12th

June, 2015

Vol. 4, Issue 56

Pymble Ladies

College Community

Service

Alice Betteridge

teachers visit – a

professional sharing

day

A thank you!

Diary Dates

Birthdays

Deputy Principal’s

Message

Principal’s Message

News from the

Classrooms

Attachments

Address: Cnr Ayres and Acron Roads, St Ives NSW 2075 Telephone: 9449 6003 Fax: 9983 9334

Email: sirericwoo-s.school@det.nsw.edu.au ABN: 98 951 675 254

Week 7 saw a total of thirty year 9 students from Pymble Ladies’ College (PLC) visit SEWS throughout the week as part of their community service program. Students and teachers from all classes were excited to see the level of engagement that the PLC students gave. The girls showed a high level of dedication, enthusiasm and maturity throughout the week. Throughout the week, PLC students assisted in a range of classrooms with a variety of activities, which included working with students on individual social goals, creating beautiful artworks with students, helping with spelling and mathematics as well as participating in break times and assembly.

One of the highlights of the week included the collaboration between a group of PLC students with some students from 4E and 5H in the creation of a puppet show which they then performed for all staff and students. A brilliant performance, great work everyone!

Matt Eastman

Clean Up Australia

Alice Betteridge Teachers Visit – a professional sharing

On Friday 5th June teaching and support staff from RIDBC visited for a Professional Exchange opportunity at SEWS. The staff at RIDBC Alice Betteridge School, teach students who have a hearing and/or vision loss, as well as an intellectual disability. The students receive a tailored education program to optimise their participation and learning. The staff had a tour of the three areas of the school and were particularly interested in learning about the sensory programs that we provide at SEWS, including our sensory room. There were opportunities for the staff to meet the SEWS team for professional exchanges and see classroom and sensory programs in action. We hope that we have inspired the teachers at RIDBC with some ideas to take back and implement in their own classrooms.

Sarah Pawley

A thank you

A very big ‘thank you’ to the Crawford family, who have generously donated a large number of beautiful books to the school library. We feel sure that they will be greatly enjoyed by our students and their families. Happy reading!

The Library Team

Dates for your Diary

Parent Information Session ~Music Therapy ~ and Network Luncheon – Thursday 18th June 2015

School Concludes Term 2 – Friday 26th June 2015

Birthdays

A very happy 11th birthday to Nick and many happy birthday smiles to his class mate our other Nik who turned 9 years of age. Birthday wishes were sent to our lovely Georgia who turned 18 and big birthday hoorays to Alex who turned 9.

Deputy Principal’s Message

Sir Eric Woodward students benefit and thrive from our diverse and differentiated curriculum. Yesterday I enjoyed watching and listening to the amazing sounds coming from the music therapy classes. What a delight it is to see the smiling faces and total engagement of all the students. The DESU are looking forward to expanding our music therapy programs with some exciting CD’s and new instruments. Barbara and Josh are working together to make this happen. This week I will be heading out on my first field trip to visit Alex and his tutor. I am very excited to see first-hand the incredible educational programs being implemented by the DESU teacher and tutor. It will be great to see Alex engaging in a variety of activities and experiences to develop his skills across a number of Key Learning Areas. Once again I need to comment on the hard work of all our students and staff across the school. I love to see what everyone is working on and the exciting opportunities available to our students. It was fabulous to see some of the seniors head out on community access this morning. I believe cake or ice-cream may have been on the menu!! This morning it was lovely to hear about one of our DESU students who is engaging in so many wonderful community activities and building her skills set in a number of different ways. I am always keen to hear about the great ideas and programs on offer to our students. Our talented staff and tutors are truly committed to always providing outstanding learning opportunities. Finally you will be excited to hear that reports are being written. It won’t be long until you have some feedback on the first semester of 2015. I hope you enjoy reading these reports as much as I do. Sian Watkins

