A Word from Sarah Allen
The Hawkesbury Show, 2021, was a highly anticipated and enjoyable event for our school, families, friends and feathered folk, and a successful community weekend. I especially enjoyed visiting all the pavilions and searching for ‘Kuyper Kids’ entries. The show enables so many to use their God-given talents to create some beautiful displays. I look forward to the 2022 show and seeing our school’s creativity bloom again.
Here are some words from our students…
For the Hawkesbury show we had to prepare our animals and vegetables, to the highest extent. This included for our feathery friends washing, drying, fattening and preening. For the vegetables harvesting, rinsing and rearranging. The washing was done using purple soap for a glowing white and wool wash for softness. After a quick wash in the morning of the set up, and purple dye going everywhere, we went to set up the Kuyper Tent. With a stray bag that was a wrong replacement and a lunch break at Macca’s we finished up and went home. The next day, the first day of the Hawkesbury Show, the Elective Food Tech and Agriculture classes rocked up, opened our tent and finalised everything. We played around with ‘Spheros’ and origami cups and talked to kids that were interested. The Food Tech class performed two demonstrations of Hommus dip and the Agriculture class demonstrated how to wash a chicken. We walked around the show, bought some lunch and then went home. Our Kuyper kids did our school proud with entries in cooking, arts and crafts, animals, and floristry with lots of them placing. Overall the Hawkesbury Show for Kuyper was a huge success and it was very exciting. We hope we can continue to go to the show every year.
Taylah Allen, Elective Agriculture
On the first day, a few of the Kuyper community went to the Hawkesbury show and had a great time. First we set up the Kuyper tent which took time but we managed to get everything ready in time and had entered many vegetables, eggs, chickens, artworks and more. One of my personal favourite highlights of the Hawkesbury show was going to McDonalds in Windsor. Unfortunately a number of people had forgotten money to buy anything but Mrs Allen shouted us and bought food for us (such a great teacher). On the second day a few more students managed to go. We all had a blast and started to set up the sphero’s and taught the kids origami. We also got to walk around and see a few of our own accomplishments around the show here and there.
Tom Pennings, Elective Agriculture
At the Hawkesbury show, held from the 23rd to the 25th of April many members of the Kuyper community entered many marvelous things. The Elective Food Tech class entered numerous delicious food items including; lemon butter, jams and relishes, a great deal of these earning highly commended from the judges. The Elective Agriculture class also entered the show, with six ducks and eleven chickens entered in the poultry competition. A countless amount of our animals placed with one of our ducks for the school duck challenge winning the champion ribbon. Eggs were also entered in the competition with the six coloured eggs from the olive egg laying chicken placing second and the six bantam eggs from the schools’ selection of Belgium D’uccle Bantam chickens placing first. The agriculture class’ vegetable displays also won first place. One of Kuyper’s talented staff members also won first place in a floristry class. In the end Kuyper’s Hawkesbury show adventure was a huge success with prizes won over a range of categories.
Caitlin Steer, Elective Agriculture
Reminders
- The Parent Portal and Kuyper App will be the primary vehicle for day-to-day communications between the school and parents in 2023. The School Calendar, weekly news, event advice and other essential functions will only be available in the Parent Portal and Kuyper App. At least one parent/carer from each household where your child resides needs access to the portal or app. If you are not already using the App, or need assistance resetting your user account and password, call 4573 2999 and we will assist you to connect.
- Nurture Magazine has been sent home to each family via their eldest child. Look for an article by our very own Ruth Thompson on page 20.
- Lost Property is over-flowing. Please come and check if any of it is yours, as lost property will be discarded or re-sold at the end of the year.
- Parents are reminded to continue testing for COVID and advise us if there is COVID in their household. If concerned, we encourage students to wear a mask at school for their own and others’ protection. In line with NSW Health recommendations, we also ask that close contacts wear a mask indoors and on public transport (including the Kuyper bus) and test regularly. We still have a good supply of RAHT kits. Contact the Office if you would like some sent home.
- Reminder to parents to ensure that all fees are paid by the end of year. Contact the Office if you have any concerns.
