Dear Parents and Carers,

The P&C Working Bee was fantastic. I got to witness first-hand the wonderful spirit of Cowan. I can’t wait for the next one. The school was looking fabulous and with the kind donations from Thornleigh Bunnings we had a new path installed. Thank you for all who attended, it was a remarkable turn out. The best for quite some time.

School tours commenced last week and today. It is always lovely to meet new community families. If you know of anyone who missed out, I am prepared to hold personal tours. Just ask them to ring the office and book a time.

Term 1 School Fees are now due. If you are unable to pay at this time, can you please notify the office or myself.

Year 5 and 6 went on an excursion to CARES Bike Safety at St Ives on Wednesday. We all had a great time and not too many points were taken off the students for wrong-doing on the road. Well done to all students.

On Thursday we celebrated Harmony Day. It was lovely to see Cowan with a touch of orange. Harmony Day was established to celebrate Australia’s cultural diversity and to be a day of cultural respect for everyone who calls Australia home. Harmony Day is all about togetherness and kindness, about sharing experience and knowledge. In a small but meaningful way this day of celebration - of respect for diversity - works to create the conditions that erase fear and create friendships. Something Cowan children do well.

Cowan Public School - Newsletter

Dig Out Your Dancing Shoes

Bush Dance Next Friday!

Cowan Public School … a vibrant and caring learning community

I am delighted that this term, our school, like many other public schools in the state, will participate in a Department of Education initiative: the Tell Them From Me student feedback survey. The survey measures factors that are known to affect academic achievement and other student outcomes. The focus of the NSW-wide survey is on student wellbeing, engagement and effective teaching practices. More information about the survey is available at: http://surveys.cese.nsw.gov.au.

The survey is a great opportunity for our students to provide us with valuable and quick feedback on what they think about school life, how engaged they are with school and the different ways that teachers interact with them. More than 6,300 schools in Australia and around the world have used Tell Them From Me to survey 5.4 million students. Capturing the voices of our students will help improve how we do things at our school.

I want to assure you that the survey is confidential. The survey is conducted online and will typically take less than 30 minutes to complete. It will be administered during school hours between 11th March and 12th April. Participating in the survey is entirely voluntary.

A consent form and FAQs for parents/carers about the survey was sent home with students. If you do not want your child or children to participate, please return the form to school by Wednesday 27th March 2019. Copies of the form and FAQs are available from: http://surveys.cese.nsw.gov.au/information-for-parents.

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22nd March, 2019

Chandler Avenue, Cowan NSW 2081 9456 1065

Dates to Remember

Bush Dance from 6pm 29th

Cake Day Apr 3rd

School Photos 4th

PSSA Winter Sport begins 5th

Wet Weather date for Bush Dance 5th

Easter Service during Scripture 8th

Easter Celebs/Grandparents’ Day 10th

ANZAC Day Service 12th

Please refer to website for all calendar dates

Peer Reading—Tuesdays & Thursdays

Cowan Band—Wednesdays at 7.30am

Music Tutor Program—Individual Days

Cowan Dance Group—Fridays 8am

PSSA Sport—Fridays 9-11am

Term 1

Election Day Cake Stall & BBQ Mar 23rd

World’s Greatest Shave—Bill 29th

cowan-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au www.cowan-p.schools.det.nsw.edu.au

Photography: PicMii by Kristiina

Congratulations to the following students

who received awards recently:

Bronze: Melanie Joshua Tasman

Timothy

AWARDS

P age 2 I ss ue 4 Cowan Public School … a vibrant and caring learning community

Sarah and Colo both swam well in the 10yrs 50 metre freestyle.

Congratulations to our students for participating and thanks to all parents and grandparents who came along to cheer our kids on. Miss Roberts

Read/Red Day... You will remember late last year Cowan Public School students enjoyed a morning of learning a little about Dyslexia and how to understand and support others who may have difficulties in learning to read. On the day, the students met my bear "Little Read Riding Hood", and they wore red clothes and enjoyed creating red paper planes. They also generously donated a gold coin towards some new books for the library.

This money has now been used to buy the following books:

I Want my Hat Back by Jon Klassen

You, Me and Empathy by Jayneen Sanders

365 Days of Wonder by RJ Palacio

Fish in a Tree by Lynda Mullaly Hunt.

In New South Wales public schools there is a period of time set aside each week for teaching scripture or ethics. Following legislative changes in 2010, families can now choose for their child to go to ethics classes as an alternative to spending that time in supervised care or scripture classes. We have a couple of interested parents who are pursuing in becoming Ethics Teachers and are wondering if there is an interest here at Cowan Public. Can you please let the office staff or myself know if this is something you would like your child to be involved in.

NAPLAN assesses literacy and numeracy – important skills that each child needs to succeed in school and life. The NAPLAN tests are designed to help us make sure students are on track with their literacy and numeracy development. Students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 participate in NAPLAN tests for reading, writing, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy.

