DATES FOR YOUR DIARY:

MARCH

Monday 20th Mrs Gittoes away

Wednesday 22nd Mrs Gittoes away Wednesday 29th Mrs Purvis away Friday 24th Mrs Gittoes away

Friday 31st March Finlayson Sports APRIL Wednesday 5th Easter Hat Parade P&C Working Bee Friday 7th Pink Day LAST DAY OF TERM

Bald Blair School students, staff, parents and community members have always been extremely proud of our sporting achievements and for the past couple of years we have continued to be a force to be reckoned with in the sporting arena. The past two weeks has seen our students excelling in the sporting arena at tennis, swimming and cricket.

At the Armidale PSSA swimming carnival our swimmers Mac and Alice Finlayson, Aidan Purvis, Bridget McKemey and Nakita Hoffman swam brilliantly and the P5 relay team improved their PD by another 9 seconds. Great result!! The next day Harry and Aidan Purvis travelled to Tamworth to compete in the North West PSSA tennis trials and Aidan was chosen in the North West PSSA team to compete at the state titles to be held at Newcastle from May 2nd to 5th. Last Friday Harry Ray, Aidan Purvis and Harry Purvis were selected to participate in the Armidale and District PSSA cricket trials and Aidan was successful in being selected. He now travels to Inverell to compete in the Northern region trials next term. Good luck!!! Our next big sporting event is the Finlayson Sport’s Day to be held at Chandler School on Friday 31st March

commencing at 9.15am with the march past. Students and staff have been practicing marching, ball games and running however the wet weather has prevented our students from practicing high jump and long jump. Hopefully the weather will improve and the gym mats can come out later in the week. Congratulations to all of the highly dedicated students who consistently hand their homework in on a Friday. Well done!!!! At the present time our staff at school are extremely busy with writing their professional development plans (PDP), writing the Annual School Report (ASR) using a new program called SpaRo, updating the School Plan and writing the plans milestones for 2017, getting ready for the LMBR, updating literacy and numeracy continuums, implementing TEN and L3 program and planning and teaching a variety of explicit lessons in all key learning areas. Could all parents please check their child/children for head lice because a couple of cases have been reported?

Kindergarten N ews

Kindergarten It is so inspiring to see our kindergarten students continue to learn and progress with their skills in reading, writing and mathematics. They are continuing to improve their listening skills via the 5L’s – listening with your ears, looking with your eyes, locking lips, locking legs and placing their hands in their laps when they are sitting on the floor. In reading they are learning their sight words and some students have progressed to their second list of words in the Magic 100 words program,

Bald Blair public

School news

TERM ONE 16th March, 2017. WEEK 8 baldblair-p.admin@det.nsw.edu.au Phone: 67791578 Fax: 67792060

School Vision We are a vibrant and innovative learning community that is committed to delivering excellence within a rich and

diverse learning environment. Our challenging learning programs are delivered by high performing staff in an inclusive, safe and supportive learning community. We promote excellence and equity by ensuring all students

become successful learners, confident, and creative individuals and active and informed citizens.

revising all sounds from A-Z, they have been working on the letters s, a, t, p, and I, and combining letters like s, a, t to sound out simple CVC words “sat”, working on rhyming words, what letter does a word begin with or end with, writing simple sentences, practicing writing letters, studied the number five and six and they just love to listen to at least six books per day. Each day the students also confidently complete a cutting activity and a number of fine motor activities. It is pleasing to see that all students are trying to achieve their learning goals like gluing around the outside of their cutting skills before putting it in their book, writing their words on the line, starting their letters in the correct spot, trying to be neat when colouring and using a variety of colours when completing an activity. Some students are even logging themselves on the computer using their email address. Thank you to all of the kindergarten parents who have been listening to their child read and complete their homework tasks. Parents often ask me how can I help my child at home. Here are some things that you could do:

• Read a story to your child before bed • Let them count forwards and backwards from a

given number • Draw a picture and they could write a story • Play a game of fish or memory • Give a child a word and say what rhymes with this

word eg hat – mat • Write their numbers • Practice writing their letters • Make simple craft or art pieces

In Class with 3-6 Another busy fortnight in 3-6 Emojis! We have completed two STEM projects with the small school alliance. The

students engineered a helicopter and experimented with making the helicopter fall to the ground with the quickest time. Students believe the shorter the wings the faster the fall! We have also been looking at the scientific aspect of floating and sinking. Students engineered a junk boat out of recycled materials. The goal was to have their boat travel across water

with added extra weight of counters and not sink. We are half way through reading 'The Indian in the Cupboard' and students have completed numerous activities around the story.

