Certificates

From the Archives – John Manton’s letter hearlding the beginning of Newington College

On 18 February 1863, Rev John Manton wrote a letter to Mr A MacArthur, one of two leading Wesleyan churchmen then visiting England. In December 1862 these men had been asked by the Church’s Education Committee to ‘…secure the services of two competent Masters, and send them out with the least possible delay.’

John Manton’s follow-up letter, his copy of which is held in the College Archives, provided MacArthur with news of developments in the last two months. A contract had been let for £1050 for repairs at Newington House, not including the fencing that was also needed. He reported rapid progress, with the slating of the main building completed, replacing the previous shingles, and some of the internal work also done. Several friends of the project had visited Newington House and were all ‘…much pleased with the situation and the place itself.’

Fund raising for the work was continuing: he and others, including Rev William Kelynack, a later President of the College, had secured promises of £690 in the Sydney, Goulburn, Bathurst and Illawarra Districts. Manton hoped to raise ‘a respectable sum’ in Maitland, but noted that it would be ‘…some time before the money can be got, in consequence of the dulness [sic] of the times.’

‘I see nothing in the way to prevent our making a beginning in July next,’ Manton declared, ‘should the Masters arrive by that time, which I sincerely hope may be the case.’ He would soon begin to advertise the opening in July ‘…in full confidence that the Masters will be forthcoming by the time we want them.’ This, however, was clearly his major concern. He urged MacArthur to ‘give the subject your earliest attention, as we should not be able to find suitable persons here.’ In due course this question was to be resolved in an unexpected way.

David Roberts
College Archivist

A Message from Mr Wyatt

Learning Conversations

One of the highlights of my job is hearing conversations about learning; whether these conversations are between boys or teachers. This, after all, is what schools should be about…learning! I am pleased to say that this is a constant at Lindfield. As I walk around the classrooms boys and teachers are talking about learning. As I walk in into the staffroom and meetings teachers are talking about learning.

The highlight of last week was hearing the spelling conversations that have been taking place in each of the classrooms and at our planning meetings. Our revised spelling program involves the boys making connection between phonemes and graphemes, and completing spelling words with related word banks. Already we have started seeing some positive learning taking place.

To support parents in making sense of this new approach and knowing how to support the boys we have decided that our planned Parent Information Sessions on Wednesday 27 February (at 8:30am and 6:30pm) will change to focus on Spelling. If you would like further explanation or to learn how you can support your son with his learning I encourage you to attend. We will reschedule the previously planned session on PYP and Mathematics in Term 2.

Even better than conversations about learning taking place at school are learning conversations that continue at home. At the beginning of the year I mentioned the idea of Action; boys taking their learning further outside of the classroom. It has been great to begin receiving emails from parents about these types of situations. We are thrilled to be able to celebrate this with our boys and to highlight it on our Action Wall. Please don’t hesitate to send examples of Action to your son’s class teacher whether it is big or small.

PYP Exhibition

One component of the Primary Years Programme that we have eagerly been waiting to introduce is the PYP Exhibition. The Exhibition is the culminating event of the PYP and allows students in the final year of the programme to collaboratively design and conduct a unit of inquiry about a real life issue. This process allows students to highlight and celebrate their learning (what they have learnt and how they have learnt over their time in Primary School) with the school community. We have begun the initial planning behind the scenes and will shortly introduce the Exhibition to the Year 6 boys. Stay tuned for further information in coming weeks.

Pastoral Positives – Detective DoRight

As we continue to promote positive pastoral care and social skills we are launching a new initiative this week to help our boys to focus on all of the positives that are occurring in our school.

Beginning this week at Assemblies we will be having a regular visit from Detective DoRight, our resident super sleuth. Each week Detective DoRight will be interviewing one of the boys who has been caught doing the right thing! Our boys are fantastic and do so many things right.  We want to celebrate this and use these segments to encourage all of our boys to keep following our Essential Agreement on a regular basis.

