Junior Years News

Friendships

“The ability to obtain, maintain and retain friendships is, according to all the childhood psychologists in the whole wide world, the greatest predictor of wellbeing. Having a rich repertoire of friends is a true indicator of whether your child is travelling ok.” 

- Dr Michael Carr-Gregg

Friendship issues are often the topic of meetings between teachers and parents and can be hard to navigate. Ideally, we want to empower students to manage and build these friendships rather than interfering as adults.

SchoolTV has an extensive section of resources for parents on this topic.

These include short video interviews with leading specialists for quick information which you may be wondering about.

There are also longer articles around the following topics:

• Is Your Child Inviting Rejection?
• Does Your Child Have Enough Friends?

The Fact Sheets are very useful and cover a range of topics:

• Parent Guide: Toxic Friendships
• Being a Good Friend
• If Your Friend IS Not OK
• Building Friendships 

If you are ever concerned about your child and their friendships, their teacher is the first person to contact.  Sometimes what your child may tell you may be different from what is happening at school!

SchoolTV can be easily accessed through School Box or the College website. As well as information about Friendships it is a great source of reliable content on many issues affecting school aged children.

Maria Denholm

Head of Junior Years

Year 2 Prayers

As part of a recent Christian Studies unit of work the Year 2 students created their own Psalms reflecting on the environment. Many of these were shared at the JY Assembly in Week 3.  Please enjoy this amazing writing from our Year 2’s who very successfully captured the awe and wonder of God’s creation.  

Free Online Phonic Readers

SPELD SA Phonic Readers - New Series

SPELDSA provide a range of phonic readers, similar to what our students initially use in Prep and Year 1 for free on their website.

These are a great resource for families so that students can continue reading during the holidays, particularly for those taking extended breaks.

Review and revision of what students have learnt is extremely important as they learn to read. There are many levels provided right from the beginning through to the ‘extended code’ which is where we are aiming for our Year 1 students to finish the year. So, no matter what phonic books your child is at, there is something for everyone here to continue that important practice.

Chicks in Prep

The Prep students have been inquiring into what living things need. One way they have been learning about this is by observing the hatching chicks in their classrooms. 

They have also shown how well they can now write by recording their knowledge. 

Prep Bush Babies Incursion

On 20 October, 'Animal's on the Move' came to visit our Prep students to show their 'Bush Babies'. This incursion connected to our current unit of inquiry into 'Sharing the Planet', where we have been learning about different living things, their features and their needs to grow. Each class had the opportunity to see possums, frogs, native birds to Australia and even had the chance to hold a snake! They were all very brave and enjoyed learning about each of these animals and how these animals survive in the wild.

Year 3 Science

In Year 3 we are learning about rocks, soil, and minerals. Today in the science lab with Ms McCarthy we learnt that some rocks like Diorite can float as they have gas bubbles inside them. We then learnt that if you put rocks in vinegar or any other acidic liquid, the gas bubbles will leave and the rocks wont float. We also did a microscope activity and we found lots of crystals mixed with living organisms. 

Jake and Vihaan 3A

Year 4 Democracy, Community and Me Incursion

Linked incursions, the fantastic organisation, came to our grade and explained the complex subject of 'Democracy'. There are three levels of Government, Local, State and Federal. However, we mainly looked into one; the Local government. The local government has 6 councillors and one Mayor, the leader of the Local Government. We experimented with different parts of the Local government and some people even got to act in a pretend council meeting. I deeply enjoyed this incursion, and I am the rest of Grade 4 enjoyed this too.

Tanya Rajasinghe 4D

Recently we have been learning about democracy and the three levels of government. During this incursion, we learnt about the council and different types of democracy. The teachers running the incursion taught us this by running a mini election. All the students voted for their peers characters. Once we had counted the votes, we found out who would be the mayor in our mini council meeting .The mayor wore the traditional clothes that a mayor would. After we found the rest of the council, we ran a fake council meeting with the rest of the class. It was very interesting and fun to learn about democracy and the council. 

Mira Tummalakunta 4B

Year 5 Project Rockit

In this presentation we learnt about ways to stop bullying. Some ways to stop bullying is to just walk away. If you walk away, you are saying you have no interest in what they are saying. Think of a comeback; if you think of one when you get home remember it and use it next time. A good comeback is “did I ask?” or you can look at your watch and walk away. These techniques are very helpful because they may drive off bullies. Beware as bullies want a satisfying reaction. Don’t give a reaction: if you give a reaction, it will be more fun to tease you.

Veera Dhalokiya 5B

In the Workshop I learnt about what types of bullying there is, how to stop bullying and what to do when you’re in that sort of situation. They gave examples on how we could prevent bullying. They also played games with us. It was a fun and great learning experience. I was able to connect with this experience since I have been in similar circumstances. I understand that it is hard, and I am so happy that people are doing what they can to stop bullying. It was a great experience for me, and I am glad that I was able to learn from the Project Rockit team.

Celeste White 5A

Project Rockit was a very fun experience! We learned about the different types of bullying, how we can stand up for ourselves or others when we need help and more good ways to stop bullying. The four ways of bullying are physical, verbal, online, and relational. Physical bullying is when you use your actions or the person starts hitting, kicking, punching, or more physical harmful actions. You can prevent this by walking away or reporting to any adult or someone you trust. Verbal bullying is the state when the person that is doing it is bullying someone that the person can’t control. For example, their appearance, gender, and unique things about them, etc. Online bullying is disliking or hating on a post on social media, being rude on games, or being rude. Others are trying to enjoy the fun of games and other platforms while the people are saying rude things about others. You can stop this from happening to you if you block or report the person that is showing conflict to you or others. Relation bullying is when you have a relational problem with a friend, or someone you are close to, or spreading hate on someone behind their back. We can stop all these problems if we block, report, walk away, or just leave them talking to themselves, or find a comeback that is not insulting. Always be confident if you want to stand up for others or yourself, otherwise it won’t have a big impact if you use a small voice.

Austin Pang 5A

SRC Forum

On Thursday, the Junior Years Ambassadors, Rishi and Srida attended the SRC Forum organised by Federal Member for Lalor, Joanne Ryan. They were able to share the work they had done with the GNLC SLC and hear what other leaders were doing in their schools.