Castle Hill Public School

NEWSLETTER Les Shore Place, Castle Hill NSW 2154 Phone: 9634 3777 Fax: 9899 6845

Email: castlehill-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au Webpage: castlehill-p.schools.nsw.gov.au

April 01, 2020

I hope that this message finds you, and your family, safe and healthy. Our teachers are continuing to provide on-line learning programs for all of our students via Seesaw. Any students attending school will complete identical tasks to those being completed at home. While not yet confirmed, we are working under the assumption that on-line learning will continue after the scheduled school holidays. We are aware that on-line learning has worked very well in some households but perhaps not as well in others. In an attempt to support students and parents, we are asking for your feedback on your experience with on-line learning so far, via the following survey links:

Kindergarten: https://tinyurl.com/ujm9qyj Year 1: https://tinyurl.com/v5g75ak Year 2: https://tinyurl.com/wpcjsse Year 3: https://tinyurl.com/yx63lybj Year 4: https://tinyurl.com/raky93o Year 5: https://tinyurl.com/tr7sp46 Year 6: https://tinyurl.com/sl3rwd2 Please note that these links are the same as those sent via Skoolbag earlier today. We will also send them via the class parent network in an attempt to make contact with as many parents as possible. If at all possible, we ask that these surveys be completed by Friday of this week. Please complete one survey for each child that is enrolled at Castle Hill Public School. In addition, we have produced a ‘CHPS Tips and Tricks’ presentation that we hope will support parents and students in completing learning tasks via Seesaw. You can access this presentation by following either of the following links: https://tinyurl.com/te2x7zo

https://sway.office.com/5q2pbwhhkjA3aJj1?ref=Link

As well as setting tasks and providing feedback to students, teachers are also marking class rolls each day. As previously communicated, where students are engaged in their learning via Seesaw on a given day, they are granted flexible leave. If the teacher cannot see that your child has engaged with their learning tasks on any given day, without a parent explanation, they will be marked as absent. If your child is unwell, we do not expect them to attempt tasks. Please contact the school via Skoolbag to inform us if your child is unwell and they will be granted sick leave.

Year 5 & 6 Science Excursion CANCELLED

Wednesday April 01 All band tutorials and practice CANCELLED for Term 1

Friday April 3 PSSA CANCELLED for Term 1

Friday April 3 Harmony Day CANCELLED

Thursday April 9 Anzac Day Ceremony CANCELLED Last Day Term 1

Assemblies are cancelled. We will notify you of any changes when they occur.

WHAT’S ON

SCHOOL ASSEMBLIES

PBL Fortnightly Expectation Focus

Term 1 Weeks 9, 10 & 11 Respect Take pride in yourself and your school.

For your information, the Department has made a range of resources available to parents to assist with on-line learning from home. Visit the following site for further details: https://education.nsw.gov.au/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/learning-from-home/advice-to-parents-and-carers Again, a big ‘Thank You’ for your support and co-operation during this difficult time. Please do not hesitate to contact your child’s class teacher, Mrs Kohary, Miss Machuca or myself if we can be of assistance. Please take care and look after yourself and your family. 6E Class Teacher Miss Matthews will remain as the 6E class teacher for Term 2. Vacation Care As we move toward the Term 1 vacation period, the Department’s Before and After School Care (BASC) team has committed to collecting and collating vital information regarding vacation care. To support this process, we are asking that all families who require care for their children complete a survey regarding care arrangements for the upcoming holiday period. The Department is working with vacation care providers to ensure that the needs of all families are met during the Term 1 holiday period. Please complete the online survey to confirm your child/children’s care requirements, which can be found here: https://surveys.education.nsw.gov.au/s3/school-holiday-care For those of you who are using the printed version of this survey (see attached), please return the completed survey to the school by COB Friday 3 April 2020.

Craig Oliver – Principal

Craig.oliver@det.nsw.edu.au

APSMO Maths Games and Maths Olympiad

It is hoped that our first paper from the Australasian Problem Solving Mathematical Olympiads (APSMO) for schools will be completed through our remote learning program, by the end of this week. Participants will be provided with a link from their class teacher through Seesaw. This year, we have just over 120 students participating in either Maths Games or Maths Olympiad. Students participating have been selected based on a combination of the following: completion of a trial paper, class work, previous involvement in Maths Games or Maths Olympiad and 2019 achievement grades in mathematics. Although students are competing against other members of their class and teams from other schools, they are primarily competing against themselves. As each of the contests is a month apart, there is plenty of time for practice and improvement. Due to the current situation with COVID-19, the first paper for both Maths Games and Maths Olympiad will not count towards a student’s or school team’s final score. More information is available through www.apsmo.edu.au.

