Newsletter - Term 4, Week 6

Hello everyone,

I hope this week’s newsletter finds you all well and beginning to enjoy the beautiful weather. What a great feeling to know that we are able to experience something of our normal lives. The restrictions are gradually easing, the Covid numbers have been 0 consistently now for 14 days and life is starting to return to normal in Victoria.

Here at school we are travelling along just nicely with most students returning to school every day and engaging in their learning and working diligently with their teachers.

Preparations are well and truly in place for the 2021 school year and there is a plethora of things that need to be done before we close for the end of the 2020 year on 18^th December.

Prep transition will see a modified program being offered and we believe that it will provide our new families with a quality experience regardless of some of the restrictions we have to abide by. Our Grade 6 students have already begun preparing for their Graduation and entry into secondary school. It will be a year that these students will never forget, and we hope that they will remember how valued and cared for they have been throughout it.

Whole school transition activities have begun across the Learning Neighbourhoods and students have enjoyed the opportunity to experience the new spaces, with loads to see and hear from different teachers and students. Our aim is to have all students experience smooth and positive transitions that enable them to think positively and be confident knowing where they are going to be in 2021.

This week we have been celebrating NAIDOC Week. Our student Cultural leaders have been sharing a range of facts with everyone during eating time. The leaders have been able to speak clearly and confidently over the Public Announcement system with the rest of the students and teachers listening intently. Well done to our Cultural Leaders and thank you for being effective role models for the other students.

You may have noticed the large NAIDOC Week mural that is displayed at the front of the school. A very big thank you to Mrs Stanford for all her organization to have this presented and completed by every student in our school. It looks fabulous and demonstrates our pride in working together to celebrate and acknowledge the Indigenous culture and history of our beautiful country.

Have a great weekend and enjoy the freedom to do whatever it is that makes you smile.

Kind regards,

Carmela

Each year the Department of Education surveys parents and uses the results to direct future school planning and improvement. This year, all parents are invited to participate. We encourage you to take the survey—your opinions are important and will contribute to the future management and organisation of Broadmeadows Valley Primary School.

• Go to:https://www.orima.com.au/parent
• Select Broadmeadows Valley Primary School
• Input the School PIN: (THIS HAS BEEN SENT AS A TEXT MESSAGE TO ALL FAMILIES. PLEASE CALL THE SCHOOL OFFICE IF YOU DID NOT RECEIVE IT AND NEED IT)
• When complete, please click on the tick button at the end of the survey to submit your answers.

Email us a screen shot of the completed survey to broadmeadows.valley.ps@education.vic.gov.au and we will include you in the raffle to win 1 of 5 hampers.

The Foundation students have been engaging in various learning experiences this week.  Students had another opportunity to explore the different ways materials can change when mixed. This week the students made predictions about what will happen when we mix water, food dye and cornflour. They observed the changes and saw that the ingredients mixed made Oobleck (a liquid that temporarily thickens when a force is applied).

Students have been demonstrating more confidence in exploring different ways to build numbers to 10 and beyond. They have been showing an understanding of how number can be made up in different ways using materials such as bundles and icy pole sticks, unifix blocks, tens frames and other objects, e.g., teddy bears. 

We are so proud of how far our students have come along with their reading. They are taking part in many reading opportunities such as independent reading, guided reading and whole class stories. Please see the photo below to see one of our guided reading groups with Miss Black.

Just a friendly reminder that next Tuesday on the 17th of November we will be celebrating our 150 days of Learning! We encourage that students come to school dressed up with costumes or outfits you already have from home.

We can’t wait to celebrate together a very special day!

Sarah, Laurena, Jan & Jamielee

LN2 are loving being back at school and engaging in hands on learning again. Students have been participating in a variety of learning tasks in our Integrated Literacy/Geography/Maths unit that the teachers planned all the way back in Term 2.

In the last month students have learnt about Africa and South America, and have researched facts about some specific African and South American countries. We are very lucky to have Rugia working in LN2, as she has visited one of our African countries – Egypt – and brought in Egyptian money (pounds) and some souvenirs that she brought back from Egypt, to share with us.

Students have been watching ads and learning to identify the persuasive language and devices being used to convince people to travel to a place or buy a product. Students have started creating their own ads to advertise Australia and some of the African countries we have learnt about, and will have the chance to do this again next week with the South American countries.

In maths we used pictographs to represent the populations of the Australia states and the other countries we have researched. Students had to create graphs where one picture equalled large numbers (like 5 or 10 million) because the populations of some of the countries were very large!

Teachers have been catching up on the assessments that we missed during learning from home. They are busy testing students on their reading and we have had some excellent growth! Congratulations to the following students (and their parents!) who have made exceptional leaps in their reading during home learning – Zaine (7 levels), Maki (5 levels), Sua (4 levels), Manushi (3 levels), Ali B (3 levels), Maede (6 levels), Cyrus (4 levels), Saleem (4 levels), Lily (3 levels), Hasan (3 levels), Ronan (3 levels), and Alizey and Nafesa who have completed the final level! There are still lots of students left to test, and we look forward to seeing how much everyone else has improved in their reading.

This week we have been learning about money. Students have been learning about making money amounts in different ways. Today they used IKEA catalogues to plan their dream bedrooms and add up how much it would cost.

