Today was a very busy day....
The Early Childhood and Primary Students where split up today into 2 group this way we could cover both Chinchilla State School and St Joey's. The Secondary group spent the day at Chinchilla High.
Chinchilla SS the Prinicpal was the Lovely Majella, she share a hour with us in the morning being the first day back at school she also had interviews to do of new students, so we listened and asked questions. Majella was more than happy to chat with us and share her experiences about working in the country areas.
Andrew the HOC then ushered us into classrooms where we got to get our hands dirty and speak with children in the classes and experience more in teaching styles. The staff in the staff room where wonderful and more than happy to chat during lunch breaks.This school was very friendly to newcomers from the COAST who were battling with the cold!
After Lunch we swapped over with the other Students are St Joseph's. Here we meet with Chris and his wonderful ALL FEMALE staff of 26 and this school had 195 Students attending. At this stage we only got 1 hr to speak with Chris and see the class rooms. Some of the things we noticed was that most of the students had glasses this is all because the school believe eye tests must happen early so eyes can be fix which was done on enrolnment and in the Prep year, the technology of the school was amazing for such a small school.
After school we had a few tours to do one of which was a tour of the local home for students who come in from the country areas like stations and spend the week in the township to attend school the student who attend this house are from year 8 to Year12. The house parents are wonderful and made us afternoon tea yummy Apple and Cinnamon muffins very nice and a cup of tea or coffee. We spend about 45mins walking around and lucky for us this is the day that the students are allowed to visit the local shops but they to make sure they are home for homework time which all students participate in, this house seemed very homey and the students love going there.
The next part of our day was the EQ housing tour this was wonderful and enlighting on what is available for teachers heading out this way and what the houses cost for shared housing.
At this point information overloaded was happening and we seemed like sheep being rustle through houses and back to the bus, it was getting cold and we where tired, but we made the best of the situation and got back to the accomodation in time to change for dinner which was being provided at Chinchilla State School.
Majella and her wonderful staff organised dinner and drinks for us in the library which was warm and muchly enjoyed by us all. On the menu was Pumpkin Soup, Potateo and Leek Soup with garlic bread then a little later we where also provided with some warm pasta meals and salad. After this Majella had organised her first and second year teachers to speak with us about there experiences. This was very enjoyable, we finished the night with a 1.5km walk back to our accomodation in the cold of the night.
This is going to be the coldest week Chinchilla had experienced all year!!