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- Term 3 Week 10 2020
- Principals Report
- Foundation - Year 2
- Year 3 - 5 Class
- Year 6 - 12 Class
- Mathematics and Science
- Adventures in the Library
- Kitchen Garden
- Language and Performing Arts
- #theresnoroomforcomplacency
- #stopthespread
- #keepupwithinformationcovid19
- HAS Calendar - Whats Happening / Coming Up Next Term
It has been a busy term where staff, students and the community have had the opportunity to get back to basics, with restrictions from COVID-19 getting a little lighter, enabling more contact for the community within the school. In this newsletter parents and students will find articles on the activities in each learning area in the school, informing of the highlights in learning that have occurred.
In week 3 of the term we had our mid-year interviews where parents and students had the opportunity to come into school and receive feedback on progress so far for this year. Goals have been set at the start of the year and have changed as student targets have been met. These goals address a variety of areas from basic organisation to work routines, but for many of our students they link back to Reading, Writing and Numeracy, our three main targets on our School Improvement Plan. At the younger year levels from Foundation to Year 2 the target especially addresses the synthetic phonics associated with our Read Write Inc program and from here they progress through different aspects of Reading and Writing, all connected to the Australian Curriculum. Similarly, in Numeracy targets set have been linked to the Australian Curriculum and with this aspects of Numeracy such as fluency, automaticity, number sequences and the problem solving approaches that are built more and more into numeracy as students advance through school. At the end of this term reports will go home and they will continue to link up to goals such as these. Secondary reports will be written for each subject and will be formative in nature, while primary reports will be progress checks, reflecting on student effort and progress in each subject.
Throughout the term there have been some great highlights. Earlier this term we held our Sporting Colours day, organised by our SRC to support Kids with Cancer. Students and staff really got behind the cause with a colourful day punctuated by a great variety of sporting strips, representing many different codes, from the football codes, through to motorsports and rodeo. We had a game of ‘Capture the flag’ at lunchtime and finished the day with a testing quiz, where students showed their sporting and colour knowledge quite well, two students in particularly topping the effort with 100% scores. At the end of the day the school community had raised $80.05 for the cause.
On the curricular side our science classes recently engaged in the watermelon challenge, a great team based and hands on learning activity. Watermelons sacrificed themselves in explosive style as students experimented to find out how much energy needed to be expended to blow them up. Rubber bands were used in the hundreds as the melons were wrapped and succumbed to the pressure. Each rubber band had an equal strength in Newtons which was then used in the calculations to figure out the amount of energy required to complete the explosive act.
Recently we had a close stretch of community activities starting with our Open Night on Thursday September 3rd. We had a good crowd of visitors to the night this year. Presentations by teachers and students occurred in the Foundation to Year 2 room, the Year 3 – 5 room, the Secondary Classroom and the Science Lab. In addition to this displays occurred in the Library, Design and Technology, LOTE / Performing Arts and the Kitchen Garden. The night went well with visitors able to see examples of student learning and the processes involved as well as the products of their work.
On September 8th the school held it's Autism Awareness Day, which was attended by members of our community and also a representative from NDIS. The day started with a welcome to country by Pauline McKenzie and a big 'reveal' of our Autism Awareness shirts by our staff. From there students went around to a variety of activities all aimed at giving them an awareness of what life is like from an autistic point of view. The day finished with the unveiling of a sign that will be going up next to our playground area to educate and encourage all our kids to understand the communication needs of other kids. The sign is a picture sign, similar to the visual schedules and other visual tools that are used with Autistic students, and will give our students and adults a chance to understand how to communicate in different ways. I was also shared a link to a great Youtube video which provides a good explanation of Autism, what it is and the experience of autism, the video can be found at
The video provides an animated and interesting explanation of autism and is worth sharing with your kids. The day was testimony to the efforts of all the staff involved, especially Amanda Hilder and Deb Youle. A range of photos from the day can be seen on our Website at
Sports Day this year was a huge success, as around 80 students from Hawker, Leigh Creek, Marree and SOTA attended and competed with each other in a positive atmosphere. The noise level was great, and I received reports from people away from the school who were able to listen to students and adults cheering competitors on, a really positive aspect of the experience for our students. The interschool competition was won by Marree and the House competition by Heysen, in an incredibly close contest over Arkaba. A great feature of this years event was the opportunity to recognise different athletes with age level medallions, and also the new Team Spirit award which was won by Jack Allen. A good variety of pictures from the Sports Day are available to view on our website.
