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The light rains down. My king, in this late-summer hour,
You reign within my heart as well, with growing power.
You shine with strength. You gleam and glance and glisten.
You lead me into depths where I, within the silence, learn to listen.
And there you form life's fruits, fruits good to eat,
In weaving soul-light warm, where they grow ripe and rich and sweet.
Dear Families and Friends of Golden Hill Steiner School,
Welcome to our first Golden Quill of the term. All classes have started the year well as can be seen from the articles submitted this fortnight.
School photos Photo day ran smoothly last week. Given the short notice we all had of our scheduled day, MSP photography has extended the order cut off date. All orders are to be made online using your unique shoot key that each family received by email and text on Tuesday of last week. To avoid an archive charge being added, please ensure you place your order by February 23rd. Should you have any questions in relation to ordering, please contact MSP Photography direct on 9240 8000.
Hats, Shoes and Hair A timely reminder that, as per our Dress Code, children must wear a hat during terms 1 & 4. Children are expected to wear footwear in the playground and should wear covered shoes for those days that they have woodwork or gardening. Students with hair longer than shoulder length must wear it tied back. Thank you for assistance in reinforcing these guidelines with your children.
Board Members Golden Hill Steiner School is goverened by a School Board. We are currently seeking interested community members who would like to contribute to the school by becoming a board members. Board members assist in guiding the direction of the school and supporting the Principal in their task of managing this. It requires attendance at 6 meetings per year. Other support is offered by correspondence through email and the Board Chair meets with the Principal on a regular basis. Please contact the school office or Board Chair, David Stockdale for further information if you are interested and able to contribute.
P&F Thank you to those parents who have taken on the role of Class Carer for the classes this year. To support the Class Carers and the school it would be great if we could establish our P&F again. This requires 3 parents who are happy to take on the executive roles of P&F President, Secreatry and Treasurer. If this is something you feel you have the skills and time for, please let Jacqui know so we can call a meeting in Term 1 and get our P&F happening.
High School Our first High School Planning Committee meeting is scheduled for the afternoon of Monday, February 22nd. We have gathered a diverse group of people with a variety of experience and skills to get the ball rolling with this exciting new chapter for Golden Hill Steiner School. We are working towards a launch date for Class 7 in February 2022. Watch this space for updates!
Warmest regards,
Jacqui Hamblin
Principal
Autumn Festival - Friday 19th March
We will be holding our Autumn Festival on Friday in Week 7 of Term 1 - 19th March. The themes we will be weaving through our Autumn Festival will be gratefulness and courage.
Our festival will begin at 10.40am in the hall after the children have had a slightly early morning tea break.
We invite all parents and school community members to join us in the hall to contribute to our Autumn Harvest Table, which will be distributed to a nominated group within the Denmark community. Families can send along some of their garden produce or excess goods to contribute to a class basket in their child’s class.
Our Class 4 and 5 students will be presenting this years Autumn Festival story, ‘The Shadow Giant”, and all classes will be joining in to sing and celebrate the changing of the season. Our songs and performances will conclude at approximately 11.50pm.
Classes 4, 5 and 6 will be invited to walk our Bridge of Courage across the Kwoorabup River. Classes 1, 2 and 3 can watch the upper primary students and will then be encouraged to write a note of gratitude to add to the gratitude tree on the Class 1 and 2 verandah.
1pm – Picnic Lunch on verandahs or on lawn depending on the weather.
1.30 to 2.30pm – Courage Games
Children in Classes 1 to 6 will be divided into four Autumn Courage Games Groups. Four stations will be organised by class parent groups to provide a fun afternoon for the children. An assigned teacher will supervise children. Please support your Class Carer to either assist in setting up and packing away or to assist and direct children participating. Each group will be at each station for 15 minutes. A bell will signal time to change.
Trust fall – parents in Classes 1 and 6
Spear throwing – parents in Class 4-5
Water carrying/balancing – parents in Class 3
Blindfold obstacle course – parents in Class 2
2.40pm after a quick tidy up everyone will join in a circle to sing and our festival will conclude.
