International Maarif Schools of Australia eNewsletter

Well done to the students who have been selected as 'Student of the Week' during our Monday morning assemblies. These students are selected for academic achievement and for modelling our school values.

	Week 3	Week 4
KA	Cesur Bugdayli	Filiz Tekin
KB	Rayan El Helou	Ahsen Gelebek
KC	Lara Lahham	Khadijah Kassem
1A	Mayar Mahasneh	Hazel Mete
1B	Zain Kreich	Sena Alca
2A	Meryem Gecer	Zaynadeen Nahle
3A	Jasmine Skaf	Sayid Kudusov
3B	Zayna Harambasic	Adem Mete
4A	Mikail Inan	Zubeyir Ha
4B	Elisa Ozdemir	Muhammad Kassem
5A	Amima Ali	Ali Dbouk
6A	Nadeen Abu Issa	Bilal Cetin
6B	Ahmad Sehsah	Ecrin Sahin

Let’s Clean Up Australia!

To acknowledge “Clean Up Australia Day” and to reflect on keeping our environment tidy, KA students went for a walk about in our school playground and picked up all the rubbish they can find. They were so proud to be involved in making our school space clean. We were also vigilant of being hygienic as we wore gloves and washed our hands afterwards. Students did a fantastic job, keep up the great effort KA!

Mrs Ulku Turkmen

KA Teacher

We are learning syllables

This week we learn all about syllables and how many ‘claps’ are in a word. We break up words into syllables and put them together and say the whole word. We also do syllable segmenting using our caterpillar templates. It was really fun, and we enjoyed clapping our hands and turn it into a fun game where those who clapped incorrectly, were out of the game.

Ms Gulden Aksoy

KB Teacher

Emotions

In Week 3, KC had a fun and informative ‘emotions’ workshop run by our school counsellor. The students learnt about the different emotions and how to deal with them. 

For Art we coloured and decorated animal masks.  We spoke about how animals were living things, tying in with our science topic. 

In English we are continuing to learn about phonemes. KC learnt that M-A-T makes ‘mat’ while we sat on the mat on the floor. Students are enjoying finding the rhyming words in the books we read and clapping to the syllables. 

Ms Saadet Ugur

KC Teacher

Activities

Year 1A has been bustling with activity and we are excited to share some of our latest updates with you.

Our students have been enthusiastically engaging in math warm-up activities, which have been made even more fun with the use of various interactive devices. These activities have been focusing on whole numbers and have been a hit with our students.

In science, our students have been exploring the fascinating world of living and non-living things. We are impressed with their curiosity and eagerness to learn.

We are proud to report that our class has been demonstrating excellence and respect, actively engaging in their learning. It is wonderful to see them thriving and growing as learners.

Finally, our students are settling in well into the new year. While the first few weeks can be challenging, our students have shown resilience and adaptability, which we are confident will serve them well throughout the year.

Merve Sarikaya

1A Teacher

Gymnastics

What an amazing few weeks it has been! Students have started to explore the basics of gymnastics movements and demonstrate how they can incorporate them into individual and group sequences. They make decisions about how to combine particular movements. During the sequence-making process, students actively support members of their group by communicating, cooperating and participating in decision making. Students also suggest how people and the availability of facilities influence choices about physical activity.

Activities in this module are based on a learner-centred approach with an emphasis on decision making and problem solving. Activities are sequenced in understanding, planning, acting and reflecting phases.

Students use the basic gymnastics skills of springing, landing, balancing and locomotion in their everyday lives and in many sports. Participating in activities that enhance these skills contributes to their safe and effective participation in everyday activities. The nature of gymnastics skills also provides a valuable medium through which to foster students’ creativity.

This module provides students with opportunities to experience a broad range of interesting and physically challenging movements in a safe environment. It also provides opportunities for social interaction between students. Opportunities to experience and practise new movements contribute to students’ overall development by improving their physical skills, enhancing their general fitness and further developing their skills for social interactions with peers and others.

This module focuses on four main patterns of movement: springing, landing, balancing and locomotion.

