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BALD BLAIR PUBLIC SCHOOL NEWS

Term 3: Week 5 23 August 2019

Phone: 02 6779 1578 Email: baldblair-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au \

DATES TO REMEMBER

Wednesday 28 August Senior STEM at Guyra CS

Friday 6 September Superhero Day

Friday 13 September PSSA Regional Athletics

Monday 16 September Beanie for Brain Cancer Day

Thursday 19 September Assembly

Friday 27 September Last day of Term 3

Monday 14 October Students return Term 4 (Yes, Monday!)

Monday 21 October P&C Meeting 6pm

Principal’s Message Ros Edwards Book Character Parade Thank you to all our parents who put in a huge effort to prepare their children for the book character parade yesterday. I know this would have added some extra time to your morning routine but all the children looked fantastic. Thank you to the P&C for donating book gifts for every student. Senior STEM at Guyra Central School Next Wednesday, 28th August, our Year 4, 5 and 6 students will travel to Guyra Central School to be part of the Senior STEM program. The program will run every Wednesday morning until the 13th November. E Safety for Parents and Carers The eSafety Commissioner has put together a wonderful resource for Parents and Carers with tips and advice on helping your child have safe and enjoyable experiences online. As parents and carers, you know your child better than anyone and have the best opportunity to support and guide them to have safer online experiences. This guide covers some of the key online safety issues for young people and includes a range of practical tips and advice on what to do if things go wrong. You can also find a list of important services that can offer extra support. You can access the guide at https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents/online-safety-guide

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Kindergarten/ Year 1 – Owls Mrs Purvis

It has been another busy start to the term. All the students in K/1 Owls have been working hard in all Key Learning Areas.

100 Days of School On Wednesday 24th July, our class celebrated 100 Days of learning. The students made 100 Days Smarter crowns, counted and grouped 100 objects, wrote a story ‘If I had $100 I would......’, decorated a biscuit with lollies to make the number 100, counted to 100 by one’s, two’s, fives and tens and created an artwork incorporating the number 100. The students also presented their 100 Day Projects to the class and explained what they did to complete the project. The imagination and creativity every student displayed in their project, was outstanding. To finish the day we had a class party. It was a wonderful day. We are still counting the days at school in our daily number talks in our maths session and are excited to see how many days we will reach by the end of the year.

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K-2 Science- All Mixed Up This term, in science the students in K/2 are completing the Primary Connections unit ‘All mixed Up’. In this unit students are learning about materials that don’t mix well, and others that are difficult to separate. Through hands-on investigations, students are exploring how changing the quantities of materials in a mixture can alter its properties and uses.

Personal Development/ Health K/1 Owls have been learning about keeping themselves safe and healthy, this term, in their weekly Personal Development and Health sessions. In Week 4, the students learnt about how to keep their teeth healthy and why it is important to look after your teeth. Each student received a toothbrush and toothpaste to take home and use.

Owls Cafe There is much excitement with the addition of a structured play area in our classroom, this term. The students have enjoyed working with their classmates to take on a variety of roles in the cafe. They have been learning about money through the use of a till.

STEM This term, in STEM the students have been exploring Bee Bots. A Bee-Bot is an exciting robot designed specifically for use by young children. This colourful, easy-to-operate, and friendly little robot is a perfect tool for teaching sequencing, estimation and problem-solving skills.

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Year 2/3 Astronauts Mrs Lenehan

News Another busy term ahead, and all students in 2/3 Astronauts have been working extremely hard in all Key Learning Areas. Students are developing more confidence in their ability to tackle learning tasks and have been encouraged to be more persistent and diligent. Ms Wilson has been busy working one-on-one with selected students and small groups for reading, writing, spelling and numeracy. This is working really well, and hopefully we will start seeing some more progress with our students learning outcomes in the next few weeks. History We are learning about the history of celebrations and commemorations around Australia and the world. Students understand the difference between a celebration and commemoration. So far we have learnt about the significance of Australia Day, and over the next few weeks will be learning about a variety of celebrations. PDHPE This term our topic is, ‘Drug Education.’ We have defined a drug as a whole class and have brainstormed legal drugs. Students are learning about the harmful effects drugs have on our body. Students produced a poster around ‘cigarettes’ to encourage people to make the right choices.