Kindergarten Enrolments 2014

We are in the process of finalising our enrolments for Kindergarten 2014.  If you know anyone who might be interested in enrolling their son for Kindergarten 2014, please encourage them to call the School Office on
9416 4280.

BBQ Sat 23 Feb at Koola Park

Cricket at Koola Park

The Newington College Lindfield Sports Committee is delighted to host another sumptuous BBQ on Saturday 23 February 2013 from 7.30am – 10.30am.

Click here for more information.

Faith Matters

Look for the Honey

In their book, The Laws of Lifetime Growth, authors Dan Sullivan and Catherine Nomura explain, “Continual learning is essential for lifetime growth. You can have a great deal of experience and be no smarter for all the things you’ve done, seen, and heard. Experience alone is no guarantee of lifetime growth. But if you regularly transform your experiences into new lessons, you’ll make each day of your life a source of growth. The smartest people are those who can transform even the smallest events or situations into breakthroughs in thinking and action. Look at all of life as a school and every experience as a lesson, and your learning will always be greater than your experience.”

In an old Peanuts cartoon, Charles Schulz shows Charlie Brown at the beach building a magnificent sandcastle. It’s a work of art. As he stands back to admire it, suddenly it’s destroyed by a big wave. In the last frame he says, “There must be a lesson here, but for the life of me I don’t know what it is.” That’s how many of us feel after a potentially valuable experience. We go through it but don’t grow. We attend meetings designed to help us learn, then do nothing with what we’ve heard after closing our notebooks.

A few days after slaying a lion, Samson returned to the scene of victory and discovered two things in the carcass: (a) Bees, that sting. (b) Honey, that tastes sweet. “He took some” (Judges 14:9).

In life, move beyond the pain and look for the honey!

Peter Morphew
School Chaplain 

Prep Shop

The Prep Shop requires the ongoing support of Volunteers for 2013, if you are able to assist please fill in a Volunteer Form or contact Maria Dickinson at maria.dickinson@bigpond.com

Now available at the Prep Shop are the Stickybeaks re-usable Lunch Order Bags ($10). The bag is easy to wipe clean and includes a transparent pocket to display your son’s name and class with a separate pocket for your son’s lunch order and money.

The Prep Shop is open on Mondays from 3.00pm – 3.45pm and Wednesdays from 8.00am – 8.45am.

Literature Festival 2013

On March 20, 21 and 22 Newington College will host the 6th biennial Literature Festival across all three campuses.

Here at Lindfield our celebrations will reflect the sesquicentenary milestone of the College with a variety of authors and presenters interacting with the students. Archimede Fusillo, Oliver Phommavanh, Richard Tulloch, Felice Arena, Michael Gerard Bauer and Jeni Mawter will all work with the students across the three days of the festival. Students will play with poetry in a workshop with Miles Merrill and Stage 3 students will participate in a writing workshop with Jeni Mawter.

Some favourite activities will be included in our celebrations – a Spelling Bee, the old fashioned way, a Trivia Quiz with teachers setting questions about learning, and a Book Parade.

The Book Parade will focus on characters from classic literature. In library sessions discussions have commenced with what makes a story a classic and this has started the students thinking about potential book characters they would like to represent at our parade on Friday 22 March at 9am.

Visiting authors will be happy to sign copies of their published works. However, we will not have them on sale at school at the time of the Literature Festival.

