Boneo Buzz: 16th August

Friday 16th August, 2019

Dear Parents and Guardians,

A firm believer in the quote ‘It takes a village,’ I start our Buzz today with an update on our facility improvement plans. School Council discussed initial quotes for the extension of the multipurpose room or the construction of a cover over one basketball court. Initial costings sit at around $350 000. We have decided to investigate building a cover over the basketball court using existing funds and the generosity of our Boneo community.

As we head towards November and National Philanthropy Month, I ask that our community continue to challenge ourselves to get involved, to give back and to not just settle. Philanthropy provides countless opportunities, not only for you, but for future generations. What you do today has the ability to make a lasting impact on another.

Our students are the beneficiaries of philanthropy from our current parents, staff, past families and friends. We are exceptionally grateful to those who have given generously to provide the educational opportunities, upgrades to buildings and facilities that our students currently enjoy today.

Philanthropy does matter. There are many ways to give back, whether it’s through the gift of time, money or your expertise. Most importantly, all donations, large and small, are important to our School.

On Tuesday 17th September at 6:30pm you are invited to a community meeting where we will share our plans and outline how you can assist in any way to bring this project to fruition. Join us for drinks and nibbles.

Book Week Celebration

On Monday, we will be celebrating Book Week with a dress up day. All students and staff are invited to come to school dressed as their favourite book or book character.

We will be holding a special assembly at 9am with a parade of costumes and special Book Week activities.

Please note that this assembly will replace our usual afternoon assembly time.

House Athletics

Years 3 to 6 House Athletics

On Monday 2nd September at 9am students in Years 3 to 6 will participate in our House Athletics Carnival. All students will participate to earn points for their House. We encourage students to dress in their House colour and have some fun.

The Boneo Primary School Athletics team will be selected to progress to District Athletics at Ballam Park on Wednesday 4th September from this event.

Prep to Year 2 House Athletics

In Term 4, on Friday 8th November our junior students will participate in House Athletics on the oval.

Scholastic Book Fair

As we prepare for our Book Week celebration, it was wonderful to see the excitement our Book Fair created this week.

A big thank you to Jan Fletcher for her coordination of this event and to our team of parent volunteers, who offered their assistance over the four days.

We are thrilled to announce that due to the incredible support of the Boneo community we achieved sales totaling $5155. This amazing result allows us to select books to the value of $1500 for our children to read.

16th August 8 (1)

16th August 6 (1)

Parent Opinion Survey

The annual Parent Opinion Survey for 2019 is now live and we are inviting all families to participate. Please take the time to complete the survey as your opinions are important to us and will contribute to the future management and organisation of our school.

This survey is completely anonymous and will take approximately 10 minutes to complete.

All families will have received the survey link and password via Compass.

The Department of Education and Training has extended this survey. The link is now open until Sunday 18th August.

Oaks Day Event

Each year, our school sets a fundraising goal for our Oaks Day event.

Proceeds from this year’s event will be used to purchase a second class set of Lennovo ThinkPad computers. These devices are vital to ensure our students develop the skills to be job ready. Global connectivity, smart machines, and new media are just some of the drivers reshaping how we think about work, what constitutes work, and the skills our young people will need to be productive contributors in the future.

To ensure we are able to purchase these computers, our goal for Oaks Day 2019 is $15,000.

This event connects over 180 members of our extended community. We are incredibly fortunate to have the generous support of many local business, this support alone however, is not enough to achieve our target.

This event requires a team of volunteers to assist with the coordination of the function, sourcing of donations and assisting on the day.

We require volunteers to join our Oaks Day 2019 team, and look forward to seeing some new faces at our next meeting on Monday 19th August following the Book Week Assembly.

If you would like to support this event, or have any questions about what is involved, please contact the school office or join us in the staff room for our meeting.

Snapshot of Learning this Week

Technology Innovation

Recently, Boneo Primary School has been taking part in the Monash IoTKG (Internet of Things Kitchen Garden) program as a pilot school and we’ve been given new sensors to test out in our garden! However, unfortunately over the weekend, one of the sensors mysteriously stopped working…

This week, the Grade 3 and 4 students embarked on a journey, using their detective and creative skills to discover why the new light sensor had stopped working.

The students looked at trends in the data collected by the sensor all the way up to when the sensor malfunctioned, but what happened after that? The budding engineers realised they could use data from the second sensor (a water sensor) to determine what went wrong with the light sensor. As the students analysed the various graphs produced by the water sensor, they realised there was a large spike in water moisture of the soil over the weekend. Their first clue!

Using some help from the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM), the students identified that there was heavy rainfall over the weekend. Linking up all the data presented to them, the little detectives concluded that the light sensor was in fact not water proof and that the sensor had been placed in an unsheltered area, leading to its destruction… but it doesn’t stop here! The students immediately started thinking of solutions for how they could fix this problem and they quickly realised they could use the school’s brand-new 3D printers!

The students are currently working on designing a shelter for the sensor and will be trialling out their solutions soon!