Parent Newsletter November 2022

Dear parents,

It seems that the school has suddenly come alive with the Christmas spirit. Lots of moms came to school on Monday to decorate our trees.

Christmas songs can be heard being rehearsed by our primary school children for the forthcoming productions.

In fact, many may have told you how Santa phoned me last week to see if he was invited to the Christmas Bazaar on Saturday, 3 December. He promised to attend and meet all the children from 12:30 onwards.

The APS moms are exceedingly busy with this exciting event, there is still time to donate chocolates, cakes, drinks, and other perishable items, you can even bring the food in on the same day.

I would like to introduce 3 members of staff who have recently joined Aloha College Marbella:

Marie Hodgson, Year 2 teacher

 

Mercedes Colmenar,  Head of Admissions

Mercedes will be working closely with Fatima Fernandez, who is also my Personal Assistant, as well as in charge of plenty more tasks.

Alejandra Soldevilla
New Part-time Receptionist

Congratulations to Anastasia Kononenko who is fast becoming a famous author. She is only 9 years old and has just completed her second book which has been published.

Anastasia’s book will be shared at the Christmas Bazaar.

More success from our Primary school pupils –  Alex and Catalina demonstrated their Taekwondo—skills with me. They have recently won medals in Malaga Open – Taekwondo ITF

An artist

Daniil is quite an artist, below is a display of some of his artwork. 

Our Year 13 students are very busy preparing for their university applications, Pablo and Javier have already received invitations to attend an interview for the prestigious Oxford and Cambridge universities.  Good luck to both of them.

Javier Mendoza Guerrero y Pablo Benet Vincenti

School photos

The quality of the school photos were a great success, they are now available for you to purchase online, in time for Christmas.

Punctuality 

Please, can I remind all parents of the importance of picking up your children on time after school or activities. Many children get quite distressed when they are left waiting, for fear they are going to be left behind.

Late collections are now being closely monitored and much as we regret having to do this, continuous late collection may result in your child not being allowed to participate in after-school activities. Please support us on this matter.

Next week is a very short week, please remember that the school is closed on 6, 8 and 9 December, but we will be having normal classes on 5 and 7 December.

We hope you enjoy the following Primary and Secondary news.


PRIMARY SCHOOL NEWS

Primary students have been busy in a hive of learning this month. From sharing learning with parents during the Foundation Stage Stay and Play sessions to amazing sounds of choir rehearsals flowing through the corridors, a buzz of excitement has hit the school as we begin to prepare for our Christmas shows! 

We watched in awe as year 4 performed their class assembly ‘Active Planet’ in front of so many parents and visitors. Thank you for coming to see the children’s learning and thank you also to Miss Manning, Miss Lancaster, Miss Freeman and also Miss Kate for their support in planning the assembly. Can you believe we ended the assembly with a phone call from the big man himself, Santa?!

This week, Science lessons in Year 5 reached a new level of excitement and enthusiasm this half-term with the start of the new unit – Space Scientists!

Investigating the structure of the Earth, how the Moon’s gravity affects our tides and discovering that our Earth is like one big bar magnet, have fired up the imagination and creativity of our young scientists. The realisation that we have both Magnetic and Geographical poles was a revelation, leading to a new understanding of navigation and the importance of declination. 

In year 2, during their Spanish lessons, the children have been learning all about different kinds of fruit, naming them and describing their taste. The children know so many now and can even create a shopping list in Spanish. The children discussed the benefits of eating healthily, and so they made some kebabs with grapes, tangerines and bananas in one of our lessons. They were delicious!

With a busy month of festivities upon us, we look forward to seeing you all at our key stage shows. 

IMPORTANT DATES IN DECEMBER

Saturday 3rd – Christmas Bazaar – all families are very welcome

Monday 5th & Wednesday 7th  – Inter-house competitions – children will be advised as to which day to wear PE kit. 

Tuesday 6th, Thursday 8th, Friday 9th – School closed

Tuesday 13th 9.15h – Foundation Stage Christmas Performance – Main School Hall, parents welcome

Thursday 15th 9.15h – KS1 Christmas Performance – Main School Hall, parents welcome

Friday 16th 14.30h – KS2 Carol Concert – Arts & Sports Hall, parents welcome

Monday 19th – Christmas Jumper Day (own clothes) and Class Christmas Parties.

