29 August 2019

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From the Principal

Our Motto: Friendly Respectful Courageous Learning

Our Commitment: With courage we learn, connecting to people and place. Striving for excellence by being curious, creative and resilient.

Highlights

We have had another very successful fortnight after our feet touched the ground following the Hagley Farm/Cradle Mountain school camp. Highlights include:

• Children coming to school in the mornings very excited about their learning,
• Grade 3/4 students’ wonderful celebration of Mr Kelly’s birthday!
• Kinder students exploring how sheep keep warm after shearing?
• Carl Noonan and Ros Wharton continuing work around our final two school logo designs and working on a polished version with graphic designers – once we have these we will organise for our school community to vote on the final logo which will then be used for our school uniforms and school signage refresh,
• Having a film crew visit filming Bicheno Primary School parents and staff for a new Tasmanian Department of Education marketing campaign called Teach Tasmania,
• Working with Carolyn Watson Principal of St Mary’s District School finalising plans for our Grade 6 Transition program to St Mary’s – more details to follow soon,
• Having Lisa Drinkwater form the DoE Respectful Schools team conducting professional learning for all classroom based staff on Zones of Regulation in relation to identifying behavioural triggers, successful strategies for different students and ideas around developing our draft school safety and wellbeing policy, and
• Special congratulations to our students Grace Briggs, Hallie Thompson, Polly Alexander and Elyse Briggs who were part of the winning team in the 2019 Netball Grand Final held at St Helens – it was a great game with the girls demonstrating courage, high skill levels and strong determination with Grace Briggs being awarded player of the Grand Final.

School Satisfaction Surveys

Annual School Satisfaction Surveys for parents and staff are being conducted during August 2019 across Tasmanian government schools. The surveys provide an opportunity for parents and staff to give important feedback on what the school does well and where we can improve. Questions cover a range of topics about our school. All responses are secure and anonymous.

Parents and staff are invited to participate.

Parents who have registered an email address with the school will be emailed a survey link and login details to participate. You can copy this link into your internet search engine or contact the school office to access a computer to complete the survey online.

We encourage you to complete the survey to give our school a clear direction for future programs and services for students.

IMPORTANT: In 2019 all Grade 4 to 6 students will be undertaking a Wellbeing Survey that will incorporate elements of the Satisfaction Survey.

Student Assistance Scheme

A reminder that the Student Assistance Scheme closes to all new applications and to further assessments of eligibility on 6 September.

The Student Assistance Scheme is means-tested and will cover student based levies for low income families. Please see the office if you would like to apply, it’s not too late!

Parent Contributions

A friendly and timely reminder that Bicheno Primary School levies should now be paid as soon as possible. If you are experiencing financial difficulty or hardship paying for school levies, please come and see the school office or the Principal about establishing a regular payment plan. School levies form an important part of resourcing schools, so non-payment of levies directly impact the opportunities and resources we can deliver to ALL of our students. At present we have around $7000 of outstanding levies which really impacts on our budget for student learning resources. I will also forward a reminder letter to families who have not paid in 2019, and follow up with a phone call if required.

Duty of Care Before and After School

Recently we have had some inappropriate student behaviour which has resulted in students being hurt well after the afternoon school bell. As a result it is timely to provide a reminder to parents around timely pick up of students at the end of the school day. Key points in relation to this are:

• Staff provide a duty of care from 8:15am until school starts and from after school until 3:15pm when duty of care is handed back to parents.
• Parents must aim to be here to pick up their child/ren at 2:45pm.
• Parents who stay and play with their children after school are expected to also monitor their child’s/children’s safe and respectful play during this time as staff cannot cover all play areas at the same time.
• Coles Bay students are placed in the care of the Calow’s Bus driver for the duration of the bus journey on the way to school and for the return trip after school.
• Parents/guardians are responsible for your child/children’s duty of care from when they are dropped off in the morning (no earlier than 8:15am) and from when they are picked up, and
• Families can use the playgrounds after school hours only with parental supervision (N.B. no children can stay after school without parental supervision)

Progressing the Implementation of our Instructional Model across our 5 Schools

Last week I had the pleasure of working with staff and 4 other Principals and Pamela Macklin from Vic Zbar Consulting around the implementation of, and professional learning aligned to, our fresh water salt water Instructional Model.

We are making really exciting progress with all leaders and staff committed to improving all students learning using the best teachers in our classrooms.

Have a wonderful week everyone!

Best regards
Rob Presswell

Book Week Parade

Chess Tournament

On 13 August, several students competed in teams against St Marys and St Helens.

What’s happening in our classrooms?

Kinder learning about felt

Prep/One

Social/Emotional:

We are learning to help people when they are unsure.
We are learning that it isn't okay to talk over people.

Reading:

We are learning our set 10 sounds.
We are learning the chunking strategy.

Writing:

We are learning to form our letters correctly.
We are learning to start sentences with words other than ‘and’.

Numeracy:

We are learning numbers to 100 and 1000.
We are learning about more than and less than.

Science:

We are interested in learning about different planets.

HASS:

We are interested in learning about different places around the world.

Prep/One did some paintings about the BookWeek Book: Heads and Tails Insects

Grade 1/2

In English, we are learning to write procedures. A procedure tells the reader how to do or make something. An example of a procedural text is a recipe. We wrote procedures when we made fairy bread.

