2014

Best wishes to my last year's students and parents for this year! I'll miss you all! Please feel free to pop in for a visit and chat! My door is always open :-)

This Week

Hi lovely Families,
Happy birthday to gorgeous Grace for yesterday. Thank you for the delicious honey joys. Thank also to the parents who were able to attend the 1:1 laptop program information Night on Thursday. The Expression of Interest Forms were sent home on Friday except to Freya who has been unwell.
We are performing at Assembly on Friday!!! There has been much discussion about what we should do. Some children have been working on a movie which has been great but has also caused some angst due to people being left out and negative feedback. I have spoken to the class about this and the need to speak to others as you would like to be spoken to and about empathy. Some children wanted to sing their current favourite song about a fox but several staff suggested that it's probably not the best thing to sing at a school assembly. I have come up with an idea I shall share with the children tomorrow. If you are available on Friday please come along to watch us and thank you in anticipation as to my requests!
The children are currently undertaking some online testing. These are adaptive tests and are quite long, 30 questions in English and 60 in Maths. These provide great data and are a great way to track the children's achievements. Some children completed them in year 1 and 2 but the generally start at year 3. It's not their favourite use of the laptops but is essential at this stage of the year.
Thank you for providing the children with fascinating information about their ancestry. The presentations have been up to their usual high standard and we are learning a lot about this.
Hope all go the guests at the Spring Carnival Luncheon were well behaved and Vicky's house is back to its original condition. Thank you for hosting this school event.
Production Rehearsals are in full swing, shame I can't sew or I would help out there. Thanks to Kirsty for making a sword or 50 and Cherie for her sewing. Apologies if I have omitted other helpers.
Hopefully the weather warms up during the week!  We do have school on the Monday before Cup Day, however, if you are intending on having an extra long weekend enjoy it.
Thanks again for your support. It makes my job so much easier and rewarding. I am truly loving teaching your delightful children.

Welcome to term 4

Had a great time in Darwin! beautiful weather and place. Looking forward to revisiting for longer some time. It was great to get back to school though. We had a busy week last week. We have been collecting data and statistics and graphing these. Production practise was a hoot, most impressed with the dance moves! well done to the 6 children chosen for recording the song. We managed to run 1194  laps of the oval collectively!! Jono received an award for encouraging others to increase the number of laps each day. All children were amazing, I amazingly managed 9 laps on Friday!!! Please let me know if we should continue this. The children really enjoyed it and in terms of having a balance with sitting and moving it was of great benefit. Well done to Ebony on her sensational speech as part of the school's Public Speaking Competition. The 9 speeches delivered were of a very high standard and it was quite difficult for the judges to pick 5 to go on to the next level. The school Disco was the best Disco OOPS has ever had, in my opinion, 3WS certainly has some great dancers and singers!! Thank you all for the information you are providing about your ancestry. If you were at Assembly on Friday you would have seen how many children have come from overseas at OOPS. We are looking forward to visits from you or your parents to share your cultural heritage with us. Please let me know when you are available for this, thanking you in anticipation. The NAPLAN results were outstanding. I look forward to seeing how this group does in Year 5!!  Don't forget about the 1:1 laptop information night on Thursday 7pm - 8pm in  C Wing. Have a great weekend, enjoy this gorgeous weather.

We're a happy team at Hawthorn!!!

It was a great day at the MCG! Thought you might like some snaps from my day! Off to join the celebrations at Glenferrie Oval around midday! Zac, Nathan and Vishay might see you there! GO HAWKS!!!

Holidays

Hi All,
Enjoying this gorgeous weather and Footy Finals!!!! Apologies to Monique, Grace, Daniel, Bardon and Bailey B BUT GO HAWKS!!!!! I'm going!!! Hopefully I can redecorate the school in brown and yellow since Duncan requested I don't and he will still be in Finland!!! Hawks fans have my permission to wear footy colors first day back, regardless of the result. Term 4 means hats are required so please ensure your child has their hat in their bag. About to go out for breakfast with my Dad! He is 80 today! It's Miss Kelly's birthday tomorrow!
Enjoy the holidays :-)

Last Day of Term 3

I don't believe how fast this term has gone by! Yesterday we had visits to our classroom to Endangered Animals Expo. The children were proud to present and pleased with the feedback other students and teachers gave them. We visited 4AF and 3KP and noticed that each grade had a slightly different focus on the same theme! We love diversity!Today parents are welcome to visit our room! We will be visiting 4TR, 4BB and 3JH before recess.
It is Footy Day so there should be lots of brown and yellow around the school! Fingers crossed for a victory tonight!
Regarding Footy Day Lunches, I am opposed to the drinks the canteen provides today. It is my belief they contain too much sugar and make the children hyperactive. I'm asking the children not to drink this at school but at home so you can observe any changes your child might have as a result of this drink. I have asked Duncan to have this drink removed from the canteen for the past 3 years!
I am off to enjoy a week in Darwin the first week of Term 4! Tahnee will be teaching 3WS for that week. After 21 years at the same school, I'm enjoying some Long Service Leave! I have left the planners for Tahnee to follow and will email spelling words for Week 1 later today, hopefully I remember!
Welcome to the McPhee family! Jesse has had a wonderful first week at OOPS, thanks to your gorgeous children. Thank you for your continual support and feedback. It makes my job so much easier.
Enjoy the break from school uniforms and lunches!
GO HAWKS!!!!

The Year is flying by!!!

Hi Lovely People! We have Planning Week this week. No Specialist classes for us until Friday. The Level 3 teachers are spending Friday planning for next Term. We are working on an Endangered Animal Project in cooperative groups during the afternoon sessions. This draws together our learning on this unit and we are learning heaps. Footy Day ( last day of Term) orders went out on Monday and  can be returned  by next Monday, September 16th. The children know my view on the Quench drink!!!! We are having a Scientist visit our school on Monday as part of the CSIRO Scientist in Schools program. We have been reading magazines from CSIRO, Scientriffic, which have further sparked the children's interest in science. Hope you can get to the Coffee Morning tomorrow, thanks Cherie for sending the reminder.