Nerae Preece Principal

From the Principal’s Seat…

What are you reading at the moment? I am currently reading some magazines, one about wellness and the other about home decoration. I borrow these through the Eastern Regional Library, on an app called Libby. I like to read other things too, and my favourite topic to read about is self help. I read my first book about this all the way back when I was 17 (it was called Being Happy by Andrew Matthews), and the interest has continued. Interestingly though, up until about 8 years ago I didn’t think of myself as a “reader”.

I thought readers were people who read everything, and I just didn’t have the time for that, until… a dear friend helped me realise that I was a reader. She encouraged me to find good fit books for me, and not feel bad if I didn’t finish a book if I didn’t like it or to not feel shame for reading books that may not be perceived as “cool”. Imagine if I had a bunch of adults in my life when I was little that helped me realise that I was a reader.

That’s our job as a home and school partnership. We have 7 years to help our little people see themselves as a reader, of whatever they’re interested in. At school our students have book boxes with Good Fit books in them. These books are used to practise the reading strategies that students are learning. Our students find these books in our classroom library and at our whole school library, sometimes students can bring these from home. Everyday our students read for 15-30 minutes, sometimes they read to themselves other times they read to a reading buddy, but this practice helps them improve along with reading to their teacher.

There are some things that you can do at home… They are free to do!

Join the Eastern Regional Library. They offer such an amazing range of books and you can order books into Healesville if they don’t have it at the branch. I love their app Libby which offers ebooks and audiobooks.
Ask your child what they are reading about, what they like about their book, what they are planning to read next.
Track their reading, our prep to grade 2 families use take home book packs, use this track and celebrate the books your child has read.

There is really no excuse not to enjoy reading with your little people, it’s free, it just takes a little bit of time, and it’s an amazing investment for your child’s future. I wonder how many books we can read as a school this year?

Assembly (leadership)

A reminder that we have a leadership assembly on Monday from 2:45pm-3:30pm. Mr Allan Rennick from Healesville High School will be presenting our badges to our Grade 6 leaders and our Student Representative Council. This is a special time to acknowledge the importance of being a leader of yourself and others. We look forward to seeing you there!

3 Way Interviews

A gentle reminder that 3 way interviews are online on Wednesday the 1st of March. You can hop onto Compass or reach out to your child’s teacher to book an appointment. If your child is 12 months behind or ahead they will have an Individual Education Plan to support their learning. A draft has been created to start the conversation. If your child is working right at their level, you will be discussing goals and what will be next in their learning.

This is a good opportunity for you as a parent to let us know all the things you know that will help your child learn. You know them best!

If you are having trouble getting onto Compass, call Brogan on 0359624019.

Open Night

Popping a place saver in here… Our upcoming Open Night will be held on Wednesday the 29th of March from 4:30-6:30pm. This will be an opportunity for Kinder families to come and see how we work at Badger Creek.

Our focus for our current families is on Respectful Relationships. There will be guest speakers, food and a chance to see what your child has been learning. We can’t wait to see you there!

Kayaking and swimming

This week our students in grade ⅚ have been involved in kayaking and district swimming. A big thank you to Mr Pitts for organising these events for us. We can share more of the results next week from our District Swimming Event.

NAPLAN

NAPLAN is in term 1 this year! We are in the midst of preparing for this, and wanted to let our families of students in grades 3 and 5 know that in March the assessments will begin. You can find more information here

If you do not wish for your child to participate in this assessment please send us an email at badger.creek.ps@education.vic.gov.au

That’s about it for this week. Have a great weekend!

Nerae Preece

Principal

IMPORTANT SCHOOL DATES

Important school dates to remember:

27/2 – Grade 1 / 2 Healesville Sanctuary visit

27/2 – School assembly – 2.45-3.30pm

1/3 – 3-Way interviews

10/3 – Kayaking on the River – Grade 5 / 6 students (optional)

13/3 – Labour Day public holiday

17/3 – School curriculum Day

27/3 – School assembly – 2.45-3.30pm

29/3 – School Celebration Night – 4.30-6.30pm

31/3 – School curriculum Day

7/4 – Last day of term 1 – assembly 1.30-2.30pm – 2.30pm school finish

Fun playtime activities at BCPS…

This week in Music…

Greetings to our wonderful community,

Our grade 3/4 students have been having fun learning the ukukeles in music over the past few weeks. We now know 3 chords, C, AM and F. There are many, many pop and folk songs that can be played using these chords. We had a go at playing ‘Best Day of My Life’ by American Authors this week. Check them out!

Instrumental Music Lessons.

We are so fortunate to have an excellent instrumental music staff at Badger Creek. Your child has the opportunity to learn the piano, guitar, bass, ukukele, drums, flute, clarinet, saxophone or violin.