Deputy Principal

Principal’s Message

I would like to take this opportunity to remind our families that the parent/carer workshop and network luncheon is next Thursday, 18th June. This will be a fun interactive session with our music facilitator Josh and a great opportunity to network with other families. I look forward to seeing you there. It was wonderful to welcome the young ladies from Pymble Ladies College. It is always a joy to see the instant rapport our students have with other students from varying schools. The girls expressed that their time at SEWS was a great one and we concurred. Exciting news! Our new school bus is almost completed getting is final art work this week. I would like to thank Daryl Perry President of the P&C for all his work on making this new bus a reality. Daryl worked with Variety Children’s Charity for support of our new sunshine coach. Next term look at for our new wheels! SEWS is still welcoming donations for the silent auction at the Challenge Fund Charity Golf Day. Funds raised at the silent auction will support our students and their programs. Don’t forget, if you like golf or are up for a good day you can attend the day in July! SEWS teachers and supervisors are finalising Semester 1 reports and as I have been reading them and hearing from the teachers what a great semester it has been. Our parents and carers should be very proud of your children, we certainly are. Our students work so hard and their successes are a credit to them and the many people that influence their education. As we move into the final two weeks of this semester, I would like to send out congratulations to all our students, teachers and families on a great Semester 1. Have a great weekend!

Jo-Anne Gardiner

Principal

= News from the Classroom

Barbara’s Class This term, Jeni has been experimenting with

common household substances, such as salt. She has recorded her observations using words, tables and photographs. One of the experiments involved soaking half a cut potato in salt water and the other half in fresh water. She used her eyes and her hands to explore the difference in the two halves and found that soaking in salt water made the potato change colour and become soft. The Kaleidoscope app continues to be Katana’s

favourite. She will hold her hand on the screen to interact with the colours and patterns, and sometimes take a quick look to see what she has created. Katana has also recently enjoyed exploring the Art of Glow app, looking at the screen for over five seconds on one occasion! Lachie is still very enthusiastic about his work

placement at Tyreright. He is doing so well that his hours have been extended. Lachie is now working until 3pm, twice a week. Braydon is getting back into the swing of his school work this week, after the devastating storms at the beginning of the term. He is starting by organising new school equipment, furniture, visual schedules and doing some fun art and mapping activities. Barbara

Jen feeling the results of her potato and salt experiment

Jen's experiment to show the effect of salt water on potato

Lachie refitting a tyre and checking the air gauge

Lachie taking a tyre off to check the inner tube

Louise’s Class

One of the great things about being a distance education teacher is the many and varied ways the teacher is able to keep in touch with students. Touching base is so important to understand what is going on in the student’s life and to informally assess progress toward achieving learning goals. In the past week I have spoken to students on the phone, received emails and also had images shared via text and Google Drive.

Each week I have a one hour phone lesson with Chris. Chris is a great listener and follows multiple step instructions as we complete a variety of different activities. Chris also has a great work ethic and always does his best to ‘have a go’. Matt regularly sends me a weekly email. His latest email is: ‘Hi Louise I'm making another cake with Mum before Dad Goes Away. Goodbye from Matt.’ Matt is a great email writer AND cook - whilst Matt’s dad, who is his tutor, is away for a well-earned break, Matt will still be busy with his school work while his mum takes over the reins. Another great cook in our class is Susannah. Susannah’s tutor has shared, via Google Drive, images of Susannah baking. Susannah is happy to cook lots of different recipes for her family. This week she has cooked pumpkin soup and made coleslaw (including making the dressing). Jayden, as always, has been hard at work also. You can see from the image that his tutor sent via text that Jayden loves hands-on activities and visual arts activities in particular. Louise

Susannah follows packaging instructions to bake

Jayden has explored making prints with his hands

Sharon’s Class Bella has been studying the painting style of artist Georges Seurat. Seurat found that rather than mixing the colours of paint on a palette, he could place tiny dots of different colours next to each other on the canvas and the eye would mix the colours. Well done Bella you have used your power of observation to create your own Georges Seurat dot painting. It was also very sweet of you Bella to send me a text message on Friday afternoon wishing me a great long weekend. Last week I received a series of emails from Fionn and attached to each email was a photo. Opening each attachment were step by step photos of his cooking activities in Food Technology. Fionn made an impressive looking apple pie and is becoming a terrific cooking enthusiast. Thanks for the continuous updates Fionn!