We have finished our procedure writing and are working on recounts for the rest of the term. Students have completed their procedure assessment. In geography students are conducting a mini research task on one of Australia's natural features. This will be presented to the class in the next two weeks. We also linked our visual arts with our geography unit. Students drew and painted Uluru! Homework return has continued to be impressive. Please try and listen to your child/children read their spelling words out aloud and cover them when writing them out. Look, cover, write and check strategy! As you know I'm finishing up at the end of this term, so if anyone would like to make an appointment to discuss any matters or check on student progress please contact me! I'm more than happy to meet with you before baby Lenehan arrives! North West Regional Swimming Carnival On Monday 6th of March selected students from Bald Blair attended the North West regional swimming carnival which was held in Armidale. It has been a while since our small school has had students represent at the North West level in swimming. It was a huge achievement for the five students who attended which were: Mac Finlayson – 9 year old 50m freestyle, who swam 16th out of 28 P5 Relay Team – Alice Finlayson, Bridget McKemey, Nakita Hoffman and Aidan Purvis The relay team came fourth in their heat and swam 9 seconds faster than their previous time. All students had a great time representing our school and hoping they can go again next year!

North West Tennis Trials On Friday 3rd March my brother Harry and I travelled to Tamworth to compete in the North West tennis Trials which were held at Treloar Park. I came 5th overall and I w ill now travel to Newcastle in May to represent the

North West Tennis team at the State PSSA Tennis Carnival. It is a privilege to represent my school and region and I’m looking forward to travelling to Newcastle to compete in the carnival. A idan Purvis

McGrath Foundation Pink Stumps Day!!!

Bald Blair Public School will be holding a pink stumps day to help support the

McGrath Foundation. This is going to be a fun day for all parents,

students and teachers to attend! On the 7th April (last day of term) parents

and friends are invited to our school to help raise funds for the foundation. We aim to

start the day at 1 o'clock with a BBQ lunch. This will be followed by a big game of

cricket where parents and students can play. We ask that you bring $5 per person to go

towards this great cause. If you would like to donate extra money that is also fine.

Below is a website link that you can visit to add to our donations.

A huge thank you to Harry Ray who came to school with the idea of a pink day! Great

initiative! Can you please RSVP to the school no later than Monday 27th March to let us

know if you’ll be attending the BBQ.

Everyone is to come dressed in PINK!

Science 3-6 with

Mrs Purvis Desert Survivors

In science the students have been provided with hands-on, shared experiences of how living things adapt to other living things through the use of colour.

Japanese with Mrs Purvis K-2 The students in K-2 have been continuing to learn how to pronounce numbers 1- 5 and how to follow the correct sequence

to form the symbols for the numbers 1-5 in Japanese. They have also been learning to sing Heads, knees and shoulders in Japanese. 3-6 The students in 3-6 have been continuing to learn symbols in the hiragana alphabet. They have been learning how to produce the symbol correctly and how to pronounce the sound and some words that begin with that symbol.

Music 3-6 with Mrs Purvis Our school has been very fortunate to be invited to take part in a course designed to give primary school teachers the

skills, knowledge and confidence to teach ukulele in the classroom. Earlier this term I took part in a one day workshop with Cathy Welsford and I was introduced to how to teach the K-6 music syllabus through the use of ukulele. I look forward to implementing a series of lessons designed by Cathy to teach the students in 3-6 how to play the ukulele. Lessons will commence this Thursday after our Cardio tennis lesson. In the Library with Mrs Purvi

Students are

enjoying their

Library Bags Please remember to send library bags with your children on Wednesday (K-2) and Thursday (3-6) if they would like to

borrow books from the library.

