What a positive two weeks it has been at Erina Heights. My office has been a hive of activity with students sharing work that they are proud of and explaining their learning journey. It has been great to also visit classrooms and see the great teaching and learning happening around the school. A visit to 5T saw robotics in ‘full swing’ with dancing robots, tools programmed to massage and some crawling objects. Students enjoyed sharing how they had programmed their Lego objects and what they could do.

It was great to spend some time at Mingara with students who were participating in the zone swimming carnival.

We are excited to have works completed on our cola area with the concrete resurfaced in a short synthetic grass with 6 handball courts. Students enjoyed their first day of handball competition during recess and lunch breaks today and teachers have loved using it as an additional learning space with Mr Barnes using it during his maths lesson this morning to teach his class about area, length and space.

Thank you to Gail and the P&C for their efforts in applying for an $18000 Community Building Partnership grant that contributed to funding these works.

Canberra Excursion

We have been able to decrease the cost of the Canberra excursion and hope this provides some relief to families. The cost of the excursion will be $450. This was partly due to an increase in the PACER rebate which is now $30 per student.

Mrs MacDonald

K/1C have had a wonderful few weeks showing their growing knowledge and independence in a range of ways.

They have been exploring daily phonics lessons, literacy activities and spelling patterns and generalisations. They have developed understandings on prepositions and how these can be used to describe specific details about a person or object within their writing i.e. ‘Our class pet Pepe was shy and nervous and hid under the table to escape the excited stares of K/1C’.

They have completed a range of art activities using artistic techniques and mediums to show their creative capabilities.

In maths, K/1C students have enjoyed their daily number talks and hands on learning to measure the length of a range of areas with informal units of measurement. We recognise that our school environment needs to be looked after by us and have committed to not only cleaning up the playground area last week for Clean Up Australia Day but for the rest of the year after our breaks to ensure our rubbish is in the bin. We love our school and are so very blessed to have such wonderful play areas that we want to ensure they are always clean and ready to be played in.

Our classroom is a BRIGHT and FUN place to be and our K/1C students recognise there is an opportunity each and every day to learn something new and to share their knowledge with everyone.

Mrs Calverley

Every morning we are greeted by the cheerful smiles and passionate stories from students in KDH. We have been impressed with how all our Kindergarten friends are adjusting to school life. There is so much to learn when starting school and KDH is making great progress at navigating this new chapter.

When talking to students about their school highlights, the playground is always high up on the list. They thoroughly enjoy the activities that are organised by our senior students, both at recess and lunch. The playground equipment is always a hit too.

We do a lot of learning in KDH and students engage in a range of activities in English and Maths every day. We’ve worked with books such as “We’re going on a bear hunt” and “Alexander’s outing.” We are learning our letter sounds and how to blend these sounds so that we can read and write. In Maths, we’ve gone on a nature walk to collect objects which we then sorted in many ways according to their attributes. We have trekked the school looking for patterns and even made our own AB/ABB/ABC patterns using different objects. A feature in our classroom this week was introducing the iPads into our learning space which was very exciting for all.

Every single day is filled with many new learning experiences and opportunities. Students in KDH should be very proud of the excellent start they have had to their schooling. Every day we learn and every day we laugh.

Mrs Diggins and Mrs Hall

Welcome to the wonderful class of 2H! We have hit the ground running and everyone has settled in beautifully. I am delighted at how enthusiastic and eager all of the students are to learn. We are working together to create a positive learning environment, incorporating the school’s core values of Personal Best, Responsibility and Respect.

In Mathematics, we have been focusing on whole number, the attributes of 2D shapes and creating a two-way sort using numbers and shapes. Students have also been examining various patterns in our environment and are currently creating their own Mandala.

2H students have been working hard with their reading, phonics, and writing skills. Some of our focus texts in the English syllabus have been ‘Our Island, Peggy and Koala Lou’. These texts look at various aspects of a narrative and provide a stimulus to drive their creative writing.

Congratulations to all 2H students for their genuine enthusiasm for learning. I am extremely proud of all the students for their determination to improve and perform at their personal best.

Mrs Hillmann

For those of you who may not know, our school is a part of the Kuriwa AECG (Aboriginal Education Consultative Group). Mrs Diggins and I attended the first meeting along with teachers, SLSO’s and parents from the many Primary and Secondary schools in our Kuriwa area. We meet at least once a term to have a yarn and discuss how we can improve Aboriginal Education in our school’s. If you would like further information about the AECG meetings please email the school and a member of our Aboriginal Education team will get back to you.

Kuriwa AECG has its own facebook page where you can keep up to date with information from all the schools.

The Gulang Festival meeting was prior to the AECG meeting and like last year, we will be doing the Gulang Festival art competition again which will be completed in the second half of the year. In addition to the artworks, we will be performing at the Gulang Fest this year. Our Aboriginal students will be given the opportunity to showcase their talents on stage at the Gulang Festival. More information will be coming out about this later in the year.

Mrs Hilllmann

Mingaletta and Gudjagang Ngara li-dhi Aboriginal Corporations have both started their Dancing programs. So if you are interested, please see the details below.

Mrs Hilllmann

Congratulations to the wonderful Erina Heights Public School School swimmers who competed at the Tuggerah Lakes PSSA Zone Swimming Championships at Mingara last Friday. The students all put in their personal best and made parents and teacher proud to share the day with the team.

Thank you much to our wonderful parent, Yvette, for her help in organising the swimmers and making sure they were ready for their events. Thanks also to the parents who took photos to capture special moments throughout the day and shared them with teachers and families.

There were so many amazing achievements and highlights throughout the day with special mentions to Ava S, Ivy H, Kane DN, Aaliyah C and Phoenix M who will be representing the Erina Heights Public School and Tuggerah Lakes PSSA at the Sydney North Swimming Championships on March 23. We wish them all the best. Permission notes for this event will be sent home next week.

Mrs Thaler

Our 3-6 students have had the pleasure of having Mark Presdee, a local tennis coach, come in and teach them the fundamental skills of tennis, footwork, ground strokes, volley and teamwork. It has been great to see students trying tennis for the first time or students reconnect with a sport they may have given away. There are always lots of smiles and laughter happening on Thursday. We are looking forward to see the skill level of Erina Heights Public School students increase over the next three weeks Mark is in with our 3-6 students.

Mr Beames

Like all NSW public schools, we can request contributions to enhance our educational and sporting programs including elective subjects. School contributions help provide additional educational resources for the benefit of students. The contribution is set at $40 per student or $100 per family of three or more. While contributions are voluntary, student resources are maximised when each family makes its voluntary contribution.

We have our fabulous Easter Raffle coming later this term! It is a great fundraising opportunity for the P&C to raise funds for our school.

But we need your help! Please add to your next grocery shopping list- Easter eggs as we are now accepting donations of chocolate Easter eggs for our upcoming Easter Raffle! We would love any chocolate Easter donations to be sent to the school office by Wednesday 29 March. We greatly appreciate your support with this fundraising venture for our school!

Next Friday, the eldest in each family will bring home an Easter raffle ticket booklet for you to sell to friends, family and neighbours. Please ensure the purchasers full name & phone number is written on the stub. Please return by Monday 3 April all sold, unsold or partially sold booklets. There will be a prize for the class that returns the most booklets & for the family who sells the most booklets. If you would like extra booklets to sell, please ask at the front office. The raffle will be drawn at the Easter Parade on Thursday 6 April!

The next P&C meeting is the AGM where all positions will be declared vacant & new nominations determined. We warmly invite you to attend on Tuesday 21 March 7pm in the school staffroom.