Guildford West Public School
NEWSLETTER - 2024, Term 2, Week 10
Dear Parents and Carers,
We have made it to the end of another busy term! This term, students have enjoyed participating in lots of fun, hands-on learning experiences both inside and outside the classroom. Last week we held our athletics carnival for students aged 8 and older which was a great success.
Next term, we look forward to welcoming parents on site for Education Week in Week 3 for some Olympic-themed activities! More information will be provided early next term regarding this event.
I encourage you to take some time to relax over the holiday break and enjoy some time as a family. NAIDOC Week falls during the school holidays and there are lots of local activities and events that you may wish to take part in. More information can be found below regarding a local family fun day.
Three-way parent teacher interviews will be held on Wednesday 31st July. I encourage all parents to book in a time using our online booking system to meet with your child's teacher to discuss your child's progress and goals.
Wishing you a safe holiday break, we look forward to seeing students back next term on Tuesday 23rd July.
Ms Weston
Principal
Support Unit News
Cooking
S Tamworth have enjoyed being back in the kitchen using ingredients from our garden to try new recipes. They made French toast using fresh chicken eggs and honey and pumpkin muffins. S Tamworth learnt to follow a recipe, measure ingredients and work together as a team.
Science
This term, S Tamworth has been learning about animals. They have learnt about different types of animals including mammals, sea animals and insects. Students have read books, looked at specimens and engaged in play to explore the features, diet and habitat of different animals. The class created and wrote about their own imaginary animal and have cared for our class pet, “Sparkles” the yabbie.
Sport
This term S Tamworth have had fun joining Stage 2 for sport. Students have been involved in a range of activities including cycling, basketball and playground games. They have also spent time in the multisensory room, developing their gross motor skills. S Tamworth tried their best and enjoyed taking part in the school cross country and athletics carnivals.
Early Stage 1 News
In our Paddock to Plate lessons, we've been exploring the connections between our garden, chicken coop, and cooking activities. The students enjoy visiting the chicken coop and vegetable garden to collect eggs and harvest produce. This term, our focus ingredients were eggs and pumpkins. In the first round of cooking, we used the eggs we collected to make French Toast. In the second round, we used the pumpkins we grew at our school for our recipes.
Our Kindergarten students have been diving into the exciting world of music through the hands-on Amplify program. They've been discovering the magic of music by playing a variety of percussion instruments. With each session, they explore and experiment with rhythm, beat, tune, dynamics, and pitch. The classroom comes alive with the sounds of drums, tambourines, maracas, and xylophones, as the children learn to create and appreciate music in a fun and interactive way.
Stage 1 News
Cooking
The students in Stage 1 have been busy this term harvesting in the garden and cooking in the kitchen. During our Paddock to Plate lessons we have been liking our time on chicken watch collecting eggs and using them in the first round of cooking to make French toast. Our focus for the next round of cooking was pumpkins. We have been fortunate to have a large harvest of pumpkins growing in our gardens. Students were fascinated by how the pumpkins grow on vines and some of our students harvested them with the help of Mr Shaw. We used the pumpkins in the kitchen to bake delicious pumpkin and chocolate chip muffins. The students (and teachers!) loved the interesting taste of pumpkin and spices.
Chicken watch
Students in Stage 1 have been looking after our resident chickens this term. We have had the opportunity to interact with these lovely ladies. They are usually very happy to see us and communicate this loudly! Students care for the chickens by ensuring they are fed a specific mixture of pellets and other ingredients and they have enough hay to keep them dry. Students took turns to go into the chicken coop and feed the chickens. Some brave students carried the chooks and collected the eggs. We had to be careful as our hens were very protective over their eggs. We are so lucky to have these wonderful chickens and look forward to our next opportunity to care for them.
Stage 2 News
What a term it has been! Stage 2 classes have been busy in the kitchen again over the last few weeks. Students have been cooking honey-pumpkin muffins which have been described as “delicious” and “yummy”. The students also cooked rainbow slice. Both recipes used many of the herbs, vegetables and eggs from our school garden. We hope students will continue to refine their cooking skills and make fun and healthy snacks at home with you!
Last week the students attended our annual athletics carnival. There were many events for the students to show their athletics skills including running races, shot put, discus and long jump.
Students have also been hard at work in the classroom as well. During math lessons, students have been building their mathematical understanding while completing a variety of problems and puzzles. In music, the students have been creating their own songs using technology.
Public speaking was a focus this term. Students wrote and presented their speech in class. Two representatives from each class were selected to compete at the school final. Congratulations to Katelyn and Scarlett who were successful in the final and competed at the zone public speaking competition. Lastly, our students commemorated National Reconciliation Week with each student pledging how they are going to make our community a better place.
Stage 3 News
The last 5 weeks have been incredibly busy and productive for Stage 3 classes.
Students have been highly active during Friday sport. They learned to play volleyball, basketball or rugby. This term, students also had a group of students learning to ride bikes around the school. It has been a wonderful few weeks of fun doing physical activity with peers from other classes.
Students have also engaged in music lessons as part of our creative arts unit this term. During these lessons, they explored the different parts of pop songs. Students learned that the ‘hook’ in a piece of music is the catchy tune or lyric that makes the song memorable. They applied their knowledge about pitch and duration to play these songs on different instruments including the glockenspiel.
In English, Stage 3 students have been analysing Gregg Dreise’s text “My Culture and Me” and explored how the author uses symbols and language to teach the audience about his Aboriginal culture. Students are taking inspiration from Dreise’s work to create a class book to inform their peers about their own cultures. Students have done an amazing job with designing symbols and ideas to represent important ideas that they would like to share about their cultures. We cannot wait to share our class books with you when they are completed!
NCCD
Dear parents, guardians and carers
Every year, all schools in Australia participate in the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD). The NCCD process requires schools to identify information already available in the school about supports provided to students with disability. These relate to legislative requirements under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 and the Disability Standards for Education 2005, in line with the NCCD guidelines (2019).
Information provided about students to the Australian Government for the NCCD includes:
year of schooling
category of disability: physical, cognitive, sensory or social/emotional
level of adjustment provided: support provided within quality differentiated teaching practice, supplementary, substantial or extensive.
This information assists schools to:
formally recognise the supports and adjustments provided to students with disability in schools
consider how they can strengthen the support of students with disability in schools
develop shared practices so that they can review their learning programs in order to improve educational outcomes for students with disability.
The NCCD provides state and federal governments with the information they need to plan more broadly for the support of students with disability.
The NCCD will have no direct impact on your child and your child will not be involved in any testing process. The school will provide data to the Australian Government in such a way that no individual student will be able to be identified – the privacy and confidentiality of all students is ensured. All information is protected by privacy laws that regulate the collection, storage and disclosure of personal information. To find out more about these matters, please refer to the Australian Government’s Privacy Policy (https://www.education.gov.au/privacy-policy).
Further information about the NCCD can be found on the NCCD Portal (https://www.nccd.edu.au).
If you have any questions about the NCCD, please contact the school and ask to speak to Miss Giles.
Ms Weston
Principal
Guildford West Public School
Email: guildfordw-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au
Website: www.guildfordw-p.schools.nsw.edu.au
Location: 23-51 Palmer Street, Guildford West NSW, Australia
Phone: (02) 9632-9942
Facebook: guildfordwestps