Farewell to our Year 6 and 7 students... what a great bunch of kids you are!

Last Thursday night we farewelled our Year 6 and Year 7 students of 2014. Following is my message to them...

'This Graduation Ceremony is a special one as we farewell not one but two year levels at the same time. This is the first time in Queensland’s state education history that a whole year level has moved to a different educational setting. There have been a few trials in the last couple of years but this week every state school farewells their Year 6 students as well as their Year 7s.

Over the past few years at Graduation I have talked a lot about our school – how it’s grown, our teachers and other staff members, you as students and the fantastic opportunities students have had throughout the year. This year as we near the end of our fifth year and probably can’t call ourselves a new school any more I want to talk about something else.

This evening I’m going to talk about this man. Do any of you know who he is? That’s right. It’s Adam Goodes. Now I know those among you who know me well are probably saying "Good Grief, surely she isn’t going to talk about football" – it's legendary on staff how little I know about this topic. But yes, I do want to talk about football – or more specifically a footballer - Adam Goodes.

Image courtesy of the Australian Human Rights Commission

As well as being a class A footballer Adam is also Australian of the Year for 2014. His acceptance speech on 26 January this year was lauded by many as ground breaking. For me, a person who doesn’t usually listen to much footballers have to say, it had me standing to attention.

Adam’s message has so much relevance for you as you sit here tonight contemplating the next 5-6 years at high school.

In his speech he talked about what an honour it was to receive an award for doing stuff that he loved and believed in. He didn’t receive Australian of the Year for playing football – it was for his work against racism in our country and his leadership of the Racism Stops With Me campaign. In talking about his work he said he chose that life is all about actions and interactions. He choose to believe that our choices and how we interact with each other creates our relationships and this in turn creates the environment we live in. Our environment shapes our communities, which then shapes the country we all live in. He then went on to say that he has faced racism in his lifetime and, although it is difficult, it has helped shape the man that he is today. And he said that he believes racism is a community issue, which we all need to address and that’s why racism stops with him.

He further said there are always two ways we can look at a situation: we can choose to get angry or not, we can choose to help others or not, or we can choose to be offended or not. We can keep pretending it’s not our issue or we can educate ourselves and others about racism and minority populations.

What Adam was talking about was not just taking responsibility for your own actions but also taking a stand - speaking to your friends when they take out their anger on their loved ones, minority groups or they make racist remarks. It means treating people the way you want to be treated, whether that’s your manners, the way you talk to people, whether they are your loved ones or the person serving you dinner.

It’s about how you choose to give back and make a difference to those around you, your community, your country – this goes outside just yourself. In a country as special as Australia racism holds no place in our society (although sadly it is rampant) – this is why, as a nation that is connected in many ways, we must make racism a thing of the past and be proud of our heritage.

Adam’s message applies not only to racism but to all areas of your lives, our lives. It applies to whether you choose to make the best of your high school years or fritter them away. It applies to how you manage peer pressure. It applies to how you respond when you are harassed by someone – or worse, the subject of a bully. It applies to your stance on violence and it applies to the value you place on your own and others' learning.

Adam Goodes said the ultimate reward for him is when all Australians see each other as equals and treat each other as equals. For him, everything is about people and the choices we make – he believes it’s the people and interactions between us that make Australia so special

And it’s just those things that make our school so special – the people and the interactions between us. Teaching you about relationships and choices has been at the core of everything we do at Peregian Springs SS. And the ultimate reward for your teachers, teacher aides, Ms Cathcart, Mr Foxover, Ms Marszalek and I is when we see you happy, managing yourself well, even in trying situations, and achieving to your very best.

You have had the benefit of marvelous teachers this year, in fact every year. Publically, I’d like to thank you, Chris, Justin, Bec, Pete and Chris for the work you have done with our Year 6s and 7s. Your ability to teach with innovation, passion, courage and care is an inspiration to all of us; it's remarkable, you might say – again you have challenged your students to learn, set high expectations for each of them, you have tried new strategies, kept them on the straight and narrow, cared about each and every one of them, and worked to instil a love of learning they will take with them to high school and beyond. Every child in front of me this evening is a better person for your dedication and commitment.

And this is actually true of all the teachers you have worked with this year – Mrs Hobson, Mrs Guest, Mr Rickert, Mr Huxley, Ms Johnson, Mr Hutchins, Ms Timbs, Ms Steer, Mrs Dean, and Mrs Crow. You have learned an enormous amount from being at this school for your final primary year – not just about English, Maths, Science and History but also about the more important attributes of how to be a better person in this world, in this country, in this community. Graduation from Year 6 and 7 marks the end of an important chapter in your young lives. We hope that your time here has begun to prepare you for the complex future ahead – a future in which you will realise that the buck for making something of yourself, for contributing towards a better community stops with yourselves.

To the Year 7s – you’ve been with us since Year 3. I remember some of you on that first day in 2010 – such little cuties in your little uniforms, faces shining with expectation; still shining today. And now all grown up - to a point - but what I love is that you still get involved, still love to dance - in front of the whole school - still love a sticker from me when you’ve done something amazing – or have accompanied someone to my office who has done something amazing. We are going to miss you very much; and more than that we are going to miss having Year 7 in our school. We will miss the maturity you bring, the level of conversation we can have with you, your developing sense of humour and the ability to appreciate irony, a skill that tends not to develop until early adolescence. We will miss your leadership and sense of responsibility and we will miss watching you test being a teenager throughout the Year 7 year. No matter where you go to high school we will be watching your achievements and hope that you remember your primary years fondly.

