Primary Newsletter
IN THIS ISSUE: •
Welcome to Term
•
News from the Classroom
•
Birthdays
Dear Parents and Caregivers, Welcome back to the final term of the year! I hope that the short break was a happy time, during which batteries were recharged, and that all our students will enjoy expressing themselves in their own unique ways in the coming term. While we might not know what the immediate future holds, one thing which is certain is that the resilience and creativity which the students showed earlier this year will continue. The teachers and I look forward to seeing the students rise to the challenge of showing how much they have learned this year, while having a good time in the process. In only a few weeks, the Year 3-6 students will write their end of year exams, and we know that they will give their all to obtain the best possible results. Of course, school is about so much more than just assessing academic prowess. In ‘normal’ years there would be numerous cultural, sporting and outreach activities to enjoy. Then there are the many opportunities just to enjoy each other’s company, whether out on the playgrounds or while sitting together in class. Education is about tapping into the whole self, while exploring each individual’s unique abilities and interests. In the end, the academic and other activities are a means to an end. Yes, they impart knowledge and skills, and they teach us how to reason and make sense of the world. But mostly, our years at school help us to figure out who we are and how we relate to others and to our environment. Our great hope is that here in the Primary School students feel comfortable to do just this, constantly expanding the horizons of who they are and how they relate to others. One great sadness in recent years has been to notice the rising hostility among people who hold opposing views to each other. Instead of being able to discuss things in a rational, calm manner it seems that social media has stoked a fire of everincreasing polarisation. Whether about politics, The Reddam House Primary School Newsletter
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healthcare, religion or any other topic, we appear to have become ever more set in our ways and unwilling to budge. For this reason, I am grateful that the teachers look for opportunities to explore how other people live, whether in finding out more about Indigenous Aboriginal culture or in celebrating the religious and cultural activities associated with different groups. Long after our students have moved on from their school days, we hope that they may take with them the far more important lesson of tolerance, and the ability to listen patiently to the opinions of another without judgement. May this coming term bring with it opportunities for all of us to do just that. This year, many of our students entered the international Concours D'Arts Eisteddfod. This is run from Reddam House Bedfordview through an online worldwide platform, and this year included students from fellow Inspired schools worldwide, from countries as far as Belgium, South Africa, New Zealand, Spain, Peru and Oman. We are proud to announce that our students won a number of individual sections, as well as overall medals. The full Gala Awards announcement can be viewed here: Concours D'Arts Gala Awards 2021 Winners of Individual Sections Eason Yuan: Classical Instrumental, Own Choice Year 2 Ruby Zhang: Classical Instrumental, Romantic Year 2 Jesse Joye: Classical Instrumental, Own Choice Year 5 Janie Kogan, Contemporary Vocal, Musicals Year 5 Dean Pulmano: Contemporary Instrumental, Jazz and Blues Year 5 Isabella Winkler: Contemporary Instrumental, Jaxx and Blues Year 5 Special Overall Awards Overall Best Performance Grade K-3: Eason Yuan Overall Best Performance Grade 4-7: Jesse Joye Then, Ruby Levitt was honoured to receive an email from Gabrielle Upton MP asking her whether she would be willing to create a 2021 Hanukkah card, which will be sent out in celebration of the festival. Ruby’s art is truly beautiful, and this card should be a colourful blessing to all who receive it. Well done, Ruby. Have a great term! Dee Pitcairn
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Reddam House Would like to wish a very happy birthday to Brandon Bova, Hillary Huang, Capri Reynolds, Ariana Hronis, Flynn Cheng, Regina Muhlmann, Emily Petersen, Yi Sun, Samuel Pinski, Hugo Wise and Thomas Hui. Who celebrated their special day this week
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ART GALLERY
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KINDERGARTEN Welcome back to our final term of Year K. The teachers were so excited and proud to be welcomed back online by massive smiles and some very grown-up, organised students. In literacy this week, we recounted our fun and enjoyable school holidays. Some of the students reflected on their memorable times at the beach or just spending quality time playing board games with family at home. The students were encouraged to include learnt spelling rules to spell unfamiliar words and connectives to enhance their sentence writing. During Mathematics lessons this week, the Kindy students explored numeration. The students are enjoying thinking about larger numbers and where they are located on a hundreds chart. Some pupils challenged the teacher to a ‘guess my number’. These really had the teachers thinking about their knowledge of numbers. We are so impressed at how well the students remembered their pattern counting in twos, fives and tens. Our Kindy scientists shared their keen interest about living and non-living things. The Kindergarten teachers were really impressed by how much knowledge the students had about classifying these groups of objects. We are in for an amazing, productive Term 4 and the Kindergarten teachers look forward to an exciting, creative and engaging term ahead!