 Sue Gough
School Librarian

Tuckshop

Week 5

Tuesday 26 February 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Help Required

Thursday 28 February 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Annabel Williamson
11.00am  – 2.00pm  Help Required

Friday 1 March 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Jules Ashworth
11.00am  – 2.o0pm  Help Required

Week 6

Tuesday 5 March 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Lisa Glover

Thursday 7 March 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Rhoda MacCulloch
11.00am  – 2.00pm  Fiona James

Friday 8 March 2013
9.00am – 12.00pm  Help Required
11.00am  – 2.00pm  Help Required

Parent and Friends News

Dear Lindfield Community

I hope you all have your RSVP’s in for the P&F Welcome Reception this coming Saturday night, kicking off at 7.30pm. The Grade 6 parents have asked if you can come dressed in either black, white or grey or just a token of one of the colours on yourself if you can manage it. It’s not obligatory and you will not be denied entry if you can’t manage it. It will be a great night and hopefully the rain will hold off. If it does decide to be a wet evening you will be directed to an alternative location in the School.

The Sports Committee’s first home game BBQ at Koola Park went off very well. We had some great parent volunteers and came away with a profit. Huge thank you to our Sports Committee for being so dedicated. The next one is this Saturday so if you are at Koola Park, please come along and support the P&F by buying a delicious bacon/egg/sausage roll. There are drinks also available and if anyone has a contact for a coffee van please can you let us know as the one that was organised has fallen through.

On the topic of sport, the annual Newington Sports Lunch is to be held on Friday the 22nd of March. This is for the entire Newington community and any friends, family or business associates who may wish to attend. The invitation is attached and costs $125 pp with a fabulous lunch and beverages included. This year, due to it being Sesquicentenary ie. 150 years of Newington), the committee has managed to secure 6 legendary speakers. The Sesquicentenary Committee are also looking for any physical donations for a silent auction and raffle and will give your business recognition for this on the day. If you wish to donate anything please let me know.

STICKY BEAKS ARE IN THE PREP SHOP! Our older families may remember being able to buy reusable lunch bags for the Tuckshop from a couple of years ago. We now have a supply in the Prep Shop and if you wish to purchase one they are $10 each. They do save on using paper bags and have a zip pocket to keep money in.

Hope to see you at the first P&F meeting for the year, this coming Monday 25 February at 3pm in the Library. Mr C and Mrs Barg will be on hand to mind any boys. They will come and meet them in the library and take them to the appropriate area, dependent on the weather etc.

Mrs Judy Ryan 
P & F President 

Being a Reflective Learner

As a PYP School, there are 10 Learner Profile Attributes that we look for in a life-long learner: Inquirers, Knowledgeable, Thinkers, Communicators, Principled, Open-Minded, Caring, Risk-Takers, Balanced and Reflective. The aim of the International Baccalaureate is to ‘develop internationally minded people who, recognising their humanity and shared guardianship of the planet, help to create a better and more peaceful world’.

Each Prep Talk, I will focus on one attribute and hopefully demystify the meaning behind each.

So .. . what does it mean to be a reflective learner?

Throughout their school life, the boys are encouraged to reflect upon their learning. This reflection should continue outside the classroom and beyond the school gate into their adult lives. Reflection in any situation is an integral part of our learning. Knowing how we know and reflecting on this enables us to engage in higher order thinking. We begin to assess the evidence we have collected and collated, reflect on classroom practices, learn from others around us and screen for bias, inconsistency or error.

How do we reflect?

We can reflect in many ways and within many contexts. Reflection can lead to personal growth and deeper understanding. Identifying strengths and areas for improvement are important starting points for reflection. We may also reflect on our thoughts or attitudes and how they may have changed and what has led to this change. Discussions with others often give another perspective to situations and events, and can be a catalyst for being reflective.

Encourage your sons

Encourage your sons to be reflective in any situation and model how you reflect yourself. If we never question what and how we learn, we will have a very narrow and shallow view of life. Reflect on feedback and constructive criticism. How can you reflect in your everyday life? Are there real-life contexts in which you need to engage in reflection? Are you embracing your opportunities?

In your son’s learning environment

In class, your son will be using learning tools to help him reflect on what he is learning about in class. This reflective practice will be regular and ongoing. Your son will also be using a reflective tool that will come home with their Inquiry Book at the end of each 6 week unit. This is used to reflect upon the current unit and what they have learnt about themselves as a learner as a part of this experience.