Skoolbag – Have you changed your subscription settings? With the new year beginning and changes to the school year, many families are often worried about not receiving important messages now that their child is in a new grade. Follow the steps below to ensure you don’t miss out on key dates and information. Once you have opened the app, select the tab marked GROUPS and select your child’s grade. If you are new to our school, you can download the free app by following these steps:

Mrs Alex Kohary and Miss Danielle Machuca

Deputy Principals

FROM THE SCHOOL COUNSELLORS We hope that everyone is finding successful ways to manage in these complicated times. You are still able to contact the School Counsellors during school hours by doing the following:

• Contact the school and give them your contact details (email is best to start with). • The office will then let us know and we will get back to you as soon as we can.

Also keep an eye out for information that we will be putting out regularly on Skoolbag. This will have helpful and supportive tips about how to help your children at the moment. Stay confident and healthy.

Best wishes Pat Young and Hannah Johnson

Creative and Critical Thinking Week 9 Solution:

Goat

Empty

Wolf

Goat

Cabbage

Empty

Goat

This week there are two problems to try out! Weekly Problem Solving – Week 10

The infamous BrainBashers encyclopedia has been suffering from its usual problems again. Below is a printout of reptiles and amphibians, each of which has lost every other letter. Can you replace the missing letters? -r-g -o-t-i-e -n-k- -e-t -i-a-d -r-c-d-l- -a-a-a-d-r -u-t-e -k-n- a-l-g-t-r

(Challenger) Which one of these sentences is the odd one out? (Hint – acronyms) Sam wanted another newt. Every artistic giraffe likes elephants. Badgers rapidly excavate a mound. Wild rabbits enjoy nature. Dale understood cute kittens. Casual restless aardvarks need exercise.

Remote Learning Resources If you would like to find some additional activities for your child, please have a look at the website below for some ideas. https://www.khanacademy.org/ - Maths and Science http://www.davidsongifted.org/search-database/topic/105211/entrytype/2/mc_cid/4c0225d494/mc_eid/e83bd3be73#cat101175 – Games and Puzzles

Bebras Challenge The results are in! Castle Hill Public School achieved some amazing results at the latest Bebras Challenge! Overall we received four High Distinctions and eight Credits. Some students competed as individuals, whereas others worked in teams. All should be very proud of their achievements. Please look out for further information in October for the next challenge.

High Distinction Credit Aurora G (3/4H) and Darena B (3/4H) Vicky Q (3V) and Neil A-M (3V) Yousef Z (4G)

Karim S (3D) Samuel W (3/4H) Mihi B (4M) Jared C (4G) Marvin F (4G) Jake G (3/4H)

Hiya G (6T) Carl O-C (5A) Dhruv S (6E), Aveeraaj S (5/6R) and Eki S (6E)

ANZAC Writing and Colouring Competition If students would still like to compete in the ANZAC Writing (Year 3-6) or Colouring (K-2) Competition, entries must be received by 10.00am on Monday April 6. No late entries can be accepted. A copy of the entry forms, as well as further details, can be found further along in the newsletter. Entries can be emailed to the school – castlehill-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au Any entries that had previously been handed in at school will be posted also.

Amanda Hobbs Coordinator

Websites and Apps to Help Students with Reading and Writing their School Tasks

For Support with Reading and Writing:

For with help reading: Try the free app: Speechify. Use it to have the text or your internet pages read to you. Speechify: Turns anything into an audio file for free: https://www.getspeechify.com/

For help with writing/editing: Use the computer and a Word document so that you can use the spelling and grammar checker under ‘Review’. Also try the ‘Read Aloud’ button to have your writing read back to you to see if it makes sense.

For help translating written information: Use Microsoft Translator App. This will allow parents and students to take a photo of assignments or school letters and immediately and accurately translate them to dozens of languages: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/microsoft-translator/id1018949559 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft.translator&hl=en

For Support with Mathematics:

For help with mathematical definitions, problem solving strategies and mathematical explanations visit Photomath at https://photomath.net/en/plus

For help understanding your Mathletics tasks at https://login.mathletics.com/. When working on a Mathletics task, use the ‘i’ icon on the right-hand side of the screen to watch a video explaining the concept.

