Doolooboorah

Newsletter 2nd December 2020

The Skoolbag app is our main communication tool with our school community. Please ensure that you have downloaded the app so you don't miss out on any vital information.

2021 School Term Dates

Term 1

Friday, 29th January

Thursday, 1st April

Term 2

Tuesday, 20th April

Friday, 25th June

Term 3

Tuesday, 13th July

Friday, 17th September

Term 4

Tuesday, 5th October

Thursday, 16th December

.

Principal's Report

Congratulations 2021 Captains and Seniors of Harbord PS

After an extensive series of lessons and activities, our year 5 students have completed the Student Leadership Program in preparation for 2021. All students have developed important skills around leadership, responsibility and resilience. The students who stood for a leadership position in 2021 gave role model speeches to their teachers and peers along with the very difficult impromptu speech. The candidates also completed a role model project. The final step of the process was their candidacy speech and student and staff votes.

Congratulations to our 2021 Captains

Niamh (5F)    Emily (5A)    Charlie (5A)    Fionn (5A)

2021 Seniors

Madison (5W)    Violet (5L)    Amalia (5F)    Levi (5L)    Flynn (5S)    Jacob (5F)    William (5W)    Samuel (5D)

We believe all year 6 students are leaders at our school. They set the tone of the school and lead by example. Those who are not successful for the limited number of leadership positions will have many other opportunities via house captaincy, library monitors or SRC.

Remembrance Day

One of our year 6 2019 students, Leonardo Anderson wrote an amazing poem for Anzac Day 2019. Leonardo’s poem has now been used as the ‘voice over’ in the documentary “Saluting Their Service”. Congratulations to Leonardo, we are very proud of you.

 Trailer “Saluting Their Service” which features Leonardo poem https://youtu.be/-dicoYLi_g4

 Full film version: https://youtu.be/kriiiF_LwC0

Year 6 Production

Congratulations to our year 6 students and teachers on an amazing year 6 Production. Special thanks to our teachers who moved mountains to ensure the production could still go ahead. The students have shared their summary below and the links to each class performance:

‘The Year 6 production is an annual event that year 6s perform a show full of acting, dances and humour. This yearly show has gone for an outstanding 60 straight years! This year was very peculiar as the past lockdown gave us little time to prepare a normal standard production. Besides the obstacles we had to face we were able to pull off an amazing performance with short skits from each class and for the first-time students were able to run behind the scenes of the show.

Unfortunately, this year we couldn’t have any parents come and see our show but thanks to Mr Sly we have it on video so parents and relatives can still see the hard work us and our teachers have put in. 

After all that hard, hard work of organising and creating our roles in the production, what better then be served some of the most tasty pizza ever? How lucky we were to be able to have some of that sweet hot cheese melt on your tongue? We all know this couldn’t have happened without the company I LOVE PIZZA, our AMAZING sponsors. Thank you for everything!

Links:

Acknowledgment/6K-6K’s Got Talent: https://youtu.be/pEwixuX09lg

6N-Junior Fashion Competition 101: https://youtu.be/KBzOLe-CQAM

6Y-Around The World In 10 Minutes: https://youtu.be/_xIALyGjBVo

6M-Olympics: https://youtu.be/Mu6-oXqM-oc

6H-Grocery Store Stereotypes: https://youtu.be/Ous3hEoyVfk

Thankyou speech/Mrs Tickle: https://youtu.be/8iy2BYc_nNg

Teaching & Learning Update Yr4 Environmental STEM Projects

Mrs Yates and I were very impressed when we saw the year 4 STEM projects on the environmental impact of plastics in our marine and local environment.  As you can see from the photos, the students have become knowledgeable and passionate about the use of plastics.

Presentation Days

Presentation Day will be held this Thursday 3rd December, 2020.

·         The Year 1-3 assembly will be held from 9:30am to approximately 10:30am

·         The Year 4-6 assembly will be held from 11:45am to approximately 1:15pm

The Department of Education and Health are now allowing schools to proceed with end of year award ceremonies. However, schools still need to comply with the 4 square metre rule for staff, parents and visitors. Due to our large student numbers and the size of our hall, we are unfortunately unable to have parents attend this year.

