29 March 2021

Newsletter Articles

Important dates

Thursday 1 April - Interschool Swimming Carnival
Friday 2 April – Good Friday Public Holiday
Monday 5 April – Monday Public Holiday
Friday 9 April – Youth Health Expo
Friday 9 April – Last day of Term 1
Monday April 12 to Friday 16 April - Mid Semester Break
Monday 19 April – First day of Term 2

From the Principal

Hello – Werte!

What an incredible term it has been so far! This will be the last newsletter before the Easter break. I hope you all have a safe and relaxing time and come back feeling refreshed for another exciting term of school. The learning that has been happening in our classrooms and out on excursions has been incredible and an absolute credit to our talented teachers and students.

I want to acknowledge our student leadership team for 2021. I look forward to working with them closely this year! Our student leadership team will be providing feedback to the school leadership team. They will also help to plan and deliver school assemblies and events. They will represent our community and enact the changes they wish to see.

School Captains: Kyila Pepperill, Meredith Cook
Vice Captains: Ettain Winter and Jawyon Taylor

I would also like to extend a warm welcome to our 2021 school council members – Rick Duncum, Jacki Raybould, Amiuus Lennie, Kerryn Strawbridge, Maree Woolford, Laryssa Montgomery, Arthur Townsend, Simon Rowlands, Jeremy Cook and Carol Watson. The School Council plays a vital role in helping to set the long term future of the school and overseeing our schools operation. If you would like to have a say about the direction of the school please do not hesitate to get in contact.

If you are travelling over the Easter period please keep up to date with all advice relating to COVID. Home | Pandemic Communications (nt.gov.au).

Cassie O’Bree
Principal

Ms Cassie O’Bree

School news and updates

Back to School Vouchers

If you have not yet used your “Back to school voucher” Please make sure you do so by Friday 9th April as they will expire.

Come & join us – Tutor staff wanted!

2021 Student leadership

We have selected our 2021 House Leaders. Congratulations to the following students for taking on this important responsibility.

These students join our School Captains and our Student Representative Council in our Student Leadership program.

Following the special assembly, our 2021 School and House Captains had their first meeting. Students got straight down to work completing a three Cs brainstorm that asked them to define what they care about, what they are curious about, and what they are concerned about in our school. Students identified that they care deeply about the wellbeing of their peers, the environment and ensuring student voice is heard. They are concerned about the school’s environmental impact, bullying and providing opportunities and activities that promote physical and mental health. Gee whiz, it sounds like they’ve got their work cut out for them!

Year 7

Math

Monday morning - brains are switched on! Students explored a famous problem in mathematics, the hypothesis of an Ancient Greek mathematician Diophantus that any positive integer can be written as the sum of four square numbers. It was an investigation into square numbers as well as a mathematics history lesson.

Science

Today, Ms Mavec’s Year 7 classes took science to the kitchen and practiced separation techniques for insoluble substances. They filtered dirty oil, sieved pasta, decanted water off carrots, and centrifuged lettuce and water.

Students in 7.4 and 7.5 used a separation technique called chromatography which separates different pigments in dyes to figure out who stole Ms Mavec's tea!

They also used a separation technique called distillation to separate a copper sulfate solution into a copper sulfate powder and water

Academic Enrichment Program

Students participating in the Year 7 Academic Enrichment Program began work on their new unit exploring floods as a hydrological disaster. They began by learning about the causes and effects of La Nina and defining the difference between weather and climate. They then got to put their detective hats on and pull out their magnifying glasses to examine a series of photographs taken between 1935 and 1988 of the various floods that have happened in Alice Springs. They had a great time trying to match their photographs to a modern map of Alice Springs.

Year 8

Science

In Science, Year 8’s have been researching different types of rock and the Rock Cycle as part of their Geology unit. They also went on a little trip to the Bat Caves. There are upcoming excursions to Emily Gap and to Desert Park.

Year 9

Home Economics

Year 9's have been smashing it this week with their 8 layer honey cake and 4 layer rainbow cake in Home Economics.

Science

Year 9s have been learning about how the body responds to changes within its environment through the nervous and endocrine system.

Last week, 9.6 had to ‘escape’ from ‘captivity’ and solve clues to find a hidden ‘antidote’ against a trial vaccine that turned people into zombies. The students worked collaboratively to review what they had learnt over the last five weeks about the nervous system, the endocrine system and homeostasis and further develop their problem solving skills.

This week, 9.6 has been learning about microbes, in particular, bacteria. The students explored how bacteria are used in food production. We took it a step further and made our own yoghurt. We started by warming up the milk and then mixing it with some plain yoghurt which contained the live bacteria. The mixture was kept in a clean jar, wrapped in a tea towel to keep the milk nice and warm for the bacteria to ferment the milk and turn it into yoghurt. We had some very good results!

Small Group Classes

Small Group Classes have started a phonics based literacy program in the library with Mr Gill, Ms Harris Ms Tenneil and Ms Sue.

Art Class – Wood burning

Have a look at the incredible work of art that our students are achieving!

