Box Hill North – 1/2G & 1/2S

What a sensational year it has been in 1/2S and 1/2G!

Our highlights have been…
awesome excursions like Scienceworks, plays in Literacy groups, whole school sports day, Santa’s workshop, Earn and Learn and the BIG BANG PARTY NIGHT!
We have learnt lots in a fun way!
One of the new things we’ve been excited about is our new interactive whiteboards. We look forward to using them even more next year.

In the past few weeks, we have done lots of orientation activities, getting to know our new teachers and new people in our year level. We were all so excited to find out our new grades last Tuesday and are looking forward to working with our new teachers.

Thank you to all the families that have helped us out and been part of our 1/2 family. We couldn’t do it without you!

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN…
With so much going on at this time of the year, here are just a few reminders to get us through the final week!
Monday 15 December: Carols NightStudents are expected to be at school by 6.45pm.
We are doing an ‘Aussie’ carol so we have asked students to wear summer gear such as board shorts and t-shirts in ‘festive’ green and red. Santa hats, reindeer antlers, zinc cream on noses etc. are all great touches but please do not get too concerned about outfits. We’d just like all kids to turn up and join in, in the spirit!
Tuesday 16 December: Year 1/2 Picnic at Memorial Park
We will leave school at 11.30am and return by 1.30pm. Students need to bring their own packed school lunch and a drink bottle. Parents and siblings are welcome to join us for the walk, games and picnic.
Wednesday 17 December Zowie Day Celebration
This is a free dress day.
Year 1 students are asked to bring savoury food to share and Year 2 students need to bring fruit or sweets. BYO drink bottles.
If parents are bringing up hot food, we will be eating at 12.30pm.
Of course, any help with setting up or cleaning up will be much appreciated!
Friday 18 December: SCHOOL’S OUT!
School finishes at 1.30pm. The final assembly will be at 1.00pm in the gym.

Thanks again for all your support in making this a great school year,
wishing you a safe and happy holiday,
signing out for the last time,
Magda and Steph and all your lovely children!

Box Hill Cup
The kids that turned up on Monday had a fantastic day at the Box Hill Cup!
Firstly we designed beautiful hats with feathers and fancy stuff and we had Fashions on the Field.
Congratulations to Jess and Blake for their amazing creations. They won $10 in Earn and Learn money!
Then we had the Box Hill Cup Race on our new interactive whiteboard (Wall-e G and Eva!) It was hard to control Eva but we are getting better at it! Everybody got some money to bet on the race. Johnny, Kaitlyn and Josh won $30 but most of us lost! We learnt that gambling does not pay!Congratulations to Bec G who won our Cup sweep.

Our Super Scientific Mums who Save LIves
It was the mum scientists’ turn to speak to us today. Karen told us about being a radiation therapist and working with cancer patients and Jo told us about her work trying to find cures for diseases like diabetes and arthritis. We thought that they are both a bit like doctors and do very important work to save peoples’ lives. We learnt lots about the inside of our body and we were surprised with how much maths scientists use in their work. All the scientists that have visited us study such different things! Science is about everything!!

GATEWAYS Challenge
Congatulations to Blake, Thomas, Alice and Kailtyn who participated in the Year 2 Gateways Challenge last Friday. The report from the presenters said that our students were ‘impressive, co-operative and a cohesive group’. What a wonderful effort. We are so are so proud of you and the way you represented Box Hill North!
Thanks to Keren, Megan’s mum who trained the teams. We couldn’t do it without her!

FUN RUN FUN
We were so lucky that the rain held off and we had our run.
We were very persistent and all completed the race!
Congratulations to everyone for competing and trying their best. There was some great sportsmanship too with everyone cheering on all the grades!
Our placegetters were:
1/2 G 1st: Lucy 2nd:Kaitlyn 3rd.: Alice 4th:Mati
1/2 S 1st: Sam 2nd:Ben F. 3rd.: Daniel H. 4th:Josh T.

REMINDERS
BIG BANG PARTY NIGHT
Notes are due next Wednesday. Please let the teachers know if your child has any special dietary requirements or if you can help out on the night. All students are expected to attend. A note with more details will be sent home before the event.

Curriculum Day
Next Friday is Report Writing Day. Teachers will be working at school but there is no school for students. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday to Emaan, Magda for tomorrow (she is whingeing that she is feeling REALLY OLD!) and to Johnny on the 25th November.

Busy, busy, busy!

