Doolooboorah

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Congratulations to our swimmers who were placed, made finals and completed their personal bests, many students conquered their worries to “have a go” and participate. We are very proud of you all. Thank you to Mr Ben Holmes for his outstanding organisation of the day, the teachers who assisted, Freshwater Swimming Club who acted as timing officials and our P & C executive who handed our place ribbons to the students. The zone carnival is this Friday and students who qualified will receive an information note today.

All students will be participating in an engaging presentation called ‘Backflips against bullying’ this Thursday and Friday. This incursion is a great and engaging way for students to be explicitly taught that bullying, or bystander behavior is not OK.

Thank you to our many parents who attended the parent ‘meet the teacher nights’ last week. We were as excited to see you in our classrooms as you were to see your child’s learning environment. Hopefully restrictions will ease and we can have parents on site soon.

It was also great to see so many parents online at our P & C zoom/face to face blended P & C meeting last week. Thanks to Heather Lawson for this great initiative to allow as many parents to be involved as possible. In the next newsletter, I will share our next draft 4-year Stategic Plan with you as part of our community consultation process.

Susan Tickle

Principal

The students were so excited, it has been a while since we have been able to celebrate an event together.  The Year 6 leaders were showing tremendous house spirit in their colourful outfits.  The highlight of my day was watching the student stand erupt in cheers as the house relays began.

Congratulations to all our swimmers.  And thank you to our teachers and parents who contributed to the great success of the day.  Mr Holmes coordinated a well organised carnival.  It ran so smoothly that we were able to run the house relays and make it back to school with time to spare.

The winning house was…

1st place PATERSON

2nd place DENNIS

3rd place LAWSON

4th place KENDALL

A reminder to the students that made it through to Zone that the Manly Zone Swimming Carnival will be held on Friday 5th March. The Sydney North Regional Swimming Carnival will be held on Monday, March 15th.

Year 6 were very excited to begin the annual Design, Make, Innovate project with Balgowlah Boys High School. The Year 9 mentors engaged their Y6 group in constructive conversations as they began the process.  The project is titled Shrinking Our Footprint. Shrinking Our Footprint is a student self-directed and collaborative project for Stage 3. It was great to see the students engage in our collaborative spaces that facilitated rich discussion.

We are currently making plans to hold an induction ceremony for our 2021 student leaders.  Our delay has been due to negotiating current COVID restrictions as we would much rather be able to invite parents to this event.  We will inform students and parents of our plans shortly.

For current Year 6 students who applied last year, the Selective High School Placement Test will be held on Thursday 11 March 2021 from 9.00am to 1.30pm. Unless parents have made special arrangements with the High Performing Students Team to attend an individually allocated test centre candidates from this school have been sent to: Northern Beaches Secondary College Manly Campus, 138 Abbott Rd, North Curl Curl.

Go to https://education.nsw.gov.au/public-schools/selective-high-schools-and-opportunity-classes/year-7  to find:

·         Test centre allocations by public school. 

·         A map of test centre addresses under the heading 'The test'.

·         The bulletin, Test information for parents and students. The bulletin contains very important information about the test and should be read carefully.

Thank you to all parents who completed the form specifying a change to your child’s scripture/ethics preference.  We were inundated with forms and have worked hard to accommodate these changes in a timely manner.  This week, all students should be attending their chosen activity (Catholic, Protestant, Ethics or non-scripture where students engage in non-curriculum meaningful activities).

To minimise the disruption to these classes, no more changes will be accepted.  In some cases, the classes are full.  Changes will be open again mid-Term 2, ready for Term 3.  At that time, we will again look at the classes and attempt to honour everyone’s choice.  If you completed a form but your child did not attend as expected, please contact your child’s teacher.  If the group is full, your child has been placed on a waitlist for Term 3.

