Wishing all the Candlebark students, teachers, staff and families a very Merry Christmas and a safe and prosperous New Year. It has been a pleasure to keep you informed and hopefully entertained with The Bark this year. I look forward to so seeing, hearing and sharing all the future adventures of our Candlebark kids with you all in 2020. Enjoy the holidays!
Jane Cahill - Editor In Chief
Contents
- Term Dates 2020
- Kitchen Garden
- Spring Soiree
- Grade 6 Graduation dinner
- Fashion Week 2019
- Arc at Candlebark
- Christmas Reading
- Grade 3 Gariwerd Camp
- Grade 6 Girls Hike
- Year 7 New Zealand Trip
- Candlebark Christmas Picnic
- Community Notices
Term Dates 2020
- Term 1: 29 January to 26 March
- Term 2: 14 April to 18 June
- Term 3: 14 July to 17 September
- Term 4: 6 October to 17 December
Kitchen Garden
I was lucky enough to help out at Kitchen Garden a few weeks ago and by help out, I mean, watch Steve and the Grade 3/4 kids pick the beautiful fresh produce and turn it all into a delicious meal. Sushi, yuummmmm!!! When we sat down to eat Steve said to the kids; “Do you know why food is sacred?" They all look at him with wonder, searching their brains for the answer, and he answered "Because it gathers people together. Look how much joy is at this table.” It was such a delight to share the experience with Steve, Pauline, my son Albert and all the kids.
Spring Soiree
The 2019 Spring Soirée was full of wonderful performances by many of Candlebark’s instrumental music students. This soirée is their annual chance to show off their musicality and hard work throughout the year and to share their love of music. We ran performances in two different venues at the same time. It was more like a mini-festival than a concert.
We were were very fortunate that Joanne Croke hung students paintings and drawings to the walls of the meeting room and the library. These images complemented the music-making beautifully.
A big thank you to the instrumental music teachers: Dan Marsh (piano), Sasha Brohnstein (violin), Caitlin Williams (flute), Jamie Barlow (drums & guitar), Luke Collins (drums & guitar), Zoë Barry (cello) and Emily Bennett (voice & choir). They are all such wonderful musicians and great human beings; we are very lucky to have them at Candlebark.
And now is a good time to be thinking about music lessons in 2020. An instrumental music enrolment form will be sent out to families soon.
Written By Taran Carter
Grade 6 Graduation dinner
Fashion Week 2019
Fashion Week Headquarters - December 2019
This year, the Candlebark Fashion Week Committee intentionally organised a Fashion Weeeek (no, it is not a typo) to create awareness about correct spelling and to foster excitement about a wonderful week to come. And what a Weeeek it was!
Day after day, the committee was literally blown away by the creativity, the flair and the enthusiasm of the students. Movies were celebrated, fears were released, weddings were organised, nostalgia was celebrated, and food was acclaimed.
Day after day, many colourful stories and souvenirs were created.
Day after day, it was entertaining, surprising and refreshing to witness how students can think outside the box and express their ideas when radical self-expression is encouraged.
The Fashion Week Committee wants to express its sincere gratitude to all the students who participated this year, the students who organised the fantastic communication campaign and the staff who attended and supported the event throughout the week.
Enjoy the pictures and see you all next year for another Fashion Week.
The Committee.
Movie Monday
Terrifying Tuesday
Wedding Wednesday
Throwback Thursday
Food Friday
Arc at Candlebark
For two weeks in mid-November I worked on a Laboratory style workshop with Candlebark and Alice Miller students and with world renowned puppetry and physical theatre director Scott Wright. Scott is Artistic Director of Erth Visual and Physical ( erth.com.au ) based in Sydney and has run creative laboratories with young people around the world for many years. Very generously, Alexandra Harrison, Rainer's mum, who directed the Cartographers dream circus show which we were all amazed by last term, volunteered a great deal of her time, wisdom and energy to the project as well. My "Down the Hill" group, some Grade 6 students and ten students from Alice Miller developed physical and puppetry performances that they could show without our help to an adult audience. Importantly for Erth, the theme of the Arc Laboratory at Candlebark was to see whether children can view a work by professional performers, then with intensive direction, learn the skills and self-regulation to re-imagine and re-create it themselves. The knowledge we garnered at Candlebark will be invaluable in the development of a major production by Erth called Arc, in pre-production for the Sydney Festival in 2021. We reckon it was an overwhelming success. These photos were taken on the last day of the program for the Candlebark students. They were rehearsing for a showing to parents and I think the shots capture the amazing energy, focus and dedication that the students all demonstrated for the duration of Arc.
