Alawa Primary School Newsletter

Earlier this week we had 27 parents attend our Cybersafety Expo. We arranged special focus booths on the following areas identified through the recent survey which 57 people responded to:

• You Tube / You Tube for Kids
• Approach for raising awareness at Alawa
• Parental Controls and Safeguards
• Gaming

Thanks to Constable Dan Bull, Athena Hammond, Jed Henderson and Jo Baines.

Resources and follow ups will be shared via email this week and regular updates posted through the school newsletter. An invitation to parents who attended to join a special webinar hosted by Dolly's Dream has been sent out as well.

Jed Henderson, Jo Baines, Athena Hammond & Sandy Cartwright [Digital Dexterity Taskforce]

Hello everyone

Welcome to week 6. Wow! Over half way through this term already.

National Simultaneous Storytime was celebrated last week. This year the book is called Give me some Space by Philip Bunting. It was read by NASA Astronaut Shannon Walker. All year levels met with their buddy classes straight after muster on Thursday to share the book online and complete an activity together. 

We can feel the lovely change in the weather and we know it has been wonderful sleeping weather. As great as it is to sleep in, please be aware that this is key learning time and students are missing out on instructions and connections with their class.

Australian Early Development Census

The Australian Early Development Census [AEDC] is a national data collection of early childhood development at the time children commence their first year of full-time school. Since 2009, communities, schools and governments across Australia have used results from the AEDC to help provide the right kind of services, resources and support. Our teachers of children in Transition have completed their online training prior to completing the Instrument [AvEDI] for children in their class.

Data collection will take place for our students from next week and results will be available from late 2021. Individual children are not identifiable in the results.

Our participation in the AEDC helps to build a more complete picture of the health, wellbeing and development of children in the community. By taking part in the AEDC, you will be contributing important information that can assist other schools and the entire community to better support children and their families to be ready for school. To find out more please visit the AEDC website www.aedc.gov.au or get in contact with me - 8997 7666. 

Genevieve Donohue, [Assistant Principal]

Dear NT Government

Most people would agree that Crocodylus Park should be banned because of the cruelty of the zookeepers and the habitat. Plus the small cages are a threat.

Firstly the extremely bad zookeepers only give them a tiny amount of space and food especially for the monkeys.

Secondly the habitat that they live in is nothing like the wild. Did you know that the tiger only has a living space about 8m wide and long? 

Surely you would now agree that Crocodylus Park should now be banned.

Leo Barker [3/4 Baines]

In conjunction with our Rainbow Run on Friday the 28th May, the Cafe will be selling a lunch special available for all students to purchase. 

$6.00 - Sausage in bread, popper juice and icy pole

Orders can be made via QuickCliq or please note 'Lunch Day special' on students lunch order bag. 

www.quickcliq.com.au  

In Year 2 Ward we have been working very hard to write persuasive texts. Below is our first attempt at a class letter to Ms Cartwright.

Dear Ms Cartwright,

We are writing to you because 2 Ward would like to wear no shoes in the classroom on Wednesday’s please. This is because we DO NOT want our mat to get grass all over it.

Ms Cartwright it will only be from 8:30-9:30am because our mat will get dirty from the grass at boot camp. This will give us time to clean all of the grass off of our shoes.

Because the grass is wet we will leave our shoes outside to dry. We promise to keep them neatly under our bags, so that no body trips over. They will be nice and neat there.

We would like you to let us do this as we do not like wearing our wet, soggy and grassy shoes inside. Please let us do it.

Sincerely,

Year 2 Ward.

After seeing our neatly lined shoes and grass free classroom for two weeks in a row. Year 2 Ward gets to take their shoes off every Wednesday after boot camp until the end of the term. 

Preschool children have been enjoying interacting with our five gorgeous baby chickens. The chickens have grown so much in just a week and the children are fascinated to watch them interacting and have been very gentle when holding and caring for them.

Lots of changes are happening in our indoor learning area. A doctor’s surgery has been set up in the home corner. There are two beds, bandages and medical equipment and also an area for recording patient appointments. Children have taken turns as patients and medical staff, having conversations about why they are sick and deciding which equipment will be needed to help the patients.

 Building upon interesting block play that was happening inside, seesaws have been set up outside as part of the obstacle course. Children have had a great time exploring the seesaws; learning about balance and weight and working out how to run along one seesaw to make the beam tip so they can keep on running!

We hope you have a lovely week.

