Holiday Activities / Games

Playing games with your children is a perfect way to spend some quality time together while at the same time consolidating learning skills, using social skills and having fun.

Allowing time for board games helps practice cognitive skills such as problem solving, speeds up our response time, helps develop logic and reasoning skills and can increase our spatial reasoning.

What do our children want more than anything? They want someone to play with, someone to listen to them and to have fun.

What do we as parents want? We want to develop our children’s verbal and communication skills, increase attention skills to encourage concentration and focus for longer periods of time and to activate our children’s imagination.

In addition playing games with our children allows us to spend quality time together, offers great learning opportunities, can satisfy competitive urges, offers opportunities to master new skills and gives endless possibilities for social skills to be practised.

Learning opportunities can cover number, shape, patterns, counting, letter and sight word recognition, reading with a purpose, strategy development, hand eye co-ordination and fine motor skills.

Communication skills such as engaging your children in conversation, sharing interests, turn taking, verbal communication, winning gracefully and a child’s attention span can all develop through participation and completion of games in a relaxed holiday atmosphere.

Maths

Snakes and Ladders – counting forwards and backwards / direction

Dominoes – number patterns

Cooking – measurement within the recipe; shopping list – (paying $ / c)

BLOKUS – a strategy game for all ages

JENGA – patterns / strategies / fine motor skills

Monopoly – counting, following directions, strategy

Reading / Spelling / Vocabulary

Read for fun

Start a novel together and take it in turns to read

Maps – follow your trip on a road map / world map; give directions for a trip; read the street signs

Recipes – reading, following directions

Scrabble – spelling, vocabulary

SNAP – sight words, spelling words

Boggle – spelling, vocabulary

Have their own shopping list to help in the supermarket.

Writing

Write the family Christmas cards

Keep a holiday diary

Research

Use your computer skills to find some interesting local activities.

Log on to the Museum or Art Gallery and find activities you would like to attend.

Keep a weather map for the holidays – create your own weather symbols.

Find the cheapest mode of transport from A to B – cost of train from one place to another; work out how much it would cost to get to Manly from your house by ferry, train, bus or car….

Physical

Write yourself an exercise program

Practise a new skill each day

Play Twister with a friend

Creative Activities

Create your own Christmas cards / gift cards

Create a colouring book for a younger sibling or friend with your drawings

On large paper, potato print your own wrapping paper.

Plant and care for a vegetable plot

Remember a balance of structured and non structured activities is good for all and encourages creative opportunities….

Quiet time – is equally important for all….

Happy holidays

Katrina James – Learning Enhancement

Faith Matters

School was out and 10-year-old Charlie was thrilled to be out of London celebrating Christmas in the country. Driving along the winding roads with his mother, he was captivated by the snowy winter landscape. But suddenly the snow got heavy, the visibility turned bad and the car slid out of control, ending up in a ditch. Charlie tried to push while his mother pressed the accelerator, but it was no use. They left the car and walked down the road where they knocked on the door of a little house and asked for help. Flustered, the lady invited them in to use the phone and warm up while she made tea and cookies.

“What’s so special about that?” you’re asking. “Just another everyday event, right?” No. At least, not to the woman who opened the door that day; she’s already told the story hundreds of times. And can you blame her? It’s not everyday the Queen of England and Charles, Prince of Wales turn up on your doorstep!

On a winter’s night over 2000 years ago, the Prince of Peace knocked on our door – and it was no accident. The Bible says it “happened to fulfil the Lord’s message … He will be called Immanuel … God is with us.” Christmas can be a lonely time if you’ve lost your job or your family or your sense of hope and the joy of others can be a painful reminder of what you’ve lost. But you’re not alone. You may feel lonely, but you’re not alone – God is with you. He really is! Believe that, and have a blessed Christmas!

Rev Peter Morphew

A Message from the Head of Lindfield

Developing Successful Young People

What does success look like at Newington? It looks like a safe environment, where every boy is valued and included. It is boys who are independent communicators, are collaborate and adept problem solvers.

Success looks like our boys fulfilling their potential. We have a strong focus on developing a holistic education which provides a high quality international education focusing on academic achievement, which is differentiated to meet the needs of the amazing diversity of boys in our school.

Success means providing a values based education where our boys understand that empathy, caring for others, working together and contributing to the communities around us is what makes us happy and successful.  Success means giving our boys a range of opportunities through the PYP inquiry program, sport, the arts and the extra-curricular program to find areas of passion and to develop them.

Through our pastoral and social-emotional program we want to develop confident, resilient boys who are unafraid to follow their passions throughout their lives. We want boys to realise that material possessions are fleeting but service, community and connections with others are the key to a successful life.

What success do parents want for their children? Most parent define success as children who are happy, connected and independent. I say to all the parents that their job is to grow up their children to leave them. Success for them to develop independent, contributing members of society.

Sometimes parents want to shield their children from the hard parts of life, they want their children to be happy and experience an easy life where they are successful in everything they do. But if we manufacture success at every turn, then we are doing our children a disservice.