To the Year 6s – you’ve been with us since Year 2. You were also very cute with an impatience to learn that impressed all of us. I’ve loved watching that impatience blossom into determination to do the best you can. This has been really evident in your classes this year and your teachers have had to work hard to keep up with you. You are the first and only year level not to have experienced being in the most senior year level of your school for Year 7. For this you will have to wait until you are in Year 12. But this hasn’t stopped you at all. In every area you’ve been out leading the school, grabbing every opportunity and making the most of being senior students regardless of the year level. We will miss your individual personalities and sense of fun.'

A week of wins and challenges

What a week it's been...

It started late last Sunday afternoon when my work phone suddenly rang and seven excited kids were screaming down the phone at me about having won the Tournament of Minds at regional level. This was a totally unexpected result since it was our first entry ever and poor Danae (our Talent Development teacher) was tearing her hair out about props that hadn't been made and lines that hadn't been learned. The result was so unexpected that much to the delight of the children and their parents she burst into tears - and is now planning on winning the State Final in two weeks! I just love aspiration and high expectations!

By now, all Year 3, 5 and 7 students will have received their NAPLAN reports for 2014. On Tuesday I received an email from the North Coast Region congratulating us on the achievement and improvement of our students. Apparently we are punching well above our weight and matching or exceeding some of the best schools in the nation. I don't know about that - I'm just happy that each and every child is learning.

Our school Athletics Team went off to Districts on Wednesday. Seven kids have qualified for the District Team to compete at Regional Trials - and overall we came third! Not bad for a young school with relatively small cohorts for each year level. Cam, our PE teacher, was beaming from ear to ear (there's a not so quiet but friendly rivalry between PE teachers at Districts). Even better was the continual comments he received about how good our kids looked in their athletics singlets (Pete Ashenden from Live Well Pharmacy in the Springs Shopping Centre bought these for us). When kids look good, they are proud, and pride often translates into great behaviour and achievement.

And then, Friday was our annual Book Week Assembly - without a doubt the best Assembly of the year. Pete's Play has become an institution and this year's theme was precious - read a book and pass it on, track your book through Facebook and see where around the world it goes. From Assembly this week six new books have gone out into the world.

The Assembly was full of colour, costumes, laughs and mishaps. I'm not sure there is any school anywhere in which a teacher would encourage 820 children to get up and dance and then expect them all to sit down on cue - not once, but seven times! But our kids can. I never cease to be amazed at how they have learned to engage and have fun - and know when its time to stop.

EVERYONE dresses up - and the costumes are fabulous - especially the handmade ones. Simon (Year 3 teacher) always writes a song. This year's version of Kermit the Frog's Rainbow Connection sung perfectly by Ellie was stuck in our heads all day.

And to top a week of wins and participation off 15 students spent their Sunday at the University of the Sunshine Coast for the Japanese Speaking Contest and it was gold medals for Year 4 and the Junior Open and a Commendation for Year 4.

The week hasn't been without its challenges - in a school community that houses nearly 1000 people every day of the week there are always things to work on - relationships to mend, procedures to fix, improvements to be made.

On the whole though, I think we are making a pretty good fist of being a school to be proud of - proud to attend it, proud to send our kids to it, proud to work in it.. and for me, proud to lead it.

August/September - it's Magic Month in Prep and Year 1

Sometimes I feel so sorry for my Prep and Year 1 teachers... sometimes I see them with their heads in their hands in the Staff Room at their wit's end. They are convinced they have done everything possible to teach little Johnnie his letters, and little Susie her numbers. They usually have done everything we can all think of - except wait...

August and September is Magic Month in Prep and Year 1 classrooms. Suddenly eight to nine months of learning seems to sink in, and Susie and Johnnie are reading and counting away like there's no tomorrow.

Children need time and some children need lots of time. Children are learning all along - even if it doesn't seem like it, and then suddenly it seems like the penny drops.

Of course, time isn't all they need. We can't just sit there waiting... and hey presto, there's some learning. 

Children also need committed dedicated, organised, innovative teachers (luckily we have an oversupply of those at Peregian Springs). And children also need someone who partners with their teacher - someone at home who listens to them read every day, who reads to them every day, who models writing by making notes and shopping lists every day, someone who demonstrates the power of regular sustained practice every day - the Preps and Year 1s who have this person at home make the greatest gains and have even a more magic month come August and September.

There's something remarkable going on...

A couple of weeks ago I posted on our school's Face Book page that some of our teachers are becoming voracious bloggers. One has been blogging a long while and the other has just discovered it as a tool for learning and collaborating and feeding his excitement. The second blog is a collaborative effort and both teachers hope to get a remarkable bunch of students writing and collaborating with them.

They both have remarkable students in their classes - in fact we have remarkable students in every class. Many of them are waiting politely to show how remarkable they are. And their chance is about to come...

While I was swanning around Europe watching the World Cup in Berlin and swimming with sharks in Scotland (I'll include a photo - I still can't believe I did this...), Chris and Pete were cooking up a storm and scribbling on whiteboards, planning and plotting for the build of a Remarkable Room and what would happen in there. I knew what they were up to - in between soccer games and deep dives I was reading their blog. So I waited, and then on Friday I was summoned to come and see what they want to do.