Utnenge

In humanities we have learned about International Women’s Day, Harmony week and st patricks Day. International Women’s Day is to recognise the achievements of girls and women and raises awareness of issues they still face. Harmony week is to recognise the contribution of multicultural communities in Australia and we learnt that students in Alice Springs come from almost 50 different countries.

St Patrick day, people all over the world celebrate with parades with lots of green and all things Irish. St Patrick day is celebrated on the 17th of March. St Patrick who believed he drove snakes out of Ireland when really there were no snakes 

In sustainability, Evance has made two new garden beds outside our classroom and sown seeds with Ed. Shontae has made a worm farm with worms we got from Kaz. We planned to go to the rediscovery centre with Alex and Sarah to find materials for our recycle art but we couldn’t go.

VET Conservation & Ecosystem Management

Highlights from the last few weeks …

• Trips to Simpsons Gap and the Alice Springs Desert Park in exploring the connection between habitat and species’ needs
• Learning about the roles of Parks and Wildlife rangers in managing our National Parks e.g. managing fire, weeds, feral species and visitors to support conservation
• Hands-on experience of the PPE (protective personal equipment) and tools that Rangers use (the helmets and water unit were popular)
• Seeing our seedlings grow

Coming up

• Developing a site for planting our seedlings (specifically the melons!)
• How fire is used for management
• Work Health and Safety – reporting incidents and job site evaluations

Stars Foundation

What a treat! A beautiful celebration morning tea for the women in our community. Thanks Stars Foundation staff Staci and Sam for celebrating the occasion. IWD2021.

Clontarf Corner - Term 1 - weeks 3-7

What a huge start of the year it’s been for the CMS Clontarf Academy! With camps, afterschool activities, morning trainings and much more!

Week 3 saw the Imparja Cricket Cup come to town, this was a joint activity between Yirara, CMS and Tennant Creek Academies. The night before we ran a sleepover so that we were up and ready for the early start on the day. The lads involved with this were Tyreece Forbes, Lazarus Gallagher, Liam Turner, Tristrum Watkins, Kallum Forrester, Nathan Woodbury, Aesha Saylor, Billy Stuart, Jack Butcher, Declan Abbot and Kevin Tiltsen- Collins.

In week 4 we had a game of football against Yirara College and a parent/teacher night with a BBQ dinner and a morning tea held by Clontarf.

Week 5 came around very quickly, Year 7 & 8 went on an overnight camp, this time to Uluru. Brendan Pon, Nathan Woodbury, Pat Shaw, Martin Norman, Brody Satour, Colique Wiseman, Chat Palmer, Dominic Richards, Mason Tilmouth, Isaiah Williams, Kevin Tiltsen- Collins, Steven Ellis, Decklan Dempsey and Tekai Lankin all took part in the camp.

Week 6 came with a health session from Congress for contact time on Monday for the year eights, Tuesday we helped out the Alice Springs Town Council with Clean up Australia Day – cleaning up the rubbish in the Todd Creek for morning training, Bike mechanics as an after school activity on Tuesday too, another health session for year sevens on Wednesday, Basketball against St Philips on Thursday and Good Bunch Lunch on Friday.

With 3 weeks left of school we still have so much coming up!

Polly Farmer

Polly Farmer has been a hive of activity over the past two weeks. From helping to set up for the student leadership assembly in week 6, to completing school assessment tasks, to beginning work on their passion projects. Everyone has been busy.

For her passion project Jasmine is researching youth mental health and creating a series of painting depicting her theme, Jawyon has decided to focus on skill development in AFL, Shakana is learning nail art, and Liam and Lazarus are learning to play the guitar. Over the next couple of weeks we should start seeing some of these projects start to take shape.

2021 NT Music School Battle of the School Bands

Community Announcements

Youth recycled art prize – Public art making workshop

Alice Springs Town Council is running a recycled art workshop, facilitated by local artist Alice Ross, hosted at the Alice Springs Public Library.

Come on down and create artworks out of recycled and salvaged materials!

When: Wednesday 31 March 2021 3.30pm-5.30pm
Where: Alice Springs Public Library – ask the front desk on arrival
Who: Hosted by local artist Alice Ross, for young people aged 11-25 years of age
What to bring: Nothing! Everything is provided

With the artworks made, submit them into the Youth Recycled Art Prize by 6th April to be exhibited in the exhibition opening on 9 April 5.30pm – you may even win a prize!

Skate Park Activities are BACK!

These upcoming April school holidays, Alice Springs Town Council will be running various skate, scooter and BMX workshops at the Alice Springs skatepark for young people!

The workshops will be facilitated by local skaters including Frank Wilson, Joe Hurley, Mel Waters, and Greg Barnes!

See below the schedule, and email or call Zak Tilley to register your interest in any of the activities!

8950 0582, ztilley@astc.nt.gov.au

Aquatic & Leisure Centre

Have a look at the poster below for upcoming FREE events at the Alice Springs Aquatic & Leisure Centre over the April school holidays.

Sports voucher

Sports Vouchers are available now!

Apply for yours online,

*** Children living in an urban area are eligible to receive two $100 sport vouchers each year - one in January and one in July - for sport, recreation and cultural activities.

Parents or carers need to apply for vouchers online each semester.

All vouchers expire on 31 May each year.

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