We have been busy doing lots of experiments and follow up work related to our Scienceworks excursion. We have learnt all about fractions of a number or group. For example, we know half of 10 is 5; and 10 doubled is 20.
In Word Study we read the poem, ‘The Ning Nang Nong’ and looked for words with ‘ong’ ‘ang’ and ‘ung.’ We found words like song, jungle and lung.
In PE this week, we had the ‘Jump-Off’ for Jump Rope for Heart. Please remember to return your forms and money.
We are still loving our interactive whiteboards… they are great fun!

See below for some photos from Scienceworks!

Happy Birthday to Josh, Emily, Kaitlyn (Wally) and Ben F!

COMING EVENTS
Big Bang Science Party Night. Remember to bring in your forms! And if any parents can help on the night we’d be really appreciative.
Fun Run is next Friday. Students need to wear shoes and bring their drink bottles.

Have a great long weekend everyone!

We have become really high tech and are using our Interactive Whiteboard to publish this blog and have been using it for lots of fun activities this week!

Inquiry
We had a science filled excursion at Scienceworks!!
Here are some of the fabulous things we did…
The Planetarium
- We flew to the moon and saw the solar system
- We saw different constellations of stars that made shapes – like scorpions, the Southern Cross and a peacock
- We discovered that Jupiter is the biggest planet, and we can see Venus and Jupiter in the night sky
- We also saw the Milky Way. There is the shape of an emu in the Milky Way.

Sportsworks- We ran against Cathy Freeman and tested our strength and balance
- We had turns at basketball, baseball, netball, handball, rock climbing and wheelchair racing

Nitty Gritty Super City-
We looked at all the science involved in building a city
- We had to use great teamwork to build a wall
- We looked at the recycling that happens in a city
- We worked in a cafe, made music and some people went into a TV studio and record a weather report!

We couldn’t decide on which part was the most fun because it was such as SCIENCE-SATIONAL day!! Thank you to our wonderful parent helpers and to Dawn and Edwina for helping to make our day so great!

We had some excellent presentations from our first ‘Science Sleuths!’

Maths
In Maths we have started talking about fractions.
Fractions is about breaking things up into equal parts. We have been looking at halves, thirds and quarters.

Happy Birthday to Josh in 1/2S.

Our Science Sleuths for next week are… Mati, Kaitlyn, Angelina, Jess and Charlie from 1/2G. From 1/2S Ben F, Soheil, Lucy and Ben Q.

We will also be farewelling Soheil from 1/2S next week as he is moving to Bunbury. We’re sure he will have lots of fun at his new school! We will all miss him! Thanks for your great contribution Soheil!

Our very exciting first two weeks at school!
We’ve had a very exciting start back at school! We have been busy doing lots of work and fun activities.

Literacy
During Literacy, we have been practising and presenting plays to our grades. Some of the plays we did were… Cinderella, The Yuckiest Wish and The Brave Little Tailor. We made props for our plays and acted them out in front of our class. When we were reading our plays we made sure we used GREAT expression and read smoothly. We did a magnificent job!

Maths
We have been looking at money over the past two weeks. We know lots about money! Here are some of the things we have discovered…
- there are lots of different strategies we can use when we’re working with money like skip counting and number charts
- we have silver coins (5 cents, 10 cents, 20 cents, 50 cents) and gold coins ($1 and $2) and notes
- coins are all different sizes and shapes and so are notes
- the note that is worth the most is the $100 note
This term we are doing ‘Earn and Learn’ in our classrooms, where we can earn money for doing the right thing and be fined if we are not doing the right thing. We have earnt lots of money for doing great things like helping others, being on task and being organised. Today is also Pay Day! We are very excited.

Inquiry
Our inquiry this term is called ‘Why is it so?’ We have discovered that it is about Science. We had to draw pictures of what we thought a scientist would look like and we also used Thinkboards to record information about different science equipment, like test tubes and safety goggles. Yesterday we had two guest speakers come to tell us about their jobs. Steve was a paper scientist at the CSIRO and Ian was a chemist.

Dance Party
We had a lot of fun dancing at the JSC Dance Party. We got yummy food and drink to have after the party had finished. We danced to lots of different music and all got to wear glow sticks! You could dress up as a rock star or in fluro colours. It was fantastic!

Healthraiser News
The Healthraiser last term was a huge success! We raised $331.35, which is amazing. We sold lots of YUMMY and HEALTHY food to the whole school. Everybody loved our signs advertising our foods. We used the money raised to buy games for sick children at the Box Hill Hospital.