Writing In writing, the students have spent the first couple of weeks writing two imaginative texts. Their topics were ‘Space’ and ‘winter.’ Students were given an explicit criteria for what needed to be included. There was a huge emphasis on paragraphing, sentence structure, and the correct use of direct speech. Students also had to include similes and personification somewhere throughout their text. Students have been attempting to be more descriptive in their writing through the use of synonyms, antonyms, homonyms and homophones. As a whole class we have brainstormed a huge list of synonyms and antonyms, with all students contributing to the discussion. Students have interacted with hands on learning activities like homophone BINGO to recognise and learn the variety of words that sound the same but have different spellings and meanings. Wil Schaefer was one of our winners! Our focus for the remainder of the term is around procedural writing and poetry.

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Reading Students have been working really hard through reading groups, focusing on sight words, expression when reading and fluency. All students on sight word lists have made progress, and should be proud of all their hard work. Students are reading with confidence and becoming more fluent every week. Students have been encouraged to read with expression and have been quizzed through comprehension questions at the end of the text.

Numeracy In numeracy, students have been expanding their knowledge around whole number and place value. We have looked at expanded notation up to four digit numbers and numbers greater than and less than.

Year 4-6 Waterfalls Ms Edwards

This term we have been learning about different types of poetry. We have written Cinquain poems and Haiku poems. We have also been leaning how to use personification in our writing. Next we will be learning about Limericks. In maths, our focus has been on working mathematically to solve problems. We have learned about patterns and how we can use patterns to help us solve mathematical problems. Science In science, our focus this term is Biological Sciences. We have been learning about how living things have life cycles and depend on each other and the environment to survive. We have also started learning about the germination of eucalypt seeds and the relationship between eucalypts and the European honey bees. History In history, we are learning about the colonies and how and why they were founded. We have been studying convicts, the wool industry, fishing and whaling, exploration and free settlers.

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Creative Arts In music, we have been learning to play marimbas with Miss Mitchell. This is lots of fun and we are looking forward to performing in the future. In visual arts we have looked at the work of Romero Brittoe and his use of cubism in his artwork. We have produced artwork with cubist elements. Growth Mindset We have been focusing on having a growth mindset rather than a fixed mindset. This means changing our words to change our minds. For example, instead of saying “This is too hard..” we say “I will learn how to do this.”

Highland Fling Black Mountain Public School

We celebrated Education Week with the Highland Fling at Black Mountain. The students engaged in a range of creative activities, including music and STEM. Thank you to Justine Eddy and her team for co-ordinating a fabulous day. As part of the celebrations, we started our day with our Education Week Awards Assembly. Award recipients this year were: Outstanding Student Achievement: Ursula Chilcott-Geere Staff Recognition Award: Lando Warner Parent/Community Award: Sally Geere Staff Recognition of Excellence: Julie Gittoes

Education Week Awards

Highland Fling Activities

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Science Day Sandon Public School

The Science Day held at Sandon Public School in Armidale was a fantastic day. Our students had the opportunity to conduct experiements and learn from experts from the UNE. The day was co-ordinated by Matt McKenzie, Principal at Thalgarrah Environmental Education Centre. Thank you to Mr McKenzie and Mrs Smoother of Sandon for hosting the day.

Congratulations

State Cross Country Congratulations to Ashlee Morgan on her wonderful achievement of placing 22nd at the NSW State Cross Country Championships at Eastern Creek in Sydney.

PSSA Zone Athletics Carnival On Friday 2nd August Ursula, Brock, Ashlee, Clem, Harry and Isabella travelled to Armidale to compete in the PSSA Zone Athletics carnival. All students showed excellent sportsmanship on the day. Results were as follows: Ashlee- 2nd 1500m, 2nd, 800m and 2nd 200m Isabella- 1st 100m Our small schools relay team (Ursula, Harry, Brock and Ashlee) finished third and will progress to the Regional carnival in Tamworth. Ashlee and Isabella have also progressed to Regional level in their individual events. They will compete at the PSSA North West Athletics carnival in Tamworth on Friday 13th September. We wish them the best of luck.

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Book Parade