While trying to keep warm, Amy has been working consistently on her school work. I enjoy our weekly phone call and recently Amy was quite excited to tell me that she had finally completed her crochet blanket for her bed. I do look forward to seeing the finished masterpiece. On warmer days Courtney has been visiting natural environments and playgrounds. Recently she enjoyed the beach with her family and was delighted when she was bought an ice cream. The local park continues to be a favourite outing, a place where Courtney engages in leisure activities like moving her fingers through the running water. Sharon

Fionn then continued to pick rhubarb to use in his pie

Fionn's began his day making a delicious breakfast

It is pie time

Bella's Georges Seurat artwork

Bella's text message

Fionn is preparing the pastry

Courtney feeling the sensation of the cold water

Melissa’s Class

Well here we are at week eight on the downhill stretch to the holidays. After all the hard work my students have been doing they definitely deserve the break. Tyson has been busy learning his spelling words, using his space torch, making moon dough and he even started music lessons. I hear that he is a natural on the piano. I can’t wait to hear him play Hot Cross Buns. Kate is continuing with her unit ‘Frozen’ learning about the Inuit people. Kate has been making Penguin biscuits, matching pictures that are similar and making a snowy owl. Charley has been learning about floods and she is investigating chemical reactions with an experiment mixing Mentos and diet coke together to make an explosion. Definitely a lesson to be done outside! Jess started her work experience at a local kindergarten last week. I went out to support her on her first day and we had such fun at the Kindergarten singing, dancing and helping the children with their art. I know Jess will make an excellent addition to the Kindergarten when she visits once a fortnight. Melissa

Tyson Experimenting with Moon Dough

Tyson Making Moon Dough

Class 2B During Week 7, we have had a number of volunteers in class from Pymble Ladies College. The girls were outstanding as they joined in class activities and themes of study. They helped to mount art works, assist with student program goals and generally were great fun to have around. Since the beginning of the year we have enjoyed having a volunteer, Vicki, on class with us each Friday morning. She has really made an impact with our students by quickly building rapport and engaging with each of them through storytelling and just being part of our class team. Thank you, Vicki; we look forward to having you on class next semester. Sue & Louise

Daniel enjoyed dancing under the Chinese lanterns

Louise explains to Brooke the importance of wearing safety glasses

Nathan investigates the Tibetan 'singing' bowls

Sophie and Brooke out doing circuits

Telecaster listens and looks on as Vicki reads a fun story

Class 5H We were lucky to have the PLC girls working alongside us in the classroom last week. Each day we had a new group of girls bringing their special talents and enthusiasm. This proved particularly beneficial for us on Wednesday as it coincided with the arrival of our new family of puppets. So…a puppet show was inevitable. What fun we had rehearsing songs, dances and putting together some colourful costumes. Elysse, from 4E, who has been working in a mentoring program with Stephanie, added her musical talents to an impromptu performance for their classmates. This spontaneous event highlights our belief that learning and laughter can go hand in hand. Sandy & Jennie

Our puppet family

4E Creating their Danny, Champion of the World scene

Danny, Champion of the World Word Wall

Luc measuring our track during Mathematics

Nick measuring our track during Mathematics

Stephanie and Elysse rehearsing for the puppet show

Stephanie enthralled by the puppets

Class 4E Students in 4E have been researching the plight that The Great Barrier Reef is facing. Some of the threats are coming from poaching, pollution, climate change and the crown-of-thorns starfish. The students have identified the need for action and with some choosing particular issues including the poaching of native turtles. We are always impressed by the sense of social and environmental responsibility that the students show. In Library 4E have been reading through Danny Champion of the World by Roald Dahl. The students have really enjoyed hearing about his adventures and love the characters that he meets. 4E has bene hard at work creating a word wall to show all the interesting words that they have been fining in the text. The last few weeks have seen two birthdays come around in 4E; Nick and Nik have both celebrated their birthdays. Happy birthday boys! Matt & Paula

Nik and Jai double checking their results

Luc's poster raising awareness of the threats to The Great Barrier Reef

Nick's Birthday

Nik's birthday

Deborah’s Class Following the workshop by the Monkey Baa theatre group that Esther (Year 10) attended, she has since seen their play The Unknown Soldier. The ANZACS are a particular interest of Esther’s, linking all key learning areas. She has written another great story to share with our school community, which is attached to this newsletter. She is learning two new songs on piano, including There’s a Place for Us, from The Chronicles of Narnia: the Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Brayden (Year 11) is breeding bearded dragon lizards, which have grown considerably since his first newsletter report. He is also breeding crickets, which are used for the dragons’ diet; his direct observations forming part of his Science program. Logan (Year 8) is developing his reading skills, and his ability to explain the difference between fact and fiction. He created the Stampy Cat character from Minecraft for Creative Arts, using foam pieces. Congratulations to Rhys (Year 10) for his achievements in number operations in Maths. Alex (Year 12) recently returned from leave, while his hometown recovered from the floods earlier this term. Welcome back Alex! Deborah

Brayden's bearded dragons

Esther on piano

Logan's Stampy Cat

The Unknown Soldier

Play review by Esther 5 June 2015

On Friday morning, Mum and I drove to the Manning

Valley Entertainment Centre in Taree to see a play

called The Unknown Soldier, performed by the

Monkey Baa theatre. There were many children

there.

