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- Principal's Report
- The Australian Curriculum - Have a say in what your child learns.
- POD 2 Update for Term 2
- Term 2 in 3/4C
- A World of Learning in 3-4D
- Walk Safely to School Day
- Youth Week Workshop
- Ditto's Keep Safe Adventure Program
- 50 nights of home reading
- School photos - Wednesday 26th May
- Uniform
- Community News
Learning Assets
Since the beginning of the year we have been working with all our students from Kinder to Grade 6 to develop descriptors to reinforce our Learning Assets. Learning Assets are a set of skills or dispositions that help students understand how to learn. After consultation with students and teachers we have developed an Early Years and Primary set of posters. These posters will be displayed in classrooms for teachers to further unpack with their students and explicitly teach what it means to be a good learner. Research has shown that our capacity to learn is not fixed and by teaching students how to learn, their capacity can be strengthened. We also know that ‘today’s schools need to be educating students to thrive in 21st century. Students need to learn how to be tenacious, resourceful, imaginative, logical, self-disciplined, self-aware, collaborative and inquisitive’ (Claxton, G. 2011).
Our six Learning Assets are:
- I am a researcher
- I am a thinker
- I am a self-manager
- I am a communicator
- I am a collaborator
- I am a contributor
Learning Assets Below
Primary Learning Assets
Writing Seed
Students and staff had a big surprise when they arrived at school last Wednesday. All the chairs in classrooms, offices and the staffroom were on strike, demanding better work conditions. During the day, students discussed how the chairs were feeling and engaged in different forms of writing, such as persuasive texts and letters, so the chairs would return to their regular function. I know I wrote my chairs a letter very quickly, as one block sitting on the floor made me miss and appreciate them.
In Week 5 please keep your eye out, as writing responses will be displayed in classroom windows.
Congratulations to our Somerset Stars
A huge congratulations to our students who represented the North West in the PSST State Athletics Carnival. All five of our students gave their best effort and made us all very proud.
Ella – 7th in 100m Grade 3 final
Toby – 2nd in 800m Grade 3 final
Miller – 1st in 100m and 1500m Grade 5 final, plus 3rd in team relay
Lara – 5th in 1500m Grade 6 final
Jacobi – 3rd in 400m final
Keep aspiring and growing, as you never know where your efforts will lead you.
The Australian Curriculum - Have a say in what your child learns.
All students from Prep to Year 10 in Tasmanian schools are taught the Australian Curriculum.
The Curriculum is currently being reviewed and refined to ensure that it continues to be world class and best meet the needs of our students in our changing world.
Families and school community members are invited to contribute to the review. This is an important opportunity and we encourage you to visit the website and have your say in what your child learns.
The website is open from 29 April – 8 July.
www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/consultation
For more information:
- View this short video to learn more about the Review and how to give feedback: https://youtu.be/dgefBna6n9s
- Fact Sheet – About the Australian Curriculum Review
- Fact Sheet – About Public Consultation
Our Pod have begun the term with determination. We have a few things we are focusing on within the curriculum including:
- Narrative and Persuasive Writing
- And soon, poetry and recounts
- Number operations, location and time
- Change – Earth and Space, as well as within History
Our teachers are providing challenging ways to explore these learning opportunities and working hard to engage students in the value of the term: To Dream.
Included are photos that demonstrate some of the thinking and learning the students are using as they work through their lessons:
Writing: Bump It Up Walls – students are encouraged with their writing to use the prompts to improve their original draft and develop their writing even further:
Maths: Addition and Subtraction strategies – students are learning the many different strategies of adding and subtracting (as well as multiplying and dividing). Knowing many different strategies is important when solving mathematical questions and using the right strategy for the type of mathematical question is valuable and higher order thinking.
Applying the maths strategies.
Science: Our students are currently focusing on Earth and Space.
In observing day and night, they will develop an appreciation of regular and predictable cycles.
They are beginning to understand that some systems change in predictable ways, such as through cycles.
