Primary School
Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Show me and I learn.
- Benjamin Franklin
So many exciting events and opportunities have been happening in our Primary School; we hope you enjoy reading about them below:
Kindergarten (Hard): We have been having lots of fun this week painting "up and overs" as part of our pre-writing patterns activity. We have also enjoyed clapping the syllables in animal names. We have been playing colour eye-spy which is lots of fun, especially with our focus colours of yellow and red.
Kindergarten (McPhee): This week we ventured to the Wild Space for the first time. We all had a great time exploring together. In class, we have been finding out more about each other and our families. It has been lovely getting to know each other and getting used to spending three big days at school.
Pre-Primary: This week in Pre-Primary, we have been learning the sounds ‘s’, ‘a’, ‘p’ and ‘n’. We made popcorn on the same day we created pink and purple planets for our night sky collage. Construction, watercolour painting and the Home Corner continue to be our favourite play activities, where we get to practise our social skills and put our creativity and imagination to work.
Year One: The Year Ones have had an exciting start to the term. They have all enjoyed being assigned a classroom job to undertake for two weeks, which has prompted some very mature and independent behaviour. The inquiry unit started with a time tub. Lots of items relating to Mrs Gouldthorp and the passing of time were uncovered, much to the delight of the children. Maths games were played to reinforce numbers and number bonds to 10 and 20, and the Scientific role-play area (the Australian Wildlife Rescue Centre) was opened! The Year Ones joined Year Twos last Friday on a trip to the Wild Space. This trip was purely for fun and to introduce this wonderful learning area to the new members of our classes. However, future Wild Space trips will take on more intentional learning tasks.
Year Two: This week we have been busy investigating our Forces unit in Science. We have found many different ways to make a marble move and investigated the effect of gravity on cars racing down a ramp. We have also looked at the changes in toys over time. Students are bringing in an olden-day and a modern-day toy so we can compare what they are made of, how they are made, and the materials used. Our spelling and reading programme has started off extremely well, and we have enjoyed using MAB blocks to make numbers up to 1,000. I am so impressed with how hard everyone is working so far, and I could not ask for a more interested and enthusiastic group of learners.
Year Four: Year Fours have taken on the role of engineers this term as they dive into the world of simple machines. On Friday we learnt about inclined planes and engineered a paper ball run using only three materials in the hope of being the last ball to reach the end of our incline planes. Did you know that simple machines were invented to make our lives easier and have little to no moving parts? We also ran the first Primary School Chapel Service and delivered an important message about doing good deeds as part of God’s work. We made magnets to encourage good deeds that went home as gifts for our families.
Year Five: We are fully immersed in our current Inquiry topic: "Adaptations must be made to live in a variety of geographical locations and environments." Our outdoor classroom has provided fantastic real-world examples of how nature has adapted to the windy conditions of Oyster Harbour and how our school was thoughtfully designed on the wetlands.
Did you know that eagles have a third, transparent eyelid? This incredible adaptation helps protect their eyes while maintaining clear vision—just one of the many fascinating ways living things adjust to their surroundings!
Year Six: This week, Year Six has dived into the wide world of portal stories by starting our class novel, Mister Monday by Garth Nix, our model texts in Talk-4-Writing, and creating a portal to anywhere! We cannot wait to see where we are transported to! The possibilities are endless. Will we end up in a labyrinth-type house, or Jeff the Capybara's home realm, or even a world that looks eerily like this one but with unavoidable differences... Round and round the portal goes, where it ends up, no one knows!!
We are still looking for a Year Six Class P&F Representative. Please let Primary Administration Officer, Ms Christina Hitchcock know if this could be you. It is not a hard job, just pushing out some messages throughout the year.
Upcoming events
Week Four
Friday 28 February, Pre-Primary to Year Six House Activities
Week Five
Monday 3 March, Labour Day Public Holiday
Wednesday 5 March, NAPLAN practice test
Saturday 8 March, International Women's Day
Week Six
Wednesday 12 March - Friday 21 March, NAPLAN (Year Three and Five)
Have a wonderful weekend!
Ms Leah Field | Head of Primary and
Mrs Hayley Ranger | Head of Early Childhood
Music Ensembles
All our ensembles have started rehearsals this week and there have been lots of lovely sounds filling the Music building. New members are still welcome to join our ensembles.
Primary School groups include the Tiny Trebles, our choir for students in Year One to Three; Primary Voices, our choir for students in Year Four to Six; Violettes, our beginner string ensemble; Foundation Band, our beginner band; and Intermediate Strings for Primary and Secondary Students.
Please contact the Music Office with any queries music@gsg.wa.edu.au
Instrumental lessons have vacancies on the following instruments.
Piano, keyboard, violin, cello flute, voice, trumpet, trombone, French horn and classical guitar.
Ms Emma Luxton | Director of Music