Over the term our students have benefitted from the opportunity to be coached in different sports. Earlier in the term Volleyball SA visited and provided coaching in the basic skills of a game which is quite different to other sports our students have participated in before. Dig Set and Spike are new terms and skills that our students have learnt as a result of this. On Monday September 14th, our students also received coaching from Tennis SA, utilising the new Hot Shots Tennis kit that our local club has received. Both visits gave our students opportunities to further develop skills in these sports.
In week 9 our Year 3 – 7 students visited Monarto Safari Park and gained unique opportunities to observe up close a large range of fauna from the African Plains and other locations. A special focus however of the camp was the opportunity to observe and learn about the endangered Rhino. We didn’t just find out about the species itself but also about the complex challenges surrounding the attempts to save this creature.
This term across our state and nation the issue of Cybersafety has arisen increasingly, in light of the fact that more Australians have been at home and in contact with each other over the internet. This has created issues for students in particular as they have been increasingly exposed to a variety of Social Media and their destructive impacts. In week 9, Headspace, who have been once again visiting our school on a more regular basis came in and spoke with our older students about Social Media and the issues associated with it. A prime learning experience in particular was gained as students found out how intrusive the internet can be, even on the lives of innocent individuals.
In one staffing change for term four, Amanda Hilder will away on a well earned break for the final part of the year. In her place we will be welcoming Harald Walther, who has worked with our students before and is a familiar face for our JP students. We wish all our students a great holiday and look forward to catching up for the start of term four.
Mr Daren O'Neill
Principal
From the land of the little people...
As term 3 draws to a close we look back and take note of all the time that has passed and all that we have strived to achieve. Individual efforts have been astounding, and as a class group we are magical.
Somethings we have been working on this term are;
Maths:
The passing of time, Counting strategies, Fractions and the card games of Fish, Snap and Memory.
English:
We have continued working within the Read Write Inc. program, used Vinny, Connie, Penny and Ollie to help us write well and concentrated on writing narratives paying lots of attention to using describing words by focusing on our 5 senses to help us.
Science:
We have discovered about vibration by investigating sounds balloons can make, making rubber band musical instruments and cup phones. We have also studied different ways to package something precious to send through the mail by running our different ideas through some rigorous testing.
HASS:
From our picture book study of My Cat Likes To Hide In Boxes we chose a country, asked some inquiry question about that country and then answered the questions by searching for relevant pictures, talking to adults and sometimes we talked to our family and learnt about their travel experiences. We put all of our research into a picture book made with Book Creator.
Thank you again for all the support you have afforded me throughout the term. I promise you it does not go unnoticed. It is so important for us all to work well together for the betterment of the beautiful children in our care.
Wishing you all a fantastic time over the holidays with lots of laughter and fun.
Mrs Amanda Hilder
Foundation - Yr2 Teacher / Literacy Coordinator
3-5
This term in English, students wrote their own version of a fairy tale of their choice. They had to write two versions of the story. The first was to be told from the villains perspective, and the second was to be a fractured fairy tale. These stories turned out fantastic! We had a big bad wolf who was actually a vegetarian, another wolf who had bad allergies, an angry giant who kept having his things stolen by a tiny human and a poor old lady who had children eating her house! The stories were all very creative and students had a great time writing them.
In HASS this term, we studied celebrations around the world. We looked at some of the things students celebrate at home, school and in the community and then made some comparisons to events that people celebrate in other countries. Later in the term we turned our focus to learning about Asia. We learned about China, Vietnam and Thailand and next term we will continue with Japan and Korea.
HPE
In Health, the 3-5 and 6-9 classes used the movie ‘Inside Out’ to learn about emotions and how our personalities come to be what they are. It was a good little unit and it was useful for students to think about why they or others might respond to particular events.
In PE Rebekah taught us about volleyball. This was a great opportunity for Bek to use a strength of hers to complete her SACE. Her knowledge and understanding was very beneficial to the other students as well as it gave them the chance to play a sport that they otherwise wouldn’t have done.
We also spent a lot of time preparing for Quorn Sports Day in Week 4 and our own Sports Day in week 8. It was great to have Leigh Creek and Marree come down as it encouraged more competition. Hawker students performed fantastically on the day with many personal bests beaten!
Miss Hayley Brown
Year 3-5 Teacher / HPE Coordinator
Welcome to the end of another hectic term. The last few weeks have been a bit of a blur! The year 7’s of the class headed off for the camp to Monarto last week, and the year 8 and 9’s were to go for a hike on Friday with the R-2 class, so it’s all happening!