It's big, it's great, it's going to have an impact on all of our students as we start to turn the learning process upside down and concentrate on imagination, innovation and investigation, and less on rote learning small units of content and skills.

Their planning looked like this...

Yes, I tried hard not to look horrified...

There was some writing in recognisable text which I was very happy with - these two are clever enough to recognise the parameters I would put around their project. But there's not too many. You can't put parameters around learning that is this exciting and extensive.

Our kids are in for a remarkable treat. I can't wait...

A Scottish basking shark 8m long

Big, messy, noisy learning - the very best kind

I wandered into 6S yesterday to say hi to Pete - he was the only teacher I hadn't had a chance to catch up with after being on leave. The activity going on with 55 kids and two teachers just washed over me like a forceful wave. Kids were constructing houses and aircraft hangars, testing buzzers and bells, researching their ideas on the net, and there were electrical wires, complex diagrams and Internet enabled devices everywhere. Every child was excitedly working on their project, chattering about it, studying it with frowning eyebrows, testing solutions and improving their product. Pete and Chris (6S's teachers) sat amid cardboard, aluminium foil, paint, textas and paper challenging their learners, raising new questions, and smiling.

This is big, messy, noisy learning at its best - this is real inquiry, real life learning; the type of learning that spawns truly long lasting, sustainable and impressive learning outcomes across a range of areas. Students are researching, reading, writing and calculating in a meaningful context with few restraints.

I love it.

Reading Reports...

Today I brought home a big cardboard box of Report Cards to sign.

Yes, it's that time of the year again. As I put the box on the floor next to my table my young rag doll climbed in and lay all over the folders. Oh, the life of a cat... 

I've had to wrestle the folders out from under him and as I sign each Report Card and have a last flip through I reflect on this process every school will be going through right now.

Report Cards and the process involved in preparing them is perhaps one of the most time consuming processes for any school. At Peregian Springs we believe that Report Cards are one of the most important documents provided to parents. This is why they are time consuming and often difficult to produce. In fact, it is because of their value and importance to parents that we read and sign each child’s report after the teacher has written it.

We do this for many reasons:-

We want to know how each child is developing and to read about their progress over the semester.

We want to be sure of the ‘quality’ of the content of the report. As a teaching profession, we believe teachers need to be accountable for these reports as they are a record of what has taken place.

We want to affirm our wonderful teachers in the work they have put into reflecting on student progress and writing their detailed reports. 

So my hand is aching and I've gone through two pens already. And I'm just hoping that parents will appreciate the efforts their children have made in their learning, and the thinking their teachers have put into providing an accurate report of each child's progress. I'm also wishing that all I had to do was lay all over them and look cute. And I'm hoping that some children don't find stray cat hair in their report when they open it up and read it next Friday!

School photo day...such excitment over having your picture taken!

Last week was the annual school photos event. There was such excitement everywhere about having your photo taken. All the classes looked fantastic as they marched up to the Indoor Sports Centre - checked shirts, hair combed, ribbons and bows in school colours, and black shoes. Teachers all over the school were checking each member of their class for sticky up hair and shirt collars, dirty knees and odd socks. Teachers were all dressed up too. One said to me 'I've got make up on for two days in a row!' And another turned up in a tie and dinner suit! (I saw him later in the day and he had ditched the tie and rolled up his sleeves!)

Thursday morning was staff photo time - the kids were disappointed they couldn't watch. Up until this year staff photos have been done in the middle of the oval with all the kids looking on and laughing. Last year my heels sank into the boggy grass and my hair blew everywhere and I said to Mrs Cathcart, 'please organise an alternative for next year'. So we built the Sports Centre! The photographers lined us up and I had to sit down the front and in the middle - as usual. All the tall men stood in a group behind me. We definitely need to break with tradition next year - I'm going to stand up at the back!

This year the photographers allowed the classes to have a fun photo, as well as the more serious traditional class photo. Some of these are gorgeous - actually all of them are! I think we need to reverse the trend of spit and polish for photo day and include more waggley ears and sticky out tongues. 

Sometimes we take ourselves far too seriously!

A licence to be creative

I love it when teachers send kids to see me with their 'best' work. It's a chance to celebrate learning, have a chat and ask children about their activities. It's also an opportunity to indiscriminately hand out stickers - I always ask 'are you too old for stickers?'. They never are...

The other day a group of Year 5s appeared at my door asking me if I wanted to see their movies. I don't need any other invitation to down tools and take a break. They proudly explained that their teacher had been to a conference and had returned and implemented a session once a week where they could be 'creative'. (It's always funny the ways in which kids see things - I'm pretty sure the teacher would be horrified if she knew they thought they could only be creative once a week!) They had made some movies about Queensland Day and as they pressed play up came a stream of photos of underwater scenes, the Queensland outback and other iconic Queensland images.

'Lovely', I said. 'Did you take those photos?'

'Oh, no', said one of them. 'They're from Creative Commons'. And so began a conversation on intellectual property, stealing the work of others from the Internet, and how many people make their living from their work online and should be paid for it. I was so impressed that 10 year olds already understand that you can't simply just copy and paste whatever you feel like using and pass it off as your own work. I was so impressed they knew about Creative Commons, what it means and how to find images they could use which didn't infringe on the rights of others.