Seesaw When creating an activity on Seesaw there are shortcuts you can include so a visual comes up in your instructions (see image 1 attached). If you look at the instructions section of this image you will notice instructions such as add response and record have the icon to support students understand the requirements/what they need to click and post. Attached is the list of Seesaw shortcuts which you can include in your activity instructions. To use these you just type (or copy) the shortcut into your instructions. One you press save it will then convert to the icon - e.g. :add: converts to the icon for 'add response'. These help provide a visual for students to assist with their understanding of instructions. Below is the link to the Seesaw website where they talk about the shortcut icons: https://help.seesaw.me/hc/en-us/articles/115005120583-Seesaw-Icon-Shortcut Please let Miss Brown or Mrs Hobbs or myself know if you have any questions.

Happy Seesawing :)

Miss McKey Operation Art Thank you to all of those Operation Art students who have already returned their notes and artworks. I understand that there are some students who have still not brought in their artworks to school, due to concerns about COVID-19. If those students would still like to be involved with Operation Art, their artworks may be dropped off to the front office by Thursday 9th April. The normal whole school selection process is no longer available as our annual school Operation Art gallery can no longer go ahead as planned. There will be more information to come on how the 4 artworks will be chosen and when the artworks can be displayed for our school. The 4 chosen artworks will now be displayed in an online exhibition for the 2020 Operation Art Exhibition. Thank you for your cooperation and my apologies for the changes.

Miss Halford

SILVER AWARDS – These will be presented at school on a date to be confirmed.

YEAR 3 YEAR 4 YEAR 5 YEAR 6 Marko 3C Matthew 4M Karim 3D Sarah 4T Victoria 3D Rachel 4W Mia 3M Burak 3M Mackenzie 3M Ryan 3V Joel 3V Jivisha 3V Violet 3/4H

GOLD AWARDS - These will be presented at school on a date to be confirmed.

YEAR 3 YEAR 4 YEAR 5 YEAR 6 Ian 3E Sashanth 4G Idin 6M Hannah 3M Christopher 4G Dareen 3M Jasmin 3V

PLATINUM AWARDS – These will be presented at school on a date to be confirmed.

YEAR 3 YEAR 4 YEAR 5 YEAR 6 Samantha 3M Jayden 4M Ryan 5A Sarah 5/6R Vicky 3V Yajnesh 4M Sakina 5A Taleah 6M Jayden 5H Evan 6M Krit 5W Rithika 6M Kyrzty 6P

The Castle Hill Public School cross country carnival due to be held in Term 2 has been cancelled. At the current time, the winter PSSA sport season has been postponed but not cancelled. We are awaiting further information from CHPSSA as to if and when the season will commence. Some suggestion has been there may be opportunity to have winter PSSA in Term 3, 2020. Of course, that is pending future developments around home schooling. Please continue to read the newsletter for announcements about school sport over the coming months.

Troy Gibbs PSSA Sport Coordinator

Canteen Information As instructed by the Department of Education the Canteen will be closed until further notice.

Online Ordering The Uniform Shop will be open for online orders through flexischool, all orders will be filled when the Department of Education lifts restrictions.

Sharyn Haggar Uniform Shop Manager

NSW Department of Education

Vacation Care

Survey for primary school parents and caregivers

With the Term 1 vacation period approaching, we ask that you confirm

whether your child/ren will require care and supervision during school

holidays.

Please return the information in the form below by Friday 3 April 2020.

1. Enter the name of the school where your child / children are enrolled.

2. How many children require care during Week 1 of the holiday period?

Please indicate how many are enrolled in vacation care.

Enter your answers as numbers in the table below.

Day of the week How many children

need care?

How many children are already enrolled in vacation care?

Friday 10 April (public holiday)

Monday 13 April (public holiday)

Tuesday 14 April

Wednesday 15 April

Thursday 16 April

Friday 17 April

3. How many children require care during Week 2 of the holiday period?

Please indicate how many are enrolled in vacation care.

Enter your answers as numbers in the table below.

Day of the week How many children

need care?

How many children are already enrolled in vacation care?

Monday 20 April

Tuesday 21 April

Wednesday 22 April

Thursday 23 April

Friday 24 April

Monday 27 April (school development day)

4. If your child/children are already enrolled in vacation care for the

upcoming holiday break, please record the name of the service.

5. Does your child/ children require care outside of 7am-6pm?

Yes

No