Alice, Emma, Kelly and Flor  [Preschool Team]

Students at Alawa receive raffle tickets [house points] for their attitude and behavior in the playground and out the front of the school at the end of the day, as well as having a go at the weekly quiz. These are then counted on a Friday along with the points from the activity after recess on Friday where we count the students in full uniform, wearing house shirts etc.  At the end of each term we also include the points earnt through the recycling project and water bottle checks.

In Week 5 of Term 2 Goyder is ahead of Finnis and Manton. 

Goyder is in the lead for the year!

Muster is held at Alawa after each recess and lunch break - this gives us an opportunity for everyone to settle from playtime, share any celebrations and work on consistency of messages and expectation.

Each day we allocate class points during Muster time recognizing those students who were ready and waiting to go back to class calmly and quietly after break times. The winning class from each 3 weeks will receive ice-blocks from Ms Cartwright and get to choose 5 songs that will play before our bells for the following 3 weeks.

In Week 5 Term 2, the class with the most points was... Year 2 Ward!

A lot has been happening in the Library over the past few weeks including Naplan, National Simultaneous Storytime and the addition of a new Lego Table. The visit of the Chief Executive and Deputy Chief Executive of the Education Department saw the addition of two beautiful new books to the library – Going to the Footy by Debbie Coombes and My Friend Fred by Frances Watts.

On Thursday, the whole school gathered in three locations around the school to hear NASA Astronaut Shannon Walker read Give me some Space from the International Space Station and have been checking out some space themed activities at lunch time. Last week also saw the addition of a new Lego Table [put together by Mr Michael] to the Library with the Lego Build theme for the week of Space reflecting the story from National Simultaneous Storytime. 

Sacha Evans [ Library & ICT Manager]

This week the Tek Ninjas participated in Moonhack 2021 with this years aim to get 34,000 kids coding during Moonhack in 2021. Moonhack is a free international event bringing kids from across the world together for a week of coding! Our coding is being done in Scratch and the projects for 2021 are:

• Nature Returns – Make an animation and watch the bush grow back after a fire.
• Dhinawan in the Sky – Learn about the Gomeroi story of the Dark Emu by building your own animation in Scratch.
• Matariki [in partnership with Code Club Aotearoa]- Learn about the Maori New Year star, Matariki, with Code Club Aotearoa.
• Home Power Hero – We use a lot of power in our homes. One of the simplest ways to reduce our energy consumption is to turn off appliances.

If you would like to find out more or participate at home you can head to the Moonhack website at: https://moonhack.com/

You will find the projects mentioned above, a couple of projects for HTML and projects from Moonhack going back to 2016

Our Mission— is to provide the Alawa School community with delicious healthy meals and snacks and to create meaningful links to our kitchen garden program.

LUNCHTIME SPECIALS: Weeks 4-6

Wednesday – Spaghetti Bolognaise *V option available or Chicken wings and fried rice

Thursday– Spaghetti Bolognaise *V option available or Homemade Beef Burgers

Friday –Lunch Special - Sausage sandwich, Popper and Icy Pole- $6.00

[Serve $3.00 or large serve $5.50 Spaghetti, Gluten Free Spaghetti $6.50]

A reminder that our school Cafe is open Wednesday to Friday ONLY. Closed on Monday and Tuesdays. 

Order online at www.quickcliq.com.au  

Whilst we had a small group this week at Playgroup, we made up for it with lots of fun! We loved exploring the light board this week and experimented with the different colours and opacity of all sorts of objects and shapes. We joined them together to see what colours we could create.

We spent lots of time outdoors and really enjoyed watching the preschool chicks stretching their wings, running, and even leaping in the air, they pecked and scratched at the grass and it was lovely to see them lay down and sleep in the sun. Thank you for the opportunity Preschool. We also enjoyed the cubby, climbing and building, puzzles and playdough.

Next week we are planning to do some baking again. 

Miss Maria [Playgroup Coordinator]

We will be holding a Professional Development Day for staff on Tuesday June 15th.  Professional development days are used by schools to improve the skills of our teachers, school leaders and school administrative support staff. They also allow us the time to continue working on our School Improvement agenda. Students are not to attend school on this day and we have once again arranged Brat Pack to be available for child minding [at your own cost] for those in need.

Please contact Brat Pack direct to secure your child’s place.—8927 2546 or thebratpack@bigpond.com

* Please note that Jingili OSCH will not be operating that day.

If you have any questions or concerns please contact the office on 8997 7666 during school hours.