Monday 19th 16.00h – 17.30h – Y5 & 6 Christmas Disco

Wednesday 21st – Bring-a-game to school day (no electronic games)

Wednesday 21st 16.00h – School Closes for Christmas


SECONDARY SCHOOL NEWS

Silver Adventurous Journey Expedition in the Sierra de Las Nieves

Our intrepid Silver Duke of Edinburgh teams embarked on their second out-of-school training activity this year. Twenty one students from Y11 and Y12 spent three days and two nights taking part in their Adventurous Journey practice expedition in the Sierra de Las Nieves National Park.

The adventurous journey is like nothing students have ever experienced before. It is a real adventure. They plan their own routes (21 hours walking in total) and meals. They also carry everything they need including tents, stoves, food so they can be completely self-sufficient over the three days. They are supervised remotely and met at points by our team of dedicated and experienced teachers. All the students did a fantastic job. They had to learn to work as a team, navigate and walk long distances on tricky terrain with heavy bags! It was tough, and they were challenged both physically and mentally but we are so proud of everything they have achieved, how far they have come and the unique learning experiences we are able to offer our students at Aloha College Marbella.

Year 10 French Cinema Trip

Our Y10 French students attended a showing of ‘La dernière vie de Simon’ in the Cinesur Malaga Nostrum cinema as a part of the French Film Festival. The film proved intriguing and was certainly enjoyed by both the students and the teachers. Our students were extremely well behaved and as always represented Aloha College Marbella very well. 

Sporting Competitions

These past two months have been full on for the PE department and our competitive teams with tryouts starting in September and competitions starting in October. The schedule has been busy to say the least.

We have taken successful teams to compete in San Pedro for under 15 and under 19 boys and girls football, securing two golds in both U19 categories. We also travelled to Verona during half term with three competitive teams to the Mediterranean Cup. We returned as under 18 elite group bronze, under 18 girls elite bronze, and under 16 elite group gold champions.

In November, we started our basketball programme with a team travelling to Atalaya for under 14, securing the gold medal and trophy for the boys’ team. We also hosted two major tournaments for under 16 and under 18 in our Arts and Sports Hall, attended by 200 students each day from eight visiting schools. The under 16 boys played extremely well and managed to win silver medals, while the under 18 boys went one better by securing gold meaning the trophy stayed here at Aloha College Marbella.

We are now gearing up for our cross country season and I look forward to inviting all students to try out for a provisional squad and get fit over Christmas by entering our kilometre challenge, more details to follow!

Visit to Marbella Design & Art Fair 2022

A group of Art students from Y10 -Y13 visited Marbella Design & Art Fair. They had over 150 exhibits and students were able to see a vast array of interior design exhibitions and talk with artists and designers about the process behind the scenes, motivations and consider how to work to a design brief. Students also had time to explore the exhibitions and complete some drawings in their sketchbooks.

Susana Urbano, parent at the school,  led a fascinating talk guiding students through the terrace exhibition entitled ´Freedom´ and how specific materials had been carefully selected to work within the theme. We also met Romanian Artist Stefan Postol. He regularly works with interior designers on his intuitive abstract artworks and gave a talk about his painting which touches on topics such as women’s freedoms and time to be silent. Students were able to consider the effects of lighting, sound, sustainable materials and how to create an ambience in the various stunning exhibitions. It is clear that in design every detail counts!

It was a thoroughly enjoyable experience for all involved as well as a terrific opportunity to gain a deeper understanding and broaden knowledge about the interior design industry. Many thanks to Susana Urbano for inviting us to attend. We look forward to returning again next year!

A+ programme introduced for year 12 A Level students

We are delighted to announce that we have launched what we have called the A+ programme, a new and improved programme of study for our A Level students in Year 12. The objective of the A+ programme is to provide students with an enriched programme to enable them to reach their full potential in a diverse range of areas including critical thinking, PE, wider reading, independent supervised study and the opportunity to learn new skills online with world-class universities. Student Tom Gainey describes it as “a great way for students to develop which provides opportunities for investigating topics that are interesting to our future studies and careers”.

Cadena SER radio broadcast

On November 28, Cadena SER radio station broadcast a live radio show from our school. This was connected to the recent conference organised by Mentes Expertas, following our drive to promote the importance of emotional intelligence and wellbeing in our community.

A selection of pupils from Primary and Secondary School were interviewed, including Carlota Ranea from year 12. “I was interviewed because I’m one of the Peer Educators, so they wanted to know about that programme and why we do it. They thought it was great to have us students talking about mental health and wellbeing with younger students, as not all young people would be comfortable talking to a teacher. It was really interesting to be involved in the radio show, a bit nerve wracking at first but the presenters were great at asking us questions that we knew we could answer well.”

We hope you have enjoyed this newsletter, and we look forward to seeing you on Saturday at the Christmas Bazaar.

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