principal’s word · proving very popular and many students have joined the group and have...

Newsletter: Volume 5 Issue 6 July 2013

Dear Parents,

The school looks very wintry at the moment with a carpet of leaves everywhere and bare branches where there once was a leafy green tree. Today is a beautiful day and surprisingly warm.

You may have noticed or heard that we have been having problems with the sewage system. The system has been failing for some time and I have been trying to get a commitment from the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development to replace it. This has been ongoing for some time now. Last year when we built the cover for the basketball court I had emergency repairs carried out to fix problems that were occurring then. This cost the school almost $30,000 and took all of our operating reserve. I have been trying since that time to get something done so we have a more permanent solution but until this point no new system and we still have not been reimbursed. Recently there has been an overflow near the Art Room and it slowly got worse. In the interests of Health and Safety we had to put our case to the department for an immediate repair. This has been done and the area has been cleaned up and the overflow diverted to the proper channels. We are going to get a complete new septic system and hopefully the work will commence in the holidays. If you notice work occurring around the school it will be the system being replaced.

On Friday 14th June we experienced a loss of power which had a very bad effect on our computer system. The power went out at 3:00 am and did not return until 12:50pm. This meant that our servers went down when the backup batteries failed. Consequently our servers lost a large amount of data that took some days to recover. Teachers were unable to connect to the network to access work and lesson plans and reports that were underway were lost. It has been a very difficult task to get the reports into the system and some teachers have had to re-enter their data several times. Consequently our reporting process is delayed and we may not be able to get the documents printed in time. I must apologise in advance if you do not receive your child’s report this week. They will be done and may not get to you until next term. Sue and the team have been working very hard to get them completed but it has been very frustrating as teachers think they have finished and then the upload fails and the reports are gone and have to be re-entered.

The last day of term has been designated Wellbeing Day and our VCAL students have been working very hard to provide a range of activities for all our students. I know many students from our popular Warhammer Club are looking forward to meeting some visitors who are bringing Mediaeval Weapons to display. There will be Pancakes on sale and various workshops around the school ranging from Paper Crafts to sporting activities. I am sure your child will find the day rewarding and fun.

PRINCIPAL’S WORD

311 Mt Dandenong Tourist Road, Sassafras, 3787

Important Dates

Fri Jun 28th – Wellbeing Day

Fri Jun 28th 2.30pm – End of Term 2

Mon Jul 15th 9am – Start of Term 3


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Our Mathematics teacher Liz who is replacing Nick Burke while he is on leave in South America is having twins. This is very exciting and we are very pleased for Liz, Rodney and Emily. This creates a small problem however, as Liz will not be available to teach until the end of Nick’s leave as we planned. I have arranged for an experienced teacher of mathematics to come in and work with Liz until she leaves to have her babies. This teacher’s name is Lachlan Mclean and he has been a teacher for many years and will be able to work with our VCE students right up to the exams so they do not miss out on any revision and are able to complete all of their course work. He will remain as Nick’s replacement until Nick’s return next year in term one.

On Thursday 6th June we had Performance Night. What a wonderful show Luc and his performers gave us. The hall was packed with people and everyone enjoyed the various performances. The African drumming is proving very popular and many students have joined the group and have lessons. We are very fortunate at Sherbrooke to have free music lessons. Many schools can only provide lessons to paying students so we are very grateful to Luc and his team for providing such a high quality free service.

Our visitors from China will be here on the 30th July. I would like to say thank you to all of those parents who have agreed to invite one or two students into their homes. We have arranged two excursions for them during their stay. On Thursday we are off to the city for some sightseeing and on Friday we will be at the Zoo for the formal welcome by the Minister for Education Mr Dixon. For the rest of their stay they will be in normal classes with our students and working on building their English language skills. We are very grateful to the International Education Division of the Department for helping to organise it all. I am sure it will be a wonderful experience for these young people from Kunshan which is a town near Shanghai. They are all around 13 or 14 years old so it will be a great experience for them to look back on.

We wish all students a safe and happy break. We will see everyone next term for the start of semester two.

Anne Broadribb

Year 7 to 10 End-of-Year Camp We are happy to announce an exciting camp that has been organised for term 4 between the dates of Tuesday Dec 10th and Friday Dec 13th. It is at a wonderful venue at Yarra Junction. It has bunk bed dormitories and many outdoor activities such as: flying fox, 110m waterslide, canoeing, low-ropes course, raft building, camp fires, beach volleyball, in ground trampolines. Indoors there is: basketball, volleyball, table tennis, billiards, air hockey and foosball.

The centre provides qualified trainers on each of the riskier activities and we will also have a qualified teacher for the water sports.

We hope it will be an exciting time for the students to spend together and build on our whole school collegiality. The cost will be $280. Payment plans are being organised so that the expense of the camp can be spread over the 3rd and part of the 4th term.


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Primary News

This term has been very busy. After completing the Naplan testing all students have been writing Narratives and exploring Narrative and Descriptive texts. The Prep – 2s have been reading Matilda, building a Matilda Town and expanding vocabulary by studying ‘Trunchball’s’ language. Silent Reading and Guided Reading continues to be an important part of our program. There has been a constant stream of visitors to Anne’s office as Prep – 4 students received their Principals Awards for 25, 50, 75,100 or 125 nights of reading. Year 3 -6 have been completing book reports.

