Permaculture Design Course

I have just completed a Permaculture Design Course at the Food Forest in Gawler with Graham and Annemarie Brookman and guest lecturer – world renowned Permaculture Specialist David Holmgrem (pictured) .  The course was 10 days of intensive face to face sessions combined with 4 weeks of additional personal study days.

It was such a wonderful experience (exhausting but wonderful), we were immersed in the philosophies of Permaculture Design and given the opportunity to visit a number of sites around Adelaide and Stirling who are practising these philosophies on a daily basis in a range of ways.  Being surrounded by like minded people during the course was truly inspirational.

I presented a successful project presentation during the course and was lucky enough to have 4 other students choose to join my team and develop a Permaculture Design for my school.  My team was wonderfully diverse with members bringing a range of skills to the team such as plant knowledge, energy efficiency expertise and IT skills. 

My team presenting our project and with our model and site map.

We developed a plan consisting of 5 stages that our school can implement over time as funds and hands on assistance become available.  We felt it was vital to include the students at the school in the design process.  I worked with them to measure the spaces and to do the ph testing of the soil on the site.  Students were also involved in gathering items for the model made for the project and subsequently made a range of models of the site themselves.

I look forward to implementing the design into the school with the support of my team and students and thank my team for their time and expertise with this project.

 Graham and Annemarie Brookman and I after receiving my certificate and the 2013 Permaculture Design Certificate group.

Dyslexia Aware Schools

Wow I cant beleive how quickly this year is traveling, I am a little behind with my blogging as I have been so busy with my studying but will do my best to rectify that now...

With the Kitchen Garden program now up and running at our school I have changed my focus to implementing a ‘Dyslexia Aware School’ accreditation process throughout the Barossa and Gawler Regions with the hope that once the process is in place those of us involved will be able to support schools Australia wide to become accredited and make the changes needed both at a classroom level and leadership level to improve the learning outcomes of the thousands of students in Australia who have been diagnosed with Dyslexia or who have Dyslexic type learning needs. 

I was thrilled to spend time with world renowned Dyslexia specialist Neil Mackay (pictured below)during his recent visit and am truly excited to have been invited to work with him on writing and implementing the accreditation process for schools in Australia.  Staff at my school are committed to having this process completed by the end of the year and are looking forward to having Neil spend time at our school when he returns to Australia later this year to work through the audit and accreditation process with us.  We will be working in partnership with the Dyslexia Action Group of Barossa and Gawler Surrounds (DAGBAGS) to ensure the accreditation process is successfully implemented in as many schools as possible.  The group is also looking into creating and supplying a range of resources that can be used by schools as they adopt some of the methods/processes proven to improve the learning outcomes of these students.

June already!!

Well it is June already and as I write this I am finding myself wondering where the first half of the year has gone!! I am also very excited that June has arrived as later this month I will be taking three of my colleagues from Naracoorte South Primary School to the 'Happiness and its Causes' conference in Melbourne where we will hear 'His Holiness the Dalai Lama' himself speak.

I am also looking forward to hearing many of the other great speakers who I'm sure will enlighten us with many words of wisdom to help us get the most from our lives.  At this time of year when reports are looming, the sky is dreary and the wind is freezing, I am definitely in need of some positive energy!  If you would also like some daily inspiration you can like 'happiness and its causes' on Facebook for links to many inspiring blogs and quotes to lift your mood.

Last month I was able to use the first of my award money to take my whole current school staff (of four teachers) from Frances Primary School to the Hawker Brownlow 10th Thinking and Learning conference in Melbourne.

This was an amazing opportunity where we could all learn together and return back to school all with the same understandings, ready to put our learning into action in the classroom.  

We attended Jay McTighe's 'Understanding by Design' sessions for two of the three days and on the third day attended Phil Warrick's 'The Highly Engaged Classroom' and William Ferriter's session on 'Writing Student Centred Learning Targets.'  I would highly recommend you to seek out works by these professionals.  They provided us with many practical ideas but also challenged our thinking on our classroom practice and our understanding of the Australian Curriculum.  

Here is a photo of us with Jay McTighe. (I'm the one on Jay's right.)  His books on Understanding by Design are well worth exploring further and he also has a great website- www.jaymctighe.com where you can find lots of useful links to more information.

It was an amazing learning experience for me just to be in a big city! I managed (with assistance from friends) to work out the train system, the shuttle bus and even braved it on a small plane to get to Melbourne.  All very big steps for this country bumpkin!  

This was the view from our motel room. A lot different from the view from my window at home- The lights I see in the sky at night are stars!

I will write again after my next adventure to Melbourne.  Until then. 

Keep Smiling

Natalie Gherardin