Rozelle Public School Newsletter

Rozelle is a place where Aboriginal children learned, played and celebrated their culture for thousands of years on this beautiful, natural land. As we learn, play and celebrate together on this land, we honour the Wangal people of the Eora nation and pay our respects to elders both past, present and emerging. 

The past fortnight has been a challenging time for the school community. Last week we faced unprecedented weather in Sydney which saw minor flooding in our preschool playground, leaking roofs and overflowing drains in the main school. Overall the school coped remarkably well with learning programs continuing as normal. I would like to thank all families for their perseverance and cooperation when dropping off and picking up their children in such drenching conditions. I would also like to acknowledge the commitment and professionalism of our staff who persevered during a challenging period of wet weather - including extended days of inside recess and lunch. 

This fortnight has also seen an increasing number of students in home isolation due to COVID. The majority of students are in isolation because they are close household contacts and will hopefully only miss a week of school. However this can be longer if they test positive during that period. Staff too have been impacted by the recent increase in COVID cases - again close household contacts.  

In the event that your child receives a positive RAT test, you need to: 

• record the positive RAT result through the Service NSW website or Service NSW app – and add details of your child's school or early childhood education centre.

• notify the school of the positive RAT or PCR test result as soon as possible.

• follow NSW Health advice to isolate for 7 days.

As we enter the final three weeks of Term One, all families must remain vigilant. Any student with symptoms should remain at home, get tested and not return to school until symptoms have gone. 

Next Friday afternoon I am very much looking forward to attending the P&C welcome BBQ for 2022. The BBQ will be the first P&C event for the year and is a wonderful opportunity for the community to come together. Apart from the BBQ, there will be an ice cream van and last year’s popular tattooist will make a return. Parents can be assured they are temporary! The welcome BBQ will run from 4-6pm and I hope to see you there. 

SPORTING SUCCESS

Congratulations to the RPS Zone Swim Team who won the Balmain Schools’ Zone Swimming Carnival. This is the second consecutive year they have topped the table of 19 local schools. 

Special mention must go to: 

• Davin C tied first place over all for Junior Boys Individual Scores.

• Phoenix B came first over all for 11 year old Boys Individual Scores. 

• Juliette R came first over all for 12 year old Girls Individual Scores. 

EASTER HAT PARADE

The Easter Hat Parade is set to make a welcome return to Rozelle in 2022. In previous years, the parade has been a true community event, being held on footpaths of Darling Street. However, for the past two years with COVID restrictions, this has not been possible. The organising committee are currently working on logistics and the plan is for this year’s parade to return to Darling Street. The parade will be held on the last day of Term One - Friday 8 April at 9.30am. 

SCRIPTURE AND ETHICS MAKE A RETURN

Yesterday, Scripture and Ethics classes recommenced after an absence of 8 months. Our scripture and ethics teachers are volunteers and I would like to extend a warm welcome back to Rozelle. At this stage there are no volunteers to run Kindy and Year One Ethics classes. This means, any student who has requested Ethics in Kindy or Year One will join the non-scripture group. Scripture & Ethics classes run on a Thursday afternoon between 2-3pm.

LOST PROPERTY 

When parents are up at the school they may have seen the lost property trolley. It is wheeled regularly into the Darling Street playground. Should your child misplace a hat, jumper, water bottle or lunchbox…you may find it in the trolley. Please remember if school items are labeled with your child’s name, there is a greater likelihood of them being returned. 

Parent Teacher Meetings will be held during week 10. Starting on Monday 28th March thru to Friday 1st April 2022. Meetings will run for 10 minutes and will be held at school in your child’s classroom. Using the school interviews website or QR code, you will be able to see all available time slots for your child’s teacher. To enable easy booking, please go to  https://www.schoolinterviews.com.au/code/rtkzf or use the QR code:

The event code is: rtkzf

Bookings will open on Friday 18th March at 3pm.

