Volume 4 - 17th March 2023

From Our Principal

One of the pleasures of teaching (and there are many!) is seeing students smile when their learning is acknowledged and celebrated in a public forum. This year, our students have had an opportunity to share their classroom learning efforts on assembly and be acknowledged for their great work by students, staff and parents. Ms O’Connor, Head of Department – Teaching and Learning, has been collecting samples of student work showing excellence in organisation of thinking in the curriculum. We are so impressed with our students’ efforts and skills!

As we near the end of the term, our students are finalising assessment and slowly starting on the new learning leading up to Term 2. The whole school data will be collected and analysed to identify our students’ strengths and areas of improvement. Our focus is on improving English and mathematics data in line with the Department’s Equity and Excellence agenda.

Our Deputy Principal, Elena Finlay, and Mathematics Curriculum Leads, Corinna Prasad and Emily Everingham, are working on the revision of the maths curriculum to incorporate more outdoor learning experiences to support student engagement with maths.

As you are aware, NAPLAN testing is taking place at the moment and we are very pleased with our students’ engagement with the tests. Every morning, our students have an opportunity to enjoy breakfast with their cohort to enable them to focus better and do their best. We look forward to receiving their results later in the year. It is important for our Year 5 parents to note that this year’s result reports will look different to previous years. More information will be shared in the coming months.

I am sure that you are aware of our chant Reading is Everywhere. Reading is Everyone’s Business. To celebrate reading, one of our students visited me last week to show me his excellent reading skills. Below is a photo of Tristan Bell-Mailman reading the book We Are Australians by Duncan Smith and Nicole Godwin.

From Our Deputy Principal - School Culture

From Our Deputy Principal - Teaching and Learning

Awards @ Leichhardt!

At Monday’s Week 7 Assembly many students were celebrated for their achievement with Reading Eggs.  Below, pictured from left to right, are  Shaunak, Bison, Ivy, Dominyk, Jasper and Wiley.  Well done, students!

Hunter and Ayden below collected a handful of Reading Eggs awards!  Well done, boys!

Khloe, Ashton-James, Helena and Zakk (pictured L to R) were also very proud of their achievement.  As was Ms Everingham who won the Reading Eggs Teacher Engagement Award for February!  Well done, everyone!

Kaiden and Hailey (pictured below) took out awards for Year 6!

Currently, there is a challenge underway in Year 6, to see who can take out the March Reading Eggs Award for the Most Books Read.  The students are counting down the days until the results are announced.

Maths Awards

It was great to see Year 4 student, Riley and and Year 5 student, Cody, receive Mathletics Awards and Eva, pictured below, received the Mathseeds Award.  Well done, students!

Please encourage your child to engage with Reading Eggs (Prep – Year 6), Mathseeds (Prep – Year 2) and Mathletics (Year 3 to Year 6).  If you do not have their login details, please contact their teacher.

NAPLAN @ Leichhardt

This week the Year 3 and 5 students completed the Writing and Reading components of NAPLAN.  Next week they will complete the Conventions of Language and Numeracy components.  If you have any questions regarding NAPLAN, please contact Mrs Elena Finlay, Deputy Principal – Teaching and Learning on email:  efinl9@eq.edu.au

Writing @ Leichhardt

Currently, students in all year levels are busy finishing off their assessment pieces as Units of work come to an end.  Please make time to speak with your child regarding how their assessment tasks are progressing and if they are having difficulty or concerns, please make contact with their teacher.

This term the Year 5 students’ English Unit focused on developing the skills to write a spooky or suspenseful story.   Students engaged very well with this task and below are two samples of Year 5 student work.    Here are just some of the features that the Year 5 students were taught and challenged to use in their writing.

1. Figurative language (similes, metaphors, personification) to develop description.
2. Develop a fantasy setting.
3. A variety of sentence beginnings
4. Subordinate conjunctions e.g. if, since, when, although, while, before, because, as, after, until.
5. Alliteration e.g. big blue boat
6. Precise vocabulary
7. Consistent point of view
8. Accurate spelling and punctuation
9. Paragraphing

As you read the below work samples of Daymon and Angelica, you will be able to identify many of the above features.  Well done, students!