School Banking is every Tuesday

Is your child missing their Bald Blair Tracksuit???

There is a size 6 jacket, size 6 pants & size 10 jacket all without names

here at school!

Thank you Mrs Lenehan for capturing 3-6 during STEM junk boats!

To Mac Finlayson, Ursula Chilcott-Geere, Korin Kelly, Emily Campion & Clem McKemey who all celebrated their Birthday’s recently.

In K-2 Class with Mrs McIntyre L3 Training update Last week I had my next L3 training. I have been learning a lot of great different reading and writing strategies to start implementing in the classroom. Not only Kindergarten but also Year 1 and 2 students have been enjoying the small group activities at the jellybean

table. Can’t wait to see what happens at the next session on Thursday next week. Carolyn Gadd (the L3 trainer) will be coming up to Bald Blair on Friday the 24th of March to complete her first lesson observation. The students love the idea of me doing more learning as well. As part of L3 groups, students rotate through 6 hands on/interactive activities a week in a small mixed ability group of 3. These activities are independent and help students develop fine motor skills and enhance their learning. Maths Over the last two weeks in Maths, we have been busy learning about multiplication in terms of ‘groups of’ and have been practicing skip counting by 2’s, 5’s, 10’s. In addition, we have been looking at using arrays to undertake the takes. If you would like to help your child at home or in the car, perhaps you could have them skip count by 2’s, 5’s, 10’s. If they have mastered those, you could try 3’s, 4’s. Also counting forward and backwards would help assist the students with what we are doing at school. This week we are completing ‘Grouping in twos, fives and tens’ on Mathletics in the Multiplication strand. Literacy This term we have been doing a unit on books written by Mem Fox. As part of the unit, we have read the book ‘Possum Magic’ and students plotted the Hush’s trip around Australia

on a map and we had the opportunity to try some Australia food that made Hush visible. It was great fun.

Spelling Hands on spelling activities have been a huge hit and have greatly helped with students seeing the pattern within their weekly spelling words. Activities have included:

- Writing words in sand - Make their words with alphabet stamps - Stamp their words playdough - Type words on the computer – changing the

font, size and colour - Thread their words on laces

If you would like to help your child with spelling at home, you could perhaps

- Get them to read the words to you

- Test them on their words

- Write some of their words in sentences

Important Message to Parents

Regarding School Times All parents please remember that ‘staff at our school’, are not required to be at school until 8.20am if they are on the first duty. Staff may arrive earlier and that is because they need time to set up their teaching and learning programs for their students to complete during the day. If, from time to time you need to drop your child/children off earlier please organise this with your child/children’s class teacher. Don’t just assume that it would be alright. A friendly phone call would be most appreciated. Also Mrs Davidson will be out of the office on a number of occasions this year because she is being trained in LMBR so no emails concerning students are to be sent to her email. As per our Emergency Management Plan if child/children arrive at school before a teacher then they must sit on the silver seats under the COLA. No playing or running around. Parents also need to remember that staff participate in staff meetings on Wednesday afternoon so all students must be collected from school by 3.40pm. Over the coming months all staff will be required to complete a number of professional development courses after school so collection of students at 3.40pm is paramount. The homework centre is still running on Tuesday afternoon from 3.30pm until 5.30pm. Community Health Nurse Visit for Years 5 & 6 A community Health Nurse will visit our school in Term 3 to talk to our year 5 & 6 students about “Growing Up & Puberty”. Details will be sent home in term 3.

From the Office! Please send in lunch orders if you would like your child to order lunch at the upcoming Finlayson Sports. Also could you please ensure

notes and money are in a clearly marked envelope with name. Please also remember to label your child/ children’s clothing.

Guyra Hockey Club is now taking registrations for the winter comp played every week in

Armidale at SportUNE. Offering under 9s, 11s, 13s, and 16s. Under 13s and 16s will be a mixed comp played on Friday nights with under 9s and 11s played Saturday mornings also being mixed.

We also offer a range of senior mens and womens teams. Mens are played Sundays and

Womens predominantly on Saturday afternoons. Anyone interested or looking for more

information please contact Emma Elis on 67797616 or email guyrahockey@gmail.com.