This, of course, is a key outcome of our mLearning Program. Students are learning how to navigate the online world safely and ethically. They are learning to be creators of knowledge, and not just merely consumers. If we can pull this off, and at the same time maintain their innate curiosity and creativity, then we have done our jobs well.

(For those of you wondering, Creative Commons is a non-profit organisation devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share.)

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   From http://creativecommons.org.au/

   
   

I wanted to bring this little guy home from Edutech

Six of us went to Edutech Australia 2014 this week and I got a little attached to this little guy. Edutech is Australia's premier conference on learning technologies and the latest thinking in education. Four of us went last year and in all my years as a Principal I have never seen so much value from one professional development event. The teachers that came with me transformed their learning environments, talked excitedly with kids about learning and the future and were constantly at my door with the refrain 'I've got this idea... this is what we want to do now'.

Sure, Edutech showcases all the shiny new toys and the latest gadgets to engage students in their learning...and last year we walked around the product displays round eyed and wistful (and I was desperately trying to keep the credit card in my wallet.) We bought a couple of things - a 3D printer and some 'light' reading. And we also raided all the free stuff to bring back to school. We raided all the free stuff this year too! But what was different was that we just wanted the ideas. The ideas are the most valuable commodity for our teachers and their students.

We were treated to the likes of Ken Robinson, Sugata Mitra, Ian Dukes (21st Century Fluency Project) and Yong Zhao and the ideas were flowing. The messages about educating for creativity and fluency with technology rang loud and clear and was music to our ears. We have a ton of things we want to do to ensure our children retain their innate curiosity and develop their ability to be creative problem solvers and creative opportunity finders - essential skills of our world now and in the future. We learned about concepts that will feed our creativity as educators for the next 12 months and more.

(Having said that I was still a bit keen on the little robot. I'm sure I could think of some way he could further creativity in our school!)

Bring on Edutech Australia 2015. We want to take a whole new team next year and I'm excited already!

What a week to have the flu!

I haven't had the flu since 2007! And I've probably gotten a little complacent - sure, I wash my hands 20 times a day and steer clear of sneezing people; I send my staff home when they are sick with severe admonishments about coming back to school too soon, but I don't have the flu jab every year and for the past few years have escaped unscathed.

But, no, this is the week I pick to get bedridden - the week our Indoor Sports Centre was finally open and we could have an indoor Assembly!

I've been talking about this possibility since our very first Assembly in January 2010. The fact we didn't have a hall like every other school in Australia at that time drew raised eyebrows from the then Minister for Education and Training, Geoff Wilson, when he opened our school on 12 February 2010.

There were lots of phone calls, emails and letters from me and pleas from the P&C Association which all seemed to fall on deaf ears; then suddenly one day in 2012 I was told the funding for our hall was in the state budget.

However, a budget year came and went and there was no sign of any activity at all. I had sat in on many meetings, chosen a plan, walked the site with builders and engineers but no one could say when it was going to happen.

Suddenly last August I received a call - 'we start next week' was the message. And it's been flat out since then. We've had a few hiccups - 'small' things like too many new enrolments and not enough classrooms, so they decided to put two classrooms under the centre, lots of dirt through classrooms driving our cleaners crazy, Prep H shouting at each other over the noise of diggers and trucks despite Ms Hollonds best efforts to instil 'whisper voices' in the classroom. But now it's finished. It's big and beautiful and exactly right for Assembly.

And I had to go and miss the first one!

I've seen a recording on You Tube though - thanks to Elaine in the office. It was so great to see all the students, parents and staff in there with room to spare! And everyone stood QUIETLY for the national anthem (this is my dream!) but maybe Elaine's recording wasn't so good for that section.

We are going to have a lot of fun in that space. It's a facility that will add to our already strong community spirit. But for now, I'm so happy to see it sitting there up high on the edge of our school.

I'm not missing Assembly next week - for anything!

5SH - the first class to have PE in the ISC

Our children are so very lucky!

Today I collected the keys for our new Indoor Sports Centre and the two new classrooms underneath. It was quite overwhelming to see this wonderful facility finished and ready for kids to learn in. The builders proudly took Cam (our PE teacher), Mark (our School's Officer), Jill (our Business Services Manager) and I for a tour. We were all smiling from ear to ear!

The facility is beautiful! Just beautiful!

It's big and bright and airy. It has amazing sound proofing on the walls for acoustics - I couldn't stop touching it!) It has properly installed automatic basketball hoops - it has an international standards rating.  Yes, we could actually host an international basketball carnival in our very own Sports Centre. The space is aerated with massive fans (there is a rude name for these!). There's a kitchen and very generous amenities.


The classrooms underneath are stunning - long rooms with muted colours just screaming out for colourful art works; tinted windows and air conditioning (yes, air conditioning! I'm now conducting an auction at Staff Meetings for teachers wanting to move to these rooms!)

We can move in on Monday.

A friend of mine recently spent seven weeks working in Tanzania and spent most of that time in classrooms with children who walk up to an hour each way just to go to school.


I wonder if our children realise how very lucky they are?

Image courtesy of Africa Geographic

Happy Mother's Day

Some of you will know I'm a mother - a very proud one!