THE SPOOKY GHOST…

By Daymon (5B)

Kate suddenly saw a white figure watching her. She screamed. It disappeared. She thought she was hallucinating.  She suddenly woke up in a daze. She was confused. Was she dreaming?  She made breakfast. While sitting by the window, she ate it. She couldn’t shake off the feeling that someone was watching her. She didn’t think much of it and continued with the day. While she was going to her work place she saw a white van following her car. She took five right turns to see if the white van was following her.  She looked back she couldn’t see it. She had a sigh of relief. She finished work.

She was waiting patiently for her dad to pick her up. But he didn’t show. She called her dad but… no answer. She was worried. She walked home since her dad wasn’t answering. She thought he was sleeping and thought nothing of it. When she got home she heard a loud bang. It was coming from downstairs. Kate hurried and called her dad. He rushed down.

“Don’t worry dear,” he exclaimed. He was just getting stuff from the basement. He said he would need some help. She agreed and began to help. While she was helping, she had a flashback of a bad memory of when she was younger. That day, Kate was playing alone in the basement when she saw white figure watching her from the window.

She screamed, “AHH!” She saw that same white figure this morning. She screamed her lungs off. It was a loud as one hundred sirens going off at the same time. Her dad asked if she was okay while covering his ears.

“Did you not see that?” She screamed.

“See what?” her dad said.

She was seriously freaked out and wanted to not help her dad anymore. He agreed and she went to sleep in a daze. She woke up the next morning wondering what happened. She lost all her memory of last night. She felt if as the world was spinning and she was going to collapse. She dragged herself downstairs.

Her dad asked, “Are you okay? “

“I don’t feel so well. I’m going to take the day off.” Kate replied.

During the day, while her dad was at work, she called him just to check up on him. But she suddenly heard a loud BANG! coming from the basement.

“Is anyone there?” she exclaimed.

She slowly and carefully crept down the stairs. With every creep she felt even more terrified. When she got to the end of the stairs she saw the same white ghost she saw this morning but she had enough of being scared. The ghost chased her down the stairs to the bathroom. Kate hurried to lock herself in the toilet. She locked the white figure out and started to think of what to do. What was she doing she wondered in her head? Kate got closer and closer till she was next to the door. From outside it sounded like the white figure was casting a spell of some sort. What was the figure doing? It was intense. It was like a dark hole trying to pull her into its stomach. The figure broke the door open and took her mask off. It was Kate’s mum. No, it couldn’t be. That’s not possible, she died in a car crash 10 years ago. Was it the ghost coming to haunt her?    

The Scarlet Sky

By Angelica (5A)

Once there was a teen named Lila. She didn’t have many friends but the friends she had were very nice. One night she just couldn’t sleep. The night was as silent as an empty room. It gave her goose bumps and a slight shiver down her spine. Lila got her phone, hoping it would make her sleepy enough. Half an hour later she was getting really bored. As soon as Lila put her phone down she suddenly heard a noise. At first, she thought it was some animal or a gust of wind but it wasn’t what she thought. Lila saw a shadow creeping near her bed.  

As the shadow came near she woke. She sighed and hoped that the shadow would never come back again. She quickly went to sleep. She woke up. Everything was dark. Her heart raced as fast as lightning. She looked around in fear. She blindly looked around her room trying to make as least noise as she could. She finally found a torch and turned it on. It was just bright enough but it was flickering like it was dying.

The sky was a faint dark red. As she gazed into the deep scarlet sky, Lila realised she needed to do something. She got the equipment she needed and packed them in a bag. Lila set off quickly, she was hearing and seeing like a crazy dream. She went outside and saw an irregular house. She was curious and went inside. She found a chest she noticed how weird and small the house was like a tiny play house. Lila opened the chest only to find a weird slightly shiny sort of stone. Soon she heard a great ghoulish voice like a ghost had come to help her. At first, she was fearful, but soon she followed every instruction the voice told her.