We are very much looking forward to the last 5 weeks of school and packing in as much learning as possible.

Cyndi, Nick, Sharni & Aimee

We have been working on our kitchen garden project for term 4; making a friendship band. We are weaving cotton strands together to make a bracelet to keep or give to a friend. We harvested onions and beetroot from our garden and used them to make plant dyes so that our bracelets could be all different colours. We used the beetroot to make a red dye, we mixed the onion skins and some turmeric to make a yellow dye and we chopped up some red cabbage to make a purple dye. First we soaked the cotton in a vinegar solution then we simmered the cotton in the different colour dyes for a couple of hours. The cotton was left in the dye overnight and then rinsed and hung out to dry. Learning neighbourhood 3 have been very busy measuring and cutting lengths of cotton as well as making looms out of cardboard. They have had a lot of fun weaving their friendship bands!

We also made some natural unsweetened yoghurt out of milk and yoghurt cultures. The students will be using their yoghurt next week to make flat breads to go with a delicious lentil curry.

Mrs Amy Hermans - Kitchen Garden Teacher

Hi everyone, I hope you’re all enjoying being back at school! Students have been doing a great job in music, with LN2 and LN3 working on writing lyrics and creating music in different styles using computers. LN1 students have been getting to know how different instruments look and sound, and are doing an amazing job learning to tell the difference between them all. Everyone has also been working on their ukulele skills, learning to play chords, rhythms and songs. We’ve been having a great time, it’s fantastic to see the creativity and talent in all the students at BVPS come out in different ways!

Mr Gareth - Music Specialist Teacher 

Hello everyone, We have had a great term so far in Term 4. Our students have all been working fantastically.

LN1

In LN1 our prep classes we have been reading “Where The Wild Things Are” and drawing pictures inspired by the story. They have been learning how to draw the pictures using Primary Storyboard on an iPad. They have been practicing changing colours, drawing lines and using the paint-can tool to colour in.  

Grade 1 and 2 students have been working on creating programs in Scratch Jr. They have created code to help characters move around the screen. They have made their characters talk and react when they bump into each other.

LN2

Grade 3 and 4 students have been learning how to deal with cyberbullying. They have also been learning to create code to move characters through mazes and control Lego WeDo robots. They have showed great teamwork creating their Lego robots and making them flash lights, play sounds, move or detect motion.

LN3

Our grade 5 and 6 students have been practicing their coding skills. They are continuing to work through self-paced coding lessons. They have also been learning about ergonomics. In ergonomics they have learnt about good posture and taking breaks from their device.

Mr Liam O'Grady - Digital Technologies Teacher

It has been a great start to the term in art. Everyone is really excited and happy to be back!

This week we have been celebrating NAIDOC week. NAIDOC week is usually celebrated in July although this year we are celebrating in November. NAIDOC stands for National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observation Committee. We celebrate this week to celebrate the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.

As a school we have read cultural books, looked at a range of indigenous dancers, listened to indigenous music and also shared and learnt facts shared by Ms Bianco and our Cultural Young Leaders. 

Our whole school project was to create and design a footprint that is unique, using black, red and yellow colours. These colours represent the Aboriginal flag. We have made a display that is on the Dimboola Road fence showcasing our artwork.

Some Indigenous facts that we have learnt throughout the week include;

• Bunjil is the spiritual creator of indigenous culture.
• Indigenous culture has been around for over 600,000 years
• There are over 500 languages spoken with at least 250 still spoken today
• There are many different clans around Australia. We are on Wurundjeri country. There are 38 Koori communities in Victoria.
• We learnt the difference between a welcome to country and an acknowledgement of country

Quotes about our learning experience

“I have enjoyed learning about the indigenous cultures and how they are represented.” - Zahra 

“I have liked learning more about my indigenous culture.” - Brodey 

“My footprint was created using colours that represent Indigenous people.” - Hasan 

“I learnt that Bunjil is the spiritual creator.” – Chin Su

Written by the Cultural Young Leaders

We are still not able to have adult carers onsite at school but there are lots of other ways we can stay connected, share and learn together!

• Wednesday Walk and Talk!

  Join other parents from our school community for some exercise, fresh air and company. Every Wednesday 9.00am. Meet outside the school on Dimboola Rd (across from the leisure centre). All welcome!

• Calling all babies and pre-school children… Come sing and play with our Valley Kids Playgroup! We meet online on Zoom on Tuesday mornings 9.15-10.15am.
• Arabic, Somali and Samoan speakers online catch ups coming soon. Join the WhatsApp groups for details.

We are doing all of these things online now! Would you like to join any of our activities? Please phone Kirsten at the school office for more information.

هل تتحدث العربية؟ هل ترغب في الانضمام إلى مجموعة BVPS Whatsapp للعائلات الناطقة باللغة العربية؟ اسأل في مكتب المدرسة.

E te tautala Samoa? E te fia auai i le matou vaega BVPS Whatsapp mo aiga Samoa?  Fesili i le ofisa o le aÊ»oga.

Afsoomaali ma ku hadashaa Ma jeclaan lahayd inaad ka mid noqoto kooxda BVPS Whatsapp ee qoysaska Soomaaliyeed? Weydii xafiiska dugsiga.

Kirsten