It was wet, miserable, cold and grim, but more than anything else it was FANTASTIC! This week we had our Interschool Lightning Carnival (organised by our amazing Mrs Clohessy) where multiple local schools took part in soccer, rugby, AFL, netball and modcrosse. As usual, I was in charge of the girls’ soccer squad and the girls had to play 8 games in one day. Results-wise it was a bit of an up and down day; we won four games and lost four games, but it was made special by the behaviour and attitude of the girls themselves.  They ran and ran and ran, they listened to all the instructions, they worked hard together as a team, they endured substitutions with a smile and they looked after each other. The most impressive part, though, was they never stopped smiling. Some games were tough, the rains came and we got completely drenched, decisions went against them, but they just kept smiling. I was soaked through and cold, but warm inside from the sheer privilige of being with this wonderful, happy and never-give-up team. It was an truly inspiting day – worth getting wet for.

Take a word like door. Just an everyday kind of word, one we wouldn’t give a second thought to. However, that simple word could be the basis for a world of dreams and adventure, drama and romance, thrills and tragedy. In LA14 we’ve been working all year to develop engaging openings to our writing, particularly with regards to our narrative writing. For example, let’s get back to the word door: This was the moment her life could change forever, she just had to open the door. What door? Where is she? Is it a real or metaphorical door – we MUST read on! such is the power of being able to turn a bland, everyday word into an engaging story starter.

For this task you need to use the word door to create 3 different and engaging story starters. Try changing the genre of the story (thriller, horror, comedy, romance…) and give different feelings to your sentences.

All throughout this year we’ve been using words from our spelling lists to write engaging story starters. These are the types of sentences you’d come across at the start of a novel that the author creates to engage your attention, to make you want to read more. For this reason we went on a library hunt to try and find some of the most engaging openings. The students woked efficiently (and silently, of course) and found some absolutely fascinating story starters which we’re now going to type up and pin around the classroom. It was a really great activity and helped the students to focus their attention on what is or isn’t creative, engaging writing.

How do we give kids the skills to cope with our modern way of life? Adults often underestimate the stresses and worries kids go through.Of course, we adults have the problems of mortgages, finances, jobs, raising the kids themselves… It might seem that in comparison, kids have nothing to worry about. But we need to remember, the big issues in a kid’s life are their friendships, school, learning difficulties, issues at home, social media… No one is immune from stress. They’re also growing up in a world where they’re developing incredibly short attention spans thanks to online media apps. To help kids develop their own coping strategies, help them develop their focus and allow them to take an enjoyable break at school, we’re spending 40 minutes each week doing a little mindfulness. The kids put headphones on, play mindful music on Microsoft Teams and colour in mindful pictures. During this time they don’t speak to anyone else, they just experience peace and relaxation. Sounds blissful!

“Why do we learn this stuff? We’re never gonna use it in real life!” I reckon I hear this sentence at least once every year. The thing is, everything we teach is useful in some way or another; we need to be able to use our Maths to work out our finances and our reading to understand all the forms we adults fill in. We can even find a use for angles. This week, the students used their knowledge of measurement and angles to work out the heights of different objects around the school. They created their own clinometers out of dowels and paper, and set off with an oversized protractor and a measuring tape. They measured flagpoles, fences, goal posts, netball hoops… Check out these images.

As part of the Western Australian Curriculum, the students are required to look into the continents of The Americas (Year 5) and Asia (Year 6). This makes things a bit tricky in a split class like ours, so we often break into groups so we can focus our studies on the different topics. We’ve kept some of our processes similar, such as referring to the CIA World Factbook website for information, and the format of our projects will follow the same structure. To check that they all had the right information, the students got into groups depending on the counties they were studying and created a big brainstorm of their findings. Check out the images below.

Well, okay, the title of this post is a little deceptive. Things aren’t really going swimmingly, we are actually going swimming! This week and next week will be all been about swimming lessons, and the students are already having a great time at the local pool. It will be fascinating to see them develop their skills as they learn the techniques needed to swim with ease, grace and power (hopefully). However, the drawback to this is that the classroom work will be taking a bit of a hit, with some days being reduced to between one and two hours contact time between myself and the students. Not that I’ve heard anyone complaining! Anyway, even with swimming, we’re going to be learning about angles, fractions, the origins of prefixes poly and ortho, writing a 5 second narrative and researching the continents of Asia and the Americas (among other topics). Just another couple of weeks for the students of LA14.

What a magical day it was – EXCURSION DAY! The students grabbed their iPads, put their hats on and lined up outside the classroom. The excitement built rapidly as we walked to the school gate. We’d arrived… at the car park. Not much of an excursion, I suppose, but it was a nice change from sitting in the classroom. There was a serious side to our little jolly, we were learning about rotational symmetry and the teachers’ cars provided a cool, real world experience for the students to check their learning. They looked at the patterns and tried to take photos of different orders of rotation, and they did a great job. Check out their blogs to see the results of our most exciting excursion this year. This link will take you to Lucas’ Blog, and this link will lead to Grace’s Blog.

La14 are currently involved in some “secret squirrel” business. We’re making a special gift for a special person who might just happen to have a special day coming up. It’s a sad fact that modern schools are extremely strapped for cash and we have to find ways to do what we want with as little expense as possible. Because of this, our very secret project is being done with practically zero financial outlay. I’d like to be more specific than that, but all I can say is that it involves making a popstick garden fence and creating some graffiti on them. Remember, sssh, it’s a secret!

“Go back to where you came from!” Ever heard people shout this at others? Or even at yourself? Well, funny thing is, unless you’re one of our indigenous population then everyone in Australia is from somewhere other than here. The question is – where? In this blogging task you need to ask your parents, or even your grandparents, where they originated from. For instance, I’m from England, but my origins can also be traced to Scotland, Ireland and Scandinavia (seems I’m a little bit Viking). Also, why did your family originally migrate? Did they have a push or a pull that influenced their decision? Were they pushed from their homes due to war, lack of jobs, no money..? Or were they pulled to Australia for the climate, better prospects for their children, job opportunities..? We have such a wonderfully multicultural classroom in LA14 so it will be fascinating to learn a little about each other as well as ourselves.