A big welcome to Ashim in 1/2G!
Welcome back to Rachael in 1/2G who has arrived back from China, and a big farewell to Shashank in 1/2G who is going to India to visit his family.

Reminders
Our Scienceworks excursion is next Thursday. We need to be at school by 8:45 because the bus leaves at 9:00 sharp.

This week has been a fun but busy week!
Our teachers had a planning day for next term, so we had specialists for the day – it was great fun!

Maths
In Maths we have been exploring area. We learnt…
- some things are better than others to measure area with
- when we’re measuring the area of something, there should be no gaps
We read a story called ‘The Red Woollen Blanket’ about a little baby who was given a blanket when she was born. As she got older, her blanket got smaller and smaller. After reading this story we had to make our own blankets for a teddy, making sure it was a ‘snug’ fit. We then had to find the area of our blankets. We enjoyed this lesson!

In Writer’s Workshop, we’ve been publishing our best pieces of writing on the computers and we’ve started work on our special ‘Writer’s Gifts.’ We have also looked at advertisements for our Healthraiser.
In Literacy, 1/2S have been reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar and 1/2G are reading Charlotte’s Web.

Inquiry
During our inquiry sessions, we have been working really hard to get ready for the Healthraiser. Today at assembly, some of the 1/2s put on a fabulous performance for the school to tell them about the Healthraiser. It was VERY funny!
We have also created our own posters to advertise our Healthraiser and the foods we will be selling.

Homework
Remember that all activities should be completed by Monday. Students will have to present two activities to the class on Monday and Wednesday.

We’re so excited because tonight is the Arts Festival!! There will be lots of activities to do and artwork to see!

We welcome Wei – a student teacher from Melbourne University who will be working with 1/2G every Tuesday and Thursday.

HEALTHRAISER
We are having a HEALTH RAISER as you may already know. Each 1/2 child will make something that’s healthy and yummy and then we are going to sell it. We are hoping to make everyone at school more aware of being healthy. It’s going to be in the gym at 10:30 on the last Friday of term 3. Healthy snacks will cost 50c to $2. Please make sure you remember to bring your snack next Friday.

By Paul, Alice, Rebecca M

Reminders…
Next Week
Wednesday – Principal for the Day – dress up as a teacher and bring a gold coin donation!
Thursday – Footy Fun Day – remember to dress up in your footy colours. There is a special lunch for this day. Remember to get your orders in by Monday. There will be a parade in the gym at 2:30. All parents welcome! Go Pies! Go Cats!
Friday – 1/2 Healthraiser – please remember to bring your food to sell and money to buy some treats for yourself!
NO LUNCH ORDERS on the last day of term.
School finishes on 2:30 next Friday. Final assembly will be in the gym at 2:00.

From Magda and Steph, we wish you all a very safe and happy holiday! Thanks for all your support this term. Hope to see you all next term!

1/2 Healthraiser

As we have learnt so much about being healthy and happy, we’ve decided to take some action to teach the whole school about being healthy. All the 1/2s got together and came up with ideas of what we could do to take action. We decided we would hold a ‘Healthraiser’ where we sell healthy and yummy foods to the rest of the school. Each of us has to make some healthy snacks and bring them to sell on the last day of Term. There is a special sheet on the noticeboard opposite the staffroom to sign showing us what snack you will bring along. We would like to make sure we have a variety of healthy foods to sell!

Fathers’ Day BBQ
The Fathers’ Day BBQ was sensational! The sausages were scrumptious and we all had great fun playing with our Dads. Our dads were so proud of all the wonderful work we’ve been doing. Thanks to the fabulous mums who helped out! We had so much fun!

Literacy/Numeracy Day
We had heaps of fun at Literacy/Numeracy Day! We were in mixed groups that had kids from all across the school. The Grade 1s and Preps got to work with their buddies. Some of the great maths activities we did were Greedy Pig, Yahtzee, Heads and Tails and Minute timing. We did literacy games like Boggle and Scrabble, and also activities about friendship. We even wrote our own ‘Fractured Fairytales!’
Here are some of our comments…
“It was the best day of my life so far.” Thomas
“All of the grade agreed we all had fun today and that learning can be fun when we play games.” Shashank

Happy Birthday to Ben Q and Becky G!

Reminders
- Next Friday is a very special day. It is the whole school Arts Festival! We are looking forward to all the fun activities.
- Remember your ‘healthy’ homework needs to be completed by next Friday!
- We all need to think about what healthy food we will bring to the Healthraiser… try to sign up on Monday next week.

