Alawa Primary School Newsletter

April is here and so is the final week of Term 1- 5 days of learning, celebrations and planning for Term 2 at Alawa!

Our teachers all meet for half a day this week in teaching teams, collaborating on their assessments, their planning and their focussed interventions for their classes in Term 2. Our usual awesome relief team [Mrs Harding, Ms Wood and Mrs Ashford] are all in covering classes for short periods and the lessons as always are left by the class teacher.

Student Led Conferences: A great buzz around the school

It was terrific to see so many families come along for Student Led Conferences last week - 71% of our students took up this opportunity to share their learning with their families.

Years 3-6 Swimming program

Last Friday we wrapped up our Years 3-6 Swimming program - fantastic to see this happen and we look forward to it now being included annually on our school events calendar.

Harmony Day

I look forward to seeing many families join us for our special community breakfast, performances, activities and assembly this Friday morning.

Student Referees

Over the term 17 of our students have stepped up and taken on the role of referees for sport games during recess and lunch. They then get awarded a score from 10 based on their efforts and commitment by the teacher on duty. Terrific to see so many engage and help out. The top 5 then headed off to lunch with Ms Ros and Mr Wilson yesterday:

• Will Coote
• Miguel Clark
• Hien Thuc Ta
• Ameliah Howard
• Caspar Pike

I will be on leave for the first two weeks of next term - some further minor health issues to focus on. Gen Donohue will be Acting Principal for the eight days I will be away.

Have a terrific Easter, school holiday break and please stay safe

Have a fab week,

Sandy Cartwright [Principal of the Best School in the Multiverse]

Muster is held at Alawa after each recess and lunch break - this gives us an opportunity for everyone to settle from playtime, share any celebrations and work on consistency of messages and expectation.

Each week we allocate class points during Muster time recognizing those students who were ready and waiting to go back to class calmly and quietly after break times. The winning class from each 3 weeks will receive ice-blocks from Ms Cartwright and get to choose 5 songs that will play before our bells for the following 3 weeks.

The class with the most points in Week 9 of Term 1 was....Transition Henschke with 125 points!!!

The winning class for weeks 7-9 is.....Year 5/6 Baines with 384 points!!!

Students at Alawa receive raffle tickets [house points] for their attitude and behaviour in the playground and out the front of the school at the end of the day. These are then counted on a Friday along with the points for students in full uniform, wearing house shirts etc.  At the end of each term we also include the points earnt through the recycling project and water bottle checks.

In Week 9 of Term 1 Finnis was ahead of Goyder and Manton with 2428 points!!! 

In the lead for the year...Finnis with 20841 points!!!

In 4/5 Griffin we have been learning all about ‘show don’t tell’ to ‘explode the moment’.  It’s been very exciting. 

First, we looked at some good texts to find how an author crafts his or her great writing.  Our class novel, The Wishing Spell, has given us some excellent examples.  We studied these from a reader’s perspectives to look at what makes a good piece of writing for the reader.

Then we practised using descriptive language to ‘show’ the reader rather than ‘tell’ the reader what is happening.  Using this writing strategy means the reader infers what is happening in our stories.

Here are some examples of our ‘show don’t tell’ sentences, can you infer how our character is feeling?

•       I was clenching my fist so hard I could have crushed rock. [Heath]

•      He was stomping around like a cranky soldier. [William]

•      She stomped down the stairs like an elephant. [Lucinda]

•      She ran away, crying into her hands. [Tamsen]

•      She felt like her heart just broke. [Hien Duc]

Then we exploded the moment by adding details to elaborate:

•      Willow stomped her paws quickly, she looked like she was about to breath fire.  She turned around and slashed my face with her tail.  She was in a mood. [Olivia]

•      I had just woken up to see my room looking like a pigsty.  I walked carefully past my stuff, making sure not to step on anything, into the long hallway – only to hear giggling from the closet in my room.  I stormed back into my room and saw my brother laughing on the ground. [Reuben]

•      Sarah shrugged, how could her best friend Mave turn her back on her?  She felt absolutely forlorn as she walked into her room.  Within seconds she was sobbing uncontrollably on her bed. [Alice]

We can’t wait to practice writing some longer stories to explode the moment.

Leanne Griffin [Year 4/5 Teacher] 

 Hello Alawa Families,

Recently have had many visits from our resident Frilled neck Lizard ALLE. They have been spotted sunning themselves on various trees around the preschool and seem happy to pose for photographs [as long as you keep a safe distance away].

ALLE forms a big part of the Alawa identity and Preschool children have loved noticing all the places that ALLE appears on our school uniforms and also in the classroom [in the forms of a puppet].

ALLE has been helping to teach all the students at Alawa about the ‘ALLE’s tools for learning’ through fun, short films about their adventures around Australia and how they utilise tools such as ‘Problem solving’ and remembering to ‘Persist’.

We had a very close encounter with a real life ALLE on Friday when they appeared on the tree right next to the cubby house. It was very special to observe this beautiful creature up close and was certainly the highlight of the day for everyone who witnessed it.

Emma, Emma and Kelly and Flor [Preschool team] 

Farm has been nice and warm over the last few weeks. The perfect environment for our seedlings to grow. Early years have been pulling weeds, planting seeds, mulching and fertilizing our vegetables with our home-grown worm juice.

We have an abundance of watermelon, cucumber, tomatoes and basil seedlings planted out and growing like crazy. Farmer Bob has been able to catch 24 rats so far this term, which has helped with the survival of our little plants.  We have 2 new beautiful rabbits donated from the Jenner Family which are slowly getting use to the hustle and bustle of farm life.

Year 1 have finished learning all about frogs lifecycles and will soon be building frog homes. Year 1 have also painted some special Easter egg rocks which will be hidden around the farm later this week.

Please remember the garden produce stall will be out the front of the school on Thursday afternoons loaded with an array of fresh farm fruit and vegetables for you to purchase.

 Thank you for those families who are looking after the farms on the weekend and the school holidays. Your time and effort are very much appreciated. 

Linda Conder [Farm Teacher] 

Our Mission - is to provide the Alawa School community with delicious healthy meals and snacks and to create meaningful links to our kitchen garden program.

Cafe Specials Weeks 6 - 10

LUNCHTIME SPECIALS:

Available every day lunch only:

- mini beef burgers  $3.50

- spaghetti bolognaise small serve $3.50 or large serve $5.50 /Gluten Free Spaghetti $6.50

Wednesday - Homemade Pizza - Large size $5.50

Thursday – Sausage sandwich special - icy pole and popper - $6.50

 Friday – Curried sausages and rice- Large size $5.50, Small $3.50

A reminder that our school Cafe is open Wednesday to Friday ONLY. Closed on Monday and Tuesdays. 

Order online at www.quickcliq.com.au