The ‘My Story’ project that most families have completed has been a great success. Students have enjoyed learning about their own families. We have really appreciated the effort that families have made. All students have enjoyed using Mathletics, Reading Eggs and Reading Eggspress. All students have their own passwords and can access these programs at home.

The year 5/6 class has had a very busy semester. Their hard work in the class and eagerness to participate in other activities should be celebrated. This term, they have started taking a closer look at debating. There have been a number of debates held in the class, and a trainer from the Debaters Association Victoria visited to teach further skills to students interested in competition debating. These students will become ‘experts’ on the topic, and will help teach some of the skills to the rest of the class. A few students in the year 5/6 class have also had the opportunity to participate with older year levels in interschool sport for baseball and soccer! In the second last week of term, the year 6s participated in a transition week. This allowed them to get a taste of what is to come, and to start building relationships with the current year 7 group. The teachers involved in this transition week reported that they are looking forward to working with a well-prepared and positive group of students.

We have all enjoyed having Dallas in our Unit. She is now 5 ½ months old and starting to settle down. We are pleased she has now finished teething!

We are hoping you all have a safe and enjoyable holiday.

Leanne, Andrew and Lara

Primary Team


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WELL BEING DAY

The VCAL students organised Well Being Day for the rest of the school on Friday June 28th. They cooked pancakes for morning tea, organised more than 20 workshops and cooked sausages for lunch. A big thank you to the students, for all their efforts. Some of the workshops were run by staff members and community members. Thanks to them also. Some of the workshops included War Hammer, military weapons, craft, art, self-defence and yoga.

COMMUNITY SERVICE

For the past two months the CaLM group (Conservation and Land Management group) have helped the Friends of Sassafras Creek weed a little known National Park in Perrins Creek Rd Sassafras. The boys have cut ivy from tree trunks, and a very old stone wall and cut and dabbed sugar maples, New Zealand Wine trees and deadly night shade. It is a major project.

CERES

The 7 to 10 students went on a long adventure on Monday June 17th into Brunswick to CERES. Four hours on public transport and the rain did not stop us having fun. The 7 and 8 students participated in learning about African culture – they loved the fire building and the water carrying – on your head! The 9 and 10 students looked at energy sustainability and were pleased to find out that they knew much more than they thought they did. Thanks to Jacqui, DD and Michael.

RESOURCE SMART

The staff attended two Professional Development workshops on sustainability over the last month. They were part of the grant we received from the government to participate in the AuSSI Vic (Australian Sustainable Schools Initiative). We did a lot of work on where we are along the sustainable journey and what needs to be done. We will be working on our School Environment Management Plan and we would love to hear from any parents who would like to help shape this document. It would not involve lots of meetings as most of our deliberations could be via emails. Contact DD for information.


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BELGRAVE LANTERN PARADE

Despite the big dragonfly made by some of the high school students not making it to the parade, the school and it’s dragonflies were still well-represented on the night. Thanks to all who made lanterns and came along, and especially to Rod for facilitating.

SHERBROOKE WARHAMMER CLUB

Sherbrooke Warhammer Club has running since the beginning of term and has been very popular amongst the secondary students. Run by Michael and Aleryk, students learn how to build and paint plastic miniatures for the purpose of collecting and playing table top games. The club is run once a week in the library during the large break. The club encourages student interaction, promotes maths and probability skills and allows students to exercise their creativity through painting.


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HELP NEEDED!

The CaLM students are making totems to line the pathway at the back of the school – near the frog bog and bush tucker garden being constructed. We need any left over pots of exterior paint that you may have – it would be great if they are bright and colourful. Thanks DD

STUDENTS BLITZ CONFERENCE

Seven students from the VCE Environmental Science class and CaLM attended a conference for senior students from a number of Eastern suburbs schools. The venue was Tintern and the organizers were AYCC (Australian Youth Climate Coalition). There were several workshops on getting environmentally active in school and then time to plan a school project. Ours will be around litter.

The students were pleased that they were able to answer many of the questions sought and that our school had started many of the projects discussed. Especially pleasing for me was that they felt confident to speak up and especially Kayden who stood on stage in front of about 100 people to explain Sherbrooke’s plan. Well done all of you. (Kieron, Jackson, Rory, Callum, Charlotte, Kayden, Rachel)


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Community Notices


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DO YOU HAVE A 3, 4 OR 5 YEAR OLD?

A local mum and qualified primary teacher is seeking 52 children aged 3 years, 0 months to 5 years, 6 months for her Honours in Psychology research project through the University of New England. The study aims to compare the effectiveness of iPads with hands-on learning materials for pre-schoolers. Participation in the project involves 1-2 hours of time, spread

over five days, in your own home. Each child is randomly allocated to either the iPad condition or the concrete materials condition and plays a specific game once a day for five

days. Each participant receives a picture book after the fifth session as a thank you gift. For more information or to register your child, please contact Kirsty Pitman at

[email protected] This project has received ethics approval from the Human Research Ethics Committee at the University of New England, approval number HE13-066.

Please note the research is not affiliated with nor being conducted through Sherbrooke Community School; this item is just included as a community notice.

principal’s word · proving very popular and many students have joined the group and have...

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