- Families who rely on the Busways service need to know that there have been some changes to the timetables until the end of term. Use the buttons below to access the temporary timetables for Term 4.
Prayer & Praise
- Praise God that he continues in his sovereignty through all circumstances. Praise him that he is “the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God” (1 Timothy 1:17), and that he loves us.
- Give thanks for holidays, breaks and changes in rhythm. Pray for connection, peace and safety for all our families during these school holidays. Pray for connection and community to grow for all at Kuyper Christian School, particularly at Limelight!
- Pray for school families and staff families who are coping with illness and accident: Faithfull, Hill, Eastlake, Armstrong, Gubbins, Huxley, Daly. Pray for good rest, connection and healing for all our families, staff and students.
- Give thanks for our Government and those in authority. Pray that they would be led in wisdom and truth to lead our country for the future good of all. Pray that “every person be subject to the governing authorities.” Give thanks that our government has been “instituted by God” (Romans 13:1).
- Give thanks for our Board and Executive team as they interview potential new staff members. Pray for one-ness of purpose for our staff, Board, Executive team, and Association as they plan, prepare and budget for 2023. Praise the Lord for His provision to us all the time.
News & Notices
Hot Potato Band - this Friday
An exciting opportunity is coming our way – The Hot Potato Band
On Friday 21 May (this Friday) the Hot Potato Band will be conducting a workshop for selected students (who should have already received an email). The Workshop will begin at 11am and culminate in a performance for the whole school in the Hall at 2pm. Parents are welcome to come and enjoy the performance too, of course.
This is what the band says about themselves:
Hot Potato Band’s larger-than-life brass collective is a breath of fresh air, setting a new bar for energetic and interactive musical performances. Finding home in Sydney, Australia, their positive coastal energy pushes euphoric boundaries in their bold quest to reignite acoustic instrumentation. The band’s unique sound is built on the backs of three drummers, a sousaphone and five horns that cover catchy chorus lines, providing a beautiful harmonic cloud for Ben (vocalist) to float above. Hot Potato Band is un-bound by genres, stages and audiences. They are re-inventive of the traditional New Orleans brass band as a modern day dance machine and visual spectacle for all demographics with a strong sense of pride for their fun-loving, organic, and quirky musical nature.
If you are still curious, follow this link – https://www.hotpotatoband.com/
Trial Drop-Off Zone
We are currently trialing a drop-off zone so children can easily disembark from vehicles in the Secondary Carpark. This is a trial, and we welcome any helpful feedback with a view to making drop-off a safe and relatively seamless operation. This will be a staged trial initially involving drop-off only, not collection. Please email your feedback to admin@kuyper.nsw.edu.au The trial started on Monday 17 May and will run for two weeks. It will involve the morning drop-off only. Below are some guidelines:
- Only use this drop-off zone if this is normally where your children would alight. If you have been seeing your children into school at either of the other two gates, please continue to do this.
- Do not allow your children to alight at any other place in the Secondary Carpark.
- Children are not to cross the carpark. Bollards will be positioned to remind them to alight on the western (oval) side of the drop off area and use the current walkways from there.
- Drivers must take care not to block the gate as buses and cars will continue to turn around using the carpark.
- If the drop-off zone is full please do a circuit by going out the exit gate and re-entering by the entry gate. Two cars should be able to drop off at any time.
- Please do not reverse out of the drop-off zone; move forwards, turn back into the carpark (giving way to any buses and cars passing through) and continue out the exit gate.
- Remember this is a drop-off zone. To keep traffic moving smoothly, please stop only to allow your children to alight. If you need to do anything else, please exit the carpark and stop outside the fence.
Thank you for your patience as we seek to improve our facilities and systems.