So that parents can still share in this special occasion we are arranging for the event to be live streamed via Zoom. One of ourparents, Lindsay Moss from ‘StarTime Studios’, has kindly offered to film the event as a Zoom ‘livestream’ and the recorded link will also be sent out after the event to award recipients.  

Kindergarten Graduation

On Tuesday we held our Kindergarten Presentation Assembly to celebrate the year of learning Kindergarten have had. Many thanks to Mrs Lisa Miller, Mrs Jeanette Iacovitti and the Kindergarten team for organising the celebration.  Congratulations, Kindergarten, for all you have achieved this year.

Class Placements 2021

It is that time of year again when teachers spend considerable time ensuring students are carefully placed for classes next year. When forming classes, we ensure there is an academic balance and we also ensure that all students have at least one other student /friend from their 2020 class, moving into their new class with them.

Please be aware that requests for specific teachers will not be considered.

School Reports

We will send reports to families on Monday 14 December. Reports will be available on the Parent Portal request from the school office. Reports will be sent to your primary email address as indicated on your child’s enrolment form, only one report will be sent per family. If you have changed your primary email address, please notify the office to avoid missing important correspondence.

Please remember that school reports are a point in time judgment of your child’s skill and knowledge as measured against NSW syllabus outcomes. The reports aim to provide you with an understanding of what your child has learned as well as providing information about what they need to focus on to improve. If a student achieves a “sound” it means they are achieving at a level that is expected, according to the content and skills covered in that semester. Much time, effort and preparation has gone into writing these reports and we hope you find them both valuable and informative.

Gifts and Benefits

As we approach the end of the year, I thought it might be worth explaining schools’ obligations regarding gifts, benefits and hospitality. Principals are required to establish and maintain local Workplace Gifts Registers for any gifts received by staff which is valued over $50 needs to be declared and it is the decision of the principal as to their treatment. In doing so I will consider the amount that each student might contribute and the total amount of students (as larger valued gifts are usually group gifts on behalf of a class).

Can I stress that reporting the gift is simply so that it is recorded for transparency.  We are very aware that the community often wishes to express their gratitude to their child/ren's teachers. Whilst this is certainly not expected, it is greatly appreciated by our hard-working teachers.

Last Day - Recognition of Students Leaving

Students leaving Harbord, especially those in year 6, will be ‘clapped-out’ of the school, the afternoon of Wednesday 16 December. Although parents won’t be allowed on school grounds, students will come together in a COVID-safe way to farewell their peers. For most students, their commute home and pick-up arrangements will remain the same as usual. Year 6 students will be dismissed via the Wyadra and Oliver Street gates.  Parents, can I please ask for vigilance in adhering to COVID-protocols and that you remain socially distanced at this time.

Last Newsletter - Monday, 14 December

The last newsletter for this year will have some year 6 camp photographs, year 6 graduation, presentation days, staffing updates and 2020 thanks and Christmas message. Enjoy the last few busy weeks.

Susan Tickle

Principal

Deputy Principal's Report

Band “Pop-Up” Performances

Since the band has resumed face-to-face rehearsals, it has been a joy to hear musical notes waft through the school.  We didn’t realise what we were missing.

Then what a treat it was to hear the strong sounding notes, heralding that another performance was due to start. I have been told that our Harbord Band are among the best, and they did not disappoint!

Congratulations to all our students who have progressed  individually as musicians and collectively upheld Harbord’s reputation as an outstanding band.

Many, many thanks for Sandie Rose-Castle for her tremendous effort!

Maths Olympiad

It was lovely to be able to celebrate another group of students this year, our Maths Olympians.  Our year 6 and year 5 teams were awarded certificates for their efforts and the top 10 achievers from year 6 were awarded with a medallion.  Congratulations to our outstanding mathematicians, and thank you to Mrs Scicluna for your efforts in training this maths team.

Year 5 Leadership

Last Monday, we listened to the candidacy speeches of any year 5 student who nominated themselves to be a school leader (Captain or Senior) for 2021.  The teachers and students were impressed with all candidates.  They spoke passionately and displayed strong leadership qualities through the message they delivered.  We are guaranteed a strong 2021 leadership team owing to the overall quality of all students who went through the leadership process.  Thank you, year 5 students for your commitment to Harbord and to student leadership.  Well done!