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YEAR 1 Welcome back! This week, we heard wonderful recounts of the holiday break and treasured family experiences. The children loved reconnecting with each other and stepped straight into this term as confident and curious learners. We commenced our new topics and the children immersed themselves in their learning. We are discovering more about the human body in PDHPE. Starting with the skeletal system, we played head, shoulders, knees, and toes. However, we used our new vocabulary of skull, ribs, femur, and patella. Some of the children giggled with our actions of 'shaking your pelvis just like Elvis!' The children designed their own skeleton artworks and labelled key bone names. We were kept busy ordering our numbers in Mathematics, focusing on the place value to help us sort. We created our own number ladders by giving our partner 10 different numbers that they had to order from the smallest to largest. Some children even worked with 5 digit numbers! In Literacy, we began our Author Study work based on stories by Julia Donaldson. This also lends itself to our text type of 'Poetry' this term. The students delighted in listening to the popular tale of 'The Gruffalo' and identifying the rhyming words within the story. We even made our very own gruffalos! In Science, we are learning about 'Food'. We separated our shopping basket into the food's origin: was it from a plant or animal? There were some tricky items to sort. The students could not believe that sugar actually comes from a plant and the strawberry yoghurt sparked quite a debate! Great work, Year 1! We look forward to an exciting and fun term ahead!
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YEAR 2 After a restful and enjoyable break, the children and teachers in the Year 2 cohort have come back refreshed and enthusiastic. It has been pleasing to observe how quickly everyone has transitioned to the routines of school. We have noticed the students are continuing to grow in confidence and are working hard on their daily organisational skills along with independence, persistence, resilience and goal setting. We will continue to promote these values through regular classroom activities and discussions as well as celebrating our students’ many personal achievements. In English we will continue to develop students’ reading, writing, speaking and listening skills. Lessons will focus on consolidating reading strategies, comprehension, spelling, handwriting and oral language skills. This term we will be introducing the genres of poetry, persuasive and information texts as well as continuing to expand on already learnt genres of descriptions, procedures and narrative texts. When reading we will be developing sound comprehension strategies with students, including predicting, questioning, paraphrasing and development of vocabulary. Handwriting practise continues to be a feature in all Year 2 classes and is not confined to Literacy sessions but is always emphasised. In Mathematics lessons the students will continue investigations in place value and counting patterns through games and activities to consolidate addition, subtraction, multiplication and division facts. We will consolidate our knowledge of time this term using calendars, clocks, stopwatches, timelines and sequencing events. This will be integrated with Aboriginal perspectives in History / Geography. The emphasis during Mathematics lessons is to encourage the students to explain strategies used and to explore alternative methods when problem solving. This week in our History lessons, we have explored Port Arthur as a historical site. The students were fascinated when exploring its development over time from a penal settlement to tourist attraction. In Science we commenced our new topic in Biological Sciences – The Living World. We are very excited about this unit of study which provides an opportunity to explore stages of development in both plants and animals. We understand the best learning environment for students is in the classroom and we are really looking forward to welcoming back our students to their classrooms in Term 4.
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YEAR 2
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YEAR 3 Welcome back Year 3! There was a buzz on every Google Meet this week, with renewed energy and excitement. There were many tales of grand adventures that had occurred during the time away from Online Learning and all teachers were thrilled to hear how much time was spent outside and away from technology. Year 3 jumped straight back into the swing of things, exploring the importance of sleep, a healthy diet and an active lifestyle whilst discussing what ‘good health’ means in PDH. Students were able to share some stories from their holidays that demonstrated a balance between physical, emotional, and social health, especially in reference to their ‘friendship bubbles’. Some Year 3s also had the chance to explore healthforkids.co.uk to further their knowledge on maintaining healthy lifestyles. In Geography, students were eager to pick up from where they left off last term by completing their Australian Tourism brochures. It is outstanding how the students’ knowledge of Australia has progressed over the last few months. Finally, in Maths, Year 3 were introduced to their new unit: Decimals. Many were able to relate decimals to everyday experiences such as when using money, weight, or time. They labelled the place values of ‘tenths’ and ‘hundredths’ and eagerly shared their Term 3 knowledge on Fractions to help explain parts of a whole. A great start to Term 4, Year 3! We look forward to the excitement that Week 2 brings!
