Jamberoo Public School Newsletter

It may have been a chilly and early morning on Friday 30th April but that didn’t deter our 20 keen writers from Year 3 to Year 6 as we boarded the early train to Sydney. While most were sufficiently pumped with adrenalin to manage to stay awake for the trip north, there were a couple who thought it best to recharge their batteries so they were ready for a day of learning from the literary greats at the Sydney Writers Festival. We arrived at our Town Hall destination, and even managed to navigate the railway turnstiles with minimal assistance required from the friendly city rail staff who had somehow flagged us as ‘visitors to the big smoke’. It was then crunch and sip time, among the pigeons, commuters and bell chimes.

 Entering the gorgeous historic building, we were rather thrilled to be walked past the hundreds of excited student spectators to the very front row of the packed Town Hall. The teachers felt the need to reinforce the importance of active listening, enthusiastic clapping and preparing some quality questions, knowing that we would be under the watchful eye of the illustrious guest speakers. We managed to beat the other schools to the microphone for multiple questions for the various presenters, thanks to our prime spot and keen inquiring minds.

 We had 4 sessions led by a dynamic host, who quickly had us all up dancing, with her specialty ‘seat shuffle’, rapping and generally feeling like a hyped-up crowd that any mosh pit would be proud of. Author Andrew McDonald and illustrator Ben Wood entertained us with some a crime-fighting, mystery-busting pigeon play based on their Real Pigeons book series. Five-time recipient of the Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year

Award, legendary author Emily Rodda (and, incidentally an old-girl of Ms Lewis’ school) taught us how to take what we know and mix it together with our imagination to create a story. Best-selling author Jess Townsend, who wrote the Nevermoor series, enthralled us with how she captures the things she loves in her novels, including flawed heroines, fancy hotels with hidden secrets, ancient cities and even geese in tuxedos. The day was finished with award-winning writer Kirli Saunders sharing her poems and insights from her indigenous perspective of Country.

 All that was left was for Ms Lewis to work her magic and hustle us onto an early train, and the impeccably behaved students to contemplate the world of writing that had been opened to them over the course of the day. 

On the 30th of April, 27 students from Year 2 to Year 6 travelled to Gerringong to participate in the Tongarra District Cross Country. These students had to compete against a range of other schools from around the Shoalhaven District. It was a lovely day for all the participants and the proud parents and teachers that watched on. We would like to congratulate all of our superstar students who participated on the day for their determination, perseverance and amazing display of Jamberoo spirit. We wish the best of luck to those students progressing on to the South Coast Cross Country. 

You could hear the excitement in our students today as the new round of sport choices began for years 3-6. Although the last session of soccer  was held, meaning that the start of the ultimate Frisbee experience with Mrs Dammerel will need to begin next week.

Miss Alpen was able to make use of our brand new P&C netball hoops. She is exploring some skills and the children are so excited to be the first group to use this new equipment. Now we know that many of our parent body are super keen on netball, so why not volunteer some of your time to help Miss Alpen out on a Friday morning?

Finally we are extremely thrilled to announce our community sporting group - Lawn bowls. The Bowling club of Jamberoo have donated their time, equipment and expertise to our students on a Friday morning. Mrs Galea, said that it was a glorious day and the children benefited greatly from the expert guidance during their roll up. I look forward to getting down to this in action next Friday. 

What an amazing and rewarding start to the 2021 HPGE (High Performance Gifted Education) class on Wednesdays at Kiama High School. 20 Year 6 students from Kiama, Gerringong, Minnamurra and Jamberoo primary schools have come together to experience an enriched and challenging learning environment at Kiama High. This term, under the guidance of Mrs Anna Mundey, the students have been extending their understanding in Maths through problem solving mysteries and digital challenges. The focus has been to develop curiosity, resourcefulness and resilience in collaborative problem solving.

Students are connecting with the Victorian Era through a novel study and history Inquiry. They have also been introduced to Charles Darwin through deep discussion and questioning.  Kiama High School teacher have provided sessions in hands on science and in coding. The students are getting to experience moving to different classrooms and teachers for an enhanced learning opportunity and are excited to attend future classes around the school. Thank-you to the Kiama Community of Schools team for developing this remarkable program for our talented students.​

In visual art we have been learning about the primary colours and the secondary colours. Students drew their own fish and painted three of them the primary colours (red, yellow, blue) and then mixed the paint to make the secondary colours (orange, purple and green) on the other three fish.