On Tuesday 26th March, our school will par ticipate in the NAPLAN Practice Online Test, to make sure students understand how the test works and see if all equipment and procedures are flawless for the actual testing period in May. Students do not need to be computer experts to take the NAPLAN test online. Making sure students have computer skills is part of our school curriculum, and our teachers will ensure your child is familiar with the online format. If you have any questions about NAPLAN Online, please contact me.

Thursday, 4th April is school photo day. Every student is to attend school in full Summer uniform. Photo envelopes were sent home with the children today.

Kind Regards Tracey Darby (Acting Principal)

PSSA... Last week was the last round of league tag for the Summer season of PSSA. The Cowan teams went up against Hornsby Heights Primary. The matches were intense and exciting with both Harvey and Sam scoring 2 tries each for the Junior team and one to Colo, along with a stellar sprinting display from him too. The score for the Junior match was 9-5 Hornsby's way.

The seniors took to the field and dominated the defence all game, they worked together as a strong unit with many outstanding performances all round including Tim and Charlotte. Bill stole the ball twice from the clutches of a Hornsby player, gaining two exciting tries for Cowan. The final score was 10-4 Hornsby’s way.

Junior player of the Match was Liam. Senior player of the Match was Bill.

Zone Swimming Carnival... For 2019 five students from Cowan represented their school at the Zone Swimming Carnival, 8th March, this time held at PLC. The indoor Olympic swimming pool with electronic timing boards and official judges could have been daunting for the competitors, but not the Cowan students. The five athletes swam and behaved with brilliant maturity and confidence in all their races.

Charlotte competed in the 11yrs 50 metre freestyle, backstroke and butterfly, a great effort for her last swimming carnival of Primary school. Bill and Raeke both swam in the 12yrs 50 metre freestyle. Raeke beat his personal best and Bill came 2nd in his heat, only narrowly missing out on a place in the final.

P&C SPOT

Thank you to everyone who attended our Working Bee! What an effort!! It was so lovely to see everyone (including Mum’s, Dad’s and the children!!) getting in and giving back to our school. Many important jobs were achieved on the day including new paving, installing seats, weeding, spreading mulch, raking and trimming trees. Huge thanks to Mrs Darby and her family for attending and being so organised! I am truly humbled by what can be done with many people involved. And thank you to Mel Roache and the Year 5 and 6 girls for supplying a lovely sausage sizzle and drink at the end of the day. Great job everyone! We have the Election Day Cake Stall & Sausage Sizzle to be held this Saturday. Most of you would have received a note with your allocated times. Any problems please see me ASAP so I can arrange someone else to cover your time. I have allocated 3 families to each timeslot. If you are finding yourself really busy I will leave my mobile number stuck to the desk so please call me if you need extra support and I will pop up! Also we are asking families to please provide a plate of biscuits or cakes to sell on the day. Please drop these to the resource room on Friday or bring up on Saturday. Thank you! We also have the Bush Dance fast approaching. A note will be sent home shortly with more information. Tickets will be able to be purchased in advance and this really helps on the night, so if you could please do this we would be grateful. There will be glow in the dark hair streaks, body art, glow in the dark nails and of course lots of glow in the dark items to buy. Please bring extra cash on the night as there will be lots to buy. I am looking for a couple of “ex Cowan Students” (girls) to be involved in painting nails, hair streaks etc. Anyone who thinks they can spare an hour or two please let me know as we would love your help. Thanks in advance for your support with these two upcoming fundraisers. We are very grateful!! P&C Executive

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School Photos… Thursday 4th April

Wear full summer uniform, along with beautiful smiles

Photo envelopes went home with students today

Photo envelopes, along with payment, can be returned to the school office or paid online. Photo packages have to be paid for before photo day

If you would like a family photo of your CPS children, please collect a family photo envelope from the school office

Additional envelopes can be obtained from our School office or from Advanced Life at:

http://www.advancedlife.com.au/index.php.

Easter/Grandparents’ Day Celebration 2019… Wednesday 10th April

Commencing at 9.00am with our annual Hat Parade and assembly

Categories are: Easter, Environmentally Friendly and Edible

Following our assembly we invite all parents and grandparents to a delicious morning tea

At the conclusion of morning tea all grandparents will be joining their grandchildren in a rotation of fun activities until lunch time

Activities will include a photo booth, book fair, craft, interviews and games.

We look forward to sharing this special celebration with you all.

ANZAC Day Service… We will be holding our School ANZAC Day Service on the last day of this term, Friday 12th April, as ANZAC Day falls during the school holidays. Our ANZAC Service will be at 11.30am and we invite all our School and broader community members to join us for this service.

