The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School · kids certainly enjoyed buying them. For those who received LED torches, please note that they had a plastic insert in them

The Grapevine

The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School

Week 8, Term 3 Thursday, 9 September 2010

From the P&C President... Hello Happy Campers! Yes, the long awaited camping trip has finally arrived. For all those going please note that check in is from 12pm on the Saturday and check out is 1pm on the Sunday. Simply go directly to the front office and mention you are with Narrabeen North Public School and the staff will allocate you a camping spot. Have a great weekend! We hope all you Dads had a wonderful Father’s Day and enjoyed your presents. The kids certainly enjoyed buying them. For those who received LED torches, please note that they had a plastic insert in them so that the torch couldn’t be left on accidently, so if it appears not to work, be sure to check for the plastic barrier. Thanks to all of the wonderful volunteers on the day. The P&C are in need of an extra computer or laptop, if you happen to know where we are able to get one very cheaply or perhaps work for a company who has just upgraded their computers we would be very thankful and love to hear from you. Please contact me d i r e c t o n 0 4 3 2 1 6 7 0 5 5 o r [email protected] As always, the great ladies at the canteen could use a helping hand. We appreciate that many of you have volunteered to assist but as with everything we can always use a little more help. One of the biggest issues the canteen faces is in the event of someone not showing up for a shift they have been rostered on for, so if you could please inform the canteen if you are unable to make a shift that would be much appreciated. Please take the time to inform the ladies at the canteen wherever possible as it is very hard for the canteen staff to remember names and dates when you are rushing by at school pick up. If

you are able to assist for any time at all during Term 4 please email me directly on [email protected] and I will pass your details onto the canteen staff. Please do this sooner than later as rosters need to be done and Term 4 is just around the corner. Don’t forget that if you like a good time, then you need to secure your tickets to the up and coming October Cocktail party. The night is shaping up to be a huge amount of fun so don’t miss out. Gay Raubal From the Principal... Principal’s Award Winners for Week 8 Congratulations to: Ben Scott KS; Ryan Dening KR; Angus Carlile KR; Riley Hottes KR; Beau Raubal KR; Jade Watson; Zach Couper 2B; Kyle Schmidt 1M; John Caldwell 1/2C; Joel Perrin 2B; Darcy Hoy 2B; Sarah Roger 2B; Skye Prosser 2B; Zoe Ashton 2H; Jakob Preston 2H; Clare Van Der Laan 2H; Hunter White 2H; Sean Bosschieter 1M; Holly Gibson 1M; Jemma Green 1M; Jasmine Kirkland 1/2C; Max Oldham 1/2C; Ethan Carlile 1/2C; Sean Stromquist 4B; Carly Abbott 3B; Talia Withnall 3B; Sophie Vertel 3W; Zilla Gilmour 3W; Charlie

Dates to Remember - Term 3

Mon, 13 Sept Opera House Choir Performance Banner Assembly - 2:15pm

Tues, 14 Sept School Science Fair - K-2

Wed, 15 Sept Year 6 Kokoda Track Excursion

Fri, 24 Sept Last Day of Term 3

Mon, 11 Oct First Day of Term 4

Page 2 The Grapevine

Week 9 Banner Assembly The next Banner Assembly will be held on Monday, 13 September starting at 2.15pm. It will be a packed program so we hope to start right on the dot of 2.15pm. Everyone is welcome to attend. Skateboards and Scooters A reminder to all that skateboards and scooters are not permitted at NNPS. These items are not considered safe means of transport to and from school. Please ensure that skateboards and scooters remain at home. Thank you. The Great Book Swap All at NNPS had an exciting day last Friday with out first ever ‘Great Book Swap’ organised by Mrs Gaffney. We raised over $300 for the Indigenous Literacy Project. Well done! It was wonderful to see students thinking carefully when the time came to swap a book. We are looking forward to an even bigger Book Swap in 2011. Robert Blanchfield 3/4S Sentences of the Week – Week 8 Here are the YEAR 4 sentences of the week from 3/4S about our fantastic excursion to the Coastal Environment Centre! Our class has been learning many things to help make their writing amazing! This term we have been learning about: speech marks for direct speech; commas for lists and for direct speech; adverbs to give more information about our verbs; adjectives to describe our nouns; using a better word than ‘said’ in direct speech; and conjunctions to join two parts of a sentence together. We hope you thoroughly enjoy reading our sentences! Ms Stewart “I walked carefully to the lake and caught a beautiful limpet, which made trails, I saw a barnacle and held lots of Neptune necklaces,” whispered Shane. By Shane Hercules

