Dear families,

It is wonderful to be back at my favourite school after some personal leave. I have truly missed the vibrant energy of our students and the warm community spirit that makes this school so special. I took an opportunity while travelling around Indonesia to visit a small mainstream school, and they took a keen interest in the school I work at which was heartwarming.

The blossom from the wattle tree in front of the office block was a fabulous welcome back – such a bright and cheerful sight! Although the rain has been quite persistent lately, and the weeds and grass on the oval are starting to take over the site, we are looking forward to some sunnier days ahead to help things settle down.

I want to extend a heartfelt thank you to Dipti and everyone else who stepped up so wonderfully in my absence. It gave me great peace of mind knowing the school was in such capable and caring hands while I was away.

Yesterday was a real highlight as I had the pleasure of performing alongside our talented students. The Signing Choir was invited to present two songs – ‘You’ve Got a Friend in Me’ and ‘This is Me’ – at the Metropolitan North Principals Conference. The students did an amazing job, and it was so heartwarming to see everyone stand and applaud us at the end. The students handled the applause with such confidence and pride. If you haven’t already, please do check out our Facebook page for some wonderful photos from the event.

I’m also really pleased to share that our street artist visited the school recently to collaborate with us on some exciting new designs to brighten up our spaces. We already have some fantastic murals around the school – like the pod of whales near the pool and the birds and flowers along the walkways – and now he has completed some beautiful underwater-themed art pieces around Room 14. These artworks really add a splash of colour and creativity to our environment. Be sure to have a look at them on Founders Day – they’re something special to celebrate!

Thank you all for your continued support and for being part of our school community. I’m looking forward to a fantastic term ahead with everyone.

Warm regards,
Ruth Rogers
Principal

The Signing Choir were invited to perform at the Metropolitan North Principal Conference at the Epping Club on Wednesday. Around 200 schools from the region were represented at the conference and Karonga students were proud to be chosen to perform. We signed two songs: ‘You’ve Got a Friend in Me’ from Toy Story, and ‘This Is Me’ from The Greatest Showman. The students performed brilliantly and received a huge round of applause from the audience!

This performance was great practice for our big event in November, the Epping Music Festival, where we join 9 other local schools for a performance at Chatswood Concourse. At this event our Signing Choir will perform 2 songs: one on their own, and one with the Combined Schools Choir. Our dance group will also be performing on the night; they chose the song and helped choreograph the dance. We look forward to sharing more photos and news about the Epping Music Festival.

Emma, Kamal, and Ruth

Following the recent holiday break, the students in Room 3 have settled back into the school routine with ease and enthusiasm. Although the weather has been quite cold, we have managed to get out into the sun where possible.

One of our biggest celebrations this term has been Jayden’s return to hydrotherapy. Being in the warm water with Di and Suzanne is very freeing for Jayden, he can barely keep the grin off his face.

Jack continues to enjoy having stories read to him. He smiles and chuckles as we read The True Story of the Three Little Pigs. Jack is very alert during integrated craft activities and shows interest when feeling the sticks, straw and cotton wool.

Sophie has been maintaining her physical health. She takes a daily walk with support. When the sun is shining, Sophie spends her break time in Maxi’s playground. She thoroughly enjoys spending time with students from other classes.

Jessie is our resident music appreciation critic. He has his definite favourite pieces of music and moves his hands in time to the music. Jesse particularly enjoys music therapy with Natalie.

Christian is interested in all things happening in the classroom. He is very observant and loves to be in the middle of the action. Christian has been using switches to operate the paper shredder and scissors during Family and Community studies lessons with Zoe.

And finally, Dakotah has been enjoying everything, especially spending time in the kitchen garden. Unfortunately, the seeds we attempted to grow last term did not germinate. Dakotah helped to replant our garden bed with pansies, marigolds and lavender. She hasn’t needed to water the garden lately on account of all the rain we’ve had.

Wishing everyone a great rest of the term,

Megan and Sophie.

Room 8 has been celebrating...

Happy Birthday to Shea and Gabriel, who had their birthdays in July and August, and Charlotte, who had her birthday at the end of Term 2 in June.

Of course, we enjoy having birthday parties, but Room 8 is also a classroom of diligent young learners. All students have been working towards their individual goals in literacy and numeracy. With hands-on activities, digital programs on the interactive whiteboard and cut and paste tasks everyone has demonstrated great progress for example in number recognition, counting and sequencing numbers. One student has been exploring simple addition strategies with fantastic success. To put numeracy skills into action in a meaningful everyday context, the students sequenced the numbers one to twelve onto a clockface and set the handles to 9am: Time for class.

All students in Room 8 are currently working on a collaborative science and art project around paper. They are in the process of creating a paper mâché bowl and making their own colourful paper to use for some special cards (Pssst…do not tell the dads yet). So far paper has been ripped up, soaked in water and applied to a balloon. There will be some paper products to show off soon.

Mariam, Janina and all students from Room 8

The students in Room 11 have been very busy learners.  We have had a wonderful Term 2 and few weeks into Term 3, full of many exciting learning experiences.

Room 11 have especially enjoyed their Community access where we have visited a few parks where we have practised following instructions, remaining with the group and interacting with our peers and other members of our community. We have been to the Brickpit Park in Thornleigh, St Ives Showground Playground and Livvi’s Place in Kellyville, to name a few. Later this term we will be visiting Calmsley Hill City Farm and Featherdale Wildlife Park, which we are really looking forward to. Lucas T loves to go on equipment that spins, Hasnain and Harvey can’t wait to go on the swings and Maddie and Lucas W enjoy climbing up the big spider frames.

Room 11 has been very busy swimming, gardening, cooking, developing their artistic flares in art therapy and developing their musical talents in Music therapy. Lucas T and Hasnain love to play the electric piano in our music therapy lesson. Harvey, Lucas W and Maddie are very excited when we cook pancakes in cooking and love to add syrup and chocolate sauce. Pranay’s confidence is developing with every lesson in the pool, and he now loves to swim with only a noodle for support.

In art therapy we are making paper which is linked to our Science unit of material world. As a class we have ripped blue and green coloured paper into small pieces which we placed into a blender and added blue coloured water to assist in making a paper pulp. Lucas T, Harvey, Pranay and Lucas W especially enjoyed pressing the button and listening to the buzz as the pulp was made. Hasnain and Maddie both loved placing their hands into the pulp as they used the sifting tray to make a layer of paper. We cannot wait to see the finished paper once it has dried and use it in another of our wonderful art creations.

Warm regards,

Deb W and Jessie

Farhan helping Zoe plant some seeds for her gardening program.

 

 

The next P&C meeting is scheduled for Wednesday 20th August from 6.45pm at Karonga in the Principal's office.  If you are joining us online, we have moved from Zoom to Microsoft Teams.  Please contact karongapc@gmail.com in the lead up to the meeting and we can forward a link to you.

One of the items we will be discussing at our next meeting is our involvement in the Karonga School Founders Day celebrations on Thursday 11th September.  All help is greatly appreciated so come along and be a part of making the day a success.

Warm regards,

Yee-Foong Stone
Karonga P&C President

  

One & All Hub Open Day

Hornsby Community Disability Expo

Dance to the Nines Work Group

Fun & Friends Weekend Program