Newport Natter

Our Orientation Sessions for all Kinder 2021 students will begin on Wednesday 4 November from 9.45-11.15am. The second and third sessions will be held on the following Wednesdays, the 11 and 18 November also from 9.45-11.15am. Specific information including your child’s group, school map and the organization plan will be emailed to families this week but in short;

The students will be grouped alphabetically into 4 colour groups. Colour coded tables will be set up across the Western Shelter playground for signing your child in and collecting your Orientation Pack. The ‘sign in’ window is 9.45 to 10.00 am. Please enter the school with your child only during this allocated time, through the gate nominated in the email. This corresponds with your child’s colour group and is also the gate at which you will wait to collect your child at the end of the session at 11.15am. A current Year 5 student (in some cases 2 students) will be buddied with your Kinder 2021 child, to support him/her at drop off and pick up, for the 3 weeks of the program. The student will walk your child to his or her classroom from the sign in table and hand your child over to you at the nominated gate at the end of each session. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, it’s extremely important that parents spend minimal time on school grounds and reframe from entering classrooms.

Please note: the planned “drive by” session on Wednesday 21 October to distribute Kinder Orientation packs and meet our new students, is cancelled. It has been replaced by our onsite orientation sessions.

This term, the Stage 3 GAT students have been participating in the Department of Education’s Cool Controller ‘design thinking process’ competition. This has required designer and entrepreneurial thinking to work through the design process and develop a persuasive poster which advertises their idea for an improved ‘Smart’ controller unit for a ‘Cooler Classroom’ air conditioning and fresh air ventilation units. The success criteria for the task included the need for an overarching sustainable approach, as well as a focus on air quality, air flow and ventilation, and thermal comfort. The students conducted surveys across the school during the ‘empathise’ phase of the process and used the gathered data to problem solve and inspire design ideas for the ‘define’ and ‘ideate’ phases. The ideation stage has been the most challenging and involved part of the process, as the teams needed to share and then negotiate their ideas for their poster. To do this they needed to delegate roles to draw 2D and 3D representations and develop annotated descriptions of the features and applications for their design. As there were specific guidelines and recommendations for how the design ideas needed to be visually represented, the 3D Splat design tool, pictured in the photographs below, was used. The Splat tool is a powerfully simple drawing tool which has been designed to use for rapid visualisation and product design. We were sent a class kit from Splat3D https://splat3d.com/ to use throughout the competition.

The following links are examples of training videos students used to support their use of the Splat tool.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkeektDHeJ0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp4jIPkKSRs

Poster entries were submitted last term and the Stage 3 students worked hard with their teams to format and finalise their poster entries. We will keep you updated with their progress and success. What a fantastic job they have done so far to embrace all the new learning experiences within this challenging competition! Congratulations to the students and Mrs Dalziell for her leadership of the GATS program at Newport.

Last week a hardcopy note was sent home with all Year 5 students informing parents of the opportunity to apply for their child to attend a selective high school in 2022.

The note is attached later in this Natter.

There has been a date change since publishing the note; applications for Year 7 entry to selective high schools in 2022 will be accepted from Tuesday 13 October 2020 to Monday 16 November 2020. 

All applications must be made online at: https://education.nsw.gov.au/public-schools/selective-high-schools-and-opportunity-classes/year-7

Please return expression of interest slips to the office by 20 October.

Northern Beaches Council carried out improvements to our Beaconsfield Street Kiss and Drop Zone during the school holidays.

 The area now has a wider footpath and a small retaining wall where students can sit while they are waiting to be collected.

 To add to the safety of the area we ask again, for parents to keep our students’ welfare at front mind when driving around the school at pick-up and drop-off times. Please abide by road rules, exercise patience and take care.

If you need to pick your child up early from school for an appointment please phone the school office prior to coming to school. The office will note when your child needs to be collected and arrange for him/her to come to the office, ready for when you arrive. This is in keeping with our COVID-19 safety guidelines.  

The first order of Chromebooks will arrive at Newport School next week and Mr Greg Mawson will prepare the Chromebooks for use.

Prior to delivery of the Chromebooks to students, they will be asked to complete and return a Purchase Own Device from School User Agreement.

Should you wish to purchase a PODS Chromebook in the second round of orders before the end of 2020, click on the following link:  https://newport.orderportal.com.au

The next P&C general meeting is scheduled for Monday 26 October at 7.30pm. Mat Butterworth, the President of the P&C at Pittwater High, will be a guest speaker to discuss the school’s academic and sporting programs.

It is a wonderful opportunity to hear about the school and some of its amazing academic and sporting programs.

For this meeting, the P&C executive will be in the library, and will project the meeting via Zoom.

Should you wish to add any items to the agenda, please email them to secretary@newportpandc.com.au.

A Zoom link and agenda will be emailed to all parents this week.

I would like to congratulate all students for their productive, hardworking start to the term with many examples of quality learning being displayed in week 1. In particular, Year 1 worked across the whole grade with a gallery walk, visiting each other’s classes to critique descriptive writing and accompanying artwork. Students then shared their work at the 3-6 zoom assembly. 3SN have been building their vocabulary by exploring word meanings. A select group of Year 1 and Year 6 students were involved in maths lessons during a visit by the relieving executive director, Sally Egan. 6KH have completed hybrid texts (using a combination of words and images to express ideas) and displayed these in the staff meeting room and 3HC have creatively turned egg cartons into interesting art. The photos tell the stories.

Last week we emailed all parents informing that Interrelate sessions will be available online this year. It’s preferable that payments be made via the school website through the ‘make a payment’ tab. Further information is included latter in this Natter.

We’re all enthused to make Term 4 another full term of learning. To help your child be best prepared for their time in class can you please check that their pencil case has pencils, glue, scissors and other essential items and if necessary replenish them with the appropriate equipment. All students, years 1-6 should have a small pencil case that allows their desk space to be maximised.

Also, please see the homework requirements for students included in the Homework policy attached

I would like to thank Nicki Inger, Rita Erickson, Oscar Ronderos, Gine Svendsen and Stephaney Bracey for their work in re-establishing the library after a water leak in the holidays destroyed much of the carpet in the library. Luckily, no books or learning resources were affected by the flood. Thanks to their hard work, library lessons will resume as normal this week, including the sale of books to students. This fundraiser aims to give students some ownership and connection to the library with their name and acknowledgment of their donation added to the book of their choice, as well as raising valuable funds to maintain the relevance of current library resources. Please see more detailed information later in th

Book Week

​To celebrate Book Week, children have the opportunity, to choose a book during their Library lesson time, to buy and donate back to the Library.  Children have been asked to bring in $10 (for soft covered books) or $15 (for hard covered books). Please place the money in an envelope with the child's name and class on the front.

A sticker will go in the front of the book with your child's name and class.

Your child will be the first to borrow their particular book.

Happy reading!

Kind Regards

Natalie Baldi

Principal