We want our boys to experience challenge, joy, sorrow, failure and hardship and happiness. The full gamut of what life has in store for all of us. We want our boys to fail. But we make sure our boys realise that failure is not a fullstop but the beginning of a new more interesting sentence, a new more interesting chapter. It is a chance to learn. Failure is an opportunity to learn and we need to experience this to be successful in life.

As parent, we cannot insulate our children from failure, as we cannot insulate them from sorrow, challenge and hardship. Instead we need to embrace failure, challenge and hardship as opportunities to make us better as people for the future.

If a parent’s goal is to raise their children so they are ready to leave them, then they need to scaffold an environment that embraces the difficult parts of life. We want boys who can stand tall in the face of challenges and be courageous, compassionate and caring when interacting with a world that often does not mirror these qualities. That is success.

Ben Barrington-Higgs

Parents & Friends’ Association News

La Fiesta

On Saturday night 29 October our school community gathered together for our “La Fiesta” celebration.  It was our largest end of year function ever held with approximately 155 parents, teachers and partners in attendance.

The Social and Fundraising Committee comprising of Gloria Knight, Deb Burt, Katherine Lyttle, Tim Davies, Francy Taylor, Carmen Roche, Collette Middleton and Anita Chandler did an absolutely outstanding job.  We sampled delicious Fiesta inspired food, listened to John Watson from Minsky’s on the piano and enjoyed the fabulous colourful decorations – many created by the boys.

The auction items were a huge success and with the generosity of the following parents we raised approximately $2,500.  Our thanks goes to Errol Flynn, Victoria Chambers, Lucinda French, Carmen Roche, Leearna Plank, Nicole Webster, Jacqui Freeman, Evelyn Chia and Denise Smith. In addition, thank you to the families that purchased our items for sale which raised an additional $500.

All monies raised from the night will be put towards additional support and services for the boys.

It is nights like this that highlight the wonderful parent and staff community we have at Newington Lindfield.  It was a fantastic night and the P&F would like to thank everyone for supporting this event.  Enjoy the photos below!

Thank you from the P&F

To all our families, as the year draws to a close, thank you for your volunteering efforts and continued willingness to pitch in when and where required.  Your contributions help make our community so strong and we are so appreciative of your time.

To our staff, thank you for your continued passion, enthusiasm and dedication to our boys.  We appreciate all the effort you put into making their learning experiences so worthwhile.

It is such a pleasure working with our families and staff and we look forward to further assisting in building our wonderful school community next year.

How did the P&F contribute to our school community this year?

This year the P&F contributed to the school community in the following ways.  We:

• Subsidised the co-curricular drama program
• Continued to subsidise the co-curricular touch typing and chess programs
• Purchased five new coffee machines and milk warmers to use at our school functions
• Contributed to the Welcome Reception
• Sponsored a seat at the new Drama Theatre at Stanmore
• Contributed $5,000 to the Newington College Endowment Fund

A full overview of how the P&F has contributed will be posted on Spaces. 

Working on behalf of the parent body, the P&F is so pleased to be able to contribute to our school community and welcomes any suggestions from parents on ways you might like to see P&F funds utilised.

Julianne Ashworth – P&F President Lindfield

Prep Shop

The last day the Prep Shop will be open for 2016 will be Monday 5 December, the second hand shop will also be open on that day.  Hopefully that will enable you to purchase everything you need before the first day back in 2017!
 
Opening times for 2017:
Friday 27 January – 10:00am-11:00am
Monday 30 January – 8:00am-9:00am (First Day of School – usual opening)
Monday 30 January – 3:00pm-3:35pm
 
I would like to thank all the volunteers who have helped in the Prep Shop this year, you are amazing and it is greatly appreciated.

Jennifer Kahn – Prep Shop Manager

Tuckshop

A big thank you to all our tuckshop volunteers this year.  You have been a huge help.  I know the boys love popping by to see you.  I look forward to working with you all in the new year.

Cheryll –Ann Clark – Tuckshop Manager

Year 2 Sleepover

The Year 2 boys were incredibly excited all last week as they looked forward to their sleepover. Bags, sleeping bags and mattresses were all piled up in the library ready for the big event last Friday. The boys couldn’t wait for the school day to end …

Here are some thoughtful reflections from the Year 2 boys about the sleepover:

I really liked the sleepover because it was the first time I had a sleepover at school and I got to eat pizza! The Year 2 sleepover helped me to prepare for Year 3 when we sleep away for 2 nights. (Ashok Reddy)

My favourite part was when we went in the pool. We got to have pizza for dinner and other yummy food. It was amazing! (Conor Roche)

I liked swimming in the pool because we could do whatever we wanted to do. It helped me to feel safe away from my parents at night. (Baxter Plank)

My favourite things was swimming because we played tip in the water. The sleepover helped me for when we go to camp next year and it helped me to be more confident. (Luke Malmquist)

