Redlands House/Transition Gold

Blue Class News

Blue Class Juniors and Seniors started the year welcoming new friends and families and have enjoyed the first few weeks getting to know each other. Blue Juniors have read the story My nose, your nose written by Melanie Walsh and engaged in interesting discussions about their differences and similarities in thoughts, feelings, qualities and abilities. Each child has drawn a self-portrait and answered some questions about themselves.

Miss Nicholls: “What are you good at doing?”

Jesse (3 Years 9 Months): “I’m really good with cats. I pat their back and scratch their ears. They like to be scratched places they can’t reach.”

Blue Seniors have also been involved in a ‘Who Am I?’ investigation and have now started to discuss the concept of a ‘balanced’ friendship. After reading the story Friendship is like a Seesaw written by Shona Innes and Irisz Agocs, the class discussed how they can try to keep their friendship seesaw balanced, if one friend is ‘up’ and the other is ‘down’. Miss Webber and Miss Nicholls have been so proud to hear “my seesaw is not balanced” drifting through the playground as the Blue Class Seniors build on their friendship strategies and navigate their social environments with less reliance on teacher intervention.

Photograph Days

Individual photos for Redlands House and Transition Gold classes will be taken on the following days by Sandpit Photography:

Tuesday 12 March – Orange Class Juniors, Yellow Class Seniors, Blue Class Seniors, Transition Gold
Thursday 14 March – Orange Class Seniors, Yellow Class Juniors, Blue Class Juniors

Clean Up Australia Day

Last Sunday, I joined several enthusiastic Redlands families with cleaning up rubbish from the Spit Reserve. It was such a beautiful, sunny day to be by the water and the many bags of rubbish that were collected was indicative of a productive afternoon. Thank you to the School’s Service Coordinator, Kria Coleman, for her organisation of this event and for providing a delicious afternoon tea. To the children and parents who took part this year, thank you for taking time out of your weekend to give back to the community. I am always heartened by the generosity of Redlands families when it comes to community and charity events.

Staff News: P-6 Counsellor

Next Monday, the School welcomes Mrs Elizabeth Foster as the Junior Campus, P-6 Counsellor. Elizabeth brings a wealth of expertise and experience as a psychologist, most recently working with primary-aged children. She has a keen interest in working with families and in schools particularly. Dean of Students, Mrs Sam Kourakis, will closely work alongside Elizabeth as she familiarises herself with the students and the school community. Elizabeth’s office is situated in the Parkes Building on the Junior Campus.

Teaching/Learning and Wellbeing Session

Last Tuesday, Dean of Students, Mrs Sam Kourakis and Dean of Teaching and Learning, Mr Nigel Coutts, presented to families the positive behaviour learning framework which contributes to the development of a safe, positive and supportive learning community which is being implemented on the Junior Campus. You will find some interesting points below from the presentation, as well as the slide deck on Redlands Pulse, if you were unable to attend. Thank you to both presenters, whose expertise and knowledge is far reaching in this area.

There is a well-established link between student engagement, student behaviour and academic achievement.
A learning environment can be viewed as an ecosystem involving interactions between the physical environment, the teacher, the curriculum and a multitude of individual student variables, all of which influence student behaviour.
Every learning environment across our campus has a set of behavioural expectations outlining behaviours for learning, respectful relationships and safety and organisation. These behaviours have been generated by the children using Circle Time.

From the research of Mary-Helen Immordino Yang:

It is literally neurobiologically impossible to build memories, engage complex thoughts, or make meaningful decisions without emotion. Put succinctly, we only think about things we care about.
When learning and knowledge are relatively devoid of emotion, when people learn things by “rote” without internally driven motivation and without a sense of interest or real-world relevance, then it is likely that they won’t be able to use what they learn efficiently in the real world.

The consequences of this include a need to nurture a classroom culture where students feel safe, supported, where they are willing to take risks and enjoy positive relationships. Clear expectations and norms help us adjust to an environment. We learn best when we have an understanding of why the learning matters to us, where we are confident in our ability to achieve goals, even when they involve struggle. Having time to switch-off, quietly reflect and play along with quality rest are essential for learning.

Redlands Inaugural Sports Luncheon

The Redlands Inaugural Sports Luncheon, celebrating 120 years of Redlands Sport, will be held towards the end of this term on Friday 5 April between 12.00 – 4.00pm at the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, Kirribilli.

This Luncheon is open to all Redlands parents and alumni and provides a great opportunity to celebrate the integral value of sport to the Redlands community and its students of the past, present and future. We are delighted to announce our guest speakers, all past Redlands students, who will share their very inspiring journey during this luncheon:

Karyn Gojnich (née Davis), Class of 1978 (Olympic Sailor, Redlander and former Redlands parent)
Janusz Hooker, Class of 1987 (Olympic Rower)
Lachlan Mackay, Class of 2000 (Rugby: Australian Wallaby)
Holly Crawford, Class of 2001 (Olympic Snowboarder)

Tickets are $130 per person and include a gourmet two course meal and beverages. Limited spaces are available and bookings can be made here. I hope to see many of you there as we recognise this milestone in the history of Redlands Sport.

Easter Working Bee

Mrs Audrey Fellowes
Head of Early Childhood
afellowes@redlands.nsw.edu.au
9968 9848