Stradbroke School

Stradbroke School

 

I figured it was about time I did this and showed where I get to work in Australia. I'm currently living in Crafers in South Australia and I have about a 22 minute commute to Stradbroke in Rostrevor which is just at the foot of the Adelaide Hills. Stradbroke is a gorgeous Reception to Year 7 IB (International Baccalaureate) school that is held in high esteem by the rest of the schools in the area.

My impression to start off with was WOW, it's huge! It reminded me more of a small college campus than a elementary school. It has over 800 students and many, many buildings. I'm not even sure how many staff, but our staff meetings are really big.

Schools in Australia seem to take a lot of their culture from the UK and from what I can tell, Harry Potter. There are four houses in my school, Koonga, Leabrook, Forest and... Morialta (Hufflepuff). Each team has unique colours, there is a point ceremony at the end of each term and a sport cup between the houses. No sorting hat though...

Students all come to school dressed in uniforms which are really just blue shirts and shorts with school crests on them or a checkered dress for girls. During terms 1 and 4 students are required to wear hats with a wide brim all the way around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Outside my classroom (F3)

I'm in the Flexi building in unit 3 or just F3 so I face out onto the oval which is a big patch of grass in you guessed it... an oval shape that has a cricket strip and some play equipment around it. The classroom is open to a bunch of other classrooms with a common space in the middle.

The Oval

During the rainy months of winter if there is rain, a rain bell will sound so students can come in for indoor recess. Nobody comes prepared with boots or even jackets. There are no hooks and no boot racks anyway so I guess that's why. It never really gets cold enough even in winter, but I do get some odd looks sometimes walking around with my t-shirt when teachers are wearing jackets and toques in the morning.

Stradbroke has some really nice outdoor areas and you really have to walk outside to get to other classes. The library and gym are in two totally different buildings. The office and staff room are about a few minutes walk as I'm the furthest out from the rest of the school.

In Australia they have reclassified Kindergarten. This was somewhat confusing when I first started researching where to send Miles to school. Playschool or preschool in Alberta is Kindy here in South Australia. Reception is similar to Kindergarten in Alberta, but it is full day as opposed to half day and more academically focused.

Reception open unit

There are some great outdoor areas for kids to play, but it makes "yard duty" (supervision for Canadians) difficult as there are so many places for kids to hide. I also walk around with a yard duty bag and can hand out infraction cards that will give kids planning room/reflection time which is an alternative to detention.

We have a wonderful outdoor classroom area, which I haven't used yet. I'm excited to try, I'm just worried my kids will start throwing rocks. I'm going to try small steps in Term 3. Maybe Daily 5 under the bridge eventually by Term 4.

The best part of working here is the amazing staff! I go to Wednesday coffees, the staff post heaps (tons) of helpful information in various school organized Facebook groups and I get lots of help from my Flexi building neighbours, Year 1 team members and everyone else in the school. The best part of all is that there is another Canadian teacher from Ottawa at the same school so we get to talk and commiserate about all of the things that are both great and "complex" about our exchange school for the year. I'm halfway done and in a couple of weeks... Look for my Term 2 reflection and Term 2 school holidays coming soon!