Emergency Contact & General Annual Permission Notes… Thank you to our parents who have completed the above notes and returned them to school. Unfortunately we are missing these notes for many of our students. If you have not completed the above notes for your child/children, then please do so and hand in at our School office on Monday.

We cannot publish any photos etc. of our students until we receive notification of such, and in the case of an emergency we cannot just assume that the information we have on file is correct. This is a legal requirement every year.

For your convenience we have included these notes at the end of this newsletter, or you can download from our School website at the following link, under ‘Yearly Notes’: https://cowan-p.schools.nsw.gov.au/notes.html.

Payments & Receipts… Thank you to our families who have already paid their Term 1 Costing. If you misplace your copy of the Term 1 Costing, a copy of this can be found on our School website on the Notes page.

We ask that families pay promptly; this can either be in a lump sum or in instalments. Any families exper iencing difficulty in paying, please see the school office or Principal. All enquires are dealt with confidentially.

The books were chosen for the way they may encourage a reader to empathise with others and also to think about their own capacity to be resilient and never give up. They were also chosen because they will be enjoyable to read! Thank you to all who contributed some money. Carina McSweeney Learning and Support Teacher

Responsible Pet Ownership for K-2… K/1/2 were very excited to welcome Cozette and Finn to Cowan Public School Thursday last week. What an informative and fun presentation which aimed to teach all of us how to care for our pets. This interactive session included short videos showing possible scenarios involving animal behaviours and the safest ways to respond. The students loved working with Finn and gave him lots of love and attention. I am sure that he needed a good nap after he left. Lynne Scanes

K-2 Parent/Teacher Interviews… This is happening in three time slots next Wednesday, 27th March. A note was sent home with our K-2 students yesterday. Please complete the note and return to the school office on Monday, if you haven’t done so already.

Library News... Thank you to all parents who are encouraging their children to borrow from our extensive Library each Wednesday. Please remember that books need to be returned to the Library before school on Wednesday morning.

LEGO Quest Challenge... Our popular challenges have commenced in the Library under the capable LEGO Quest Coordinators for Term 1. Our team includes, Makai, Ajay, Joshua and Cristiano. The theme this week was "treasure" and what an amazing array of creative constructions now on display.

Cowan Street Library... Have you visited our new literacy resource? Thank you to everyone who has donated their preloved books to be circulated through our Street Library. More donations would be gratefully accepted.

World’s Greatest Shave… As you may be aware one of our students, Bill, is shaving his head for this worthy cause. Please support him.

Friday 29th March at 11.30am

We ask all students to bring in a gold coin and wear mufti for this occasion

Any donations can be handed in at the school office or you can donate online at:

https://secure.leukaemiafoundation.org.au/registrant/FundraisingPage.aspx?eventId=14612&registrationId=744490.

Bush Dance... Friday 29th March

6.00pm onwards

BBQ dinner and other goodies on sale

Music, dancing, eating, socialising, fun!

Wet weather date of Friday 5th April.

P age 4 I ss ue 4 Cowan Public School … a vibrant and caring learning community

Positive Behaviour Focus…

Week 9:

RESPONSIBILITY: BE AT THE RIGHT PLACE at the right

time and Be PREPARED for work and be PUNCTUAL

Week 10 & 11:

ASPIRE : Be RESILIENT and bounce back after a problem.

RESPONSIBILITY

ASPIRE

Responsibility—Be at the RIGHT PLACE at the right

time & Be PREPARED for work and be PUNCTUAL:

Responsible people make sure they are where they are

supposed to be, are reliable and prepared with

everything they need for work. They try to be on time—

being on time for school and lessons is important.

Aspire—Be RESILIENT and bounce back after a problem:

Develop the ability to become happy, healthy, strong and/or

successful again after something bad has happened.

Recovering or adjusting easily after a problem, misfortune or

unexpected change.

Kinders for 2020… Next year seems a long way away, however, if you have a child starting school next year, or know of any potential school-starters for 2020 in our community, please let us know. We would like to personally invite them to attend our celebrations happening this year.

Ice Block Friday… P&C are selling ice blocks on Fridays, during this term, for $1 each. However, they will not be sold on Red Day Lunch Fridays. If your child forgets their $1 and would like to purchase an ice block, they can have an IOU, however, these need to be paid by the following Friday.

As with our cake days, if a child has not paid their IOU by the next ice block day, they will not be able to purchase an ice block, or incur another IOU, on the next ice block day.

Cake Days... Our last cake day for Term 1 is:

Wednesday 3rd April with the Alexakis and Maksoud families providing.

Thank you to these families in advance.

If your child forgets their cake money on cake day, we do allow IOUs, however, these must be paid by the following cake day. If not paid, that student will not be able to purchase a cake.

End of Term 1… Term 1 ends on Friday 12th April. Term 2 begins for our students on Tuesday 30th April. Monday 29th April is a School Development Day for staff only.