Prep and Year 1 Visual Art

The past two weeks in Art have been filled with fun and meaningful learning. In Week 3, students celebrated Mother’s Day, also known in our classroom as “Special Person’s Day,” by creating a lovely “I Love You to Pieces” artwork. Students used their fine motor skills to carefully cut (Year 1 students) and paste pieces of paper, resulting in adorable and meaningful creations.

In Week 4, our Prep students engaged in their classroom inquiry about toys through fun guided drawing activities in the art room. Our Year 1 students further deepened their classroom inquiry by continuing their explicit learning about warm and cool colours. They had the opportunity to complete their sun and moon artwork from Week 2, and then create a new piece of their choice. This artwork required students to include both the sun and moon, while thoughtfully applying their understanding of warm and cool colour palettes.

Well done, Prep and Year 1 artists!

Grade 2 & 3 Visual Art

In Weeks 3 and 4, our Grade 2 and 3 artists have been very busy creating beautiful floral artworks!

During Week 3, students continued developing their floral art pieces and explored paper sculpture techniques to add exciting 3D elements to their creations. They showed wonderful creativity, patience, and teamwork while experimenting with different shapes and designs.

In Week 4, students put their artistic skills to a very special purpose — creating handmade bouquets and cards for Mother’s Day.

The classroom was filled with excitement as students carefully designed thoughtful gifts for the important people in their lives. Many students shared hilarious and creative ideas about where they planned to hide their masterpieces and cards until Sunday — from under beds to inside wardrobes and even tucked behind the cereal boxes!

It has been wonderful to see students so engaged, creative, and proud of their artwork, especially knowing it was made with love and care for someone special.

Grade 4 Visual Arts

During Weeks 3 and 4, our Year 4 students continued to develop their creativity, inquiry skills, and artistic confidence through engaging visual arts experiences connected to the IB Learner Profile and Approaches to Learning.

In Week 3, students explored the fascinating world of optical illusions by investigating how artists use line, shape, colour, and space to trick the eye. Students identified and discussed what an optical illusion is and how visual effects can create movement and depth in artwork. Using these ideas, some students designed and created a “bulging heart” illusion artwork as a special Mother’s Day card. Through this process, students demonstrated the IB Learner Profile attributes of being Thinkers and Risk-takers as they experimented with visual techniques and challenged themselves to create strong three-dimensional effects.

Students also began a new inquiry-based portrait project focused on a person of significance. They selected an important individual to represent in their artwork, gathered reference images, and thoughtfully planned their compositions and symbolic elements that reflected the person’s identity, achievements, or values. Students used their research and planning skills to communicate meaning through art, showing the attributes of being Inquirers and Knowledgeable learners.

In Week 4, students explored different artistic portrait styles and based their work on artist Alexej von Jawlensky. Students considered how this artist used colour, shape, texture, and expression to communicate mood and personality. Students developed their ability to make thoughtful artistic choices while reflecting on how style can influence meaning in art. This learning encouraged students to become Reflective and Open-minded as they explored a variety of artistic approaches and perspectives.

Well done, on your creativity, curiosity, and thoughtful planning Year 4s!

Grade 5 and 6 Art

Over the past two weeks in Visual Arts, students have been developing their portrait drawing skills and exploring different artistic styles. Last week, they focused on learning how to sketch individual facial features by breaking them down into simple shape components, building a strong foundation for more accurate and confident drawing. They also began exploring a range of portrait styles, considering how artists represent faces in different ways.

This week, students have been analysing, comparing, and contrasting these styles, discussing the techniques and visual elements that make each approach unique. They have also begun researching and planning their own final portrait piece, selecting both a subject and an artistic style that reflects their interests and creative direction.

Science Prep- 6

It has been an exciting start to science this term. Students in each cohort have been focusing on laboratory safety and developing a clear understanding of how to stay safe while working in the science lab. Establishing strong safety routines has been an important first step in building confidence and responsibility as young scientists.

As our unit gets underway, students are strengthening their scientific knowledge through careful observations, thoughtful questioning, and meaningful discussions. They are learning to think critically, make predictions, and reflect on their findings. Hands-on learning experiences are playing a key role in deepening their understanding and helping them apply new concepts in practical ways.

Physical Education

Throughout P.E over the last fortnight we have been honing in on our Catching and dribbling skills of various sizes of ball to further develop these movments. The student have been using their knowledge to participate in modified games that require communication and team work. It has been pleasing to see students across all year levels engaging and having fun during these lessons.