Danielle Yates

Deputy Principal

Deputy Principal's Report

Best Start Information

Today the bookings for the Best Start interviews opened for parents of students starting Kindergarten in 2021. An email was sent out to parents earlier this week with the information of what group to book a time with and the instructions on how to book.

If you are having difficulties with booking an assessment time please contact our school office via phone or email.

Letters to an Author

Over this term Kindergarten has been learning to respond to texts and have focused on writing letters to authors explaining the parts of their books they liked. For their final assessment all Kindergarten students wrote a letter to Phillip Gwynne, author of the story ‘The Queen with the Wobbly Bottom’.

It was lovely to read their responses as to why they loved the story. Some children also wrote questions to the author about the writing process. Each letter is going to be sent to Mr Gwynne and he is looking forward to sending a letter back.

Literacy Groups in Year 1

Last week I had the pleasure of visiting 1I to see the wonderful learning they are doing during literacy groups. There were many engaging activities for students to complete.

Whilst I was in the room, Miss Ings was working with a group who were learning to identify key words in texts to help them understand what they are reading. They were reading an information text about pandas and the focus was looking for key words about the habitat.

All group members were able to identify a key word and some are still working toward justifying why it was a key word. Keep up the great work 1I and Miss Ings!

Banner Assembly

Today K-2 had their second Banner Assembly for the year. It was wonderful to celebrate the achievements of so many year 2 students. We also presented the Young Speaker and Young Writer Competition winners. The assembly was filmed and the link to the recording will be sent to families soon.

Lisa Miller

Deputy Principal

Instructional Leadership

Miss Wright and I have taught differentiated mathematics lessons in year 1 classes over the past two weeks. We have focused on additive strategies which includes addition and subtraction.

Each lesson started with a clear learning intention and differentiated success criteria. During the lessons we explicitly teach the mathematical language of the syllabus.  The language year 1 focused on included, counting on, counting back, combine, plus, add, take away, minus, total, equals, is equal to, is the same as, number sentence and strategy. Students rotated through differentiated group activities during the lessons which included explicit teaching with the teacher, fluency, DENS games and Matific activities. At the end of each mathematics session, students reflected on their learning using the success criteria.

Year 1’s achievements are reflected in the photo gallery.

Mrs Scicluna and Miss Wright

Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL)

Artist in Residence Update

We’ve had a great semester with the children who have participated in the Artist in Residence programme and have got through quite a few different things such as making clay monsters, creating portraits of dads, practicing different methods for drawing people, creating treasure maps, painting Ken Done inspired beach canvases, 3D collages, paper mache (never again!) skeleton drawings, painting using our feet to hold paint brushes, still life drawing techniques, Christmas clay decorations and printing wrapping paper. It has been great to have such a lovely and enthusiastic bunch of students and to see them grow in confidence over their artistic ability.The programme will continue in the new year and we will ask children to complete an expression of interest form in the office when it is ready to start again. In the meantime, I wanted to say a HUGE thank you to Emma McNamara who has done an amazing job helping to run the programme this year. We couldn’t have done it without her and I’d like to thank her for all her time, artistic enthusiasm, generosity and for helping to inspire students with Art. 

Arts Alive combined Schools Band 2021

Are you a current member of the school band looking to further develop your skills and musicality? 

The Arts Alive Combined Schools Band (AACSB) provides exciting performance opportunities at venues including Sydney Opera House, Town Hall and Schools Spectacular. Rehearsals are held at Belrose PS, following social distancing guidelines.

Auditions for the AACSB are now open for band students in Year 4-6 (in 2021) via https://www.artsalivecsb.com/auditions.html

2021 NSW Junior Singers Auditions

The NSW Public Schools Junior Singers is one of the premier student vocal ensembles in Australia. The ensemble proudly celebrates a long history of high achievement and regularly performs at prestigious venues including the Sydney Opera House, Sydney Town Hall and at the Schools Spectacular. 

Students from NSW public schools from years 4 to 7 (in 2021) are encouraged to audition for a place in Junior Singers. The commitment is for the full school year and rehearsals are held every Tuesday afternoon from 4.30-6.30pm in Lewisham. The fee is $330.