The Year 2 sleepover helped me to get ready for camp and it also helped me leaving my family. My favourite time was when we got to watch a movie with popcorn – Yum! (Marcus Chan)

I loved the Year 2 sleepover. My favourite part was the movie because it had a really good theme. The sleepover helped me prepare for the Year 3 / 4 camp. IT WAS FUN! (Charlie Cooper)

I liked the sleepover because we got to watch a movie and go in the swimming pool. The sleepover helped me to sleep in a sleeping bag on a mattress. (Miles Tian)

What I liked about the Year 2 sleepover was that I got to swim. It helped me to understand how to pack my bag for next year. (Koda Leong)

I liked the Year 2 sleepover because I felt confident. It helped me a lot as I feel ready for the Year 3 camp. (Callan Glover)

My favourite thing to do was swimming because we got to play water polo and my team won 4-0. It helped me to be away with my classmates. It was fun. (Nathaniel Warwick)

I liked swimming at the sleepover. It helped me settle without my family. (Caleb Chien)

My favourite part was when we saw the movie. It helped me to get ready for camp by being more social. (Archie Allen)

My favourite part of the sleepover was the movie and the swim. It helped me to stay away from my parents at night. (Aaron Blayney)

Leonie Russell – Year 2 Teacher

A Message to Year 6

As the year quickly draws to an end and we prepare to go our separate ways, it’s important that we take the time to reflect on the school year and all the successes you have had as a learner and person.

It’s been a remarkable year. Memories of the Camp, PYP Exhibition, Year 6 Fair and the Surf Day should stick with you for a very long time. Remember everything you have done using a growth mindset in the classroom.

In your last few days as a Year 6 student at Newington Lindfield, take the time to reflect on all the amazing things you have done not only this year but every other year in Primary School and treasure them before you head off to High School. What are you most proud of? What are you going to give yourself a pat on your back for? What have you learnt and most importantly, what are you going to do next in your quest to be the best person you can be?

We are all very proud of you and look forward to watching you graduate and walk out the front gates one last time.

Good luck!

Jackson English – Year 6 Teacher

Year 5 – Sharing the Planet

Our last unit of inquiry for the year has been an inquiry into the theme Sharing the Planet and the Central Idea that finding peaceful alternatives to conflict can lead to harmonious relationships and new opportunities.

This unit has seen our boys asking meaningful questions related to a variety of conflict situations and resolutions, sparked by the question ‘is conflict good?’

Further student generated questions have included:

Why do terrorists do what they do?

How is conflict good or bad?

How do we make more environmentally friendly technology?

What is conflict resolution?

Are there side effects to a harmonious world?

What would happen if there was no conflict?

What part of the brain reacts to conflict?

Why don’t we let more refugees into our country?

Throughout the unit the boys were heavily engaged in our social skills program, Second Step, as they explored conflict resolution strategies and considered the many wide ranging examples of conflict that exist in our world. They also had a visit from our school cleaner to talk about his situation and reasons for coming to Australia from Nepal. In addition to this our School Chaplain, Mr Peter Morphew, led a lesson with the boys on conflict and harmony that exists in the bible.

The boys engaged with images (these can be seen here) depicting a variety of conflict situations, explored statistics and graphing related to migration, watched many examples of conflict and considered the situation of asylum seekers in Australia before undertaking their own independent inquiries.

As a culminating activity the boys worked collaboratively across the year level to write and rehearse a dramatic script that depicted a conflict situation, the way that it was resolved and the opportunities that arose. Over a couple of weeks the boys learnt about a variety of drama techniques and worked to refine their scripts and drama pieces before performing them in front of a green screen and adding relevant backgrounds. These performances can be seen here.

The boys have demonstrated the skills of collaboration and communication throughout this unit of inquiry as they have increased their knowledge and understanding of conflict and how it can be best resolved.

Pascal Czerwenka – Year 5 Teacher/Deputy Head of Lindfield Campus

Self-Defence with the Martial Arts Club

Like most of you, we are quite astounded that the end of 2016 is upon us.  It has been a very full year for everyone, and for us, full of great fun.

We have been absolutely delighted with the progress that our students have made this year, not only in terms of technical excellence, but – and of equal importance to us – also as young men taking responsibility for themselves.  We have seen ‘difficult’ students blossom into young people considerate of their own actions and the impact these have on others.  On the face of it, it can seem miraculous, but it is a simple matter of modelling these behaviours, explaining them in terms that our students understand (‘kidspeak’), and then expecting that they are capable of it – which they most certainly demonstrate!

Credit of course must also go to the parents and the College for their part in these transformations.

Some of our students are off on new adventures in other countries and places, and we will be very sad not to see them back next year but wish them all the very best of amazing journeys with their families.

To all our students, our very best wishes for a joyful summer, and prosperity and happiness in the coming year, and we look forward to seeing you all back in February 2017.

Our Facebook page and website will of course be functioning during the break (for our blog and information on our term dates in Turramurra, etc.). 

Sensei Marice