Smythe 3W; Reese Lawson 3W; Georgia Waldron 5G; Natasha Robertson-Hanning 5G; Ella Donohoe 5G and Geean Hoegee 6W. Congratulations! Coles, Sports for Schools Fundraiser The Coles, Sports for Schools fundraiser is now open. For every $10 spent in a Coles supermarket you will receive a voucher for 1 point. There is a large voucher box located in the office where you can deposit your Coles vouchers. The promotion is open until 31 October 2010. To receive the sports vouchers, you need to provide your receipt to the front counter in Coles Supermarkets. The suggestion has been made that as our school has recently received a $4,000 grant for sports equipment, the Coles, Sports for Schools Fundraiser equipment be donated to Aboriginal students in the Northern Territory as part of the Closing the Gap initiative. Other schools within the PCS are also supporting this initiative. This is a great opportunity for us to support students less fortunate than students in the PCS. Thank you for your support! Maths Workshop for Parents It was great to see the enthusiastic group of parents who joined in with Mrs Mulkeen’s maths workshop for parents last Monday morning. Parents participated in a range of maths activities typical in NNPS classrooms and heard about the NSW Mathematics Syllabus. Thank you to Mrs Mulkeen for organising this opportunity for NNPS parents. NBISC Carpark NBISC now has 4 car spaces reserved for NBISC staff only. They are located on the right hand side of the main entry (facing the entry). The disabled reserved spaces are on the left. We are very lucky to have access to the NBISC car park and always wish to maintain the very best relationship with the NBISC Management team. Please make sure that you do not park in these spaces especially in the mornings and afternoons.

The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School Page 3

“I ran carefully across the rock platform trying to find rare sea hares but I found a slimy sea slug which was hiding under a heavy, sandy rock,” said Morgan. By Morgan Patterson “I walked down to the rock platform with a laminated sea creature identification sheet and saw four sea stars moving slowly toward a sea anemone,” said Matt. By Matthew Walsh “I was silently walking down the rock platform when I saw a massive sea hare and I nearly screamed because I was the first one to see it!” exclaimed Jessica. By Jessica McMurdo “At the Coastal Environment Centre I saw a wacky sea-anemone, weird limpets, cool sea squirts, a wonderful sea squirt and a spooky barnacle!” exclaimed Mitchell. By Mitchell Teppo “I walked toward the cold lake, I slowly picked up my net and swirled it around the still water and I caught a barnacle,” said Alexander. By Alexander Hall “I saw a limpet, a barnacle, a squid and a slimy sea hare as Sally explained to us that a blue-ringed octopus can kill twenty six people in minutes!!” squealed Sophie excitedly. By Sophie Waller “I walked through the large rock platform and saw lots of limpets, neptune necklaces, crabs and sea-anemones,” exclaimed Joel. By Joel Conaty “I walked slowly across the slippery, slimy rock platform as I saw large limpets, squirmy sea hares, slimy sea stars and big barnacles,” exclaimed Madison. By Madison Coutts “I walked slowly and carefully across the freezing sea puddle so that I didn’t hurt any sea creatures, such as sea squirts, sea-anemones and sea hares,” exclaimed Kiara. By Kiara Robinson

“I saw a wonderful, slimy sea-anemone on the flat rock platform while Alexander saw an interesting sea hare on the other side,” explained Jayden. By Jayden Bteddini I saw a limpet, a sea hare, a sea squirt and some neptune necklaces on the slippery rock platform and then I saw a sea star that was moving slowly,” exclaimed Amber. By Amber Hummelstad “I was on the huge rock platform when I saw a big group of bunched-up students, so I went over to see what was going on,” explained Anica. By Anica Gallant “I walked slowly and carefully to the cold lake with a short dip net and found a stripy limpet, wavy sea grass and a few shells,” exclaimed Jack. By Jack Evstigneev When I was at the Coastal Environment Centre we looked under the magnificent microscopes and saw some very interesting things, like, a small, dried-up sea star, some flying bugs and some other amazing sea creatures! By Lilly Shumack “I walked slowly towards the huge rock platform and my group saw a sea star, neptune necklaces and a red sea-anemone. We stayed for a while in the cold breeze and after that we went back to school,” exclaimed Amelia. By Amelia Dean We went to the fun Coastal Environment centre and we searched the freezing, winter’s day lake for little mini-beasts. Then we went to the shallow rock platforms. By Isabella Rawson

Page 4 The Grapevine

The Great Book Swap Last Friday's Great Book Swap was great fun! There were lots of excited students feverishly browsing the swap tables to find a new delight. It was great to see many 'swaps' being clutched by their new owners out on the playground at break times. This was a simple fundraising idea which engaged our students in talking about the books they enjoy reading whilst raising community awareness about the Indigenous Literacy Project. I do hope you have taken some time to view their website,

www.indigenousliteracyproject.org.au

You might even see some familiar faces appearing on their Events page soon. The 'bankers' in 1/2C have meticulously counted the coins this week and as a school we raised just over three hundred dollars, with some money still to be collected. Thank you to everyone who participated and supported this event and a special thanks to Miss Dickson and Mrs Koprivec for their extra help. Happy reading everyone! Mrs Ainslie Gaffney GBS Co-ordinator Operation Art Student Success The following students have had their artworks selected for ‘Operation Art.’ Their works will be professionally framed and hung at the Armory Gallery at Sydney Olympic Park from Saturday, 9 to Saturday, 31 October. Congratulations to: Kiara Robinson ‘Butterfly Fly Away’ Mackaylla Watkin ‘Aboriginal Spiritual Drawing’ Jasmine Kirkland ‘Birthday Party in the Park’ Hailey Robertson ‘Mandala’ Mrs Karen Reid GATS Co-ordinator

