

could see the moon’s craters. Its colour was greyish.

Building the robots in the robot lab was so exciting and challenging because you had to build it yourself in teams of 4

or 5. At the end we had to do a competition to see who had put in the right programming to make the robot complete

different tasks.

At the end there were gifts, certificates and one medal for the best student!

We all had a great time and did not want to leave.

By Evy Mansat & Emilya Ozsoy

Continued……..

17

18

Primary COBIS Game– First Day!

Hello from Abu Dhabi,

We had a good breakfast, decided to cancel the beach trip as the sun is just too strong and did a final (are

doing) swim training as you can see. Later today we will have our opening ceremony and a gala dinner.

All participants are happy and looking forward to the event.

The students won the first round in basketball but unfortunately lost the second!

Christian Huegel

19

Secondary– Science Department

16th Turkish Bird Conference

On Friday 9 May, the IB Biology students attended the 16th Turkish Birds Conference at the

Demircikoy Conference Centre, accompanied by Mr. Mayer and Mr. Tarbuck. This event

visits different cities in Turkey, but this year it was Istanbul’s turn. This particular venue was

a very suitable place for this event as the conference theme was the effect of major

constuction projects on the migration of birds across the Bosphorous. The migration of birds

of prey (raptors) is renowned and brings bird watchers from all over the world during each

migration season. The reason for this concentration of birds is the short stretch of water that

separates sights for feeding on either side of the Bosphorous and thermals (areas of rising

warm air) that allow the birds to cross the water with minimal effort.

The main migration is from Europe to Africa and the Middle East.The northern route is over

Sariyer and scientists are concerned that the new airport and the first part of Kanal Istanbul

will be directly along this migratory route, probably causing a large reduction in the number

of birds. The proposed forest developments on both sides of the Bosphorous will also

seriously impact on the bird’s feeding sites.

Our students listened to a lecture on these effects and later listened to a lecture on the plight

of a particular species called the Egyptian Vulture. Both lectures were well presented and

really gave our students an opportunity to connect their learning with a local ecological issue

and to realise that there are some wonderful careers in Biology.

M. Tarbuck

The Egyptian Vulture

20

Dear BISI Community,

I have now had time to relax and unwind after the inaugural COBIS Secondary Games and it is really only now that things are sink-

ing in… we actually did this!

Pleasingly there have been amazing compliments from COBIS board members as well as Heads of participating schools, schools

staff and parents flooding in ever since. A few have been copied below which show the appreciation that all parties have for the

efforts that were put in by the whole BISI community and the awesome benefits and opportunities gained by the 168 participating

students.

‘Thank you for an amazing games. Our students got so much out of the trip, it was incredible. The format was excellent, allowing

lots of activity time. I wish the primary games allowed for this. Your team were great and I enjoyed meeting them. I think the

school should be very proud of what it has achieved! I am still buzzing from the trip! Well done Istanbul!!’ – Adam Hoult, HOD

PE, IS Moscow

‘I would just like to take this time to say ‘Thank You’ for hosting us in Istanbul for the COBIS Games, I thought you did an abso-

lutely outstanding job! Our students are still talking about their experiences! I too had an amazing time! So thank you for all

your hard work & effort to ensure the success of the games!’ – Emily Maguire, HOD PE, BS Berlin

‘Thank you so much for all your kindness, attention to detail and the hard work put into the COBIS Games. We had a ball! You

must be feeling exhausted, but rest assured this was one of the best organized events to date and the additional cultural highlights

made for a memorable weekend. The feedback from our own parents once students returned home is very complimentary. You and

the school can be very proud’. – Anne Howells, Head of School, BIS Stavanger

‘Congratulations for this weekend, our team is delighted, as well as the parents. A huge thanks from all the St George’s parents

who were waiting for the results back in Luxembourg. Hope to see you next year in Greece’ – Caroll Sarago, Parent, St. George’s

‘This month also saw the first ever COBIS Secondary Games, held at the British International School Istanbul and won by St Cath-

erine's British School in Athens. This event will now be a firm fixture in the growing COBIS competitions calendar. Our thanks to

Carolynne Bell at BISI for her tireless work organising this excellent event, and to staff at the school for helping to make the inau-

gural COBIS Secondary Games a resounding success.’ – Colin Bell, COBIS Executive

The school has also made it in to two COBIS publications this month so we are definitely being recognised for our initiative, hard

work, sweat and at times, tears! This recognition extends far beyond that of the 11 visiting schools to almost all the 85,000 strong

COBIS family members that spread across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. To read these you can follow the links:

http://www.cobis.org.uk/page.cfm?p=430&newsid=123

http://www.cobis.org.uk/cf_enotify/view.cfm?n=297

The success of the games was down to contributions made by the whole community at BISI. At this point, I would like to offer my

thanks to them.