Over the past two weeks, students in Years Three, Four and Five have participated in the Athletics Carnival held at Werribee Athletics Track. Students competed in a range of events, including the 100 metres, 200 metres, 800 metres, hurdles, and several field events such as triple jump, long jump, shot put, and discus.

The Physical Education team would like to congratulate and thank all students for their outstanding effort. It was wonderful to see so many students demonstrating resilience and a willingness to take on new challenges throughout the day.

Athletics Day- A Recount of the day

When we arrived at the athletics track, it was chaotic and huge! Some classes were already there and separating into their groups, which were decided by age, house colour, and gender. After we sat down, some groups were already taken to their starting events.

First, the 10‑year‑old groups walked to different events such as discus, hurdles, high jump, long jump, shot put, 200 m, 100 m, and triple jump. While this was happening, the 9‑year‑olds sat and cheered for the others. Most people had a great time, although we were all a bit nervous.

Afterwards, the 9‑year‑olds joined in and began their events. After around five hours, everyone was called back to the stands to finish off the day or to participate in the 800 m run. Many students completed the 800 m, with places awarded for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd.

Finally, we ended the day on the bus heading home. It was a fun day, but very tiring!

By Jade and Liza (4L)

Summer Sports Gala Day Results

Congratulations to the Grade 6 students who participated in the Summer Sports Gala Day. Saltwater achieved some fantastic results:

Tennis
- Boys: 1st
- Girls: 3rd
Volleyball
- Boys 3rd
- Girls 3rd
Cricket
- Boys: 2nd
- Girls: 3rd
Softball
- Boys: 1st
- Girls 2nd

Cross Country

Recently there were a number of students who represented Saltwater College at the district cross country event. Congratulations to all students who competed in the District Cross Country at Saltwater Reserve. Please see list of student that competed.

9/10 Girls

Emily Steenkamp

Leni Garner

Roohika Pothana

Andrienne Edwards

Zoe Adesanya

Aryssa Williams

9/10 Boys

Logan Tuppen

Jack Brown

Roczen Lee

Hadi Burki

Anbuselvan M.

Theodore Cifersons

11 Girls

Dahamsa Dissanayake

Hayley Kan

Jasmine Campbell

Sarah Shawani

Aaira Chivelkar

Sargun Makker

11 Boys

Andre Barata

Cooper Selkrig

Dylan Clendenning

Rithvik Vijayakumar

Ram Kaushik

Sarim Adeel

12/13 Girls

Zoe Tam

Ava Kamyarjam

Ameyaa Joshi

Aanvi Sadala

Fabrien Terrano

Rylee Flood

12/13 Boys

Sai Sivesh Balaji

William Penny

Avery Nzenza

Nivaan Nema

Pranav Chandra Guptha

Usman Farooqui

WELLBEING

Welcome to Week Four of Wellbeing.

Students are exploring and learning to better recognise their emotional and personal strengths. Starting with units on Emotional Literacy students build a Belonging Tree of difficult-to-control emotions and add strategies they can use to self-regulate or de‑escalate their feelings.

Foundation Years are learning how to use the Zones of Regulation and extend their emotion vocabulary, while adding strategies to better manage tricky emotions.

In Year One the focus has been on developing better awareness of how to express emotions and think of strategies to bounce back, in different situations.

In Year Two, students are identifying their strengths and how these strengths can be useful at school to manage everyday life. They are learning and practising qualities of a good listener, such as working in a group, sharing ideas, collaborating, and interacting so they can participate in class and develop skills to use in their lives.

Students in Year Three are learning to better predict likely emotions by interpreting body language and to manage social and emotional change while using strategies to self-regulate.

In Year Four, students are exploring how friendships change as they get older. They are identifying and practising strategies to navigate and manage that change.

Our Year Five students are learning to evaluate their personal experiences at school and at home and build on their resilience. They are becoming more comfortable understanding the links between their emotions and behaviours to develop a greater sense of belonging in the classroom and school community.

In Year Six, students are examining and analysing situations in which emotional responses can influence decision-making in peer groups at school or within the family so that they can recognise that sometimes emotional responses can be unpredictable.

Mandarin 🇨🇳 中文

Miss Qiao

Miss Xiong

Hi Families,

We hope everyone has had a wonderful start to the term. Thank you for your continued support of Mandarin learning at our school. It has been lovely to see students actively participating, building confidence, and enjoying their learning experiences in Mandarin classes over the past 4 weeks.

Prep: Over the past four weeks, Prep students have been learning about 我的家庭 family in Mandarin through a range of fun and engaging activities. Students explored new vocabulary through songs, dancing, card games, colouring activities, and simple Chinese character writing practice. Throughout these lessons, students have been developing their listening and speaking skills and are becoming more confident in recognising and using familiar family words in class.