At Harbord, we accept that parents give their children mobile phones to protect them from everyday risks involving personal security and safety.  It is acknowledged that providing a child with a mobile phone gives parents reassurance that they can speak with their child to make any necessary arrangements before or after the school day.  There are, however, issues associated with mobile phones and smart watches at school.  These include security, interruptions to school operations and student perceptions of equity and privacy.  Our core business of teaching and learning needs  be conducted in an environment free from unnecessary distractions or disruptions.  In general, students should not bring valuable items such as mobile phones or smart watches to school.

During school hours, parents and carers are expected to contact their child/ren via the school office.

Students using school devices, accessing the internet and email, and students who choose to bring mobile phones and/or smart watches to school are required to agree to follow the acceptable use of information and communications technology student contract that was sent home at the beginning of the school year.

There is always something going on at Harbord.  The students here have many opportunities to experience different things beyond the classroom.  This all happens due to our tremendous staff expertise and willingness to run these events for students.  Please find below a list of activities that are run at HPS outside of the classroom.  Please note, some of these activities require auditions and these opportunities were communicated to students during morning lines and groups have been selected accordingly.  If you have any questions, please first direct them to your child’s class room teacher.

Danielle Yates

Deputy Principal

We will be holding parent teacher interviews in Week 9 of this term (22/3/21 – 26/3/21). This will be a 10 minute interview where you will have the opportunity to discuss your child’s progress with their teacher.

I will send out a note on Thursday with the information on how to book an interview time. For classes that have two teachers, there may be some times where both teachers will be in attendance and there will also be times when only one teacher will be there.

This fortnight 2W have been working on writing descriptions. Frankie showed her creativity through designing her monster named Scruffy. Scruffy does not have arms but she can run very fast. Nolan’s monster was very interesting, it has three red eyes and an invisible brain. I wonder how intelligent he is with an invisible brain.

Tudor created a monster named Fluffy. He is an extremely friendly monster. Tudor made his monster look fluffy by drawing squiggly lines all around his body. There were so many lines to trace over so Mrs Walton also helped out.

Milla wrote a description about a very vicious crocodile. I was very impressed seeing how she used punctuation to make her writing exciting. She also used some excellent descriptive words to describe her crocodile.

Great work Year 2!

Lisa Miller

Deputy Principal

Differentiation in mathematics is a whole school focus at Harbord PS. Teachers use formative assessment to target their teaching and differentiate the syllabus content for the students in their class.

This week I am pleased to share some photos of our students engaged in differentiated mathematics learning activities. These photos are from various classes across K-6 this year.

I look forward to featuring each grade in more detail throughout the year.

Tanya Scicluna

Instructional Leader

As part of a Passion Project, Harbord PS student Harry (2W) and his sister Aimee have decided to collect pre-loved or new football boots and any sporting equipment to be distributed to communities that aren’t as fortunate as us. 

With the new season ahead of us, I’m sure many families will be checking out last seasons gear and finding them too small. We would love to collect any pre-loved gear in good condition and make sure they go somewhere to makes other kids dreams come alive. 

We will be using the charity RMF foundation to redistribute collected goods. 

If you have any donations that you'd like to pass on to support this initiative, please email Emma Lovell at emmalovell@hotmail.com to arrange collection or delivery of your donations.

Due to Covid restrictions, we encourage you to order online and use our classroom delivery service. If you do need to visit the shop, please be aware that there is a QR code along with a visitor form that are required prior to entering. These need to be completed even if you are only collecting an order. Our current opening hours are:

Tuesday 2.30 - 4.00pm

Thursday 8.30 - 10.30am

uniforms@harbordpandc.com.au

Please check our website prior to visiting the shop for the latest news and any changes to opening days/times. Our home page will always have the most up to date information including holiday trading dates.

Tuesday 2.30 - 3.15pm

Thursday 8.30 - 9.15am

useduniforms@harbordpandc.com.au

 What you get in the year:

• Unlimited classes & gym access
• Weekly check in’s for support and guidance
• Unlimited access to Inbody scanner
• Nutritional guidance & access to meal plans
• Joining a friendly & supportive community

Simply enter the draw via the link below to go in the draw:

https://www.code5.com.au/join-the-draw-now/