Jenny Norden (and the PTA through newsletters) connected us with a variety of sponsors who donated the following items:

Backpacks – Jatomi Pure Fitness, Nina & Jason Tubbs

Soft drinks – Coca Cola, Catherine Gammell

Ice cream and toiletries – Unilever, Angelo & Ivar Blanken

Tents, goody packs, medals & trophies – Kinder Sport, Renato & Chiara Danna (Ferrero)

Water – Nestle Pure Life, Neil & Debbie Edwards

Lunches – Banvit, Ilgi Gorener

Continued………..

BISI Hosting of the First

Inaugural Secondary School COBIS Games

21

We also sourced additional sponsorship from:

Gala Dinner – Mr. & Mrs. Sezen

Transport and hotels for parents – XPRSolutions, Tulin Cesmeli

Snacks – Real Supermarket, Olivier Langlet

T-shirts – Kukri, Neil Latimer

The generosity and support from all sponsors greatly added to the prestige of the games and without them, we could not have pro-

vided our visiting students, staff and parents with the wonderful image and presentation that we achieved.

Thanks must also go to the Kilyos hotels – Kale, Erzurumlu, Kilya and Yuva – who looked after the competitors during their stay

and provided a tremendously safe setting in which the students were able to meet life-long friends.

The parents of participating students deserve an award – Debbie Edwards, Sandra Watson, Lynn Cooper, Sandy Wiercherdink, Ju-

dith Kuper and Angelika Heidt – as they worked tirelessly to help train children, paint facilities, create materials (flags and posters),

book trips and put together the equipment and gift packs. They gave up their free time and for many, roped in their visiting family

members to help at times! I must also mention Mr. Ibrahim Dereboy who joined us for three days and did a magnificent job as our

official first aider.

Our COBIS PR students – Ryan Bosman, Tommaso Danna, Murad Kanafani and Umit Abdulkasim – did an amazing job creating

signs and posters, select teams for the schedules and prepare advertising and marketing materials. The professional approach that

they adopted tells me that we have some budding future leaders here! Watch this space….

Our CAS, Year 10 students and PR students - Sophie Schmitz, Elena Vivaldi, Sheida Kiran, Hannah Watson, Arda Oguz, Mina

Dolay, Fuad Kerinov, Georgi Averladze, Caroline Findikliev, Chiara Vivaldi, Claire McCormack, Julide Yanikomeroglu, Mingyu

Park, Ramon Klomp, Pinar Oguz, Leike Blanken, Mare Blanken, Ann Blanken, Ashutosh Bhadouria, Vasudev Bhadouria, Zev

Meerdink, Raad Momani and Vishwesh Shah – did the most fantastic job of officiating the athletics, football and swim events as

well as being fully available to help with all aspects of the games; without question or fuss. All student helpers were well mannered

and professional at all times, exceeding any expectations we had of them and showing the International community just how FABU-

LOUS our students are. They were an absolute credit to the school.

The BISI staff (too many to mention!) supported the games in a variety of ways. Some by scoring and officiating, some with prior

organisation and others by covering classes and being flexible with last minute changes to timetable. Ms. Ozlem and her auxiliary

staff were as usual, on time and on point and worked behind the scenes to ensure the flawless running of the event from start to fin-

ish.

If I may mention one staff member in particular for their help and support, it would be Miss Scotland. This is mainly for her pa-

tience as she, on top of the incredible organisational work, had to keep me calm. For those who know me, this is not the easiest of

jobs…in fact, it was probably the toughest job!

Overall, the contributions made by many resulted in the event being meticulously ran and the praise and attention that we are all

receiving is truly well deserved. Personally, I wish there was more that I could do to say ‘thank you’ as words don’t often seem

enough, but please be assured that I will be eternally grateful for all that the community did for their part in the games.