I remember when Maddie was born, looking down at her on the birthing cushion and thinking 'oh my, look what I've done'. The only other time I have felt that way was the day our school opened and all the children came streaming in the gate on that first day.

Even now I look her as an adult and marvel on how her childhood and young adulthood is panning out. She went off to Thailand for the university holidays last year and worked as a dive master for three months. Of course, I went to visit her and spent days on the boats watching her working. As she hosted 30+ holiday makers, organised the dive staff, paid the marine park fees, bossed the Captain and boat boys around, sorted out passenger problems, dealt with sea sick kids, jumped in the water with her own divers, and then made sure everyone got back to their hotel safe and sound, I kept wondering 'who is that young woman?'

There's a lot said these days about mothers and 'me time'. I've never been a fan of 'me time'. The best use of 'me time' is always to spend it with my daughter. I relish every minute with my child and always have. Perhaps I'd feel differently if I had four!

I remember the day she moved to college and started uni - I was completely bereft and thought my heart would break. I'm getting better at 'me time' now!

The other day I was listening to little Jude chattering away to his Dad in the other office. I emailed Dave and told him how I loved listening to Jude talking to him in the afternoons. He emailed back and said 'Yes, Jude has an interesting take on life and I need to stop and listen to him more'.

To all mothers everywhere - have a wonderful Mother's Day. Enjoy and make the most of the time with your children. They grow up so fast and are gone making their own way in the world before you know it.

ANZAC Traditions

It's wonderful to see our school's traditions establishing, growing and changing over time.  One of the most important traditions is our ANZAC Ceremony at school and our attendance at the Dawn Service at Coolum RSL on ANZAC Day morning.

Our Student Leaders do a fabulous job of leading the Ceremony which is usually held the day before ANZAC Day. All the classes make gorgeous wreaths and two children proudly represent their class to lay it at the base of the flag pole. In our first year we held our ceremony at the flag poles at the front of the school. Now we have 803 children meeting in the Central Covered Games Area facing the beautiful Peace Garden built by Mark, our School's Officer, and paid for by Coolum RSL.

Sometimes we have a real life trumpeter and other times we rely on technology for the Last Post and the Reveille. This year we had drummers - fantastic! And these days, we are all excellent at the Minute's Silence! This year we added the New Zealand National Anthem. After all, ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps - it's not all about us!

Early ANZAC morning we meet at Seacove Court and proudly march with our school flag to the RSL for the Dawn Service. It's often cold and always dark. And we are always very quiet and respectful. We usually take one of the class' beautiful wreaths, and two Student Leaders line up and take it to the flag pole.

ANZAC Dawn Service on Lady Elliot Island

I was unable to attend this year. University holidays don't coincide with school holidays this year so I took a few extra days and went scuba diving with my daughter. On ANZAC morning, we stood in our wet suits on the beach facing a sunrise over the water watching the Australian flag flying on a yacht's mast and I was hoping that another tradition had been upheld back at Coolum RSL - and that is the supply of muffins for hungry little tummies. (I was so happy to see later on Facebook that in fact, Mr Foxover and Mrs Cathcart had remembered, and that the tradition has evolved to cupcakes!)

I love the Drop Off Zone

I love the Drop Off Zone! How nerdy is that?

I race out at 3.00pm every afternoon I can. Sometimes Sandy (Mrs Cathcart) will say, 'I'll do it for you'. But I never let her.

It's the one time of the day that I get to spend time with the same group of children. I love that they greet me when I get there. Some of them are carrying books and we chat about stories and authors. Others are proudly carrying art works they have created that day and they love to show me.  I help them put stuff in their bags and we talk about what's in their homework folders.

We often have to huddle together under umbrellas and I have a special pair of gum boots for those days. Too many pairs of shoes have been ruined on wet days! Or I have to insist everyone put their hat on because we are baking in the sun for 15 minutes. The children are always good natured about whatever happens.

Kids yell goodbye as they climb into their cars, Mums and Dads wave, some older past students slink low in front seats trying not to be seen, and when there is a dog in the front seat we say 'how cute!' One past parent used to bring their cat and I got to cuddle him on more than one occasion. I often have a quick chat with a parent or two - Did you get my email? Your child has settled well into our school? Can you come and see me about your little bloke who is starting school next year?

The boys and I often pass comment on the cars and we love it when the Butterworth's drive their Cadillac in. We can smell the gasoline from a mile away! This week we saw a car with a self-closing boot. 'Awesome', we all said together and then laughed.

Everyone waits in line politely and kids like it when the gate is open and they can run up the path when their parent's car pulls in along the kerb. Kids watch the road and yell ' I can see my mum - she's gonna be on the roundabout soon'.

Children know not to chase their balls when one escapes across the road and sometimes I have to weave between the traffic to retrieve a lost item. And there is always something interesting left behind - a swimming bag, a diorama, a toy - yesterday we found just one Haviana thong. And we all had a laugh about how someone could have left only one thong behind.

Recently at a community meeting, representatives from the Council, the Police and the Department of Transport commented on how everyone waits patiently in the line all around the two roundabouts and through the school car park. Sure - we have the odd cranky person who doesn't want to keep moving when their children are not in the green space but in the main we are a very well behaved community! (Thanks for that, everyone)

At this same meeting a suggestion was made to get rid of the Drop Off Zone.  My heart sank. Really! Are they joking! I hope so because I love the Drop Off Zone. It usually ends my day with smiles and hugs from the kids I love. And when the last child is packed safely into a car, I wander back to the office to finish the day.