Farewell to Rachael who leaves for China next week! We hope she has a good time over there!

Our week started out with some disappointments because our sports were cancelled and our athlete, Kathryn Mitchell, couldn’t come to visit because of the weather! But we still had heaps of fun doing other activities.

Writer’s Workshop
We are really excited about our Writer’s Workshops! We’re writing about lots of different things. We’ve been focussing on revising and editing our work. Our teachers are so proud of the amazing work we are doing! Next week we will start to publish lots of our writing.

Literacy
In Literacy and inquiry we have been doing lots of activities to do with the Olympics such as inventing a mascot, designing a t-shirt and an activity where we thought about what an athlete was thinking, doing and feeling. We have also been keeping a medal tally.
We had a special visit from Jess (she is Steph’s twin sister). Jess is a pharmacist and she told us how to be safe with medicines. She also told us some stories and we had to think about what we would do in that situation. We were really excited to have Jess come and visit us… although when we first saw her, we thought she was Stephanie Rice!!
In inquiry we created a recipe for a good athlete – we thought of things like diet and exercise, but we also thought that good sportsmanship and playing by the rules are just as important! We have been working extremely hard and focussing on working well together in our classrooms, and we have finally achieved our Zowie Day! We are SO excited about it!

Maths
We have been doing lots of maths related to the Olympics. We have done lots of real life maths activities, such as looking at schedules and calendars and investigating time in seconds, minutes and hours. We also found out how many things we could do in 30 seconds and one minute!

Word Study
We have been looking at ‘tr’ words. They are a bit like ‘gr’ words, because you find ‘tr’ at the beginning and in the middle of words.

Reminders
The Book Fair is in the library until next Tuesday. We have each made a wish list of books we would like. You may also go and visit after school with your parents. Remember that all the money goes towards our school.
Father’s Day BBQ – Please bring back your forms for the Father’s Day BBQ which is on Thursday 4 September. We would love all the dads to come! If your dad can’t come, you may bring another special visitor like a grandparent or mum. If you are unable to come, please let your teacher know.
Zowie Day is next Friday! 1/2S needs to bring sweet foods to share and 1/2G savoury foods.

Our Big Olympics Week!

Everyone was very disappointed when they found out the Sports Day had been cancelled because of the weather! But we had a great surprise on Wednesday, because our teachers had planned a 1/2 Modern Hexathlon in Maths. We took the player’s oath to play fairly and with good sportsmanship. The activities were: Hoopla, Javelin (with a straw), Shotput, ‘Minute Magic’, Counter Grab and Discus. We all got a medal for participating and had some great champions who won their events. Congratulations to Emily, Tom B, Kaitlyn, Emaan, Sarah and Josh!

During the week we worked in groups to investigate all the maths involved in the Olympics. We were surprised at how much maths there is in the Olympics. Here are some things we came up with:
- The seats and tickets are numbered
- Lots of races are timed
- Length is used for the size of pools, running tracks, etc.

In Literacy and inquiry we’ve been doing lots of activities to do with the Olympics. Some kids wrote letters to their favourite athletes, some found out about the mascots, we’ve also been checking for updates on the internet. We all enjoyed writing thought bubbles for different athletes about what they were thinking.

In Word Study we have been looking at ‘gr’ words. We enjoyed the story, The Three Billy Goats Gruff, especially Olivia. We discovered that you never have ‘gr’ at the end of words, but that lots of compound words have ‘gr’ in the middle.

Reminders
Whole School Olympics day will be on Friday.
Rubbish Free Lunch Day is on Thursday. It’s been great to see so many kids getting involved!
And we look forward to our visit from Victorian Institute of Sport athlete, Kathryn Mitchell, coming to teach us some skills next Thursday.

Go Aussie, Go!

Elite Athlete Visits 1/2!
Today we had a very special visitor from the VIS. Kathryn Mitchell, our Australian National Javelin Champion came to talk to us about her life and about being healthy.
Her goal in life is to go to the Olympic Games.
We learnt that she:
- has been training for 13 years
-makes no money out of sport and has to be a personal trainer
-has a junk food treat only once a week
-trains for 3-5 hours every day and rests on Sunday so her body can recover
-trains at the same place as the Collingwood footy players
-can throw a javelin 58.81 metres!
- JUST missed out on qualifying for the Olympics by less than two metres
and she is already training for the Olympic Games in London in four years!