Drums:

Jamie Thompson has been a professional drummer and teacher for over a decade. Jamie works hard to tailor make his lessons to each child and cater to their particular learning styles. He teacher the children to read drum music and also play by ear. He is often found teaching the students the drum parts for their favourite songs.

Guitar, Ukulele, Saxophone, clarinet and flute.

Alan Gibson has been a long-time teacher at Badger Creek and also a notable Healesville local. Alan is a talented and highly experienced multi-instrumentalist. He has completed an advanced diploma in instrumental music teaching. Alan has a brilliant, gentle manner with his students and gets the best out of them with a relaxed and consistent approach. He is also very adaptable, meeting the particular needs of his students where they are.

Piano

Mima McDonell studied music at Melbourne University, specialising in teaching the piano. She is a highly motivated teacher, who provides many opportunities for her students to play in concerts. Her students look forward to their lessons each week, where Mima plays duets and also sings with them. She is so popular with our children.

Violin

We are so lucky to welcome Sally Banks to our teaching team at Badger Creek. Sally has been a professional violinist, playing in the Australian Pops Orchestra among other professional ensembles. She also ahs a love to Celtic fiddle music and folk music, which she uses in her teaching of children. I am so impressed by the way she duets with her students, getting them playing good music right from the get go.

Our students really enjoy their music lessons and all students who learn can bring their instruments to music classes and play them in class. I adapt my classroom music lessons to include any instruments the children are learning. There is also an opportunity to join our school band in the senior years.

Rhyme Time Music and Book Time.

Rhyme Time is again up and running and we have had a great turn out with pre-school children from babies to 4 years old. The group runs every Thursday during term time, from 10.15 to 11.00. All are welcome to tis free music and book time.

Have a great week,

Jenny Legg

Music Teacher

We can play C and G chords!

Grade 3/4 with their ukuleles

Rhyme Time

Thursdays 10.15am

This week in Prep…

You will never believe what happened in the Foundation classroom this week. Students returned to the classroom after playtime so find the room TRASHED! There were chairs laying on the floor, tables tipped sideways, strange footprints all over the floor and even Miss H’s lunch had been stolen and eaten with the rubbish left on the floor! Students put their detective hats on and thought about who could have done this and came up with some theories on paper. We soon found out that a DINOSAUR had come in to our room while we were outside!! That was funny because the sound we were learning that day was the ‘d’ sound! Students enjoyed brainstorming ‘d’ words including dinosaur of course.

Our Smart Spelling word of the week this week has been ‘tin’. Foundation students have been working on listening to the sounds in ‘tin’, reading, writing and brainstorming the word. We watched a short clip from The Wizard of Oz that featured the Tin Man and students had a go at creating their own Tin Man (or Tin Woman) using tin foil! These art works look absolutely fantastic and are on display inside the Foundation classroom for anyone who’d like to come in and look.

This week in Numeracy, students have been learning to understand measurement. We have been using terminology such as long, short, big, small, longest, shortest, biggest, smallest and more. Preps have been improving their number knowledge working with ten-sided dice and building towers with unifix that they compared the lengths of.

On Monday, the preps got to visit our school library for the first time. They enjoyed listening to a story, browsing the range of books and having quiet time in the library to sit and read their chosen books. We will soon start allowing students to borrow books from the library so please send your child to school with a bag they can use as a library bag on Mondays.

We have been so proud of all of the hard work the preps have been putting into their learning. Whether it be writing outside with chalk, writing inside with pencils or whiteboard markers, reading in small groups, by themselves or with reading buddies, preps have been working hard to show responsibility for their learning.

Reminders:

– On Monday please bring to school any type of cloth bag that can be used as a library bag.

– Preps are at school full time as of next week (Wednesday the 22^nd was the last day off).

– Nurse Jody is vising on the 2nd, 3rd and 6th of March (if you haven’t already, please return your nurse form ASAP).

Many thanks from the Foundation Team,
– Miss H, Miss R and Lis

This week in Grade 1 / 2…

Dear families,

We have had another wonderful week in 1/2, this week! We have all settled back into routines nicely and are completing some great work in all subjects.

This week in reading, we have focused on making text-to-self connection during our reader’s workshops. You can see our photos for some examples of the wonderful connections made by our students. We encourage those students that have not yet bought their reading satchel to school, to please do so by the end of the week.

In writing, we have been working on a shared writing piece about our swimming carnival. Students have been working with the table groups to share ideas and develop a writing piece. The photos show ideas from the planning and drafting stages of the writing process.

In maths we’ve begun looking at skip counting and number patterns. We have been using iPads to highlight the number patterns on a 100’s chart. It has been lots of fun!