Written by Andrew Blizzard
Christmas Reading!
We are more than happy to keep supporting the great Story Box Library, which makes stories available in such an attractive form for children. They currently have 292 books available, which is pretty good!
You're welcome to access Story Box Library over the upcoming summer holidays, so that your children can enhance their reading opportunities.
To access the library, go to https://storyboxlibrary.com.au/ then use the username Candlebark and the password Candle248 to log in.
Cheers, John
Grade 3 Gariwerd Camp
Grade 6 Girls Hike
Year 7 New Zealand trip
Here are some happy snaps of the Year 7s on their New Zealand trip. Many plans had to be re-devised, due to the trying weather of rugged New Zealand.
There were lots of cancellations, many alternative routes, and quite the pile of wet soggy socks! And still the kids (and Donna) had the time of their lives!
Thoughts from the Year 7s about the trip ....
Lucas Andrew Taylor
I have so many highlights from this trip, so many amazing memories were made every day.
One of the things I liked a lot from the trip would probably be just being in New Zealand, like waking up in most towns, getting out of the tent and looking outside to see huge green mountains in the near background.
Or talking to New Zealanders at the holiday park, or at the supermarket or pretty much wherever you go and them being really nice and interested with where we came from, where we’re going next, or talking about the flooding in New Zealand and the fires here in Australia.
Or being somewhere that’s so much like Australia, but quite different in things like there being so many mountains and hills, it being really green, and there being many sheep. Also, the supermarkets like Coles and IGA aren’t over there. Instead there are stores like 4 Square and Pack ‘n’ Save, but the thing that really got me was that they had Woolworths over there, but no it wasn’t called Woolworths, in New Zealand they call it… Countdown! Yeah, I know, how weird is that?
The currency makes so much sense over there. They don’t have five cents, it starts from ten cents and gets bigger. Instead of having the one-dollar coin larger than the two-dollar coin, it’s the other way around, which seems so much smarter.
All in all, this was the best trip that I’ve been on with school. I highly recommend going to New Zealand, it’s so beautiful and the people are really nice.
Reuben Roy Cahill
My experience in New Zealand was really a mix of emotions. I was sad at times angry, happy, excited and sometimes disappointed. When I was happy it was normally because I was playing with my friends and looking at the beautiful landscape or waking up in the morning. When I was sad I was normally missing my dogs and other animals. Excited when we were about to do something fun. Disappointed or angry when our planned activities were canceled
The landscape of New Zealand was so different to Australia; there were hills filled with green trees, shining in the sun unlike some parts of Australia where it can be so flat and dry. Then the snowcaps started to appear as we got further down south and it started to get colder. When I saw the green grass I thought that I was in heaven it was so green I felt like pulling it out of the ground shoving it in my pack and taking it home and gluing it to our ground in Australia.
But one last thing that I would like to say before I finish is to thank Cam, Donna, and Sarah. They organised this for us and even though most things were canceled they found other things for us to do. So thank you guys for taking us on this trip, I well never forget it.
Draco Hagan
New Zealand felt like a different world. With the landscape so wildly different. With 280 rain days the place is so green and because of all the rain it has changed the landscape to suit it resulting in jagged mountains and wide open pastures.
Visiting New Zealand's only castle, Lanarch, and reading all of the history about the place was my favourite part. The metalwork through the roofs and the entire place was connected with gas lights was pretty amazing. The current owners bought it in 1967 and have restored it and shown it ever since.
If you would like to read more and see more about the New Zealand trip click on the button above to view the Morning Meeting powerpoint that they presented on the last day of school.
Candlebark Christmas Picnic
A perfect evening in many ways, we were blessed with lovely weather but even more so we were lucky enough to enjoy the magnificent musical styling of the 'Candlebark Orchestra'.
There were some classic Christmas Carols; Jingle Bells, Silent Night, The First Noel and of course Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, but much to the delight of the crowd we were treated to some Taran Carter originals; Candlebark Christmas - my favourite of all. It so beautiful to watch the kids running around, in and out of the bush and then stopping in front of the orchestra for a sing when a familiar tune floated through the air into their ears.
