Kornmehl
Terry Aizen – Director of
Care Packs
The Care Pack project has finally drawn to a close. What an amazing and overwhelming response we had from everyone involved. I thank the Kornmehl Pre-school and Emanuel School community for your support and enthusiasm in helping to bring a smile to the faces of Aboriginal children in outback Pre-schools across NSW. The Care Packs were all counted and delivered to Gunawirra, a NSW, not-for-profit organisation in Redfern, that supports Aboriginal Country Pre-schools.
We collected 500 Care Packs in total! A tremendous effort. The Care Packs were generously filled with much needed items and the extra touch of a beautiful backpack completed the package. We received this heartwarming letter of thanks from the CEO of Gunawirra. This amazing amount of Care Packs came from just 17 schools – Emanuel School, The Kornmehl Centre Emanuel Pre-school, Mount Zion ELC, Moriah College ELC, Mount Sinai ELC, Kesser Torah ELC, Masada College ELC, Care-a-lot Childcare, Apples and Honey Preschool, First Class Learning Centre, The Killarney Pre- School, Kincoppal Rose Bay, SOS Preschool, St Stephens Children’s Centre, East Lindfield Community Preschool, East Willoughby Pre-school, Rochies Creche and St Mary’s Child Care Centre.
Breakfast and Pyjama Day
What a fabulous, exciting and much anticipated morning we all had. The weather was just right for snuggling up and keeping warm in our pyjamas. We started the day on our beds hugging a special soft toy, playing with our torches, and making light patterns on the ceiling, while listening to relaxing music. We watched two Aboriginal Dreamtime stories on the big screen: Tiddalick the Frog and How the Moon was Made. This proved to be a big hit! This was followed by sharing two very special shadow books on the overhead projector: The Game of Light and The Game of Shadows. Finally, we were woken up with fairy dust by our fairy teachers, who invited us to a very special and delicious Kornmehl breakfast. The breakfast consisted of cereals, bread and spreads, fruit and a glass of Milo. We all had a lot of fun and a most enjoyable morning.
Buddy Reading
Buddy Reading has begun again this term with Year K Yerushalayim and Year K Tzfat and their teachers Nicole Esra and Gabrielle Wynhausen. We have so many siblings and past Kornmehl children in the Year 2 cohort. It is special to see siblings, or cousins sitting side by side and proudly reading together. We value this time together enormously and recognise the many benefits that shared reading has for both parties. This is a meaningful way to not only have stories read, but also to build connections between different levels of the School.
Aboriginal symbols and learning
We have spent time over the past two weeks looking at Aboriginal symbol blocks. These blocks are individual blocks that have a symbol represented on them, for example, three wavy lines represents the word river.
The children identified that books have written words that help to tell the story.
The children took turns to guess what each symbol meant. They started to pick up on the similarities between the blocks and they used these observed similarities as clues. For example, the block with the symbol for kangaroo had footprints on it, rather than a picture of a kangaroo. Similarly, the block with the word Emu on it had footprints too. This ability to recognise similarities between symbols is part of learning to read. Children learn to recognise words that are similar in shape.
Once we had gone through all the symbols the children took turns to tell a story using the symbols. This activity involved the process of sequencing, creating a narrative with a logical sequence.
The Dolphins created their own Dreamtime story books incorporating Aboriginal symbols (iconography). We encouraged the children to illustrate their story with the teachers writing the story line. We discussed how stories have a beginning (when you introduce the characters and the place), a middle (a problem) and an end (how the problem got solved). We encouraged the children to add a title to their story and to write some of the words in their book.
At activity time the Aboriginal symbol blocks were added as a provocation to the painting table. The children were inspired to recreate the symbols using paint.
The Seashells discussed the meaning of the Aboriginal flag. The children made their own Aboriginal flag using handprints in red, black and yellow paint.
Jordan: If we put our hands together, we are much more strong.
Juliette: If we put our hands together, then we work as a team.
Shabbat
On Friday of last week we had a special and fabulous Shabbat. Year K Haifa came to join us, as well as Rabbi Ninio and Morah Adina, Head of Jewish Life at Emanuel School. Morah Adina taught us a lovely Shabbat version of We’re all Going on a Bear Hunt. During this interactive story, we searched for Shabbat objects, while chanting the words and doing actions at the same time. The children and teachers were captivated by Morah Adina’s creative storytelling. Thank you so much, we hope you will visit us again soon.