English – 6 - 11
We have combined the class this term with all students from year 6 to 11 undertaking an in depth study of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. This was met with some trepidation to begin with but everyone got involved in the story and enjoyed it once we got past the Shakespearean language. A highlight was students coming up with their own Shakespearean insults, where they discovered that some words have a different meaning in Shakespeare’s time than they do now.
A couple of favourites include:
“Thou art a beslubbering tickle-brained minnow” (You are a slobbery, feeble minded midget)
“Thou art a sheep-biting, rank-scented measle” (You are a mean, bad smelling disease)
“Thou art a clay-brained, eye-offending, mushrump” (You are a stupid, hard to look at, fungus)
Students are currently working on a journal entry from Lady Macbeth’s perspective recounting the night of King Duncan’s murder, and how she felt about it. I’ve read a few of these and they have been entertaining so far.
HASS – 6-8
We started HASS with a look at economics, Australian trade partners, and looking at where Australia sits in the global economy. We defined a recession and depression, and this brought about some great conversations in light of the current state of our economy.
We then switched our focus to business, and looked at the types of businesses there are, what makes a good business, and also took into account the social responsibilities of running a business. We included some teamwork activities where students learned the importance of testing an idea, working out what did and didn’t work, and testing again (prototyping). We then looked at marketing, budgeting and advertising, and the students came up with their own business ideas which they will begin to implement in week 10, and into term 4.
Below are the students building prototypes using the marshmallow challenge. They had to build a structure out of spaghetti and balance a marshmallow on top of it. The highest structure won.
Only one team actively planned their attempt and then tested it. This team was the winner of the challenge – well done to Annabelle and Tayla. Stella and Callie came in 2nd with Jack and Rihanna coming 3rd. All found the task more complicated than they thought!
Mrs Sharon Bates
Year 6-12 Teacher / SACE Coordinator
Recently Hawker Area school took a part in The Watermelon experiment. Our students learned about forces that create implosion. Students had a lot of fun while they learned about the scientific ways of conducting experiments. They measured the size of our watermelons, weighted them and used rubber bands, size 65. The results varied as we could not control some variables like distribution of the pressure of rubber bands across the watermelon or size and shape of the watermelon. However, all implosions have been spectacular and students enjoyed the experiment.
I am very proud to say that both our SACE students achieved a very satisfactory completion of the Stage 2 Research Project as well as Stage 1 subjects . Both girls from year 11 and year 12 worked very well to achieve the positive outcomes.
“The South Australian Certificate of Education (SACE) is a modern, internationally-recognised secondary school qualification designed to equip you with the skills, knowledge, and personal capabilities to successfully participate in our fast-paced global society.”
It is such a comport to know that students in small school like Hawker Area School can receive same quality education like students in metropolitan schools.
Mrs Lidia Szelzak
Mathematics and Science Teacher
Premiers Reading Challenge
The Premier’s Reading Challenge has finished for this year. All students involved in the programme will receive their awards by the end of the school year.
You may remember the article in our last newsletter regarding the F-5 students’ involvement in the Premier’s Reading Challenge: STEM Reading and Design Challenge. This involved them responding to one of the STEM books we read together in our Library lessons. The F-2 students designed and painted a picture based on the book, One Less Fish by Kim Michelle Toft.
Over the whole state, 1,259 entries were received by the Premier’s Reading Challenge office. The work that both the F-2 and the 3-5 students completed was a part of this. Prizes are awarded to best and runner up entrants along with recognition of outstanding school participation. Recently, we received notification that one of our students is to receive an award for her outstanding effort.
It is with pleasure that I announce that the winner in the R-2 group was Aylah McKenzie, who was a student in Amanda Hilder’s class during Term 2. Her winning entry is below.
Book Week 2020 Theme: Curious Creatures, Wild Minds
Book Week will be celebrated in Week 2 of Term 4, October 17 – 23. We plan to hold a dress up day on Wednesday October 21, with a parade at school around 11 a.m. It’s not long now, so get the thinking caps on and see what amazing outfits can be created with what you have around you.
Here are some ideas to help get the creative juices flowing…
The Curious Child: Look at books that have curious children in them such as Curious George, Alice in Wonderland, Ada Twist – Scientist, Rosie Revere – Engineer, Engineer books by Andrew King and children with great imaginations such as
When Henry Caught Imaginitis, Drac and the Gremlin, Hunting for Dragons, Where the Wild Things Are.