In Literacy, workstations have started in the classroom where students are split into four groups and placed into different activities and rotated every 15-20 mins allowing the students to experience each station and enhance on their learning. For example, station 1 is a writing station, station 2 is a technology station focusing on phonological awareness and phonemic awareness using the Reading Eggs application on the ipads, station 3 is tricky words bingo game where it teachs students how to recognise, spell and pronounce sight words and station 4 focuses on letter recognition including how to construct sentences. Each week activities will change accordingly. A workstation is effective for many children because it incorporates the structure, routine, visual cues and limits distractions. This in turn  helps to develop independence, organisational skills, the concept of working in an ordered manner, the concept of 'finished' and the generalisation of skills.

Happy Birthday to Esma and Zain! Many more great years to come Inshallah.

Ms Derya Karaman

1B Teacher

WE LOVE D.E.A.R!

D.E.A.R. stands for Drop Everything and Read. It is when kids can read and enjoy the books they want, just for the pleasure of reading and with no questions asked!

The aim of D.E.A.R is to help students cultivate a love for reading and it comes with various benefits including vocabulary expansion. Students often report learning something new each time they have D.E.A.R time!

These benefits, I hope, will only grow and multiply as we engage in more D.E.A.R time this year.

Ms Maryam Faisal

2A Teacher

Persuade me!

We are already in Week 4 of the Term! Time has flown by as the students have settled in and are well underway into their learning journey. Year 3 has been a pleasure to teach with many students demonstrating on task behaviours and a passion for learning. Students have adjusted well to the school lessons and corresponding schedules. The ability of Year 3 to acquire understandings of new concepts and ideas has been nothing short of incredible. In conclusion, a positive start to the school term.

Students are learning strategies for persuading readers and defending their views. They showed great interest and the class was very engaging. 

Ms Samira Asad

Year 3 Teacher

Aboriginal Art

As part of Year 4s unit on Aboriginal Art, students were introduced to dot painting. Students were able to research and explore the significance of Aboriginal artwork, its features and the ways this style of Art is used in Aboriginal cultures today. As a group students discussed how dots were used to conceal the sacred meanings of the Dreaming. Students were able to create their own dot paintings on pebbles with earbuds as their painting tool using a range of paint colours. Year 4 were able to express themselves creatively and made several pebble artworks.

Photos from our excursion:

Mrs Ayse Yildiz and Ms Suzan Tarpis

Year 4 Teachers

Swimming

In Term 1, Year 5 students have been attending Auburn Indoor Pool for Sport. This extra-curriculum activity helps students their ability to learn to Swim and attain Water Safety Skills. The program provides a comprehensive educational framework that enhances knowledge, skill and understanding of safer aquatic participation and drowning strategies prevention. The school program is energised of learning activities whereby students are enjoying the fun in a safe friendly environment at Auburn Indoor Pools.

Ms Robyn Libdy

5A Teacher

Welcome to Week 4 of School!

I hope that all students have been able to settle in well and are excited to be back for another amazing week. Just a reminder that students must be in their summer uniform for Term 1 girls in their blue dresses and boys in their cargo shorts and white school top. Students in years 4 till year 6 have commenced swimming lessons at Auburn Ruth Everuss Aquatic Centre. Swimming lessons this term aligns with our PDH theory lessons about making safe choices and practicing safe behaviours. One of the case studies that we have been looking at has been water safety and how students can make safe choices in the water. These swimming lessons improve students' practical swimming skills and enhance knowledge about safer aquatic participation. Students in their theory lessons have created water safety posters to incorporate their visualization skills in creating a message.

Here are some photos of students participating in practical swimming and some poster designs of students.

Miss Dilara Ozhan

6A Teacher

Compass and Circles!

During our math lessons last week, we practised drawing circles using a compass. Whilst studying the parts of a circle, we had the chance to experiment with our geometry sets and learn how to identify and measure the radius of a circle. This tool along with the knowledge we gained gave us a chance to draw circles using a compass. Students did such a good job with handling this new knowledge and successfully created many different circles with different measurements.

Here are some photos of our successful math lessons!

Mrs Asli Tekirdag

6B Teacher

Days and Months

In Turkish lessons, Year 1 and 2 students learned the months and days with songs. They learned to answer What day is it? What month is it? with daily activities. Year 1 students learned to count by 2 and 5 in their mathematics lessons and to find the number that comes before and after the other number with fun games. They improved their writing skills on the smartboard. Year 2 students expanded their vocabulary with the game of tapping the hidden word. They learned addition and subtraction with fun activities in their math lessons.

