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Dear Franklin Families,
Term 4 continues to be settled and productive and students can be acknowledged for the ongoing care and respect they are showing each other. They also deserve recognition for the positive way they have approached the end of year assessments. In particular the effort demonstrated by Year 1 to 6 students during recent PAT (Progressive Achievement Tests) testing was excellent. These assessments are especially important in 2020 due to NAPLAN being cancelled this year. Teachers will use the information collected through these assessments to measure progress in student’s skills and understandings in a range of key learning areas and to inform their end of year reporting.
This week all families received a letter from the Office of the Secretary explaining the importance of COVID-safe behaviours as we plan our end of year celebrations. Schools are required to keep their events COVID-safe in line with Public Health advice. Some of the changes that are necessary have been difficult to implement and required careful planning to ensure events follow current guidelines. We would like to thank all of our school community for their support and understanding as we endeavour to hold these celebrations safely.
Before we know it will be the end of the year and what a year it has been! Nevertheless, planning for 2021 is well underway, staffing is almost finalised and class placements only need some minor adjustments.
Have a great week
Linda Heerey
At Gumnuts we have been enjoying the warmer weather and have spent a few weeks outside in the playground which was loads of fun. One week we had messy play and enjoyed lots of different sensory experiences, but in the heat the water play was probably the favourite!
So many different things are always happening at Gumnuts, so many busy little people. We have been wondering, exploring, testing, creating, feeling, moving, sorting and so much more! Recently it has been wonderful to see so many little ones using their strength of courage and become more confident within our group.
There are only two sessions remaining for the year. Next week we are off to visit The Little Seed Permaculture Farm, see our Facebook page for more details. November 30th will be our end of year celebration and I hope to see as many of you there as possible to celebrate the end of Gumnuts for 2020. Again, more details on our Gumnuts Facebook page.
Questions, questions, questions! So many questions to be asked and answered when you are in Kindergarten. But, what a great way to stay engaged and learn.
How do our children learn from their natural environment? This has been our core inquiry question throughout the year, which has taken us on many paths, as you know.
Why are there so many rainbows near waterfalls? Asked one child. How can we make our own waterfall? Asked another.
So, we set to work brainstorming how we could make our own waterfalls and what materials we would need.
The children then broke off into small groups to design their own waterfalls. We came back and shared our thinking with the class.
We will attempt to make them on Thursday, so stay tuned!
NAIDOC week celebrations and learning in Prep
We read Ernie Dances to the Digeridoo by Alison Lester and explored the different seasons.
The children drew what had happened in each season in the story.
We then compared the seasons in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory to the four we recognise here in Tasmania and tried to work out which months they might occur in.
We read Big Rain Coming by Katrina Germien and chose some of the vocabulary to study.
The children worked in small groups to look for letter patterns, vowels, consonants and syllables.
On Friday we made dirt music. We worked with the Grade one/two class and used the earth to tell stories. The children created their stories and then one child recorded while another told the story.
We will watch these all together this week.
In 1/2M we have been working very hard on our inquiry and have been planning and collaborating to build our own community. We have been looking at mapping to plan our community and meeting to discuss our thoughts on where certain things should go in our community. We then had to make decisions together and practise respectfully agreeing or disagreeing with others, including a reason to persuade others why we are correct. We have each begun constructing a house, which has led us to discussions around 3D shapes and how we can use nets to help us make those shapes.
Last week we celebrated NAIDOC week by making a collaborative art piece, and we also explored ways to tell stories using the earth. We recorded these stories using digital technologies.
Remembrance Day was also an important day for us last week. We looked at why poppies were symbolic of Remembrance Day and discussed why it’s important we remember. Through our reading of “My Place” different wars have been mentioned multiple times which supported our understandings around the effects of war on everybody.
We celebrated NAIDOC week by listening to and watching an animated story by the neunone tribe of Bruny Island called The Creation of Trowenna. We then free-hand drew an outline of trowenna and painted our own interpretation of the story. This week, we listened and watched the story again and then wrote our own interpretations of the story. We have also been taking part in the First Nations Bedtime Stories Challenge by watching and listening to some of the stories every day this week.
In Year 4/5 we are studying significant people and times in history that have shaped the way we live today. Students have been busy researching people and historical events in preparation for writing their own historical fiction story.
We have also been listening to lots of Dreamtime stories and interpreting the lessons from each story. We are participating in the First Nations Bedtime Stories Challenge and we will study a different dreamtime story every day.
Many of our students were selected to represent Franklin at the Huon Channel Athletics Carnival. We are so proud of their achievements and their excellent sportsmanship. We are also squeezing in extra music lessons so we can practise playing guitar and ukulele in preparation for our end of year assembly performance.
Our 5/6 class had a fantastic excursion to STEM Day at St James in Cygnet. The students were involved in a range of challenging and engaging STEM activities led by a team of terrific STEM experts. Our students performed brilliantly.
FIRST NATIONS BEDTIME STORIES CHALLENGE
Our Year 1-2 listened to a story as part of NAIDOC week and then made up some of their own stories.
We would like to share Rylan's story with you.
Tennis Australia visited our Prep class week, our students had a fun time learning a few basic things about tennis.
On Wednesday last week we had a visit from staff members from Surf Life Saving Tasmania.
They spoke with the students from our lower primary classes about skills and knowledge around the water and also gave out information regarding joining Nippers which is at Kingston Beach.
Wednesday 25 November | 5-6 Excursion Raptor Refuge |
Tuesday 1 December | Kinder to wayraparattee |
Thursday 3 December | End of Year Assembly |
Monday 14 December | Year 6 Leaver's Dinner 5:30pm-7:00pm |
Tuesday 15 December | Year 6 "Big Day Out" |
Thursday 17 December | Last Day of Term Colour Fun Run |