Around The Primary

Dear Parents

The famous saying, “Children must be taught how to think not what to think” by Margaret Mead, requires to be put into practice in order for today’s children to have the opportunity to become a future generation who are creative and innovative in their thinking.

 

As educators we work towards supporting students in becoming active and engaged learners. It is important to consider skills and knowledge required in the 21st century and beyond. For learners to thrive they must be able to share their thinking. AITSL (Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership) along with Dr John Hattie, a researcher in education, identify the importance of providing Learning Intentions and Success Criteria in order to develop lifelong learners. In doing so students know what they are supposed to learn not what they are supposed to do, and they are able to identify individual goals within their own learning.

 

Many varied learning opportunities are seen around the primary school. What are students learning and how do they know if they are succeeding?  

 

"I’m learning to use the suffixes ‘able’ and ‘ible’ to change how I use base words. I know that if a base word stands alone, I add ‘able’ but if it doesn’t, I need to add ‘ible’ ."(Annie 5G)

 

"I’m learning how to count. I can check my answer by counting by tens and ones." (Aidan 1B)

 

 

"We are learning to work out the difference between facts and opinions. We’ve read these and now we are thinking of facts and opinions about our favourite cereal so we can write an advertisement. Our One Note message helps us to stay on track, so we know everything that we have to include." (Nada and Cara 4G)

 

"We are learning to work out a braille code. We have a decoder which tells us what each letter looks like so that helps us find the message." (Oliver and Gus 3B)

 

 

"We are learning to find the main idea in a text. We have been talking about what we think the main idea in sections of the book is and why. We all have to agree before we write it up. We got taught to look at the first sentence or the title of the text to help us so if we get stuck, we check in the book."  (Arabella, Amelia, Sade and Angie 4B)

 

"I’m learning digits and how to count tens and ones. This one is a ten and this one is a one." (James 1B)

 

 

"We are learning to identify facts and opinions in a report. We are using a weather report. We are using a weather site that we opened through One Note to check our accuracy." (Brodie and Charlie 4G)

 

Kind regards,

 

Kylie Allen and Jodi Joyce

Assistant Principals Primary

Dates to Remember

Thursday 23 MayYear 5 & 6 IPSHA Sports
Friday 24 MayAssembly, Roncalli Hall - hosted by 5B

NAPLAN

Students from Year 3 and Year 5 completed the NAPLAN writing assessment this week. While experiencing some challenges with the online version, our Year 5 students stayed calm and allowed teachers to manage the issues that became evident. We are proud of all of the students’ commitment and effort towards the task at hand.

 

Next week, students will participate in the Reading, Language Conventions and Numeracy assessments. The College Principal Mr Robert Henderson has made the decision that all remaining NAPLAN testing this year will be completed using pen and paper.

 

We encourage the students to approach the assessments with a positive mindset and to try their best.

Marvellous Mums 

On Monday, the Pre Primary children celebrated their mothers by inviting them to a special morning in their Pre Primary classrooms. The mums were ready to be pampered and styled by our talented students. Mums had their portrait painted, joined in the different craft activities and even got to eat fancy decorated biscuits for breakfast!

 

The morning was absolutely “MARVELLOUS” and enjoyed by all. We LOVE our Mums!

 

Chiara Bennett & Alison Dillon

Pre Primary Teachers

Solids, Liquids & Gases

In Science the Year 5 students are learning about the properties of Solids, Liquids and Gases. They had a fantastic time in the Secondary lab on Thursday participating in an investigation on the Water Cycle.

 

Students recorded observations, collected data, formed conclusions and created time lapse videos. They are now collating their findings in the Book Creator app. Students look forward to continuing their series of experiments throughout the term!

 

Library

To assist Year 6 students in developing good study habits and ownership over their leaning they now have access to the Library before or after-school for study and homework purposes or simply to engage in some recreational reading.

 

In the Library, students will be unable to use their iPads. The same iPad rule will apply as that agreed upon by the students on the Student Acceptable Use Agreement 2019- Keep my iPad in my school bag before and after school.

 

Younger siblings are welcome in the Library, however, must be accompanied by an adult and not the Year 6 sibling.

 

The Library is open at 7:30am Monday to Friday and closes at 5pm Monday to Thursday.

Muffin Monday

IPSHA Sports 

Well done to all our Year 5 and 6 students who played against Loreto Primary yesterday afternoon in the IPSHA competition.  It was great to see smiles all around and some friendly competition in the hockey, soccer, netball and AFL! 

 

Next Thursday all Year 5 and 6 students will be travelling to Newman College for their matches and are reminded to hand in their bus permission slips to the classroom teachers.