Things in schools that should never change

I recently read a blog post by esteemed educator and leader, George Couros, whose work I follow who wrote about 3 Things That Should Never Change In Schools.  George says these three things are

1. The focus on relationships
2. Opportunities outside the classroom
3. Learning in an respectful manner

and it caused me to reflect on all the change Principals and teachers are continually expected to bring about in schools. Every meeting with the 'powers that be' and every email from the 'powers that be' brings another change (dressed up as a new initiative or a 'ground breaking' program or a new direction for the Department), but it is a change none the less. And in all of this change, it's what stays the same that makes the difference to kids.

In our school a focus on relationships looks and sounds like happy smiling kids, happy smiling teachers (and other staff too, of course), lessons with buddy class once a week, new students being given 'the tour', explicit teaching about manners and expected standards of behaviour, and staff who spend their break times counselling children in need of assistance.

Opportunities 'beyond the classroom' include lunch clubs (there are loads of them), Visual Art lessons, charity work, student leadership, Reader's Cup, excursions, camps, carnivals, games, laying around on a cushion in the Resource Centre reading, Assembly performances, and musical and dramatic opportunities.

And learning in a respectful manner is a cornerstone in our school.

At the end of the day the changes count for nothing unless these things stay the same!

I don't get it...

This week's post is a guest post from Rose Marszalek,  our Head of School: Curriculum, who writes about her experiences learning mathematics as a child.

I don’t know about you, but when I went to school Maths involved blindly following rules such as A = (L + B) x 2, C = π r² , and putting a zero at the start of the second line when you were multiplying by 2 digits.  I had no idea why, but I did it because my Teacher told me to and it worked.  I loved Maths right up until Year 9.  In fact, until then I was determined that I was going to be a high school Maths Teacher.  But what happened in Year 9?  Well, that’s when I was asked to explain, justify and prove my mathematical thinking and reasoning.  And could I? No, I couldn’t because I’d just been following the processes and formulae drilled into me for the previous 8 years of my schooling.  In primary school in Queensland in the 1980s I was not taught or exposed to rainbow facts or near doubles or place value or the split strategy.  I dutifully learned all my number facts (and spelling for that matter) by rote and regurgitated them at the weekly tests and did pretty well.  I trusted the processes my Teachers drilled into me for addition, subtraction, multiplication and even the dreaded long division.  I loved it all.  But all this showed was that I had a good memory.  I made the connections and saw the patterns myself because my brain was naturally looking for them (and perhaps because my mother was a Maths teacher).  However, I couldn’t truly explain many maths concepts I thought I understood, until I had to teach them many years later to the students in front of me.

Today though, as we implement the Australian Curriculum Mathematics, we teach kids the patterns and expect them to reason, justify and prove their thinking, starting in Prep. We guide them to make the connections between related number facts, to use place value to multiply and to measure the area or a shape without a formula – controversial I know!  There is a time and a place for a mathematical formulae and vertical algorithms (or ‘sums’ as I called the pages and pages of them I did and loved in primary school).  This place however is not till later in the primary school years and in some cases not till secondary school.  Racing through number facts and rote learning them day after day is not the way of Maths anymore.  We need our children to make the connections and see the patterns, so that they know that 8 + 9 is 17 (near double or doubles plus 1) and can extend this to know that 80 + 90 is 170 and 800 + 900 is 1700.   Don’t be in a hurry for your child to get through their number facts.  Take the time to re-learn them yourselves with the strategies that your child’s Teacher is teaching them.  You just never know, something might make sense for you for the first time!

Common Courtesies - doing it naturally

I was visiting 2M last Thursday afternoon and as I cast my eyes around the room for somewhere to sit, little Jack says 'Sit here, Ms Sands' and patted the empty desk next to him. He then raced over to the corner of the room with an 'I'll get you a chair'.

And later that day as I was leaving the office laden down with my brief case, lunch bag, hand bag and other myriad things I seem to collect to take home every day, young Amaya says 'Let me get the door for you'.

This is common courtesy at it's best, and I'm so proud it happens in our school not only every day but multiple times a day.

We do teach Common Courtesies. We have a list of ten we've all decided are the really important ones. It includes things like saying please, thank you, excuse me and good morning; things like knocking politely and waiting by a door for an invitation in; things like using people's names when you address them. Our list is displayed in every classroom and we usually send it home in the newsletter once a year asking parents to reinforce the same at home.

Common courtesies are taught as a routine in our school. We can't just assume that children will know how good manners make the world go round. So by teaching these few courtesies explicitly we can at the very least ensure they have some standard ways of behaving that help them draw people closer to them.

Our kids' manners are the first things noticed by every visitor to our school. People find it so surprising.

But what I love is that they don't just know the script, know the routine and just say it - they do it naturally. Caring for others and displaying common courtesy is common place at Peregian Springs. Thank you to all parents who help us reinforce this!

Be kind to each other...

The other morning before school I walked down the pathway towards the senior school and one of the Year 4 boys grabbed his handball and said 'Are you alright, Ms Sands?' I looked at him in surprise, 'Yes, sweetheart, I'm fine.' 'Oh, that's good - you were holding your tummy and I thought you were sick.' And with that he went back to his game.