Bookings will close on Friday 25th March at 3pm.

Further bookings from 3pm Friday 25th March will not be possible online. If you have not made an online booking by this date you will need to contact the office to make arrangements. If you don’t have internet access, please let the office know ASAP and they will organise for your child’s teacher to call you to make a booking. If you have more than one child at the school, remember to give yourself time between meetings when making bookings. The website will prevent you from making back-to-back bookings for this reason. In the unlikely event that your child’s teacher is sick on the day, you will be notified of this via the email address that you supply during the booking process. We will then arrange for an alternate date to conduct the meeting.

We had an overwhelming 38 applications for Library Monitors this year and gee wiz there was some tough competition. We have selected a dedicated and enthusiastic team. Congratulations to the following Library Monitors:

Ambassadors: 

Aiden P, Gabriela V, Leire G and Lola V 

Monitors: 

Andy B, Madeleine S, Spike F, Ida L, Jarvis M, Chloe C, Ezra W, April C, Isabella M, Ollie M, Connor F, Chloe A, Sophie C, Poppy N, Ivy J and Leo G.

This week, on Monday 14th March, seven students from Rozelle Public School attended the Sydney East region swimming carnival. Well done to Oscar E (2 Kgari), Lucas S (3 Iguazu), Ella G-P (3 Reef), Davin C (4 Kakadu), Phoenix B (5 Mungo), Abbey P (6 Petra) and Juliette R (6 Havana) on qualifying for the carnival and representing our school fantastically! Each student swam their hardest and gave it their all.

Some particularly pleasing results:

Oscar E - 7th overall in the 8 years 50m freestyle

Phoenix B - 10th overall in the 11 years 50m freestyle

Juliette R - 7th overall in the 12 years 50m breaststroke, 6th overall in the 12 years butterfly, 1st overall in the 12 years 50m backstroke

Davin C - 5th overall in the junior 50m breaststroke, 1st overall in the 10 years 50m freestyle,1st overall in the junior 50m butterfly, 1st overall in the junior backstroke, 1st overall in the 200m individual medley.

Well done to all on your incredible efforts and well done to Juliette R and Davin C who have qualified for the NSW swimming carnival! We wish you the best of luck!

A long held tradition at Rozelle Public School is the Annual Easter Hat Parade along Darling Street to be held on Friday 8th April at 9:15am. Children are encouraged to create a decorated hat for the parade with some help at home. Remember not to spend too much money on materials – the best hats are those made from reused and recycled materials. You could even recycle parts of an old Easter Hat!  

Students and staff will parade up and down Darling Street before returning to the school playground for a final parade around the asphalt area. Parents are welcome to line the route to cheer us along. 

Rozelle is a “Crunch and Sip” School. Students take a short break at 10:00am to have a piece of fruit or raw vegetable and a drink of water. Giving students the chance to re-fuel with fruit or vegetables and rehydrate with water helps to improve physical and mental performance and concentration in the classroom, as well as promoting long term health. Please make sure your child has a fresh fruit or vegetable snack and a clearly labelled water bottle with them at school every day.

Visit the Crunch and Sip website at www.crunchandsip.com.au for more information and some great information about healthy lunchboxes, healthy snacks and other nutrition information.

The Arts Unit is offering talented dancers the opportunity to join students from across Sydney in exciting dance workshops. Led by professional tutors, students will benefit from high intensity sessions of warm ups, choreography and new dance moves. Please contact Ms Hansen or Ms McLachlan jennifer.mclachlan@det.nsw.edu.au to apply.

• Year 5-6 Boys only Hip-Hop Dance - 31 May at Sydney Dance Company ($85)

• Years 5-6 Junior Workshop – 6 & 7 June 2022 at Sydney Dance Company ($150)
• Year 4 Primary Workshop – 8 June 2022 at Sydney Dance Company ($75)
• Years 2-3 Primary Workshop – 9 June 2022 at Sydney Dance Company ($65)

On display at the Art Gallery of NSW, ART EXPRESS 2022 features a selection of outstanding student artworks developed for the HSC in Visual Arts in 2021 and provides insight into students’ creativity and the issues important to them. The exhibition encompasses a broad range of approaches and expressive forms. On display until April 25th.