Year 1–2: During the past four weeks, Year 1–2 students have been learning 颜色 colour vocabulary in Mandarin. Through songs, repetition, listening, and speaking activities, students have been building confidence in recognising and remembering key words. We also included engaging Chinese character colouring activities to help strengthen students’ understanding and memory of the vocabulary in a fun and meaningful way.

Year 3–4: Over the past four weeks, Year 3–4 students have been learning about 身体部位body parts in Mandarin. Students have been practising and memorising key vocabulary used to describe different parts of the body. Through games, class discussions, and repeated speaking activities, students had many opportunities to hear, say, and use the target words to strengthen both memory and practical language use.

Year 5–6: During the past four weeks, Year 5–6 students have been learning about 宠物 pets in Mandarin. Students have been practising simple sentence structures such as “我有宠物” (I have a pet), “我没有宠物” (I don’t have a pet), “我有一只猫” (I have a cat), and “我没有一只狗” (I don’t have a dog). Through sentence-writing activities, puzzles, listening tasks, and speaking practice, students have been repeatedly using the vocabulary and sentence patterns to build confidence and fluency.

It has been wonderful to see students building confidence and actively participating in Mandarin lessons over the past few weeks. We look forward to continuing our learning journey with more engaging activities, new vocabulary, and exciting cultural learning experiences in the weeks ahead.

MEDIA

Welcome to Week Four of our Media Unit.

Students in each cohort have begun their units centred around our Media Arts curriculum, either through exploring, creating, or developing media practices.

Prep

Our Prep students are using music and photography to explore our different emotions. We are learning to understand what emotions look, sound, and feel like for ourselves and our peers.

One

In our unit exploring how cultural stories have been shared over time we spent this week looking at Indigenous Dreamtime stories The Rainbow Serpent and Tiddalik.

Two

Year Two students are beginning to understand different shot-types, learning how we can put more attention to detail on how we take photos.

Three

Using our devices, Year Three students are developing their ability to present and share information using PowerPoint.

Four

In our Media Analysis Unit, the students are viewing the TV show Thalu and making text-to-world connections with Indigenous Australian History.

Five

Our Year Five students have begun their unit on how media has evolved over time. Our first lesson explored the history of animation and how to develop our own flip books.

Six

Making connections to the literacy curriculum, Year Six students are exploring how choices around character design can communicate information to an audience.

DANCE.

In the dance studio we have started working with Year 5 students in dance over the last couple of weeks. Through these classes we have covered spacial awareness, directional changes and learning to adapt to unexpected changes. Students were given a series of different dance steps and combinations which included travelling from side to side, and facing different directions around the room, while being asked to memorise which direction they were travelling or turning to in the process. This was to also help exercise their memory’s and to trust themselves and take accountability for their actions and choices made.

Following this the students were then turned to face another side of the room making this new direction their front and adapting to the new changes made. The steps hadn’t changed or the order or which way they were stepping etc, but the new front would challenge them to remember the steps and adapt to the changes made.

VSSS…..(Dance)

Our VSSS dancers had their 2nd combined schools Hub rehearsal last week held in our school gym. This saw 5 other schools join us for the second round of rehearsals for all schools participating in this years Victorian State School Spectacular. Our students danced their hearts out representing our community extremely well, showing great energy and enthusiasm while gaining the attention and respect of the shows choreographers. Some of the routines have now been completely learnt, while others have still yet to be finished. This is one of our best teams ever assembled in the history of Saltwater’s involvement in VSSS, and there’s still more to come.

Wakakirri…..(Dance)

Rehearsals are now in full swing with for the remainder of the term with lunch time and last session rehearsals happening from Tuesday to Friday each week. Students are improving each week in each rehearsal, but there is still much to learn and put into the show. This year looks to be one of our more heartfelt performances from the storyline set out, and we can’t wait for everyone to come to the show and see. Tickets are not released as yet, but we will let everyone know once we have been notified.

Hola students, parents and guardians

Our students have continued building their Spanish language skills across all year levels this term. Students in the lower grades have been learning basic Spanish vocabulary, including shapes, while also practising colours and numbers in Spanish.

Middle year students have explored Spanish games and cultural celebrations through fun classroom activities.

In the upper grades, students have been learning about the environment and discussing the importance of “Reducir, Reutilizar y Reciclar” (Reduce, Reuse and Recycle).

It has been wonderful to see students growing in confidence while learning about both the Spanish language and the cultures of Spanish-speaking countries.

Adios

The Spanish team

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