Over the years we have had a number of Harbord students thoroughly enjoy participation in the Junior Singers. The students work with the most esteemed conductors and the improvement in their vocal technique is astounding. I could not recommend the program highly enough!

 

Applications close Monday 14 December 2020

To apply, visit https://www.artsunit.nsw.edu.au/2021-vocal-ensembles-application-form

 

Miss Alice Dalgleish

Maths Olympiad 2020

I would like to commend all the Maths Olympiad participants in year 5 and year 6 for their efforts this year. 2020 proved to be a very different year and therefore Maths Olympiad was an interschool competition and was delivered through online and face-face teaching.

The students involved showed continual improvement and developed their problem solving strategies to solve mathematical problems in a creative manner, as opposed to simply reaching a solution using a prescribed method.

All students were awarded a certificate of achievement for their commitment to Maths Olympiad throughout the year.

The top 10 performing students for 2020 were Ewan, Marko, Xiao Tong, Evan, Indigo, Kayvon, Ryan, Lode, Ashley and Jared in Year 6.

Congratulations to all participants.

Mrs Scicluna

Instructional Leader

Parliament And Civics Education Rebate (PACER)

In late term 4, year 6 students from Harbord Public School will undertake an education tour of the national capital. Students will be given the opportunity to participate in a variety of educational programs with a focus on Australia’s history, culture, heritage and democracy. Sites visited will include Parliament House, the Australian War Memorial and the Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House.

The Australian Government recognises the importance of all young Australians being able to visit the national capital as part of their Civics and Citizenship education. To assist families in meeting the cost of the excursion the Australian Government is contributing funding of $20.00 per student under the Parliament and Civics Education Rebate program towards those costs. The rebate is paid directly to the school upon completion of the excursion.

Paul Kelly

Assistant Principal & Year 6 Supervisor

Toys n Tucker - Due by Friday

Each year, our school participates in this local community program organised by St Mark's Anglican Church Freshwater, collecting new children’s toys and food items (cans, packets or glass), which will be distributed to families in need in time for Christmas. The collection will run until Friday 4th December.    Contributions can be brought into the office foyer.   We have, for many years, had an extremely generous response to this local charitable event. For more information visit:  toysntucker.org.au

P&C News

Harbord P and C Christmas Raffle and Action is Live!

Raffle tickets only $5 at www.harbordpandc.com.au

Sales close 11th Dec. Prizes drawn 12th Dec. Delivery before Christmas. BOOM!

Raffle prizes in generous bundles. Exciting auction items include ‘Principal for a Day’ and ‘Birthday on the Noticeboard’ – both hot items in last year’s Spring Fair auction.

This is our only P&C fundraiser for 2020 and we kindly ask that every family buys at least one ticket.

Thanks to our generous community, 100% of your payment goes directly to our P&C and will help us recover from a really challenging year. 

Traffic Review

I have spoken with Raymond Tran at Transport for NSW at length regarding the issues around the phasing of the lights at the Wyadra/Oliver intersection and the extension of the school zones. He has been to our school and witnessed the chaotic situation with kids crossing, and cars trying to get turn through those crossings and get in and out of the Kiss and Drop zones. He agrees we need help!

We discussed several options for adjusting the traffic lights and he will take these to his manager for review. He is also going to request that the school zone is extended west up Wyadra Avenue to include the diagonal parking zone next to the oval.

It is not effective to extend the school zone past the bend on Oliver and into Bennett but there are other traffic calming options that may be appropriate. He is going to contact Northern Beaches Council and to discuss these options. I’ll post an update next term.

Spring Fair 2021

The rides are booked for Oct 2021. Hopefully this will go ahead! This will be my last Spring Fair at HPS so we will need volunteers to step up with a view to continuing this tradition into the future. We have all the plans and contacts and a great relationship with all our suppliers. No experience needed! If you love getting involved in events or you like the idea of only doing one thing every two years to help the school, jump in!

