Dear Parents,
New Year’s Resolution
Many of you will have made New Year’s resolutions, including myself: things you are intending to achieve in the New Year. Many of you – including myself – will have broken them already. Please remember that what we all need to have is Resilience! We have added this value to our existing four, to help our children learn the importance of resilience; bouncing back when things don’t always go as expected, being determined, not giving up. So once again, a reminder of our school values:
HONESTY RESPECT EFFORT CARE RESILIENCE
Please talk about these with your children.
Christmas Km Challenge
Adriana Coltorti has shown at least one of these values when, whilst many of us were enjoying an abundance of food during the holiday period, she was steadfastly running. This Year 6 pupil responded to the Christmas Km Challenge by completing an amazing total of 165 km. Congratulations Adriana!
School Nurse
Our new school nurse, Sara, is settling in well and has been very busy getting to know your children. I asked a couple of them what they thought:
A Year 9 pupil said “she makes me feel very relaxed” and a Nursery patient commented “she is very kind like my mummy”.
Thank you for all your positive feedback regarding Sara.
Trial Examinations
Year 11 and Year 13 pupils are still busy with examinations. I hope stress levels in some of your homes are not too high. Please support your children carefully.
Breakfast Club
Please remember that, although we offer the 8.15 Breakfast Club as a free facility to parents, for health and safety reasons all children have to be registered if they are to attend the club. It is not possible for parents to send their children along to the club in the morning because it is cold outside. I would be grateful for your support on this, as usual, thank you.
Australian Bush Fires
Our thoughts are with all our families from Australia or who have relations there. We hope their families are safe from danger.
Please enjoy a lovely weekend with your families.
Student Calendar
Please find here access to the Student Calendar 2020-2021.
Please enjoy a lovely weekend with your families.
Yours sincerely
Elizabeth Batchelor
Principal
PRIMARY SCHOOL
Dear Parents,
Thank you to all the parents who attended the Parents’ Evenings this week. As always it is important for home and school to communicate if a child is to achieve the best that they are capable of.
Yesterday I spent a wonderful afternoon with the children who won the November/December ‘Blossom Awards’. These children were selected by their teachers for consistently demonstrating the Personal Goals of thoughtfulness and communication. The children thoroughly enjoyed their special free choice treat time. All decided to be creative and have fun together making wild and wacky clay models. Congratulations to everyone for achieving this award (Viggo Heder and Manuel Méndez Torres FS1, Sofia Ben Larbi Doncel-Moriano and Raphael Nijmeh FS2, Sienna Kafourous and Mina Tobal Agier Y1, Sara Alonso García and Gabriel Sanz Librelotto Y2, Aurelia Howard and Fernando Fay Pérez Y3, Lea Albaker and Nikola Iliev Y4, Carlota Hamdallah Recio and Alba Sofía Olivo Campos Y5, Kira Long Garcia and Chloe Rubio Subiris Y6).
Our Personal Goal for January is ‘Resilience’ which is also one of our 5 Aloha Values. We are focusing upon helping your child to understand that mistakes are likely to happen and there will be times of stress. What is important is to develop skills to deal with these challenges and to never give up.
Congratulations to James Robb 3EK for showing resilience in his wrestling training. His determination and hard work was rewarded with a silver medal in the National Junior Championships which were held in Madrid during the Christmas holidays. What an achievement!
INTERHOUSE
Granada celebrated their Autumn 2 victory with a Friday Fun Day! A just reward for a great team effort. Please find a video here.
PARENT PORTAL
The Parent Portal has been updated with the following:
– PSHE presentations (informative meetings 8 and 9 January 2020 – under PRIMARY/Other supporting materials)
PSHE Y1, 2, 3
PSHE Y4, 5, 6
– Spring Term Curriculum Outlines
Aloha Value Focus this half term – Honesty – Why are people sometimes dishonest?
Personal Goal Target for January – Resilient – How have you been resilient in your work this week?
Yours sincerely
Kathryn Salmon
Headteacher, Primary
SECONDARY SCHOOL
Dear Parents,
As I am writing university references for our Year 13, I have noticed that the word I use the most when describing our school or highlighting strengths of each of our students is international. We have many multilingual students and over 57 nationalities represented at Aloha College Marbella; are these good enough reasons to state that our students are truly international?
I have been thinking about this over the last few weeks. There are plenty of activities which promote international-mindedness in our school. However, I believe there is more we can do in this respect.
Do you know any international events that take place in January?
The Chinese New Year starts on 25 January and this is the Year of the Rat. Did you know that in Chinese culture, rats were seen as a sign of wealth and surplus? Because of their reproduction rate, married couples also prayed to them for children. Students should not have to wait for Mr Kemp and Mr Morillas to teach them about China in Year 12. Instead, we should take advantage of these celebrations to teach our children about the country’s fascinating history, language and culture.
How can we expect our students to be responsible citizens in a global society if we are not actively engaging or exposing them to other cultures and perspectives? Having a passport filled with stamps or speaking several languages is not being international. It is more about the opening of one’s mindset to a broader way of thinking, which enables you to question and challenge such issues in today’s society.
Technology nowadays allows us to find out what is happening around the world at the click of a button. This way of accessing information, different perspectives and sometimes knowledge is excellent. However, a meaningful engagement with different cultures is what makes a student truly international.
There are numerous events that we can circle in our calendar this year. I will make sure your children are aware of them. There is another event on 25 January linked to a Scottish poet called Robert. I will let you do some research on it.
I hope you have a nice weekend.
Yours sincerely,
Francisco Escobar
Headteacher, Secondary