We thank you for your anticipated support.
Robyn x
Greetings from Playgroup!
We warmly welcome back our families of last year along with many new ones. Having had such a wonderful start to the Term, our Thursday group is now full.
Excitingly, we have begun another session of Playgroup on Friday mornings lovingly led by Katja. This session is fast filling up as well so if you are interested in joining our Friday group please enquire at the office for availability.
There is a rhythmic flow throughout the morning, beginning outside in our lovely playground. Soon enough we go inside to make our bread, then whilst it is baking there is time for play inside. Many hands make light work of packing away our toys. We then gather together in circle for rhyme, song and movement. The smell of baked bread filling the room tells us it must be morning teatime. Finally with full tummies of fruit, bread and a drink of water, it's time to go home.
We've had a good day, we've had a good play...we'll see you all again!
Sophia and Katja
Immersing babies in the Earth, experiencing the raw elements of life, helps anchor life forces in the child.
On Tuesday, the bush babies made bread which we cooked and ate, with plenty of honey!
Bush Kindy
Our Bush Kindy has got off to a gentle start. As the children have settled into new routines, they are becoming more familiar with each other as a group. The have also been familiarising themselves with the bush environment and play structures surrounding the home campsite, as well as discovering the joys of our precious creek a little further afield. Everyone was excited by the Bush Basket Kristi made out of bamboo and left for us to decorate with wool, and that also led into some children making ‘bush balls’ out of leaves, sticks and wound wool. As well as learning some of our morning circle songs, they have heard Bunuru stories about Bindi Bindi the butterfly, cicada, and the changeable weather.
Bush School
Our Bush School year has gotten off to a fine start, with the Class 1’s and 2’s so far blending very harmoniously as our 2021 tribe of Bush kids. We began Week 1 at the Earth Station, where the children picked wild blackberries, made dream catchers, and potions among other activities, before heading to the forest, where they reacquainted themselves with our beloved creek, who was very close to dried up in true Bunuru fashion.
In the intervening week there was a huge downpour of rain and the creek levels has risen, so in Week 2 we gathered in the refreshed and sparkling forest, and with karri trees shedding their bark profusely, it was a fine opportunity to make bark boats and follow them as far as we were able.
Our camp was a hive of activity, with many interesting creations, such as Zade and August’s ‘swordgrass dagger’ featured in the photos.
In Week 3, after the initial interruption of class and sibling school photos, it was time for our Bunuru adventure of exploring the contours of the creek from where it enters the school site.
There were a few challenges along the way, and these provided some wonderful opportunities for problem-solving and working together as a group. We made it safely back to our home campsite, and will attempt the remaining section in the week to come. Keep sending those spare clothes and towels!
Another source of excitement last week was the arrival of our Bush Journals, into which the children placed their first entries in the afternoon. A few samples can be seen below.
Bush Journal Entries
Oh golden sun, so shining bright
Please warm us with your golden light
Come along, let us go
To the beach where the waters surge and flow.......
It’s early days yet, with many new children who have joined us this year in Karri Kindergarten. It takes time to feel comfortable in a new environment and settle into the rhythms of the day and week, and for us all to get to know each other.
We warmly welcome our new students and their families; Safi, Ruby, Corbin and Remy, Eleanor, Grace, Isaac and Kaliera, Sage, Harlan, Banjo, Ocea, Otis and Kye. They join our continuing students, Charley, Donnie, Marlin, Sacha and Freya.
With warm days and sunshine we’ve enjoyed playing outside, while parents have been working to make our garden more beautiful ( thank you all), and even had a splash in the paddle pool on a very hot day.
Thank you to all of our parents for your support in allowing our year to begin smoothly, and for sending your beautiful children to Karri Kindergarten. We are looking forward to a wonderful year together.
