One of the best parts of my job as Principal

It's a double edged sword - a growing school. On one hand we have access to a raft of resources denied to small schools, and we have a depth of teaching expertise that enables us to offer interesting and engaging programs and to cater for the diverse needs of all our students. But it also means my role as a Principal is changing. Correction: has changed - quite dramatically over the last year or two.

We have a large leadership team now whose responsibility is much of the front line tasks I love - interacting with students, meeting with parents, spending time in classrooms with teachers improving learning outcomes.

My role is incredibly diverse - I manage a big budget, oversee the building of new facilities, recruit our staff, design and provide professional development for everyone. I plan for the future while managing the present and continually reflect on our past. We have a staff of 81 and I work with all of them. Despite this I'm determined to remain 'hands on' - I'm in the playground (and the car park!) and at Assemblies; I run our staff meetings; my door is always open for teachers; other staff and parents alike (and for kids showing off their work); I love to be in the classroom - for any reason whatsoever (and sometimes for no reason!); I run the school tours and I still do most of the enrolments.

Making time for our new families is one of the favourite parts of my role. And in the week preceding the first day I've met a LOT of new families. It has been just lovely to sit with people and listen to them talk about their kids and their hopes and dreams for their new life at Peregian Springs State School. People have come from everywhere - Western Australia, Brazil, Korea, Victoria, New South Wales, Canada, northern Queensland and Noosaville. I've read student reports, talked with pride about my staff and what they are capable of, made sure everyone has their uniforms, book packs, and swimming notes, and invited them to Meet Your Teacher afternoon. I've listened to little ones tell me about their previous teachers (this is always very entertaining), their new shoes and lunch boxes and their hopes for a friend on the first day. My heart always goes out to new students (read my blog post about being new). Starting a new school is always hard but it's also a special time, an exciting one too.

We have approximately 850 children all bursting to get to school on Tuesday morning (well, maybe a couple are a little reluctant).  I can't wait to see each and every one of them. No matter how big our school gets it's important to always make time for children and their families.

So - Happy New Year, everyone, and all the best for the first school week - whether it's your first or your sixth!

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