Nerae Preece Principal
From the Principal’s Seat
It has been another busy week for our Badger Kids. We have all been feeling a bit tired, but everyone is doing their best to stay happy and energised.
I am a little bit excited about this weekend. I get to have a bowl of Ramen (Japanese noodle soup). I haven’t eaten any since February and to be honest I am a little bit excited! What adventures will you be up to this weekend?
Teaching teams for 2021
It is very exciting to announce our Teaching and Learning Teams for 2021. We have put together strong teams across the school to help us catch up from our epic year of 2020.
In 2021, collaborative teams will be a strong focus to help us move along in our Strategic Plan. This means, that even though your child may be “allocated” to a class teacher, they will be working with all teachers in that collaborative team. All the teachers in the team will know your child as a learner, and work together with your child to help them. Let’s have a look at the teams…
Prep (Where they are currently located)- Emma Griffiths (Instructional Leader/team leader), Rohan Anderson & Stephanie Eagleton
Grade ½ (Rooms 2, 3, 4,& 5)- Jessica Riley (Instructional Leader), Kathryn Douglas, Kathleen Kean and Stephanie Krueger
Grade ¾ (Rooms 7, 8 & 9)- Nerole Blair (Instructional Leader), Andy Moore, David Clingin
Grade 5/6 (Rooms 6, BER)- Erin Murphy (Instructional Leader), Alyssa Drill, Greg Miller
Now, you will notice that we have an extremely strong teaching team. We welcome Nerole Blair and Greg Miller to our team. We will make sure you get to meet them soon. Both of our new teachers come with a wealth of teaching and life experience that I know we will learn so much from them.
We are extremely excited that Erin Murphy is hopping back into the classroom for 2021. Ready to share science knowledge that she has learned for the past 2 years.
I also cannot forget our specialist team… Jenny Legg (Music), Vanessa Imberger (Art) and in 2021 PE will be job share David Pitts and Jen Hunter (back 1 day a week from family leave)
Next week I will let you know a little more about our intervention teams.
I think you will agree that this is one strong team! Classes are in the final stages of development, but as previously mentioned, Instructional teams will take responsibility for all of their students.
Transition sessions
Transition sessions have been moving along nicely. This week we welcomed some new students who will be starting in 2020. We have another session next Tuesday afternoon. We also have our 2021 preps join us for their final practice at prep next Tuesday from 11:30-1:30.
We wish our lovely grade 6 students all the best as they adventure off to High School next week. I know they will represent our school well.
Community Consultation for our Big Build
This week I have been attending meetings about our $9 million building project. It starts with the consultation process. So we have been busy creating a survey to find out what you think our school should look like in 2030. We ask that you talk about this as a family, send it onto other local community members, we will have the link on Facebook and also distribute it to our local community organisations. This is an amazing opportunity for us to think about what Badger Creek could be for our community in 2030.
Click on the link to have your say about Badger Creek Primary School’s future! https://forms.gle/wUJe9uUy3YDneWANA
Uniform
It’s heading to that time again. Time to organise uniforms. I just thought I would pop the link in here so you can make sure uniform is sorted for 2021. Just a friendly reminder. If your child is out of uniform, please send them to school with a note.
https://www.aplusschoolwear.com.au/SearchResult.aspx?Labels=BADGER%20CREEK
Graduation Ceremony
There will be a formal invitation sent out for a very special Grade 6 Ceremony starting at 9am Friday the 18th of December. Our Grade 6 students will be presented with their graduation certificates, and I have a funny feeling they may have some very special musical items to present. We hope all of our grade 6 parents can make it.
The last assembly
Our final assembly will be at 12:30pm on Friday the 18th of December. We will be having it outside so parents can attend. At this assembly we will be saying farewell to our families that are leaving the school, meet our 2021 School Captains, as well as say farewell to our grade 6 students. School will be dismissed at 1:30pm.
First day Back 2021
Our first day back in 2021 will be on Friday the 29th of January. A nice way to ease into the school year. Save the date!