Next week in literacy, we are focusing on the reading strategy ‘back up and reread’. We will also be focusing on text-to-text connections. In writing we are learning to write about an experience and have an excursion to the Healesville Sanctuary on Monday (don’t forget to give permission on Compass) to inspire our writing. For maths, we are learning about measuring length.

Have a great weekend,

The Year 1/2 team.

This week in Grade 3 / 4…

This week in Year Three/Four, we have been developing our stamina for reading. We have also been learning more strategies to help us understand what we have been reading. Students have been noticing interesting words and have been working on backing up and re-reading when we need to. During our reading time, the Three/Four area becomes a peaceful place as students enter their imaginative literary worlds. We really wish we could see the amazing images that possibly appear in their minds as they read.

Students are learning the writing process and have been planning, drafting and will be producing their wonderful stories. Some students will take every moment they can to continue their story. What wonderful creativity.

Did you know that if you multiply an Even number by an Odd number, the answer will be an Even number – every single time? We have been discovering the consistency of rules in maths. We have continued working with Odd and Even numbers and have discovered more rules. Some students were able to discover what happens when numbers are multiplied.

Next week, we will start our Unit on 2D and 3D shapes. To help with this, we would love it if each student could bring along a small cardboard box from home. We are excited about this unit; don’t be surprised if you find your cardboard boxes disappearing from the pantry and being deconstructed – but let’s not give too much away.

In Respectful Relations, we have been learning about asking for help when we, or someone else may have a problem. Students have started creating a small book that helps explore this.

Have a great week.

Andy, Matt and Gwen

This week in Grade 5 / 6…

What a busy, productive start to the year for our Grade 5/6 students!

Surf Lifesaving Excursion

The past week was particularly exciting, with our excursion to the Surf Lifesaving Club at Aspendale Beach. Students had the opportunity to learn about water safety at the beach, which is such an important skill in this vast, beautiful country we call home. They also enjoyed some free time for beach games, including some beach cricket – pretty sure we’ll have a few contenders if they ever make this an Olympic sport!

Swimming Carnival

Our school swimming carnival was a huge success, and our students across the board had a fantastic day participating in the pool. We were SO impressed by the leadership our Grade 5/6 students showed on the day. They really stepped up and acted as wonderful role models for our younger students, both in terms of behaviour and participation. It was great to see everyone getting in there and having a go, even when they knew they wouldn’t win. That’s what it’s all about – having a go and having a bit of fun! Well done, everyone!

Kayaking

Another water activity! Quite a few of our Grade 5/6 students recently enjoyed a great day on the water learning kayaking skills. They’re heading out again soon – let’s hope the weather is as stunning as it was on the last day!

Essential Assessment

Assessment is such an important tool for us as teachers. It allows us to see what our students know, what they still need some support with, and in which areas they are ready to be challenged. One tool that has some amazing features to help us do this is our new assessment platform, Essential Assessment. Our students have completed a preliminary assessment in Number and Algebra (called a “General All”). This assessment is adaptive, meaning that it automatically adjusts itself to each student’s progression level based on their responses. It gives us a really clear picture of the areas to target in Number and Algebra this term, and it also has some nifty home learning tools which students can access to assist with reaching their learning goals. Essential Assessment works on any device, so it’s easy to jump on at home. There will be some more information coming out about this soon – stay tuned!

In the classroom

Let’s take a look at some of the key things we’ve been learning in the classroom over the past week.

Reading: we’re working on making connections with texts, summarising and predicting. Students are extending their ability to make connections between texts and their personal experience, the real world, and other texts. We’ve been focusing on being active readers and asking insightful questions as we read.

Writing: our focus has been on writing persuasive and narrative texts. Our Grade 5 students sit the NAPLAN test this year, and will be required to write either a narrative or persuasive text, so this is some great practise in preparation. Both of these text types also appear frequently in the secondary school curriculum, so it’s an equally important skill for our Grade 6s. As always, we’ve loved seeing their ideas flesh out into a developed piece of writing. There are some wonderful storytellers amongst us (and possibly some future lawyers or politicians, if their persuasive writing is anything to go by!)

Maths: we are putting our knowledge of place value to the test and working with numbers up to and beyond one million.

Student/parent/teacher interviews

The first round of 3-way interviews for this year is being held on Wednesday 1 March between 2:40 and 6:40pm. The interviews are taking place via Webex, and bookings are available through Compass.

Upcoming dates

1 March: 3-way interviews

13 March: Labour Day public holiday

17 March: school curriculum day

27 March: school assembly (from 2:45pm)

29 March: school celebration night (from 4:30pm)

Have a wonderful week!

The Grade 5/6 team