Collective Shout
Tomorrow, Wednesday 23 June, Melinda Tankard Reist will visit Kuyper to speak with our Year 7 – 12 students. She is the co-founder of Collective Shout, a grassroots campaigns movement against the objectification of women and the sexualisation of girls. Here is a snap-shot of what Melinda will talk about on the day:
Melinda and Daniel will take our young women on a ‘tour’ of media and popular culture in a dynamic, multi-visual presentation. They will unpack with our girls the images, messages and ideas they receive every day from games, music videos, advertising, marketing, social media and explicit se*ual imagery, conveying a message that their value and worth lies solely in their bodies and physical appearance. Students will critically evaluate how these messages contribute in harmful ways to their views of themselves, their bodies and relationships, affecting their physical, emotional and social development. Drawing from global research and personal accounts of young people, Melinda and Dan will then explore how young women can respond personally, including by resisting se*ual pressure, clarifying their values and enforcing boundaries, aspiring to relationships built on respect and mutuality – and collectively – by taking action for social change and cultural transformation.
Our young men are also bombarded with hyper-se*ualised messages and images in media and popular culture. Their lives are increasingly socialised, conditioned and informed by exposure to p*rn related content online. They are exposed to this content even before their first kiss, with average age of first exposure, 11. In a dynamic multi-media presentation which includes research, along with first person stories of young men, Melinda and Daniel will explore with male students how exposure to se*ual imagery is contributing to a distorted view of bodies and relationships. They will propose that boys are being raised in a callous version of masculinity through these toxic messages, hampering their ability to form healthy respect-based relationships. Melinda and Dan will help them understand what consent and healthy relationships should look like. In a po*nified cultural landscape, our young men will be encouraged to stand against the tide, resist the ‘bystander’ effect, and choose to act with integrity.
We are blessed to have this opportunity and look forward to the ongoing conversations Melinda’s visit will create.
Parents & their Children's Stories
Bronte Kelso-Marsh, a PhD candidate at Murdoch University, is working on a project being developed through the University (ethics approval 2020/200), which aims to investigate the role of parental involvement in primary school-aged children’s writing.
This project is being developed to understand more about Parent/Carer involvement in a child’s writing during the primary school years. Although research has demonstrated parental involvement in a child’s education provides many academic benefits, little is still known about what parents do to support their child’s writing. Furthermore, even less is known about what motivates parents to become involved with their child’s writing. As such, this project will address these important gaps to better understand what parents are doing to support their children becoming good writers.
The attached letter provides further information about this study and invites Parents/Carers of primary school children to complete an online survey designed to capture parental involvement in writing. The survey is completely anonymous, and it will take approximately 20 minutes to complete. A link to the survey is included in the information letter below.
As participants in this research, Parents/Carers will have early access to details of any research outputs arising from this project. These will be made available online in early 2022. To view the research outputs, Parents/Carers are invited to visit the Writing and Reading for All Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/writingandreadingforall/.
Evacuation & Lock-down Procedures
Following our last lock-down drill, we thought it would be helpful if parents understood the process. Feel free to contact the Office if you ever have any questions or concerns regarding evacuations or lock-down. One evacuation or lock-down drill is performed each term, usually alternating, so that two of each are performed every year. The Principal determines the day and time when the drill will occur. Staff are informed of the week in which the drill will occur. Students are not informed.
Evacuation
- Evacuation alarm is activated. It is a series of short siren blasts that will continue until all students have reached the assembly point.
- Students line up outside their classrooms.
- Classrooms are then locked and students, lead by their teacher, proceed to the Hall (unless otherwise advised).
- Students sit down in class groups in the Hall.
- As each class is seated, the teacher marks the class roll.
- Class rolls are compared with the daily absence list. Any discrepancies are investigated and accounted for.
- Principal provides explanation and debrief.
- Students are dismissed with their class teacher.
- Parents are (now) informed via text message.
Lock-Down
- Lock-down alarm is activated. It is a series of long siren sounds that will continue until lock-down is complete.
- Students are instructed to sit under their desks.
- Classrooms are then locked and blinds drawn by the teacher.
- Principal and Executive Staff conduct a walk-around of the school, releasing each class from the lock-down by knocking on the door and confirming that it has concluded.
- Class teacher provides explanation and debrief to students.
- Classes continue as normal.
- Parents are (now) informed via text message.