Principals Report
We are now at the start of term three and find ourselves farewelling for the moment our Year 3-5 teacher Hayley Brown who will be going on maternity leave with the impending arrival of her baby. This is an exciting time for Hayley and a big moment for our school as Hayley has been a core member of our staff for some time. Hayley was here in 2016 for one year before going to England for a year in 2017. She had enjoyed being in Hawker and when she arrived back in late 2017 the school took up the opportunity to reappoint her. Her working relationship with our students has been excellent, teaching and caring for our students in a highly differentiated class. Hayley has also taken on key roles at the school, including directing two school productions (The Lion King and The Aristocats), teaching PE to Year 11, coordinating SAPSASA and school sports and organising some big Sports Days over the last two years which have seen the participation of four other schools this year.
Hayley is only going on temporary leave and plans to return to Hawker, here is what she would like to say:
‘I’m looking forward to the next challenge of motherhood, but I still plan on being a part of the school community, and participating in school events while I am on leave. I know I will be thinking of my students that I have had this year, some I have had for the last three years. I will miss the stirring up and the arguments about who the best AFL team is – Port obviously, not Hawthorn, Sydney and definitely not the Crows! It will be weird not having the same routine and sense of control and working relationships with my students and fellow staff, however with COVID restrictions aside I do plan to visit them.’
It is an exciting time for Hayley and we look forward to catching up with her in the future.
We now welcome back Harald Walther to our staff and school community, taking over the teacher responsibilities in the Year 3-5 class. Harald has been at Hawker before as relief teacher and also took on the Foundation to Year 2 class for term four last year in Amanda Hilder's absence. Harald has many years teaching experience through New South Wales and also in the South East of South Australia, teaching at all year levels. To get to Hawker in the past he has driven up from Meningie for his stints as a relief teacher, you would have to enjoy the experience to come that distance again! We look forward to including Harald in our staff for the rest of this year.
It has been a hectic start to the term with a week of lockdown to break up student learning. Teachers in week one had to adjust their programs to accommodate a different mode of teaching and learning, with one days notice. In a challenging situation our staff and students adjusted to remote learning with all it’s variables completing activities both in hard copy and also online through Microsoft Teams. Things worked well with Teams, with students being able to ‘Post’ their teachers and have their own video conferences to catch up with their teachers and fellow students during these catch ups. A highlight for me was watching the students in Penny McCulloch’s Foundation to Year 2 class catch up each morning and get the opportunity to share their home environments by posting pictures up on the Teams page for class members to see. Parent support was fantastic in this challenging time and I thank all the parents who put their efforts in during this interesting and demanding period.
With the start to the term there are now some adjustments that are needing to be made due to the lockdown and ongoing restrictions. Unfortunately our whole school excursion to Wilpena to celebrate NAIDOC was cancelled for the moment, we will be looking into alternative ways to still celebrate this as a school community. In addition the Quorn Area School Sports Day scheduled for Friday August 6th has also been postponed, with the intention to hold this at a later date when restrictions have eased. At this stage we do have plans for this term and the following dates will hopefully go ahead if the restrictions are lifted:
- Thursday September 2nd – Foods and Cultural Celebration Open Night.
- Friday September 3rd – Pupil Free Day, Read Write Inc Training.
- Saturday August 21st to Friday August 27th – Book Week, Dress up Day Wednesday 25th.
- Monday August 30th to Friday 3rd September – Book Fair.
In this newsletter we will see the plans and programs of our teaching staff for term three. It will be as usual a busy term for our staff and students and hopefully free of any further restrictions. Enjoy the newsletter.
As usual if parents have any questions I can be contacted at the school on 86484003 or by my email at daren.oneill253@schools.sa.edu.au