Junior School

You may recall that late last term our Year 6 da Vinci Decathlon team performed exceptionally well at the Central West regional competition to finish in first place. Last week the national championships took place, delivered completely online. 

A very eager team arrived early for school and went straight into a lockdown of a different kind and had their thinking and creativity stretched in disciplines such as Engineering, Cartography, Code Breaking and Ideation. Gathering together excitedly for a before school breakfast while we streamed the Presentation Ceremony we reflected on what the challenges were and how we thought we had performed. 

Though not placing we were all very proud of the team for the way they collaborated and stretched themselves in what was a challenging time in the Learning Pit. The team and I would like to express our gratitude to Dr Drew who is such an engaging and motivated facilitator for all the time she put in to training and preparing the team, setting up for the online component of the competition and for treating us all to a yummy breakfast. We are already looking forward to our next challenge!

One thing we missed last year during the COVID restrictions was the possibility of going on excursions. Happily we are allowed out into the community again and last Friday Kindergarten enjoyed its first ever excursion with a visit to Brewongle School to learn from Eddy the Darug boy about how to find food, medicine and shelter in the bush. The children also spent time thinking and talking about the importance of caring for the environment and how to do that. They even learned some Darug words and found out that Dyarubbin is the Darug name for the Hawkesbury River. We all think that is a much more interesting name!

Thank you to our fabulous teams of parent volunteers who joined in with the P&F last week to provide the children with a sausage sizzle for Foundation Day, Mother’s Day stalls and even an early Mother’s Day breakfast at Springwood. Having such a willing and supportive community is what makes the Junior School such a great place to be a part of.

Thank you to: 

Our sausage sizzlers Richard Marsh, Chris Cigana, Suzanne Janine, Linda Emmerson, Jenny Qi, Magdalena Herceg, Gemma Lynch, Sarah and Mark Rodgers.

Our Mother’s Day stall holders Catharine Tierney, Rebecca Isbister, Katie Walters, Suzanne Janine, Justine Hampartzoumian, Magdalena Herceg, Saffron Bianchi-Howden, Samantha Chapman and Sarah Rodgers.

Thank you also to our breakfast baristas Sarah and Mark Rodgers, Mark Kinnear, John McHugh and Dylan Chapman.

Thank you especially for their leadership of the P & F to Magdalena Herceg, Gemma Lynch and Sarah and Mark Rodgers.

Many hands make light work and we are all very grateful for all of the hard work done on all of these days!

Student Achievements

This week we presented our first Bronze awards in Assembly at Springwood. Rose Cottle and Zoe Lynch were both recognised for having accumulated 10 merit certificates this year and received their Bronze Awards. Here is the list of all award recipients:

Gold: Kane Emmerson S2 Cherries

Bronze: Jaiden Marsh S3 Raspberries, Rose Cottle and Zoe Lynch S2 Geebungs

Mr Nigel Cockington

Head of Junior School