Continued…………..

22

The overall results of each activity within the games can be seen in the tables below.

Athletics: Football:

St. George's 120 St. Catherine's 120

Netherlands 110 Kings 110

St. Catherine's 100 Moscow 110

Kings 90 St. George's 90

Rainbow 80 Rainbow 80

Moscow 70 Cairo 70

Cairo 60 Netherlands 60

BISI 50 Stavanger 50

Stavanger 40 Astana 40

Astana 30 Istanbul 30

Berlin 20 Berlin 20

Almaty 10 Almaty 10

Swimming: Overall: Points Place

St Catherine's 120 St Catherine's 340 1

Netherlands 110 Netherlands 280 2

BISI 100 Kings 270 3

Moscow 90 St George's 270 3

Cairo 80 Moscow 270 3

Kings 70 Cairo 210 6

St George's 60 Rainbow 190 7

Almaty 50 BISI 180 8

Stavanger 40 Stavanger 130 9

Rainbow 30 Astana 90 10

Astana 20 Almaty 70 11

Berlin 10 Berlin 50 12

As you can see, next year we go to St. Catherine’s as they won the games but I would like to start preparing for this NOW! If you

have a child who is committed to working hard, can put in the time and effort, both in and out of school hours to train, and who

wants to be part of this magnificent event then get them fit over the summer and send them to trials in the new academic year. The

improvement in performance and attitude of our BISI students this year as a result of the games was outstanding. They did them-

selves and their coaches (Mr. Jones and Ms. McNaughton) proud.

Again, my sincere thanks to all involved for making this an event to remember.

Carolynne Bell

23

The inaugural Secondary School COBIS Games was held here at BISI in May. Four hotels in Kilyos were taken over by 168 students of 12 different international schools from around the world. The students battled it out in athletics, football and swim-ming. Overall, BISI came 8th with swimming being our strongest event. We hope to achieve even higher next year at the Games in Athens. The first day was athletics and we did well in various events including javelin, high jump and the 800 metres. A special mention goes to our medal winners who were Su Görener, Tijn Blanken and Louis Dereboy. The second day was football at Kilyos stadium. By BISI standards, we didn't do as well as we would have liked. The boys came fourth in their group and the girls came 5th. A special mention goes to Meila Heidt who scored a hat-trick against BIS Cairo. On the third and final day, we had swimming at our Zekeriyakoy campus. This was by far the most fun and successful day for the school. Out of the 12 schools, we came 3rd collecting numerous medals along the way. A special mention goes to our very own Dolphin, Deniz Atay who picked up 5 medals. The boys relay team also had a fruitful day winning silver in the group medley and bronze in the group 4 x 25m. Hosting the COBIS Games has definitely been one of the highlights of the school year 2013/14. I'm sure this unforgettable experience will live long in the memory of all the students, not only due to the individual and team achievements but also the valuable lessons learnt along the way. The value of hard work, collaboration, sup-port for one another, setting targets and realising one’s potential. Well done to everyone who was involved in such a fantastic and memorable event! Rhys Jones

24

The Athletics

25

The Football

26

The Swimming

27

Environment Committee

Green Page

One of our focuses this year has been to reuse and recycle. As the

summer holidays approach, one fun way to entertain your children and

also to teach them to value all material is to make recycled art. There

are lots of ideas on the internet. Here are a few:

If you need additional inspiration come to the Recycled Materials Art

display at Fun Day.

Julianne Aycan

28

DIRECTORS OF SCHOOLS Amanda Ilhan Pre School & Primary School Deputy Director +90 212 202 7027 amandailhan@bis.k12.tr Richard I’Anson Pre School & Primary School Director +90 212 257 5136 richardianson@bis.k12.tr William Bradley Director of Secondary and Principal of +090 212 202 7027 Zekeriyakoy Campus williambradley@bis.k12.tr Tuba Guven Director of Admissions +90 212 286 7375 registrar@bis.k12.tr Helen Kiran Head of PR/Communications +90 212 202 7027 communications@bis.k12.tr

Find us on

www.bis.k12.tr https://www.facebook.com/BISIstanbul

https://twitter.com/#!/BISistanbul