The night before I had received a distressing email from a parent who was clearly at her wits end about the swearing and racist name calling her children were being exposed to in the playground. Her concern was that this sort of talk was virtually being tolerated in our school. And she believes that we are not doing enough to challenge the behaviour and stop it.

I've been mulling over these two incidents ever since. On one hand we have children demonstrating spontaneous acts of kindness and care, and on the other, a small (very small) group of students who think swearing and racist commentary as they go about kicking a ball around is a perfectly okay way to speak and play.

In a school where a premium is placed on social and emotional development, where dedicated lessons in social and emotional literacy are taught every week in every classroom, where our efforts in this area are recognised as outstanding by the Department of Education, where dedicated staff work with individual and groups of children to assist them develop self awareness, self management and respect, and where all staff display and model integrity, kindness and compassion; how is it that the thoughtless actions of a few give rise to the perception that all children are behaving like this and that it is being tolerated?

I love our kids - the well behaved ones, the naughty ones, the ones who smile and wave, the ones who swear, the ones who look horrified when someone says unkind words, the ones still learning what unkind words are, the ones with tons of friends and the ones struggling to form relationships with others - all of them, I love all of them. And as a school we will continue to teach them how to be humans of the highest integrity in our world through our learning programs, expectations, and processes for dealing with less than desirable events and behaviour.

We need parents to partner with us in this. We need parents to stand by us and reinforce with their children what is acceptable and not acceptable in our world, parents who censor what films their children watch and what video games they play, parents who discuss the effects of racist and sexist language with their children, parents who are prepared to take a stand with us and tell their children that 'enough is enough' and that swearing and name calling needs to stop, and parents who feel so strongly about this issue that other parents who tolerate it feel pressure to monitor their own behaviour.

We can do this together and we need to be kind to each other...

The joy of listening to kids read

Not long after I started school as a little girl I was curled up in the book corner reading away when the Headmaster, Mr Evans, came into the classroom and said 'What's that silly girl doing over there pretending to read?'

I was four, and I still remember it - perhaps I need to get over now! I still remember being so angry that he thought I was pretending. I even remember the book I was reading - The Princess and the Pea from the Ladybird series. As a child I amassed many of these little hardcovers. I wish I still had them - they are worth a fortune now!

Anyway, back to Mr Evans - needless to say, he wasn't my inspiration to become a teacher - well, maybe he was. I think I knew then that kids deserve a lot better than that.

There is nothing I enjoy more than listening to kids read - any kid, at whatever level of development they are at. Reading is the key to the world and every time an adult listens to a child read and uses gentle timely interventions, they are helping the child cut another notch on that key.

I listened to couple of little girls in 3/2B the other day. They had picked a book for partner reading and were having the best fun. At the end of taking turns, using funny voices, flipping backwards and forwards through the pages, laughing at the funny parts and asking questions about the hard words I told them I thought they were amazing readers and I asked them how I would know that.

'Oh' they said 'We are fluency [sic], we use expression, we know what the words mean, and we can work stuff out - we comprend it.'

'Great,' I said. 'And how do I as the listener know you can understand what you are reading? That you comprend it, so to speak.'

'The voices we use and the funny bits we laugh at - if we weren't comprending we wouldn't know when to laugh or stop reading and think and stuff...' they said. Hmmm...

I was so glad they didn't say 'You know we are good readers because we are on Level J reading books'.

A child's reading level says nothing to a child about how they see themselves as a reader. A reading level is information for the teacher that helps guide instructional decisions. It is the result of a complex array of factors including decoding skills, voice control, fluency, expression, strategies used to make meaning, knowledge about punctuation and vocabulary, and much more.  It's not a competition nor a badge of honour. It's simply a tool teachers use to ensure children are reading at exactly the right level to continue to learn, to continue to make meaning. It's a way of making sure we don't expect children to jump to the top of a flight of stairs from half way down.

Because in the words of a couple of Year 2 girls, it's all about comprending it!

I'm sorry... such a powerful phrase when we mean it

It has been six years since the Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples was delivered on 13 February 2008 to Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people for past laws, policies and practices which affected the lives of Australia’s First Nations Peoples and Stolen Generations.

The department has marked the occasion with a display of the National Apology in the Education House foyer, which is also available to read here.  I have reprinted the transcript of these historic words below.

Aboriginal Mosaic In Forecourt Of Parliament House, Canberra, Australia*

The apology has enormous significance for Indigenous Australians and every year at this time there is discussion in the media about whether we as a nation and as individuals really have embraced these words and moved closer to resolving the injustices of the past and harnessing the determination of all Australians to close the gap in life expectancy, educational achievement and economic opportunity. Many would argue that no, we haven't. In six years we haven't moved any closer to this goal, and one has to wonder how long it will take.

The education of children is instrumental in achieving this goal. At Peregian Springs we have only a small population of Indigenous children - and many would question what the plight of Indigenous peoples has to do with us. It has everything to do with all of us. Understanding the Apology and acting on its principles is about the health and prosperity of all Australians, no matter where they come from or for how long their families have resided in this country.


We acknowledge country at Assembly every week and I long for the day when one of our Indigenous children will feel they can welcome country. We assess and check the educational achievement of every child; we monitor absences from school; we teach the cross curriculum demands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures; we recognise and celebrate Indigenous peoples' special days and we are trying to do our bit.