PCS Update for Week 8 News from the coordinators, Jann, MJ and Sharon: What an extravaganza! The PCS Music Festival provided two nights of wonderful entertainment with students dancing and singing their way across the stage at Barrenjoey High School. Students from Barrenjoey’s Entertainment class provided wonderful support with the sound and lighting. Congratulations to everybody involved and many thanks to the teachers who assisted students making it to the stage. Luan Heimlich from Macquarie University will be working at Narrabeen Sports High with staff and parents who will be entering teams in the First Lego League competition. The long awaited challenge is released this Saturday. For more details contact your Robotics Coordinator. The Biodiversity Poster competition has been judged and winners have a certificate that will be presented this week. Congratulations to all students who entered the competition. The judges enjoyed looking at your wonderful work. Students from Years 7, 8 and 9 are attending the Sustainability Fair being held at Macquarie University this week. Years 10 students were spellbound listening to the amazing stories of two inspiring people; Matt McFadyen ‘Youngest Australian to reach the North Pole on foot’ and Matthew Kershaw, A life of servitude and developing others. Matt overcame a life threatening illness and then attempted climbing Mt Kilimanjaro. Year 11 begin their Preliminary Exams this week. Best wishes to all PCS students attempting these exams. The Interschools National Titles are being held at Perisher this weekend. Best wishes to Newport and Avalon students competing - an amazing achievement to have qualified for the National Titles. The winning schools for the robotics competition have been presented with their certificates and voucher from Modern Teaching Aids. Congratulations to all students who participated in the challenge and to the winning schools. Narrabeen North is the centre for robotics at the moment. All of the PCS robots are visiting Narrabeen North.

The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School Page 5

McCain School Veggie Patches Program Our school is enrolled in the McCain School Veggie Patches Program and am seeking your help (and the help of all the NN aunties and grandmas, uncles and grandpas out there) in collecting the barcodes from McCain frozen vegetable packs and McCain Purely Potato packs. All McCAIN frozen vegetable 1kg, 1.2kg and 2kg packs are worth 10 points. All McCAIN frozen vegetable and McCAIN Purely Potato 500g, 600g, 750g and 800g packs are worth 5 points. I have just registered NNPS but know we could meet the challenge of trying to catch up quickly with the current Narrabeen Lakes tally of 115 points!! Points can be redeemed for veggie garden equipment like seeds, tools and compost. Kinders wouldn’t mind some garden nets (at 140 points a net) to try to discourage our resident bunnies and birds from feasting on our crops at times! If you (or grandmas etc) buy these McCain products please cut out the barcodes and pop them into the labelled box in the office! Parents – don’t forget to ask your friends and workmates if they can help collect these barcodes for us too! Elaine Hartman Kinder Vegie Garden Co-ordinator After School Care What a fabulous term this has been, the skating/roller blading on a Friday has been so successful we are full till the end of term for Fridays..... the kids have had a ball, even Annie got out there and gave it a go. Well done! We have Tennis arranged for Term 4 through our active sports programme and also a sports afternoon where we have many games to choose from so stay tuned. Just a reminder that all Term 3 accounts are due now, so please arrange for the

payments directly into our account or via cheque, eftpos etc. We are unable to allow your child a place in Term 4 until your account has been settled as per our policy. Before School Care, lots of positive feed back and thanks for the enrolment forms, it’s going full steam ahead. A reminder BSC will be open from 7:00am till 8:30am in 2011. Call in and speak to ASC staff for more details. Thank you, ASC Committee

The PCS welcomes Professor Tim Flannery to address staff, parents and students on Monday, 20 September from 4:00-5:00pm at Narrabeen Sports High School. Please contact NNPS office for more information or to RSVP.

The Gutsy Challenge There is still time for all our Narrabeen North Public School community to register and participate in the ‘Gutsy Challenge’. Simply go to the website www.gutsychallenge.com to register your child with our group the ‘Narra Beans’. Encourage sponsors to go online to support you in your challenge to eat 2 fruits and 4 vegetables daily in Week 9 of this term (12-18 September). All the money raised goes to digestive cancer research and all participants are in the running for some fantastic prizes. So get busy, get healthy and get Gutsy! Simon Brown

Page 6 The Grapevine

This Sunday is Sustainable House Day. A range of Australia’s most environmentally sustainable homes will be open to the public to demonstrate best practice in renewable energy, recycling and sustainable design. Find out directly from home owners who’ve put sustainable living into practice, about reducing waste around your home, saving water, natural home heating and cooling and more.

http://www.sustainablehouseday.com/ or use the following link to find houses in your area.

http://www.sustainablehouseday.com/new-south-wales.php

The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School Page 7

The P&C Newsletter from Narrabeen North Public School Page 8

PLEASE NOTE: Whilst every attempt is made to verify bonafide advertisers, the school does not accept responsibility therefore parents should use their own discretion.