Mrs Hatice Kocalar

Turkish Language Teacher

Numbers

We enjoyed our Turkish lessons this week. We further developed our numeracy skills. We played fun counting games, sang songs about numbers. We learnt about the unit of inquiry which was Numbers the number of the week was 2. We completed tracing activities and coloured in the number 2. We have learnt how to count to 10 in Turkish and our 2d shapes.

Ms Muge Tugrul

Turkish Language Teacher

İSTİKLAL MARŞI

Screen_Shot_2023_03_10_at_1.06.59_pm.png

This week, we celebrated the 102nd anniversary of Adoption of the Turkish National Anthem and remembered the poet Mehmet Akif Ersoy in Turkish lessons. Year 3, Year 4, Year 5 and Year 6 students listened to and recited ‘İstiklal Marşı’ both with and without music in the classroom.

Here is the video, some students recited İstiklal Marşı:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/12HC3UNu5mZxIN9h0I1yWGBRLsGb_7Irk/view?usp=sharing

Mrs Ayşegül Şeyma Akdemir

Turkish Language Teacher

Expenditures

Year 5 students covered the topic of expenditures last week. Students made a model of the house and talked about basic expenses and wasting in the house. They also gave examples of these behaviours by comparing positive and negative behaviours. They learned Turkish songs and practiced new words in the songs.

Year 6 students learned Traditional Turkish Shadow Theatre. They made Karagöz and Hacivat puppets and talked about their character traits. They also watched videos about Bursa, one of the most important cities in Turkey. They got detailed information about the historical and touristic places in this city.

Miss Esra Pamuk

Turkish Language Teacher

Kindergarten Islamic Studies

Assalamu Alaikum wa rahmetullahi wa barakatuh,

All praise be to Allah (SWT) and may peace and blessings be upon His beloved Prophet Muhammad (SAW), his family, companions and to all those who follow him.

Kindergarten students are learning about ‘Who is Allah?’ Allah the one and only true God, the creator and owner of everything. Students watched several short videos about the topic and coloured the name of Allah activity sheet.

We pray that Allah (SWT) allows our students to keep the awareness of Allah in the centre of their lives and let the Book of Allah be the light of their hearts.

Mr Muhammed Ordukaya

Qur’an and Islamic Studies Teacher

An

The Student Corner is a dedicated space for students of any year level to showcase their unique work and talents!

Amira Taha - KB

Esma Youssef - 1B

Aneesa Samrout - 3B

Aya El Helou - 3A

Elif Dari - 2A

Eren Hurriyet - 2A

Ibrahim Tarabay - 1A

Mikail Inan - 4A

Mina Ufacikligil - 4B

Yusuf Ali Akdemir - 6B

NSW Education Standards Authority

The National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is a point in time assessment of literacy and numeracy skills. Each year students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 participate in tests for writing, reading, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy.

From 2023, NAPLAN is moving to Term 1 and will take place from Wednesday 15 March to Monday 27 March. The reason for this change is so that results can be returned to schools earlier in the year which will support teachers to understand the learning needs of their students and plan accordingly. NAPLAN tests are just one part of our school learning assessment program and questions are primarily based on knowledge, understanding and skills gained from the prior year of schooling.

In preparation for NAPLAN 2023, our school will undertake activities to help students to become familiar with the format and functionality of the online tests. These activities are not an assessment of student ability and will not be marked.

Students and parents can access the public demonstration site (https://www.nap.edu.au/online-assessment/public-demonstration-site) to familiarise themselves with NAPLAN and the types of questions and tools available. Excessive preparation for NAPLAN is not required nor recommended.

If you have any questions about NAPLAN, please contact your child’s teacher.

As our school is growing, we request that our parents and/or carers are extra cautious during school drop off and pick up times.

We are pleased to inform you that new road signs have been installed on Percy Street. Please pay attention to the new Pick up/Drop off zones and No Stopping zones.

Please ensure NSW Government rules regarding road safety are being followed and adhered to at all times.