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YEAR 4 Year 4 teachers would like to welcome all students back to the first week of the final term. The term kickstarted with students being introduced to their new topics for the term, as they engaged with ideas and brainstormed concepts to get their minds thinking. In Science, students started the topic ‘Fabulous Forces’ by watching a video of a bowling ball and feather being dropped from a great height. Long ago, a famous scientist named Isaac Newton theorised that all objects fall because of an invisible force pulling them down – gravity. However, this led students to investigate what would happen if we dropped the same object from an atmosphere different to ours on Earth? In Geography, Year 4 were introduced to the topic “The Earth’s Environment”. In this unit, students will learn about how to live more sustainably to provide a cleaner, greener, and more habitable environment for future generations. This unit began by looking at an infographic on sustainability as we tried to decipher its meaning. It was a great half-a-week of learning, and it will be fantastic to see how students go on their indepth journey into these topics as the term develops. Well done, Year 4!
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YEAR 5 & 6 SCIENCE Year 5 and 6 students started to study their new topics this week. In Term 4, students are studying Earth and Space! Year 5 students expanded their knowledge about planet Earth this week. Students explored what makes up planet Earth and what the axis and orbits mean for Earth. Year 6 students also studied planet Earth this week. However, Year 6 students identified the layers of Earth itself and the atmosphere. Students described the characteristics of each layer of Earth and its atmosphere.
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YEAR 5 & 6 MATHEMATICS How lovely it was to welcome our Year 5 and 6 students back to the virtual classrooms in anticipation of seeing them in person in the very near future. In both Year 5 and 6 Mathematics classes, focus was on 3-D solids. Students familiarised themselves with polyhedrons and including prisms and pyramids. In Year 5, concepts such as faces, bases, vertices and edges were discussed, and Euler’s formula, faces + vertices - 2 = edges, was tested. Discussion was had as to what an apex is and how not all apexes are vertices. Furthermore, cylinders, cones and spheres were classified as not being polyhedrons. Their surfaces were rather defined as being flat or curved surfaces. In Year 6, students went full steam ahead and easily classified prisms and pyramids, once again using their prior knowledge of the Swiss mathematician Leonard Euler’s formula. They experimented with his rule a little differently and proved that F + V – E = 2. They practised drawing 3D solids, using dotted lines to indicate the surface, edges, and vertices they could not see.
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MUSIC It was lovely to welcome students back to online music at Reddam this week, and to see their smiling faces and to hear their singing voices at home. The kindergarten children learnt to sing a new song called 'Mill Song', which uses 'la, so and mi' notes. They enjoyed using parts of their body to show which pitch was higher and lower. The Year 1 children had a 'bear' themed lesson and learnt two pieces 'Fuzzy Wuzzy' and 'The Bear Went Over The Mountain'. They enjoyed creating actions to accompany the songs. Both Year K and Year 1 had fun playing on 'air xylophones' to prepare for when they return to face-to-face learning, and can start learning to play their Orff pieces on the wooden xylophones again. Some students were also able to use their own pianos and keyboards at home to learn some of the pieces, and it was fabulous to hear them perform online. Years 3 - 6 began learning all about Torres Strait Island music in preparation for their Musica Viva Online Incursion in Week 2. They learnt all about the musical group 'Wyniss', who are a Torres Strait Island group from the Island of Mua. They began to explore why music and dance is so important to Torres Strait Island culture. They enjoyed learning about the traditional instruments used by 'Wyniss', and they listened to and analysed some examples of the songs that 'Wyniss' will be performing in Week 2. The Music Department cannot wait to hear and experience the musical sounds of 'Wyniss' live next week!
