Well done to Mr and Mrs Hossack on the arrival of Blake Hossack.

Amy and Scott welcomed Blake William Mouncey Hossack (Saturday, January 19th) at 4:06pm! He weighs 7.1 lbs (3.2 kgs) and is 20.25 inches (51.5cm) long. I am sure Mr Hossack would love to hear from you wishing him well so leave a message on his blog.

Well done Team Hossack, we are all so happy for you!

Students, don’t forget to bring in as many wild and wonderful recycled materials as you can get your hands on over the next couple of weeks for our Goldberg Machine and for every ten you bring in, you will go into the draw for a great prize…Start hunting now! We want ours to be the best machine it can be. Check out this video as something to aim for, I don’t expect any of you to get there but it does show an amazing example of a Goldberg Machine at its best and for me the Japanese commentary makes it all the more entertaining, perhaps you can translate for us Remy!

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/1kvdq8cRNBM" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]


This is our daughter Mimi who we should be able to pick up in about a month.

She is from Guiyang in Guizhou province and her birthday is on January 4th 2007. We received these photos on her first birthday. She has been in foster care since she was one month old and we are very excited to see her after submitting our paperwork over 13 months ago.

Hello gorgeous students on vacation all around the world. It has been exciting to hear from so many of you over the break. You really are doing an excellent job on the blogging. Sorry I can not say the same for me but Mr Power has a way of hogging the computer when we only have the one here. We have been having a wonderful time, the weather is very hot, the traffic is very light and the pollution, well, what pollution? Only clear blue skies here in sunny Ballarat.

Hannah had a wonderful Christmas getting spoiled by Santa and her family and friends and she has really enjoyed wearing shorts and t.shirts each day rather than 3 layers and a coat like she will have on next week. If you want to see where I am staying go to this website

I hope you have a wonderful new year wherever you are and that 2008 is a happy and healthy year for all of us.

Love Mrs Power

The verdict is in! The class disagreed with Lydia that her haircut was bad, we all agreed it looked fantastic. Of course I loved it as it matched my outfit so well…

What do you think? 

Here is a petition about anti-whaling doing the rounds at the moment. Signing it is up to you but as it is an environmental issue we have discussed in class I thought you might be interested. There is also a game you can play at this site. Whether or not you sign it I would love you to blog about your opinion on this matter.

Here are the assessment rubrics for the Space Project. Students are assessed on how well they complete each of the criteria as well as a separate rubric for how well they do as a team to present their information to the class.

The students will be completing these tasks between now and Christmas. They will finish the bulk of the work by then; research is being completed this week and now they are preparing for their powerpoint, blueprint and brochure. After the break they will be presenting their project in full to each of the other groups in the class.

Assessment for what is to be submitted

Science Space Rubric 

Hi

I read an article in an Australian Newspaper this morning that sums up some of the problems we teachers face being digital immigrants in a classroom full of digital natives…our students!

The article warns that simply providing the laptops is not enough, we must also provide extensive teacher training to get our educators up to speed. Even then we are facing an uphill battle. Have a read and see what you think.

Dear Parents and Students

Thankyou so much to those of you who came along to the assembly this week to watch our ‘squakaholics’ in action. I am sure you agree that they did a fantastic job.

5KP Newsletter       

 

Wednesday November 28th

 

What’s up in 5KP?

We are successfully working on our Charlie writing projects and the students are very enthusiastic about it. We have completed the first 3 chapters and will be doing the 4^th and 5^th this week. Currently we will be completing the rough draft of a chapter every two days so that we can do the good copies after we finish drafting. I have changed the deadline for the project until after the break. It will be due on the last day of the quarter which is January 11^th. I do not expect the children to work on it over their holiday and as I did not want to work on my holiday either I thought it was more realistic to extend the deadline. It would be ideal if the students had finished all of the writing before the break and in the last week were able to focus on the editing, decorating and fine tuning of their story.

 

Math is moving along and students are working hard on the use of fractions and percents. This is an important skill and it comes up two more times this school year. Please ask your student about their understanding. We have missed a few lessons during the last week due to assembly practice so now that is over we will get stuck into the rest of the unit.

 

Our Unit Study focused on Space and the Environment has gotten off to a great start. Students have begun the second phase and are researching current solutions to environmental issues to aid them in their planning on our class goal to colonize Mars. Please be prepared to support your child with at home research. The goal is to complete all research this week and then to begin developing presentations to present to the class.

 

Please email me if you have any questions kimbra.power@saschina.org

 

Giving Tree Reminder

Please remind your son or daughter to bring in a gift for a child less fortunate than we are. Only 5 students have donated something to the bag so far.

We are giving to:

A 12 year old girl who is 145 cm tall and weighs 37kg

and

A 9 year old boy who is 140 cm tall and weighs 28kg

As Christmas is a special holiday for Western children, so also is the Spring Festival a magical time for Chinese children. Like our own small ones, Chinese boys and girls look forward to the gathering of family members, feasting, visits to friends and relatives, and gifts. There are many children in Shanghai, however, whose families cannot afford to give them new clothes, and for whom toys are a rare luxury.

The Giving Tree.

Helping you share Christmas with a child in need.

Happy Holidays and Thank You!

‘Tis the Season

With the colder weather upon us it is important that your child dress appropriately for the cooler weather. All students are expected to go outside for recess, even when the temperatures drop considerably, as it is important that they get fresh air and use up energy out in the playground during recess.

I have also noticed that some students are a little tired during the school day so please encourage your child to get a good night sleep and be refreshed for school the next day. This will help keep the winter colds away as well. If your child does happen to pick up a cold or flu please keep them at home, we can’t afford to have these symptoms passed on to other students.

Winter Music Concert

The Grade 5 winter concert is being held on Wednesday 5 December in the auditorium. Come along and support the Band and Strings as they treat us to some fantastic music. Students are expected at 1 o’clock so parents should plan to arrive by then. More details to follow with your students.

 

What’s on?

Wednesday 5 Dec.          Grade 5 Winter Concert

Thursday 13 Dec.            Grade 5 Christmas Party

Friday 14 Dec.                Winter Vacation starts. School ends 11:30am.

 

Regards

Kimbra Power