Then the play began. The Unknown Soldier is about

a teenage boy Charlie (living with his Aunt) who

discovered an old suitcase containing an Army hat, a

small brown handmade box with a photo inside, and

very old letters about World War I written by

Albert. (Felix played Charlie).

Charlie was so excited that he wanted to learn more

about what really had happened, so he began to do

some research on his Aunt’s computer. His Aunt

found out that Charlie knew her password but she

let him use it anyway.

When Charlie put the Army hat on and read the

letters, he became Jake and told us what it was like

to be in the war and described it really well. (Felix

played Jake).

Mrs Erikson told us about how she became a nurse

in World War I, trying to find if her son Jake was

alive or missing in action. She kept a diary and

wrote about what it was like and how she felt about

the war.

What I really liked about The Unknown Soldier is

how they set up the whole thing, when Charlie put

the Army hat on, read out the letters, and how they

described the war. I felt like I was right there in

the middle of it. I really loved it.

Jo’s Class Despite the cold weather of late Georgia has continued to spend time in her local community with her family.

One of Georgia’s most favourite outings lately has been going on drives with her family to collect timber for their wood fire. Georgia enjoys sitting in the car listening to music and watching her dad cut the wood as the rest of the family help load the trailer.

Georgia particularly enjoys going to a nearby park to play on the different types of equipment. Swinging on playground equipment like the swing shown in the photo provides a great opportunity to experience vestibular movement. The soothing motion of swinging as well as relaxing can also increase concentration. Which could be a contributing factor for Georgia’s much improved receptive and expressive language skills this semester. Jo

Georgia enjoys spending time in her local park

Our friendly Zoo Keeper – Ryan

Sofie meeting the furry Quokka

Vincent patted the friendly lizard's smooth scales

Yash was brave - he touched a snake!

The students of 3B have had a lot to say about their mums this week in the lead up to Mother's Day. We talked about all the different things our mums do for us because they love us, including tucking us into bed each night and buying us Mario toys! We enjoyed a reading of Owl Babies, drew portraits of our mums and bought lots of great gifts from our Mother's Day Stall. The students of 3B also painted lovely ceramic plates with their handprints as the central theme, paired with a touching poem to celebrate their mum. "Children only hold their mothers hands for a little while, but hold their hearts forever." Happy Mother's Day to the lovely mums of 3B and of the wider school community. You have raised an amazing group of little people. Cassandra & Anita

Step 1. Sylvie chose to paint her hands bright green like Yoshi

Step 2. Sam C pressed his green hand on his plate for mum

Georgia loves the movement of this swing!

Lee’s Class All my class have been working hard on their personal goals this term. Thomas had an exciting break on his trip to Tasmania. He was very adventurous, eating out, doing lots of sight-seeing and taking a joy flight in a helicopter! Now he is back on the ground at home, making steak sandwiches and tacos in the kitchen, and looking after the animals and garden. Thomas enjoyed following the Kitchen Fireworks experiment where he made sparks from the oils in an orange skin. You can see his diagram here.

Thomas' Kitchen Fireworks

Kayla enjoyed reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar and counting lots of fruit. The other girls are busy practising using their “No” symbols while they read their Spot books.