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MUSIC PERFORMANCE The entire Music Department is so excited for students to return to school this term. Although many of our ensembles and group singing will be delayed for the first little while, it is unbelievably exciting that students will be able to resume their individual tuition on their instruments. Our teachers and students have managed exceptionally well online, and we are now excited to be able to meet once again and, most importantly, to hear the sounds of music flowing through the Music Terrace corridors once again. Each of our Music teachers has prepared their students for virtual Studio Recitals. These were originally scheduled to be live performances last term, and we pivoted to this online format so that students could still share their works with everybody. Please enjoy these at the link provided earlier in this newsletter. Year 5-6 Singers At the beginning of this year, the Reddam House Year 5-6 Singers made a great start at making music together, singing in parts, and learning the rehearsal etiquette required for a successful choir. This fabulous group of young singers comprises Year 6 students who were in the Year 5-6 Singers last year, new Year 5 and 6 members, and those Year 5s who have chosen to continue choir following compulsory Sculthorpe Choir. The students had an absolute blast preparing a 3-part a cappella piece called Sesere Eeye, a Torres Strait Islander piece about a kingfisher bird, complete with dance, as well as a 2-part arrangement of Dreaming in the Sky by beloved Australian composer Paul Jarman. This amazing group filmed these pieces, and they were submitted to the Sydney Eisteddfod just before the NSW lockdown. During lockdown, rehearsals were conducted online by way of practice recordings, professional recordings, accompaniment tracks and pre-recorded video sessions, as well as the odd musical meme just for fun! This was a great opportunity to break up the lockdown monotony, and keep spirits high during difficult times, especially receiving the news of our First Place in the Sydney Eisteddfod! These committed students also undertook a very impressive solo recording task in order for us to put together a virtual choir performance. We were all so proud of this amazing achievement, and if you missed their beautiful performance of Birrama Mana in assembly last term, we highly recommend you check it out here. What lies ahead for this year's Year 5-6 Singers is a little uncertain, as restrictions on group singing remain, but could change at any moment as our state's vaccination rates go up and COVID-19 cases go down. We endeavour, as always, to offer something to these fantastic students, and look forward to seeing what other wonderful things they accomplish. K-1 Orff Percussion Ensemble It is lovely to see the Year K and Year 1 students back online for the last term of the year. The online rehearsals have been a great way to keep developing our understanding of pitch through using hand signs and solfa singing, as well as helping us keep some of the Orff repertoire, so that we are fresh and prepared for when the students are back in person. We can’t wait to see the students back in class using xylophones and percussion instruments soon.
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MUSIC PERFORMANCE Music Studio Recitals 2021 As we were unable to hold our Studio Recitals as live concerts in Term 3, each of our Music teachers has prepared a filmed recital video. Please enjoy these concerts on the website at the link below. Congratulations to all of our Music students for preparing their performance pieces, filming them at home during last term's lockdown, and sharing them for us to enjoy. Link: Music Studio Recitals 2021
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MUSIC PERFORMANCE
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LIBRARY Book Recommendations K-2: THE COUCH POTATO by Jory John Couch Potato has the best life, sitting around all day in fuzzy slippers on a comfy couch. And with a super cool device that will fetch snacks whenever the spud wants, there’s no need to get up when your goal in life is to be as relaxed as possible! Couch Potato can watch all the TV shows he wants, play video games, check e-mail and live chat with friends – all without leaving the house or the couch. But one day, after plugging in a brand-new gadget, the power goes out! None of his entertainment devices will work and he can barely find his way through his house. What’s Couch Potato supposed to do now?? Instead of sitting home in the dark, he decides to take his dog Tater for a walk. To Couch Potato’s surprise, he begins to forget about his favourite shows, devices and unanswered messages. He’d missed how the birds sound, the trees look, and the air smelled. He’s reminded just how beautiful the world can be when you put down the screens. This is a delightful story that will teach children the value of unplugging in a technology driven world. Ages 4+. 3-4: EL DEAFO by Cece Bell El Deafo is a funny, deeply honest graphic novel memoir for ages 7+. It chronicles the author's hearing loss at a young age and her subsequent experiences with a powerful and very awkward hearing aid called the Phonic Ear. It gives her the ability to hear – sometimes things she shouldn't – but also isolates her from her classmates. She really just wants to fit in and find a true friend, someone who appreciates her, Phonic Ear and all. Finally, she is able to harness the power of the Phonic Ear and become "El Deafo, Listener for All." And more importantly, declare a place for herself in the world and find the friend she's longed for. 5-6: MEGAMONSTER by David Walliams On a volcanic island, in the middle of shark-infested waters, stands the Cruel School. The lessons are appalling, the school dinners are revolting and the teachers are terrifying (especially the mysterious science teacher, Doctor Doktur). When Larker is sent to the school, she quickly realises something very odd is going on… something involving Doctor Doktur, a pair of strange spectacles, and A ‘Monsterfication Machine’. And ultimately, she finds herself face to face wit a real life Megamonster. There seems to be no scape, but for Larker, nothing is impossible…. Another great book by David Walliams. Recommended for ages 9+.
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NEXTWAVE YOUTH SHORT FILM COMPETITION
Announcing a final call for entries for the Nextwave Youth Short Film Competition If you’re a young person between the ages of 10-25 living anywhere in Australia, the Nextwave team wants to see what you can do. Make a film under 5 minutes , include the year’s signature item (a pineapple), and enter your film in before the EXTENDED submission deadline of NOVEMBER 12th, 2021 for your chance to win some amazing awards and prizes, as well as have your film premiere at the Screenwave International Film Festival on the beautiful Coffs Coast next April! For full terms and conditions, head to the Nextwave website: http://www.nextwavefilm.com.au
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