Nerae Preece
Principal
IMPORTANT SCHOOL DATES
Whole school dates to remember:
Funny Hat Day – Friday 11th December
Last day of school – Friday 18th December, 1.30pm finish time
First day for 2021 – Friday 29th January
Student lunches – Recommencing early 2021
Junior School dates to remember:
Body Safety incursion (Prep students) – Monday 7th December
Senior School dates to remember:
Grade 6 graduation – Tuesday 15th December
Grade 6 Big Day Out/In – Thursday 17th December
2021 Booklist information
MUSIC NEWS
Greetings to our Wonderful School Community,
GRADE 1-4 VIDEOS OF CLASS WORK
We have had a really fun term in music and it is a shame that we cannot share in a whole school concert this year. However, I have made videos of each class from grade 1 – 4, so that you can get a taste of what we have been doing. I am hoping to include the prep grades next week. I hope you enjoy the music we have shared.
INSTRUMENTAL LESSONS ARE BACK!
Yes…it’s true, we are allowed to have our wonderful instrumental teachers back at Badger Creek. We can now get our students playing again before Christmas and minimise the disruption to their instrumental music learning. This will help to keep us their enthusiasm and get them going again.
This year has been particularly difficult for musicians and music teachers and I am looking forward to welcoming them back to school and getting our students back to lessons before Christmas. Your Child’s teacher will contact you to arrange lesson days and times.
Have a great week!
Jenny Legg
Around the Year Levels
IN PREP THIS WEEK
“The preps have had a wonderful week of learning and playing! We have all become published authors with our picture story books. We did such a good job at creating narratives which make our readers go “OOH!” “AAH!” “UH OH!” and “PHEW!”
We have been revisiting lots of our number sense building activities through games and play.
But most importantly, we have officially geared up for Christmas! We have been in the most joyful, energetic spirits and are totally ready for all things Christmas in the classroom. We welcomed a new friend to the classroom, Whizzizcool. His name was inspired from our favourite book character… Can you guess who?”
IN GRADE 3 / 4 THIS WEEK
Our Year 4 students embarked on Buddy Training this week. They were incredible! Check out their ideas as to how they can show our school values to their buddies. Mrs Whiteside and Mrs Riley were extremely impressed!! Well done!!
This week in 3/4 we have been learning about the RED zone in the zones of regulation. This is the zone most associated with anger and frustration. In Reading we have continued our lessons in synthesising information using sentence starters like “Now I’m thinking…” and “My thinking has changed because…”.
In Numeracy we have been focused on operations and embedding the four operations in preparation for transitioning to our new grades next term. In Writing we have begun a student choice piece, students are choosing a genre that interests them (persuasive, informative, fiction, poetry) to show their teachers all of the writing strategies that we have learned this year. We have seen some creative seeds! Great work 3/4s.
Our amazing Grade 4s have had buddy training this week and practised these skills with the existing preps. They have been creating special gifts for the incoming Preps next year. The 4s showed that they are a caring and kind children who are excited to support the smallest preps in 2021! We can’t wait to see your leadership skills develop next year.
IN GRADE 5/6 THIS WEEK
This week in grade 5/6 we have been working on something called author study. A few things we are looking at are their personal life, career, author’s craft and our own opinions.
In writing we are studying animal adaptations, which is how the animals grow/evolve to go better with the changes of the earth and to help them survive better in the wild.
In maths year 5s and 6s have been learning about angles. We designed a house and had to have 36 right angles, 3 acute angles, and 2 obtuse angles. That was tricky! We also wrote our names and measured the angles in the letters!
Its nearly time for the arcade! Yes, you heard us right, the cardboard arcade is nearly finished and we have started spreading the word around the school!
As we get ready for next year, Grade 5s are working for their leadership roles and practising their interviews with the wonderful Mrs Whiteside. Grade 6s are sadly leaving school soon to go off to high school. We are having transition preparation sessions at school and we get to visit our high schools on the 8th of December next week.