Stage 1 students in Ms Lau’s English as an Additional Language/Dialect (EAL/D) program have also been excited to visit and explore the pumpkin patch. Students have been lucky enough to have the opportunity to observe the different stages of growth including sprawling vines, little flower buds, flowers in full bloom, baby pumpkins and mature pumpkins ready to be harvested. Vocabulary we have been using in this unit include: leaf, pulp, stem, skin, vine, seed, shell, kernel, nectar and pollen.

Did you know that the seeds can be roasted and eaten as a snack? We thought they were quite yummy!

Photo:  Stanley S (2 Manu), Daisy W (2 Kgari), Amelia D (1 Gondwana)

Thank you to the community members who attended our P&C meeting and AGM on Wednesday night. Congratulations to our new office bearers, we are looking forward to working together this year to build our school community, raise funds for improvements to the grounds and continue to collaborate with our wonderful school exec and teaching staff.

President: Claire Goldsmith

Vice President: Bella Berriman

Vice President: Lauren Scott

Secretary: Nic Hanson

Treasurer: VACANT

Communications: Jocelyn Robinson

Social and Fundraising Committee: Carolyn Maguire, Bella Berriman

Sustainability and Environment – P&C Green Team: Jocelyn Robertson, Illana Fisher

Uniform Shop: Maitane Baenez

Please join us and the teaching staff in welcoming our new and returning RPS families to the 2022 school year at our Welcome Picnic next Friday afternoon on the Tiger Turf/COLA area. You may bring a picnic afternoon tea/dinner or there will be a delicious sausage sizzle and Gelatissimo van on site available to purchase. Thank you to Darling St Meats and Gelatissimo Balmain for your support of our picnic.

Back by popular demand is our airbrush tattoo artist ready to ‘ink’ up the kids. Thank you to our sponsor Cindy Kennedy and the McGrath Team Balmain for providing this fun activity for the kids.

We look forward to socialising with everyone back on school grounds and we’d love to see your whole family. Please be mindful of social distancing and stay at home if anyone is feeling unwell.

Note that this will be an alcohol-free event.

The Uniform Shop is open for business! Please come and visit us between 9am and 10am each Friday morning to make your new or second hand purchases, donate uniforms, sizing swaps etc.

We are also processing our online orders at this time – all orders placed via Flexischools by 5pm Thursday will be ready to collect from the front office or OSH by midday Friday.

We’d love to have more volunteers to share the work involved to pick orders, provide customer service and sorting stock. Please send an email to rozelleuniformshop@gmail.com to find out more!

Rozelle P&C appreciates the financial support of our P&C sponsor Cindy Kennedy from the McGrath Team Balmain.

Could you be an ethics teacher?

We are seeking volunteers so that we can provide ethics classes for all the families who have requested it for their children.

Ethics teachers receive full training by Primary Ethics, the not-for-profit organisation approved to design curriculum and training for the ethics program. Training consists of a two day workshop and short online modules. Lesson materials are provided. Suitable volunteers have an interest in children’s education and development of critical thinking skills and must be available Thursdays 2pm –2.30pm and/or Thursdays at 2.30pm - 3pm each week.

In ethics classes, children learn how to think logically, disagree respectfully and support their arguments with evidence, rather than act according to blind habit or peer pressure.

Children discuss topic such as:

- Imagining how others feel

- How do we treat living things?

- What is laziness?

- How do we disagree in a respectful way?

- Fairness

If you are looking for an opportunity to make a valuable contribution to our school, please visit www.primaryethics.com.au or contact Jane May janelmay@hotmail.com or 0407 016 047