Warm wishes,
Denise
Class 1 has been settling in beautifully during the first few weeks of Term 1 and adjusting to the rhythms of our day and week. We spent the first 2 weeks with a focus on Form Drawing - finding, exploring and drawing straight and curved lines in many forms and using block crayons, ribbons, chalk, shells and gems to recreate the forms.
This week we started our Alphabet block, taking the children on a journey through the alphabet in a sequence that connects the concrete with the abstract - from images to print. During this we are listening to the stories of the Wise Enchanter and the children's quest to save the world from ignorance by finding all the Letters of the Alphabet! The children have been inspired by the retelling of these stories and have been enjoying opportunities to create and perform their own stories to the class.
At our class meeting on Wednesday, we welcomed Mala's mum Brooke as our Class Carer. Many thanks to Brooke for taking this on!
We have had a wonderful start to the year in Class 2. We launched straight into an English Main Lesson called the King of Irelands Son which is an interweaving of many Celtic tales put together into an adventure just right for Class 2 children.
To go with this ongoing chapter book we have learned many old Irish tunes, rhymes and songs with actions, movement and gesture. Here is an excerpt from the Steiner Curriculum which describes why this story is so appealing to the children at this age.
The King of Ireland’s Son – author; Padraic Colum
The King of Ireland’s Son appropriately provides imagery of an individual who is striving to develop. The King’s Son, in meeting the experiences laid along the pathway of his journey through life, is tested as to his strength of purpose, his inner ‘substance’ and ‘qualities’. He grapples with his ‘lower’ (or less conscious nature) and finds his way through difficult encounters, by virtue of his ‘higher’ (or more conscious) nature. In this way, he at last comes to maturity (individuality) as King. None of this would be achieved without the help of other beings (his companions), who guide and support him, sharing the journey with him.
Such a story is a real support and guide to the growing child. The child’s development toward individuality is not undertaken alone. The child can develop an inner trust in the world around, to offer experiences for growth (choices and consequences) as well as companionship and guidance.
It provides imagery for the idea that development is worth striving for, even whilst it involves struggle.
In craft we have been mastering ‘purl’ stitch to go with the plain stitch we are familiar with from last year. We are making cloaks and capes and scarves for a little knitted character from Ancient Ireland.
The children are working so well writing and reading from their main lesson books daily. We have been illustrating each page beautifully and the children are showing increasing pride in their work.
We are working on familiarizing ourselves with the 100 most common sight words and are exploring sound blends and word families each day.
As part of our morning rhythm we have been warming up with morning math from the blackboard as well as extending our clapping and singing of number patterns. So we are all ready to launch into our new Main Lesson which is a Math one.
We will be exploring the patterns and magic of times tables as we hear more about Celtic Ireland in the days of dragons and little folk!
2021 is off to a wonderful start in Class 3. We’ve been exploring the deep past through our studies of Time and the ancient Hebrew tales of creation. We have been learning a Hebrew blessing to say over our food as well as their songs and dances. We are hearing about the trials and tribulations of Adam and Eve once they were exiled out into the world and have been inspired to work on our own practical survival skills. We have been doing extra gardening and woodwork with Neal and Heather and learning how to grow and make what we need by working together.
We have also been beginning to experiment with building ideas in readiness for our building main lessons that are coming up this year. Amazing cubbies are evolving down in the paperbark forest and we also took on the 'Spaghetti Challenge' to see if we could collaborate to build the highest structure capable of holding up a marshmallow using only 20 pieces of spaghetti, 1 metre of tape and 1 metre of wool. No marshmallows were harmed but the mystery of the 1 missing one remains. The class has its suspicions!