This means:

- Respecting the road rules and signs, and driving within the speed limit of 40km/h in a school zone.

- Parking safely in designated parking areas or in drop off/pick up zones.

- No double parking, as it is dangerous and illegal.

- Three point turns and U-turns are not permitted in school zones, as not only is it dangerous for students and other vehicles but also causes traffic congestion.

- Follow the directions of our school crossing supervisors.

- Give way to our School Bus drivers.

Thank you for your cooporation.

Road_Safety.pdf

Road_Safety _pdf 1.68 MB

Parent Communications

Written communications to the school, including emails and letters, please include student's full name and class for identification purposes. Thank you.

Phone & Electronics

Primary School students are not permitted to bring to school, their phones and/or any electronics. This includes smart watches.

Birthday Celebrations

We love to celebrate our students at Maarif and accept that some families may want to share the special occasion of their child’s birthday with his/her class peers. As a school, we embrace this opportunity however would like to enforce a strict policy of not bringing in food or other edible items for these one-off occasions. It is important we cater to all students including those who have severe allergies by monitoring this closely. If you would like to celebrate your child’s birthday, we would suggest an alternative to food and we thank you in advance for supporting the health and wellbeing of all students.

Thank you for your cooperation.

According to ACARA National Standards for student attendance, parents are required to complete an Application for Leave Form for holidays within the school term or other leave. Applications should be submitted 14 days prior to the leave. The Principal approves this leave as appropriate.

For all student leave requests (1-50 days) an application form should be submitted to the school at least 14 days prior to the requested leave date. Supporting documentation, such as travel ticket or itinerary, should be included with student holiday leave applications.

Holidays taken by students outside of School vacation periods are included as absences.

Families are encouraged to holiday or travel during school vacations rather than in term time. If travel during the school term is necessary, the following considerations apply:

If the Principal accepts the reason for the absence, the absence will be marked as justified leave.
If the Principal does not believe the absence is in the student’s best interests and does not accept the reason, the absence will be recorded as unjustified leave.

The Leave form can be accessed below:

Student_Short_Term_Leave_Application_Form_less_than_50_days_.pdf

Student_Short_Term_Leave_Application_Form_less_than_50_days pdf 263.96 KB

All uniform requests can be made as follows:

Order Submission Only

Primary school parents are to complete the attached uniform order form
Order forms should be emailed to uniforms@maarif.nsw.edu.au or sent in to the school office with students if required
Orders will be processed weekly on Wednesdays and uniform items will be sent home with students by the following day
Contact number for uniform related enquiries 0402 393 844

Attached below is the Uniform Order Form

2023_Primary_School_Uniform_Order_Form.pdf

2023_Primary_School_Uniform_Order_Form _pdf 186.13 KB

Maarif students are expected to wear their Summer school uniform during Term 1. Please be reminded of the importance of naming all items of school uniform with your child’s name and class. This means that lost items found around school can easily be returned.

We consider that uniform is important for several reasons.

It provides pupils with a sense of identity and pride in their school.
It enhances the appearance of pupils and therefore the reputation of the school.
It helps to instil a sense of purpose in pupils when they put on their uniform in the mornings.
It helps overcome the worry about “fitting in” with fashions and keeping up with other children. All children feel equal and there is no stress, competition or worry for families about expensive brands/labels.
It overcomes the problem for both parents and teachers about what is suitable attire for school.

Students are not permitted to bring toys and valuables to school. These include Pokemon cards, fidget toys and weapon like toys. Students are only permitted to bring in appropriate toys on allocated Show and Tell days. Please check with your child's class teacher if unsure.

Thank you for your cooperation and understanding in this matter.

Instagram: @australiamaarif

Facebook: Maarif Australia

Twitter: @AUmaarif

Term 1	13 February - 5 April
NAPLAN	15 - 27 March
Harmony Day	21 March
Parent - Teacher Interviews	6 April

2023_Academic_Calendar.pdf

2023_Academic_Calendar _pdf 853.94 KB

AnThe Student Corner is a dedicated space for students of any year level to showcase their unique work and talents!

An

The Student Corner is a dedicated space for students of any year level to showcase their unique work and talents!