Have a nice a day! <3
By Bella, Alyrah and Taylah
LUNCH TIME ACTIVITIES
This term some of our senior students have decided to organise lunch time activities for the whole school.
A list of the amazing activities can be found below.
There are different activities on different days, which I know all out BCPS students will love.
Enjoy your activities!
Happenings in the garden
The Broad Bean Beratement
To say I’m a strong advocate for the inclusion of a Kitchen Garden programme in a school’s curriculum is a massive understatement. The garden is a brilliant teacher, and the lessons learnt will stay with a child for their entire life. I believe that having the knowledge and ability to grow your own food is an essential life skill. I would also say the same for being handy in the kitchen and having the ability to knock up a healthy and nutritious meal (preferably with produce from your own garden!). A Kitchen Garden programme brings with it endless learning opportunities and benefits, with the growing of food, the connection to food, and the promotion of healthy eating habits being at the forefront.
The garden also teaches us about natural cycles, particularly in relation to the seasonality of fruits and vegetables. Recently I witnessed the moment when the penny dropped for a young student in relation to the mysterious disappearance of the broad bean crop. I was quietly tending the garden when I was hit from behind with an angrily-delivered question by the aforementioned student. Actually, it was more like an accusation than a question. ‘What have you done with all the broad beans?!!’ he said in a rather gruff and indignant tone. Now, as a gardener, I field many curious questions about what I’m doing and why I’m doing it, but I’m not accustomed to questions that are delivered with the tone of a reprimand. So, once my friend had calmed down, I talked with him about seasonality and life cycles, and the impermanence of, well, everything really. It turned out that he had been enjoying a daily snack of young broad beans fresh from the vine, hence his annoyance at their disappearance. That I could relate to, as I also loved to eat them straight off the vine when I was a kid. (Although, as an adult I prefer to sauté the steamed beans with butter and garlic, then mix through some crumbled feta, top with rocket then drizzle some olive oil). I also told him that all the beans had been made into a delicious dip, and that we would be serving it up at lunch time, and he was welcome to have some. That news brought a smile to his face, and the world was once again a happy place.
The Broad Bean Dip went down a treat, and a very important lesson was learnt – change is an inevitable part of life. Things come and they go. Nothing lasts forever, so make the most of what you have, whilst you still have it.
Happy gardening!
Badger Creek Primary School has been recognised as the North East – Regional winner of the Victorian School Garden Program Awards 2020. Thank you to everyone who looks after the school gardens.
Much appreciation and a huge thank you to Sean O’Neil, Hannah Jolly and Miss Murphy for putting the application together. Well done, Badger Creek PS, you should be proud!
You can watch the virtual awards ceremony on this link: https://youtu.be/u_pdAsVpeUA
Broad Bean Dip
We were lucky enough this week to have some home made broad bean dip.
We were even luckier as these broad beans had been grown here at our very own Badger Creek PS, making them taste even more delicious.
If you would like to enjoy the recipe yourself please find the link below:
Just letting you know issue 7 of the scholastic book club is now available.
Closing date will be 30/10/20
Please see link below for all details:
https://www.scholastic.com.au/media/5667/bc-620.pdf
School uniform orders:
Please find below the link for the school uniform orders.
http://www.aplusschoolwear.com.au/SearchResult.aspx?Labels=BADGER%20CREEK
All orders are to be completed through the website
EGGS
Here at Badger Creek we are lucky enough to have our very own chickens, chickens which have been busy laying lots of eggs.
Eggs are available for purchase at the office at $5 a carton.
Eggsellent news for all you egg lovers.
DRINK BOTTLES
Please ensure drink bottles are being brought to school each day.
There are facilities to refill drink bottles when required.
Badger Creek – Turtle comic
For the next few weeks we will seeing the adventures of Turtle – The most fast animal in the world. Turtle has been created by one of our students, Charlotte. Please come on the story with turtle with us.
We hope you enjoy!
JOKE OF THE WEEK
Q. What is a cats favourite colour?
A. purrr-ple!