We are learning to re-read and edit our writing for spelling, punctuation and text structure.

In Maths, we are learning to recognise and represent multiplication as repeated addition, using terms such as ‘groups of’, ‘lots of’ and arrays. In an array, items are arranged in rows and columns to make counting and calculating easier

We are also developing our mathematical understanding by playing the game ‘Guess my number’. Students try to guess the number you're thinking of in the fewest number of guesses possible by asking yes/no questions, e.g. is it an odd number?

In Art, we are exploring different media to create artwork of our favourite parts and character/s from our class novel ‘James and the Giant Peach.’

Grade 3/4

English:

• We are learning the letter cluster “oo” and the two sounds it makes. E.g. Balloon/Football.
• We aim to identify the purpose, intended audience and subject matter of a poem
• We are exploring the common literary devices found in poetry.

Maths

• We are exploring strategies for division
• We are learning to recall multiplication facts up to 12x12
• We are representing and solving problems involving multiplication using efficient mental and written strategies and appropriate digital technologies

Grade 5/6

It’s been a busy for weeks; addition to a wonderful school camp, choir excursion and this week’s chess excursion; Grade 5/6 have also been very busy in class:

In English

Reading :- We have begun our new class novel; Holes by Louis Sachar.

In the text, we have been learning how reader’s use their prior knowledge and connections to the real world and other texts to make inferences about a character, setting or plot development.

Writing :- We have been learning to recognise and use both objective and subjective language. We have been writing personal and formal recounts using objective and subjective language

In Maths we have been studying Measurement. We have been learning to calculate the area and perimeter of irregular 2 dimensional shapes and we have been learning to calculate the surface area of a 3 dimensional shape

In HASS we have been learning about the Wavehill Walkout and how an individual or group of people can contribute to, or bring about change in society.

In Science we have been investigating the movement of the Earth and Moon around the sun.

Indonesian

In Kinder we are continuing with the ELLA program and learning to say "I like" or "I don't like".

In Prep/1 and 1/2 we are learning how to ask "What the weather is like?" and to respond with weather nouns.

In 3/4 we are learning an Indonesian poem called "Sepeda Motor". We are translating, and memorising it.

In 5/6 we are learning an Indonesian poem called "Takut". We are translating, memorising and presenting it.

Reminder – ENE fees for Gold are now overdue

BCDA AGM Invitation

Important dates

LiL calendar

School Association Update: Trivia Night

Tickets to the trivia night go on sale next Monday 2nd September. Tickets can be purchased at school during drop-off (8:30 - 9 am) and pick-up times (2:45 - 3 pm) Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week. For ticket sales outside of these times, please contact Lisa on 0407 662 878.

To raise important funds for school developments, BPSA has gathered a myriad of amazing prizes from our awesome community businesses that will be up for grabs via Auction.

Keep an eye on BPSA's Facebook page for the chance to secure epic, one-off prizes that will make your day, your year or even your decade!!

Canteen next week:

Volunteers required for School Canteen next Tuesday 3rd September. Please contact Carrie if you are keen to help out (0405 776 299 or BichenoPSA@gmail.com.

We have set-up an email address for the association to enable parents and community members to get in touch with us more easily.

The address is BichenoPSA@gmail.com

KEON: School to Gulch Coastal Rubbish Pick-up

With bags, gloves and a lot of enthusiasm, Keon headed off from the school along the coastal track towards the blow hole. It was a mighty effort from all involved, as a there was a lot of rubbish, both old and new, which was disappointing for the children as it shows that proper care is still not being given with waste. The bush on the edge of the car park at the boat ramp was a hot spot for small plastic condiment containers and plastic bottles – maybe the council could consider extra bins in this area. Another grim discovery by one of the parents, which was zoned off and by-passed by the children was a pile of asbestos that had been dumped in the bush. This has been reported to council.

To highlight the amount of waste that has been retrieved at each of the keon rubbish pick-up events this year, and to coincide with the exciting ‘Really Awesome Music’ (RAM) show on this Saturday, keon will have on display a whale sculpture made from some of the rubbish collected this year.

There will also be decorations made from upcycled lids and shells, as both a recycling initiative, as well as showing how more and more plastic rubbish is getting onto our beaches and into the ocean.

Footy Margin Tickets

Unclaimed winners

• Round 10 ticket number 661486 - Margin 7
• Round 21 ticket number 657979 - Margin 56
• Round 22 ticket number 659989 - Margin 53
• Round 23 winner was Wendy Freeman

Information for parents

A friendly reminder that the school has a duty of care for students from 8:15am, extending to 3:15pm. Students on the school grounds outside of these operating hours must be under parental supervision. The school toilets and classrooms are closed at 2:45pm. There are public toilets located next to Little Penguins Child Centre.

Rob Presswell

School Information

Phone: 63751222
Email: bicheno.primary@education.tas.gov.au
Principal: Robert Presswell
School Business Manager: Sandra Silberberg

Teachers

Kinder and LiL: Eliza Spykers
Prep/One: Bronti Cooke and Bron Pierce
Grade 1/2: Bruce Campbell and Jen Sliskovic
Grade 3/4: Sam Kelly
Grade 5/6: Jill Bosua
Support Teacher: Bron Pierce

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