Curious Creatures – Real: Look at the many strange creatures in nature. Explore Your World: Weird, Wild and Amazing by Tim Flannery, The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Ugly Animals by Sami Bayley and Fauna: Australia’s Most Curious Creatures by Tania McCartney are all recently published books but check your own bookshelves for others.
Curious Creatures – Spiritual and Imagined
Myths and Legends and Folklore – Mermaids, dragons, yowie etc.
Fantasy books – such as The Gruffalo, The Hobbit, Ice Wolves
Speculative Fiction – such as Mechanica and other books by Lance Balchin
Aboriginal Spiritual Beings – The Bunyip of Berkeley’s Creek, The Quinkins (Percy Trezise and Dick Roughsey), The Binna Binna Man (Meme McDonald and Boori Pryor)
Scholastic Book Fair
The Scholastic Book Fair will be held in Week 3, Term 4 (the week after Book Week). More information regarding the Fair will come out early Term 4. It will run very similar to last year’s fair.
Commissioner's Digital Challenge
The F-5 students have been taking part in the Commissioner’s Digital Challenge: Space to Dream, which encourages students to learn how to be an effective and creative problem solver, to be bold thinkers and create out-of-the-box solutions. The brief for the students was to design a toy or gadget on the iPad app, Maker’s Empire, for a child of their age who is moving to Mars. I will be forwarding the students’ completed designs (not the 3D models) to Adelaide before the end of term. The most creative, useful and cool designs will feature in a public exhibition at MOD Museum of Discovery (which is on North Terrace Adelaide adjacent to the Morphett St Bridge) later in the year.
Mr Green has been working hard to get them all printed on the 3D printer in the library so that students can have their own 3D model. A design can take anywhere between 2-4 hours to print. Unfortunately, not all designs have been able to be printed yet as there have been a few issues with the 3D printer. When these are sorted, all students will get their own 3D printed design. Below, are some of the designs that have been printed as well as labelled pictures and explanations of some of the designs.
Visual Arts
This term, the F-5 students have been exploring colour with Miss Suzanne. This exploration has involved mixing the three primary colours of red, blue and yellow using their fingers, cardboard and paintbrushes to create backgrounds for their artwork. Following the instructions that Miss Suzanne gave, the students then drew a dragon (or dinosaur, depending on who you ask) and a unicorn (or horse or wolf). These were cut out and added to the background once it was dry. Even though the students followed the same set of instructions, each art piece is different. A sample of the work the students have been doing can be seen below.
The Year 6-9 students have completed their 6-week unit on creating a self-portrait using multimedia. Students needed to consider what they wanted to show others about themselves and how to draw the audience into their picture. Some of their pictures are included here.
Mrs Ailsa Green Teacher Librarian and Ms Rosie Luckraft CLA
When working in the kitchen is not always cooking. The F - 2 students helped unpack the shopping. That entailed understanding and looking for the “Best Before” dates, grouping the articles and finding the most practical place on the shelves.
Every worker needs to be rewarded, so we finished the lesson by relaxing with a cup of Milo made by the cooks.
In week 7 all the classes, one at a time, were invited to the conference “Cooking for term 4 2020”. As in any conference there was an halfway break with cuppa (Milo) and biscuits. The participants were engaged and many ideas were discussed.
6-8
This lesson was about extracting flavours to use in sauces. This time green butter made with brocoli on pasta. Next time aperhaps carrot, capcicum, mushrooms butters…
All three classes had the opportunity to compare chicken and duck eggs and made omelettes.
Mrs Joelle Sharples
Kitchen Garden Specialist
Festival Sing 2020 comes to its conclusion on Wed Sept 23 with performances of the Movie and songs in many theatres throughout SA. Our choir students will be travelling to Leigh Creek Area School with Mrs Shultz and Mrs O’Neill to join with students from LCAS and Marree Aboriginal School to watch the movie, join in singing all the songs we have learned and celebrate the joy of singing together. We will then share a lunch prepared by the LCAS Home Economics students. It has been a long road through many ups and down this year, but it has been worth staying on to the finish. We have learned to use some AUSLAN signs in the song Not Perfect, journeyed with Vikings in Higher Ground, and explored the intricate webs of spiders in Spinning,, Spinning. We enjoyed Raining on the Plains earlier this year, especially when it was actually raining, chooffed like a train on a track with I’m a Train, greeted the day with choreography in Cherokee Morning Song, and finished with rapping in Sing!. Well done to the students who made it to the end of the line. Psshh!
Mrs Jacqui Schulz
Language and Performing Arts Teacher
Mrs Lisa O'Neill
SSO and Vocal Specialist
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