Nerae Preece Acting Principal

From the Principal

Hi Families,

It’s good to be back and communicating with you all. I have held back on giving you too much information over the last few weeks as I know you have been receiving daily emails from your child’s learning team. I know my inbox is getting pretty full very quickly, I can only imagine what it is like for everyone else!

A BIG thank you to everyone for following our State Governments call for us to work and learn from home, and respect social distancing. It is of course going to have its challenges, however we all know that for our community, this physical distancing is going to be important. We want everyone to stay safe.

There are a few important details in this newsletter for families who need internet. We have 2 companies that are offering reduced cost internet, these details will be listed below. We will make contact with Aussiebroadband to ensure that when you ring we are one of the listed schools that have registered.

Our Professional Learning Community Leaders, Emma Griffiths and Jessica Riley have offered some information on the small changes we have created on the blog next week. There is also a video on the Remote Learning Blog to help you understand these changes. You can find the link here.

I wanted to remind families that have needed to utilise the onsite supervision service. We ask that you please ensure that you have provided the attendance form on a weekly basis. We ask that you:

  • Send this to us by Thursday 3pm, the week before so you can be assured of a place the following week.
  • Understand that we will not be able to accept your child on the day if you have not filled out these forms.
  • Understand that we only have a limited number of staff in on the day, any extra unannounced students affects our supervision ratio.

Do not assume that your child can be looked after on the day without us knowing through a booking form the week before. Please contact the office if you need to access this form.

Finally, I wanted to let you know what I am feeling grateful for this week. I am feeling so grateful to see the world slow down a little. I’ll explain what I mean… Usually when I am at work the roads around the school are really busy, and the Sanctuary’s animals can barely be heard. At the moment when I walk around the school it is so quiet I am able to hear an amazing range of animals communicating. It’s so nice to be able to hear their calls, I feel so grateful to be able to notice this. What are you feeling grateful for?

Have a lovely weekend with your family.

Nerae Preece

NBN info

NBN Education Package

NBN Co announced that they would be waiving access fees for internet service providers (ISPs) to enable the ISPs to provide disadvantaged families with internet access at significantly reduced or no cost.

The families need to meet certain criteria, including:

  • they reside in an NBN serviced area
  • they do not have an existing NBN service
  • they have school aged children living at the residence
  • they are in receipt of a Job Seeker Allowance or Family Tax Benefit

Advantages of the NBN Education Package

Having the NBN service will provide WiFi internet access to all students in the household.  This is a considerable advantage over a dongle that needs to be assigned to individual students.   Even though the dongle may be used for multiple students, the service will degrade considerably if this is done.

Accessing the Education Package

To date there have been two ISPs who have established this service for disadvantaged families.

These providers are:

Superloop – https://www.superloop.com/education/.  This service can only be accessed by the family.

Aussie Broadband – https://www.aussiebroadband.com.au/.  This service requires a school to register interest before families can access.  Schools should ensure they maintain compliance with the Privacy Policy and not provide sensitive information to any vendor.

It is expected that other ISPs will offer similar packages over the coming weeks.

This Week at Badger Creek

Our garden is growing

Artwork by Paige 3/4 A

Our students loook a bit different this term!

TASK, ENABLE, EXTEND

Dear Badger Creek School Community,

From Monday, we are adopting some new language and features in our blogs. This is to help your child/ren to be successful at home.

HELPING WITH LEARNING:

When you open the blog, you will now see the headings:

TASK – the task that has been designed for your child, and the first task they should attempt (starting point).

 ENABLE – this prompt helps children who haven’t been able to make progress with ‘the task’. Children may feel a sense of confidence and then be able to then tackle ‘the task’ again.

EXTEND – this is an extra step that encourages children to think deeper about their learning.

These prompts provide options for children if they are ready for something a little harder (extend) or need more guidance (enable). That way we can ensure your child feels good about themselves, and their learning. We often find that children who complete the enable task, build confidence in themselves and are able to tackle ‘the task’ again. This is an example of ‘Growth Mindset’ when children are encouraged to take risks and to recognise that our brains grow the more we practice.

Questions you may be wondering…

Does my child need to do all three options:

No, however we do ask that all children begin with ‘the task’ and then move from there. If they don’t start with the task, they often won’t understand ENABLE or EXTEND as these options are based off ‘the task’.

Why did we adopt this vocabulary?

This vocabulary is based on the work of Peter Sullivan, a renowned educational professor. When making decisions that impact our children, it is important these decisions are based on evidence – rest assured this one is!

‘SEND MY WORK TO MY TEACHER’ button

From next week, you will begin to see a button next to particular tasks that allows students to send their work to their teacher. Our ICT team are putting together a ‘how to guide’ to assist you through this process.

We are collecting work from students (as we would normally) to make sure we are planning effective lessons for our students, that are based on their next steps for learning. We will provide feedback to students in our WebEx phone calls.

In Week 6, we will be sending home written feedback via email for one of your child’s Literacy submissions, and we will do the same in Week 9 for Numeracy. That way, you and your child are receiving ongoing feedback which is critical to learning growth.

We hope these simple changes are helpful J

Emma Griffiths and Jessica Riley (PLC Leaders).

Rashidi and the NGV

Rashidi’s Art Work on The National Gallery of Victoria’s Instagram page

This fabulous picture by Rashidi Brown was shared on the NGV’s Instagram page. This was an activity Rashidi did at home with his family, following the NGV Museum at Home idea – recreating famous artworks.

Well done Rashidi!

Check it out:  https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/kids/