No

Lee

Nicole’s Class This will be my last newsletter article on behalf of Nicole as she will be back in time for the last newsletter of the Term. Tommy has been studying natural disasters in Science with the current one being about tornados. The timing of the disasters he’s been studying has often coincided with the same disaster happening somewhere in the world. Great for providing real-life examples to enable sound understanding, but not so good for the people living through them. Hopefully there will not be any landslides when he studies them next. Mohamed has been studying about living and non-living things. He is beginning to understand what living things need to survive and grow. Mohamed has demonstrated that he knows the names of most fruits and vegetables, even the less common ones. He also enjoys eating a wide variety of healthy food. Mohamed has created his own ‘VIVID’ style of art work by colouring and patterning up a Dalmatian outline. It has been a pleasure teaching Nicole’s class in her absence, although I’m sure her students will welcome her back! Gail (for Nicole)

Mohamed's Dalmatian Artwork

Rama’s Class It is already week 8 and my students and I have been working very hard! Tyson has been reading about how chameleons can change their colours to fit into the surroundings. He painted 6 chameleons using different colours for the backgrounds. He has also been learning about volcanoes and knows how to make his own volcano using bicarb soda and vinegar. He enjoys cooking and whips up yummy recipes in the kitchen. This week he made an amazing volcano cake with the ‘molten lava’ flowing from the top of the cake! Amazing effort Tyson! Holly is making great strides with mental addition and subtraction problems. She enjoys volunteering in the library at the local school and follows the instructions given by the teacher librarian. Well done Holly. Joshua is in his final year of schooling and is working hard at his school program. He is thinking about his interests and strengths and is looking at exciting post school options that match his skills. Fantastic effort, Joshua. Rama

Tyson with his volcano cake

Class 1P Over the last fortnight 1P has been learning about habitats, including habitats where our scaly friends live in our unit “Feathers, Fur and Scales.” We have been reading and viewing stories about fish including “The Rainbow Fish” and snakes including the dreamtime story “The Rainbow Serpent.” While our friends from Pymble Ladies College were here we made some class habitat artworks. We used watercolours to make our ocean with rubber stamps and coloured salt to make the coral. We enjoyed creating some Rainbow Fish too. Our bush creation required a nature walk through the playground to collect leaves, bark and twigs to make our artwork. We made some snakes and lizards out of stockings and bubble wrap. Sarah, David & Trish

Rainbow Fish

Snakes and Lizards

Lorrin looking at grasses at Bobbin Head

Phoebe enjoyed hydrotherapy this week

Phoebe looking at mangrove leaves at Bobbin Head

In Boccia Georgia enjoyed sending the balls down the ramp with Pat's help

Phoebe loved music therapy this week and was very involved

Stuart rubbed the butter into the flour for our damper

Class 3B

In our “My Place” unit, 3B have been focusing on differentiating between natural and man-made objects in our environment. We have been busy drawing sketches of our school and our bedrooms. We even imagined what our bedroom would look like underwater by closing our eyes and listening

Class 6S In 6S in the past two weeks we have started thinking about famous Australian artists and how they have contributed to our shared culture. We have looked at the work of Albert Namatjira and have also explored some of the famous ‘bushranger’ paintings of Sidney Nolan. Albert Namatjira was a well-known Aboriginal artist in the 1950s and 60s who pioneered Aboriginal modern styles and techniques. He is well-known for his paintings of ghost gums in the bush and this has fitted in nicely with our science ‘habitats’ theme. In science the students looked at the ghost gums picture and explored/ attached the same object seen in the picture; e.g. branches, bark, leaves, dirt. In creative arts students used the paint program on the interactive whiteboard to simulate the pictures, choosing and looking to the correct colours for painting and then exploring brush strokes to add to the pictures. In food technology we have moved on to making damper, and have looked at video samples of people cooking damper and putting it in the fire. The students’ added ingredients enjoyed rubbing butter into flour, kneading the dough and rolling it out. We prepared it for the oven- adding some vegemite before cooking it for a truly Australian experience! Jen & MaryAnn

Lorrin added gum leaves to Albert Namatjira's painting

Dan helped choose the colour and then paint the trunk of the tree

to the sounds of the ocean. Sam F explained that if his bedroom was underwater his bed would definitely need to look like a boat and his drawings were creative enough to match! We also decided it was time to explore the man-made and natural features of a new environment so on Tuesday June 2nd we ventured out to Yamble Reserve in Ryde. We explored lots of man-made objects including swings, gates and a flying fox! The park also had lots of natural features including trees, flowers and lots of green grass. The students of 3B did well to represent the school and even taught the younger children at the park how to play nicely with others. A big thank you to Michael for accompanying us on our big adventure. Cassandra & Anita

Thomas shows how well he knows our school's natural features by modelling grass!

Sylvie and Sam C ready to take a trip on the flying fox!

3B can climb anything no matter how high!

The hill above the sandpit could fit 5 people!

Our friends from PLC taught us a brand new hand game