Year 6 Farewell

The year 6 Farewell will be an amazing evening for our year 6 graduates after a less-than-usual final year for them. Special thanks to Lisa Duffy, Lauren Moore, Kate Hood, Jill Careless and the rest of the team for their work on creating a low-cost, sustainable event. I wish all the year 6 students the very best of luck for their transition to high school and thanks to all those parents who have donated so much of their energy and enthusiasm over the years and will now be leaving our school.

Introducing Running Stars

Running Stars is a new community running event focused on physical and mental wellbeing and encouraging a sense of togetherness –brought to you by the people behind Park Run and supported by Northern Beaches Council.

It is FREE to participate and open to everyone in our community. Jog/walk with your kids or sprint ahead and smash your PB! Everyone is welcome – no minimum fitness level required.

Running Stars is held every Sunday morning at 7am. Register at https://app.runningstars.org.au/ and meet at John Fisher Park, Curl Curl (by the big steps at the netball courts) at 6.45am for the briefing. Choose your distance – 2.5km, 5km or 10km. Events are timed and you can track your progress. Run Harbord Run!

More info at https://www.facebook.com/RunningStarsCurlCurl/

Heather Lawson

P&C President

president@harbordpandc.com.au

Lost Property

The office staff will sort any lost property once a week. If clothing is labelled the item will be returned to the student's classroom. If items are not labelled they will eventually end up in the secondhand clothing pool.

IT IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT TO LABEL ALL SCHOOL BELONGINGS

P&C Uniform Shop & Secondhand Clothing Pool

P&C Uniform Shop

The uniform shop hours are (school term only):

    Tuesday 2:30 - 4pm

    Thursday 8:30 - 10:30am

We encourage you to only visit the shop if your child needs to try on items. Due to restrictions we would prefer you use the class delivery option. 

All orders are placed online at www.harborduniforms.com.au

When you purchase your uniform accessories (socks, hat etc) at our Uniform Shop, all profits go back to the school through the P&C and are used to help your children directly.

Some examples of the projects funded by the P&C are the amazing new playground in the Kindy area, an extensive range of new IT products including laptops, iPads, electronic whiteboards along with upcoming projects such as new classroom furniture, COLA over the year 1 play area and Garden of Tranquility.

All these projects have been fully funded by our P&C, so let’s keep supporting them by purchasing all uniform shop items through our onsite store.

With delivery straight to your child’s classroom, it’s the most convenient option!

Summer School Uniform

Download

Secondhand Uniform Shop - CASHLESS

Please be advised that the second hand uniform shop became cashless on September 1st 2020.  EFTPOS payments only are accepted.

Secondhand Uniform Shop

    Tuesday 2.30 - 3.15pm

    Thursday 8.30 - 9.15am

useduniforms@harbordpandc.com.au

Social distancing applies so please wait outside the shops if we are already helping others.

Freshie Food Canteen News

Flexischools online ordering: Online only way you can place an order for your child’s lunch from the canteen. Please register at www.flexischools.com.au  or download the app.  Cut off time for ordering is 8:50 am. There is a late order limited menu option available until 12md. If using the phone app: scroll down then swipe left for Late lunch- missed cut off, Recess, Lunch, IOU Payment Any problems please contact Flexischools : 1300 361 769.

Allergy alerts: If you child has a food allergy please select Alert option with each order (1st category when you select date to order). Please also notify the school office of any dietary changes.

Bread & Dairy Options: I have now set up options for wholemeal/multigrain, gluten free bread & wraps. Lactose free and dairy free options are also available. Unfortunately I have had to add an additional cost for gluten free and lactose free.

Over the Counter Service has been limited to frozen fruit cups and juicies for 1st half of lunch only. All ice blocks cost $1.00. Unfortunately supply of sorbets has been interrupted during COVID so they are currently unavailable. Please place all other orders via FlexiSchools.

Jan Baldwin

Canteen Manager – 0400 816 650

School Forms

Parent Portal Instructions

Download

Working With Children Check form for parents

Download

Community Noticeboard

Curl Curl Sports Netball

Download

North Sydney United Football

Download

Voyager Sports Camps

Download

Massive Lifeline Northern Beaches Book Fair

Download

Harbord Scouts Xmas Trees

Download

Freshwater Girl Guides

Download

Girl Guides

Download

LCF Languages

Download

J&E Piano

Download

Sponsors Corner

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