In breaking news, two of our intrepid junior archaeologists, Jasper and Zoee made an amazing discovery when they began to colonize the previous Class 3’s eating area. Upon close investigation of the mulch and what was under it, (which is an important part of eating your lunch), they unearthed the remains of an ancient civilisation! The hidden building project of a previous Class 3 began to emerge and reveal its secrets. Through carbon dating the fossilized remains of mud brick hexagonal pavers were identified as the work of some children way back in the year 2000! After some lightning fast mathematical calculations we realized these children were no longer children at all, but had reached the grand old age of 28 or 29. Hmmm….who did we know who came to Golden Hill that long ago in the distant past? Aha! Of course, our wonderful Class 6 teacher Ellen was actual a member of the class who made it. Amazing!
The children completed their form drawing main lesson with such beauty and enjoyment along with discovering the importance of symmetry, patterns, shapes and the use of complimentary colours.
Whilst enjoying this artistic yet mathematical main lesson they are improving their spatial awareness, body geography and making the transition into freehand geometry.
The emphasis of the geometric main lessons are for the children to be introduced to the ‘language’ of geometry and to have an artistic experience while drawing geometric forms.
Lots of practice is first achieved on individual blackboards, marking reference points to assist in creating balance and symmetry to the form or shape. This week we have looked at triangles, squares, and hexagons. The Class 5 children will experience using compasses and protractors later on in the year in their formal geometry lesson but we have introduced using rulers to measure the centre, and align our reference points. It’s wonderful for both classes to reacquaint with measurement and it’s lovely to hear nothing but concentration.
Each Monday, Kate teaches the children. They have begun their grammar main lesson. Kate is bringing the wonderful elements of Grammar with witty stories and pictorial illustrations using the Grammar land format. Their bookwork is beautiful.
Painting, drawing and craft support our more academic subjects.
Handwork is such an integral part of Steiner Education; it grounds the child with the sense of will to meet the challenges of work and to complete it to a high standard. Healthy pride, patience, application, realism, creativity and focus are all elements that handwork nurtures in the young person.
Class 4 is beginning cross-stitch and the Class 5 children are busily finishing their cross-stitch projects, which were interrupted last year. Below are some of our finished projects. This week they will begin their 4-needle knitting.
In class we have also been focusing on music. Our music notation skills continue to improve and we have begun learning to play the ukulele and understanding chords, strings and tabulation. We still make time for our beautiful wooden recorders and the children performed a lovely Arabic song at assembly last week. As part of our music sessions we have been learning about creating harmony from a melody. We are following the ‘Orff Approach’, developed by the German composer Carl Orff. The children and I have had a lot of fun with the simple melody of ‘Peas porridge hot’, and performed a wonderful rendition of this adding a beat, colour and an ostinato effect using voice and body percussion at last week’s assembly. Stay tuned for more.
Robyn x
It is so nice to be back in the classroom with such an enthusiastic bunch of children! Class 6 have begun their year in Ancient Egypt, hearing mythological stories of the many Gods and Goddesses. They have studied the geography of Northern Africa, in particular, the incredible Nile and how it has supported life in and around Egypt for thousands of years and the interesting animals that call it home. The children have learnt about the mummification process and how it is a vital part of travelling to the afterlife. They have spent time planning their tombs and what they would take with them after death (lots of food and pets!).
The children are now studying the daily life of an ancient Egyptian including housing, food, clothes and jobs. We have also now begun debating so be prepared for some persuasive discussions at home!
Hello Golden Hill Families,
Just a friendly reminder regarding car parking. Parent parking is in the angled bays and those picking up children should please drive forwards into these bays, not reverse in. When children leave the car they should follow the path to enter the school, rather than run across the car park to the oval. Please also use the path to walk your children into the school so that they are not behind reversing cars.
Teacher/staff parking is in the bays closest to the Kindy and opposite the Office. Please leave these bays for staff.
Let us all make the effort to drive slowly and carefully so that the children's safety is paramount.
Thanks!
Parent Education Course - No Scaredy Cats
4
Thu
04 Mar 2021
12:30 AM to 2:30 PM
4
Thu
04 Mar 2021
12:30 AM to 2:30 PM
Recurring
4
Thu
04 Mar 2021
12:30 AM to 2:30 PM
Recurring