It is always good to look back and reflect on the year and the learning that has taken place.

Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of editing students’ reports before they are uploaded to our system. What struck me in reading the reports was how well the Barbreck teachers know their students and how much learning has taken place this semester alone.

The Year 6 students visited our nation’s capital and learnt about our government and how it works; Year 5 investigated the molecular structure of solids, liquids and gases; Year 4 explored conditions in 18th century England that led to convicts being transported to Australia; Year 3 researched the way in which people celebrate and hold ceremonies around the world; Year 2 analysed 3D shapes and persuasive writing used in advertisements; Year 1 worked on worded problems involving addition and subtraction; and Prep concentrated on writing great sentences!

The gains made are most readily seen with the Prep students, as most started school with some basic word recognition and ability to write their own name and some key words. Over the weekend, I was delighted to read the recounts of the Prep’s excursion to the Environment Park. While I was able to ascertain that they had a good time and learnt about Aboriginal Dreamtime stories, it was their writing that impressed me.

Their attempts at spelling were outstanding; however, it was their use of sentence structure that impressed me most. There were girls who used opening phrases such as ‘when we arrived’, sentence joiners such as ‘and’, ‘but’ and ‘because’, as well as phrases and some clauses scattered throughout their sentences. The use of such sentence structures is usually reserved for students in Year 2! What was also apparent when I spoke to the girls through the week, was their excitement when writing. They are always eager to read what they have written or tell you about some of the interesting or ‘big’ words they have used.

Below are some examples of their writing:

“We also threw a boomerang and it was fun because I liked it spinning around.” Elizabeth Switkowski.

“Thirdly, we got to paint our arms and the boy painted our face.” Yuzi (Miranda) Qin.

“After we finished we went to make a dreamtime story and my teacher was the frog Tiddalick.” – Nina Steedman.

After that we acted Tiddalick the Frog which is a dreamtime story.” – Catherine Barry.

Yuzi (Miranda) Qin’s drawing of “Happy girls and the bus for the excursion.”

Thanks go to the wonderful Barbreck teachers for all of the planning and effort they put into teaching the girls, as much learning and skill development has taken place this year. Thanks also to our wonderful parents for your ongoing support of all things Barbreck!

Ms Karen McArdle, Head of Junior School
Year 5 Mini Business Projects

The Year 5 students have commenced their Mini Business projects as part of their Business and Economics Unit. The students are developing a business proposal for the upcoming Business Expo where they will showcase their ideas along with their products, market research, websites and financial plans. They have been working with their teams to identify effective advertising and marketing methods to assist in the promotion of their small businesses.

“I have enjoyed coming up with ideas and surveying people to complete our market research. We are creating a massage therapy business where you can choose your massage type. The most popular massage is a shoulder massage.” Clover Oxley.

Isabelle Peter, Harriet Koco and May Sutton.

“I like working together with Kristin to plan our business. We are providing a service where people come and learn how to make bath salts, soaps and bath bombs. Hopefully, it will be a successful one.”Kaia Belan.

“It has been really fun creating our logos for our Mini Business. We are creating a juice bar with fresh juices. The most popular juice was mango.” – May Aiello.

Sage Prior and Hollie Pringle.

“Minnie and I have completed some market research for our stationery shop. We found out that most girls in our year level would prefer to purchase pencils and gel pens. It was not really a surprise!” – Jiaqi (Sophia) Zhang.

Miss Kirrilly Wootton, Year 5 Teacher