Through being a reflective learner, can come great personal growth.

Joel Weekes
Teaching and Learning Team Leader

Literature Festival 2013 Invite

Click here to find out more information.

Newington Prep Schools Inter-house Swimming Carnival

What a glorious morning greeted the Newington crowd as they descended on Ryde Aquatic centre once more for what was going to prove to be another marvel in swimming prowess across the two campuses….glorious because the event was to be indoors!!!

The rain tumbled and so did the records as Jarrah Ronan showed why he is a force to be reckoned with in the swimming ranks with a powerful performance in the 50m Backstroke final, finishing 1st in a time of 39.46 sec, a new school record. He then went on to win the 50m Freestyle, 100m Freesstyle, 200m Individual medley, 50m Breaststroke and 50m Butterfly. A fantastic day out for this talented Rydalian!

And what of Kingswood?? This house that had been relegated to second place amongst the stakeholders at Lindfield for so many years! Would the new breed, the new crowd, help them achieve the success they so truly craved? The answer was yes, and the answer lay with many talented new swimmers. Oliver Haig, Lachlan Hull, Tom Kennedy, Angus Rowe and Angus Bourne all triumphed on the day in their respective events.  All booked a place to the IPSHA Swimming Carnival, and are all in Kingswood. Then there was Keaghan Davey-Webb and the fearless leader Alex Woolley, who found themselves in countless finals, pushing Kingswood to the brink of history…..

And indeed, after 10 years, and countless attempts, Kingswood triumphed over not just Rydal, but indeed Newington itself in a dominating display of attacking swimming. Their points good enough to place them in third place even before the percentage was applied. A fantastic effort by all and testament to the raw talent that is evident not only in Kingswood, but at Lindfield also. Well done by all!

Age Champions

8 Years – Nicholas Venetoulis
Runner-Up – Angus Rowe

9 Years – Flynn Gannon
Runner-Up – Lachlan Hull

10 Years – Jarrah Ronan
Runner-Up – Gaelen Dorigo

11 Years – Eden Horne
Runner-Up – Sebastian Wyatt

12 Years –Miles Parhash
Runner-Up – Louis Pidcock

Wyvern Prep House Champion – Lucas

Lindfield Prep House Champion – Kingswood

Newington Prep Combined House Champion – Kingswood

New Record: U/10’s 50m Backstroke – Jarrah Ronan 39.46

Mark Caulfield
Sports Co-ordinator 

[Show as slideshow]

Dates to Note

Friday 22 February Chapel in Don Brown Hall at 8.30am all welcome

Saturday 23 February Summer Sport Round 3, P & F Welcome Reception 7.00 – 11.00pm

Week 4

Tuesday 26 February School Assembly in Don Brown Hall at 2.30pm all welcome

Wednesday 27 February Parent Information Morning – PYP Focus 8.30 – 9.30am, Parent Information Evening – PYP Focus 6.30 – 8.00pm

Thursday 28 February QUAD Swimming Carnival

Friday 1 March Chapel in Don Brown Hall at 8.30am all welcome

Saturday 2 March Summer Sport Round 4

Week 5

Tuesday 5 March Open Morning 9.00 – 10.30am, School Assembly – Year 5 Item in Don Brown Hall at 2.30pm all welcome

Wednesday 6 March IPSHA Swimming Carnival at Homebush

Music Notes

Ensembles

All ensembles have started rehearsing at the regular times.  Please check the Music page of Spaces for further details.

Instrumental Lessons

Please remember to inform your teachers of any absences during the term, please advise of illness or school excursions as this is the School policy.  If teachers are not informed you will be charged for the lesson and the teacher does not have to make the lesson up.  Please exchange contact details as the School Office is unable to pass on the messages. If you have any queries it is best to email me:

vsouth@newington.nsw.edu.au

Vanessa South
Music Teacher