Our students will use their experiences to identify questions and make predictions about scientific investigations. They will follow procedures to collect and record observations and suggest possible reasons for their findings, based on patterns in their data. They will describe how safety and fairness were considered and they use diagrams and other representations to communicate their ideas. Students can then suggest explanations for observations and compare their findings with their predictions.
We’ve rocketed into Term 2 with all things space related in 3/4C! Students have been working on some very creative narrative writing in response to their writing seeds; ‘Houston, we have a problem’ and ‘The day the sun went out’ and had a chance to edit Mrs Gale’s work before practising their peer editing.
Students have also been using their inquiry skills to answer the question, if the Sun was 1 meter in diameter what would be the size of the Earth and the Moon? This is a great conversation starter to have with your children about their learning. Students also had great fun using role play to make sense of the position of the Sun and Earth and how that affects us, whilst testing their understanding about the position and movement of the Sun and Earth.
Making space themed Mother’s Day gifts and cards was also an important part of our week to provide students with the opportunity to show their appreciation of the special ladies in their lives.
3-4D have got straight back into some fantastic learning in Term 2. We started off the Term with a HASS Inquiry about ANZAC Day. Students inquired about the purpose of the Poppy flower and why it is significant to ANZAC Day. Students experimented with paper texture to create unique pieces of art to represent a Poppy. To build on the HASS Inquiry students took on the mindset of a soldier, pretending to write letters back to loved ones at home. The purpose of this piece of writing was to get students to communicate emotionally about how they believe soldiers would have felt fighting for their country.
This year is the 21st Anniversary of ‘Walk Safely to School Day’.
To increase our participation in Walk Safely to School Day with the theme of ‘Active Kids are Smarter Kids’, adults from our school community will be supervising groups of students to walk to school on Friday, 14th May.
Hotondo Homes (old City Mission sight) Bass Highway leaving at 8.20am with Cindy, Mrs Fisher and Mrs Gale
Lyons Street (top of Zig Zag Track) leaving at 8:30am with Mrs Jaffray and Miss Evans
Somerset Basketball Centre leaving at 8:35 with Mrs Pearce
Oak Avenue/McKenzie Drive leaving at 8:35 with Mrs Lloyd
Congratulations to the following students who have reached 50 nights of home reading. Miss Ross came around during week 2 to highlight the importance of home reading and celebrate with these readers during a pod meeting.
1A |
Matilda, Eleanor |
1B |
Amelia, Harvey, Charlie, Jep |
2A |
Riley, Quade |
2/3 |
Oliver Mc, Destiny, Sakye, Thorin |
3/4A |
Bradley, Macy P, Milla, Layla A |
3/4B |
Layla D |
3/4C |
Tony |
3/4D |
Grace, Gracie, Isla, Sommer, Nash |
5A |
Jaxon, Jake |
5B |
Chet, Maddie BB, Zara, Mason |
6A |
Avah B |
We encourage students to spend time reading at home. It doesn’t have to be a long time; 10 minutes is great. Reading can include things like library books, recipes, magazines, newspaper articles, instructions for a game, or online information. Reading can be done by the student, or a shared reading with an adult or older sibling, or an adult or older sibling can read to the student. It all counts, and it all helps.
School photos - Wednesday 26th May
School photo day is fast approaching. It will be held on Wednesday 26th May only, contrary to student order forms. Due to the change in structure we will be able to have them all completed in one day. Sibling photos will be taken first thing in the morning from 8.30, please bring your order form (available from the office) with you on the day complete with order reference number.
You will also notice a big change to the order form. The preference is for online ordering, sibling photos included. If however you do not have access to this facility please collect an order envelope from the office.
Just a reminder to please ensure you have named you childs uniform/ drink bottles etc. Over recent weeks we have been unable to return items to our students as they are unnamed. These items have either been put into our second hand/borrowing cupboard, or eventually disposed of but we would rather return them to their rightful owner. We appreciate your assistance.
Thank you