Soon she ran to where it told her to go. She saw a tall tower that wasn’t there before. It looked like it emerged from the ground. It had no door and was great giant ginormous with weird vines that had grown on the tall tower. The heavenly voice told her to climb it, so she did. Eventually she got to the top of the tower. She then realised it was a bell tower. She saw an area that looked like it had been prepared for the stone.  She thought it was for the stone, so she put it in. The sky was not red anymore, “You did it!” the odd heavenly voice called. She went back to find her parents. After a while she got back with a welcoming smile from her mum. She tiredly walked down the hallway to her bed. She went to her bed and slept in peace.

From Our Head Of Department - Teaching and Learning

Our students are continuing to focus on learning to be organised with their belongings and bookwork as part of their AVID focus. This term, we have been busy teaching and learning how to 'Set up their notes' (S in STAR) as part of learning our bookwork expectations. Year 1 have been using 2 and 3 column notes to organise their notes as seen in the photos we have shared this fortnight. It has also being so wonderful to see the amount of pride our learners' have when I visit classrooms and celebrate this learning on Parade each week. Well done, everyone! We look forward to sharing our student work display in our student office with you as we continue to celebrate the amazing learning of our students with the Leichhardt school community! 

From Our Community Support Coordinator

Active School Travel (AST) encourages families to participate in active travel to and from school. Active travel includes walking, riding, scootering, skateboarding, catching public transport or even carpooling with other families.

Benefits of Active Travel

Active school travel once a week can make all the difference. Benefits include:

• Helping students be healthier, happier and more alert at school
• Increasing road safety awareness
• Building stronger school communities
• Making streets around schools safer
• Reducing traffic congestion.

Getting Started

Remember, active travel just once a week can make all the difference!

Some tips to help you start active school travel include:

• Practice the journey to see how long it will take if you walk or ride
• Try to participate in active travel once a week and choose a day that is easiest for the family
• If you can’t walk or ride the whole way, find a place to safely park closer to the school where you can walk part-way
• Find another family to car pool

Safety

Here are some tips to stay safe while participating in active school travel:

• Always walk with a buddy
• Cross roads at traffic lights (where ever possible)
• Follow road safety rules
• Wear a helmet if riding a scooter or bike
• Be aware of stranger danger

WE NEED YOU!

We are looking for Breakfast Club Volunteers. Can you spare some time of a morning between 7:45am and 8:30am to ensure our students start their day with a nutritious breakfast. It would be greatly appreciated if you could also help clean up after. 

You will need to have a current Bluecard. If you are interested in volunteering or would like more information please call  on 3813 3222  or email Trish at pferg18@eq.edu.au

From Our Indigenous Cultural Coordinator

From Our Teachers

Year 1B

This week in HASS Year 1 used their knowledge of past and present and started to develop their understanding of a timeline! They did many different activities in pairs and as a whole group. We made a standing timeline with all different things from the past and present including phones, ink pens, watches and radios. We had some great conversations about how these items have changed. 

Breakfast Club

All Students are welcome to join our breakfast club each morning. It runs from around 8:15am – 8:25 am and  is located down in the OLA outside of Student Services. Students are welcome to enjoy two slices of toast, cereal and if available a cup of milk. If your child has any allergies or special dietary requirements please inform the school office on 3813 3222 so we can ensure that these are updated in our school system. 

Important information for lunch support 

Due to the overwhelming number of children currently accessing lunch support, students will be asked to advise their connect teacher in the morning Connect session if lunch is needed. Students who are late can advise the office upon receiving their late slip. Parents / Guardians are encouraged to contact the school on 3813 3222 or send an SMS message if lunch support is required. 

Parents / Guardians, who request lunch support, will receive an ID attend text message when their child/ren have accessed this support, so they are aware. 

Play & Learn Discovery Group

Out in Our Community