TP

Unit TP has been working on being journalists, here is our newspaper reporting on Camp.

sustainability corner

Do you follow

on Instagram? It’s full of positive environmental news, which we all need. There are also lots of posts designed to think more sustainably.

Some more positive environmental news- according to BBC News, Ethiopia planted over 350 million plants in one day to try and tackle the climate crisis… WOWEEE!! (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-49151523)

Source:http://www.africaglobalvillage.com/over-35-million-seedlings-in-12-hours-ethiopia-breaks-tree-planting-world-record/

Did you know that when paper is laminated, it can’t be recycled? Sad but true… Unless technological advances occur quickly, everything that gets laminated needs to be sent to landfill.

Keep bringing in your dental waste and old stockings. Drop them off in the containers near the front office.

maths

Teachers are learners too!

In my first year teaching, I thought that I had to everything and be on top of everything. I thought I had to know all the strategies to teach and how to fill in any learning gaps all by myself. Thankfully I soon realised that this wasn’t the case and was happy to take on advice and techniques to use in my class from the other amazing teachers around me. Jessie and I now have the privilege to share our knowledge with our amazing staff members and also learn from them as we go!

Last Tuesday we ran one of our many staff PDs and it was really fun (as usual!) The staff are always so eager to take on new ideas and to try new things to help students reach their full potential and to cater to all learning needs. Here is a rundown of what happened Tuesday night!

As the staff walked into the staffroom, they all looked tired and weary. Yes term 3 is the “quiet term” but that still means Foundation and Junior swimming, 5/6 camp and 3/4 camp, Winter Magic Market, Parent teacher interview on top of every day teaching. We started with a meditation (this wasn’t the one we used but smiling mind is a great mindfulness app for kids and adults!) After our meditation we got straight into it with our blast off game.

Here is the game board we used and the wonderful Andrew Lang taught us this game during one of our CAT meetings. The object of the game is to have your rocket ship filled with numbers going from the highest to the lowest. You roll 2 dice, for example if we got 5 and a 4 you could make 54 or 45. You then decide where you are going to put those numbers, keeping in mind you may make a higher or lower number next. If you have no space to put your number then your rocket ship explodes. All the teachers were into this activity and as the game continued we heard disappointed explosions coming from Tim and Ann- they hadn’t planned for a bigger number to be rolled! The staff then had an amazing in depth conversation about how this game could be modified to fit with the topics classes are learning. The Middle team discussed about using it with fractions to tie in with their fractions lessons. It was fabulous to sit back and listen to the conversations teams were having after playing such a seemingly simple place value game! It was also great to see this game adapted for Foundation all the way to grade 6 (something that some teachers have to do within their own grade!)

We sadly had to end the conversations to talk about our lesson plan template. This is a document teachers use to plan weekly lessons in and include warm ups, GRIN groups (more on that in a future article!) as well as the launch of the lessons, the explore part and enablers and extenders. Then Jessie got her teacher voice on and taught us a fun game she learnt during her session with Charles Lovitt.

“So, at our winter fair is coming up, all game stalls will be $1 to play. We would like to raise some money for our end of year party so we’re hoping all the parents will play our game which is called Win at the Fair (where people pay to play and we have to pay out their winnings). If you see our game board here, parents have the opportunity to pay $1 and perhaps they might win some money. What amounts might they win? Well, let’s play a few rounds and see.”

Staff started to play win at the fair, a game were you rolled the die and added the numbers together. If it’s the number 2-4 you move to the left, 5-8 straight up and 9-12 to the right.

You will then keep rolling the die and moving across the board and you will ultimately get to one of the hexagon that will have an amount ($5 if you’re lucky or 50 cents if you aren’t!). As staff were playing, Jessie was tallying up the amounts they ended up with.

We then worked out the amount that was reached the most and if we were making a profit on the game or if the parents were winning! The staff had some amazing discussions again about how to use this game and how they could adapt it to fit their year level. The creativity of the staff was inspiring and it made me wish I was back in primary school with one of the staff as my teacher! There was money and number in the Foundation game, in the Junior years there was a multiplication game and in the Middles and Seniors they adapted this game to incorporate data and fraction all from the one board game!

We then gave staff time to debrief and talk about how and when they could incorporate this new game into their weekly activities. There was so much engagement and rich conversations that we didn’t want to stop (this is a regular occurrence at all our maths PDs!) We then asked staff to fill out an exit ticket, which we do after every PD. This allows us to tailor our PDs to what staff want to know more about instead of giving them information and activities that they may not be able to use. The feedback was wonderful and we are excited about where we are going in terms of numeracy at BNWPS!

In other maths news…

Jessie and I were lucky enough to present again during the other PMSS sessions on Tuesday. It was very fun to talk to other schools about the awesome work we get to do at BNW as well as all the support we get from Leadership and the staff.

I was also excited to see all the responses about what it means to be a great maths teacher and maths learner. I loved reading the responses and seeing what people think about maths learning and teaching. I am going to try another poster, this time talking about how you use maths in real life. I think sometimes we forget how much maths we do in a day without even realising it (I’m thinking about checking the clock in the morning to see how much time I can stay in bed before I need to get up!) I’d love to see what maths you use in everyday life.

Have a wonderful week!

Jessie and Alice

book week activities

Get excited, everyone! It’s time for our annual BOOK WEEK celebration!

This is an opportunity for the whole community to share in our love of literacy and reading.

Here are the activities we have planned for the week Monday 26th- Friday 30th August, 2019

Tuesday 27th August- DRESS UP DAY

Please come dressed as your favourite book characters! Mila and Sienna (our illustrious Literacy Leaders) will be coming around to judge the costume competition (one prize for each year level) but really it’s just about the fun of being dressed up and having fun!

Wednesday 28th August- FOUNDIE AND JUNIOR BOOK WEEK TRIVIA (at lunch time)

Based on the shortlisted books from the Children’s Book Week Awards, Mila and Sienna will be running a trivia quiz for Junior and Founder students at lunch time in the library. This is not compulsory, but there will be prizes for winners!

Teachers will be reading the shortlisted books to their students over the next couple of weeks in preparation.

Thursday 29th August- READING FLASH MOB (morning)

During the morning session, at some point there will be a Reading Flash Mob. What this means is that every person on the school premises (from Hannah through to Kris and any parents enjoying their coffee at Sprout) will pull out a book and read for ten minutes. Music will be played to indicate the start of the Reading Flash Mob and Music will be played to signify when it is over. We would love 100% participation for best effect. Thank you.

Thursday 29th August- YEAR SIX BOOK-BASED TREAT STALL (lunch time)

The Year Sixes will be running a book-based treat stall in the Undercover area at lunch time on the 29th so come along for some fun bookish treats!

That’s all for Book Week, but ALSO: Next Week!

VERY EXCITING! The YOUNG AUTHORS AWARD 2019 Winners will be announced at Assembly on Friday 23rd August (except Year 3 and Year 4, as they’ll still be coming back from camp). We have been overwhelmed by the amount of entries this year and the magnificent quality of writing. We are looking forward to acknowledging some outstanding works in our school on this day!

The Nor'Wester

Issue 16 · 23 Aug 2019

In this issue