Is it enough? Probably not - in fact almost certainly not. It's an area that requires constant attention and development. We've said we're sorry and these are powerful words. Powerful words can lead to even more powerful intentions - but they are only powerful if we mean it and being sorry translates into actions.

The transcript:
 I move:

That today we honour the Indigenous peoples of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in human history.
We reflect on their past mistreatment.
We reflect in particular on the mistreatment of those who were Stolen Generations - this blemished chapter in our nation's history.
The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia's history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future.
We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.
We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.
For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.
To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.
And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.
We the Parliament of Australia respectfully request that this apology be received in the spirit in which it is offered as part of the healing of the nation.
For the future we take heart; resolving that this new page in the history of our great continent can now be written.
We today take this first step by acknowledging the past and laying claim to a future that embraces all Australians.
A future where this Parliament resolves that the injustices of the past must never, never happen again.
A future where we harness the determination of all Australians, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, to close the gap that lies between us in life expectancy, educational achievement and economic opportunity.
A future where we embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have failed.
A future based on mutual respect, mutual resolve and mutual responsibility.
A future where all Australians, whatever their origins, are truly equal partners, with equal opportunities and with an equal stake in shaping the next chapter in the history of this great country, Australia.

* Encyclopædia Britannica Image Quest. http://year3history.edublogs.org/indigenous-art-forms/

If you are diving with Great Whites, I'm coming next time

Taking holidays during school term time is such a conundrum. It's frowned upon by the state and even legislated against in the Education Act. It requires a Principal's approval (imagine if I said 'no'!) and is quite disruptive to the learning program of a class. While children are away, they miss key learnings, and the sequential development of complex concepts in literacy, numeracy and science are interrupted. It's difficult for the class teacher and even more difficult for the child when they return to school to find the class has moved on and that they are in the middle of a lot of half finished work.

The flip side is the wonderful time children have being with family, visiting far flung places, engaging with other cultures and the local people, meeting the wildlife, learning about food and customs and developing an understanding of tolerance and diversity - this is much harder to achieve in the classroom, and can be the most valuable learning of all!

Last year one of our beloved families took off for a 12 month hike around Australia. The kids were enrolled with the School of Distance Education, the maps were drawn, the caravan prepared and off they went. They have returned this year with a collection of the best memories of a wonderful year on the road. They dropped the flash drive into my pigeon-hole in the office to have a look at. Being a traveller myself I had to fight the urge to sit and look at it until the weekend. And when I finally plugged that drive into my Mac I saw the best images of a family having fun, drawing closer together, creating a life time of memories of the places they have visited. I followed their journey through the images of north Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, NT and South Australia, and up the west coast of WA. There were animals, paddle steamers, turtles, Parliament House, swimming, Uluru, massive escarpments, Ningaloo, our great capital cities and ... Great White Sharks! Oh, so lucky! I so want to swim with

these amazing, majestic creatures. My friends and family think I'm mad and no one will come with me!

I loved seeing these photos of a family at play.  I didn't see any of the kids engaging with the School of Distance Education!!! However, I know that what they have learned about our magnificent country cannot be described in any curriculum.

I have to say, I don't and can't approve of holidays in school time.  The time children are with their teacher is too short, too valuable. But if you are going diving with the Great Whites, I'm coming with you.

Stop dragging my heart around...

This week for the first time in the history of our school I watched students walking past rubbish and litter on the ground. I watched adults doing it too. Well, that's a small thing, you might say - especially in a week where EVERY class settled quickly including Preps, where (nearly) EVERY kid was smiling about being back at school, and EVERY child was learning by 9.20am on Tuesday morning.

Actually, it's not a small thing. It's a big thing.

I talked about this on Assembly on Friday morning. If we are going to start walking past rubbish on the ground, are we also going to start walking past someone who is lonely in the playground? Are we going to stop insisting everyone uses common courtesies? Are we going to stop standing up for a friend and helping them if they are bullied? Are we saying it's okay to ride bikes and scooters and skateboards all over the school ignoring the safety of all?

Bystander behaviour is well documented in print and online literature. A bystander is someone who is present at an event without participating in it. It's dangerous behaviour as it leads to a tacit acceptance of the less desirable behaviour or values. Research shows that the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is than someone will take a stand. We have 793 children in our school, over 550 families and more than 70 staff - we can't afford for even some of us to just 'walk past'.

Image courtesy of Deposit Photos (see end note)

I loved 4H's Assembly performance last week. It was a clear demonstration of a simple sentence that can change a child's whole day - come and play with us! So simple and so powerful. The large heart being dragged around on stage was symbolic of how a lonely person feels. We encourage our kids to notice the children who are dragging their hearts around and work to include them - not simply leave it be.

Equally we encourage children (and adults) to pick up rubbish as they walk past.  Leaving litter on the ground says we don't care, and if we don't care about the cleanliness of our playgrounds, the next step is not caring about any of the core values that make our school so special.

At Peregian Springs we wear our core values of respect, responsibility, relationships and choice on our sleeves - we model them, talk about them, reinforce them, explicitly teach them. As we continue to grow as a community, we need to take a stand when someone walks past rubbish.

Image courtesy of Deposit Photos ((http://static5.depositphotos.com/1014680/489/i/950/depositphotos_4892724-Heart-collage.jpg)