Dear Community,

We are now deeply entrenched in presentation season - a wonderful period at School that provides countless opportunities to showcase the results of our students’ learning journeys throughout the year. With Kindergarten Concerts, the Junior School Musical, Presentation Evening and VCE Graduation Dinner all representing opportunities to celebrate student achievement and acknowledge the incredible growth and development that has marked 2015.

The student growth is perhaps most obvious in the end-of-year Kindergarten concerts. These have been an incredible treat that have finally replaced the strains of last year’s Katie Perry and Frozen medleys from our heads with what I consider to be an upgrade to this season’s renditions of Pharell’s Happy. To see the confident and joyous manner with which our students demonstrated their significant learning through plays, Jewish songs, dances and videos is a true credit to our wonderful Early Learning educators.

The Jun

As part of our Inquiry unit on 'Our Community' a mock trial was held in Prep. Jeremy King and Simon Abraham were the Prosecutor and Defence lawyer. The two students Luca Kaye and Zach King were on trial for having a birthday on 3 December 2015. Twelve students were chosen to be the jury and Renay Hammerschlag was the judge who presided over the court proceedings.

Their cases were put forward and the jury was asked to evaluate the evidence and make a decision. The verdict was not guilty but Judge Renay overrode the decision and the boys were found guilty of having a birthday on 3 December.

On Thursday the Year 8 Hebrew students took part in an exciting learning experience 297 metres above the ground. The students used this opportunity to explore Melbourne when they researched and prepared a presentation in small groups. A total of 9 groups presented their findings in Hebrew. Once the students were up high, they had to put their Hebrew skills to challenge, as they raced to complete a treasure hunt of Melbourne's major landmarks.

On Tuesday in preparation for Chanukah the Year 7’s and 8’s participated in three Chanukah related activities. We made Chanukiahs out of clay, made latkes and had a discussion about miracles. Everyone had fun and had the great opportunity to experience these things. Thank you to the Netzer Mads and all the teachers who ran the workshops and made it possible.

The Junior School's Concert, The Great Alphabet Kerfuffle, performed on Monday this week was, in Marc Light's words, a great mix of "cute kids, swinging 50s songs, an educational storyline and an overload of daggy dad jokes".

Written by David Opat and Laura Rickhuss, the concert centred around the theme of the alphabet which had lost its order. The Prep, Year 1 and Year 2 students assisted in getting the alphabet order back. Many staff and parents contributed to the success of this performance and we are grateful to you all!

The School was delighted to host the Israeli Ambassador to Australia, His Excellency Shmuel Ben-Shmuel and Israel's first modern-day sports hero, basketballer Tal Brody, at a special Assembly for Years 6 to 8 students earlier this week.

New Jersey born, Tal joined the Maccabi-Tel Aviv team after leading his United States team to a gold medal in the 1965 Maccabiah Games. At this time, there were only 1250 athletes from 25 different countries competing. He contrasted this experience to the 19th Maccabiah Games held in 2013 where he played in the veteran team and there were 9000 Jewish athletes representing 70 different countries! He delighted students with his inspirational tales of choosing to play for Maccabi Tel Aviv instead of pursuing a career as an NBA professional basketballer.

He talked with pride about Israel's famous win against Russia in the European Cup in 1977 where he was interviewed after the game about the significance to Israel about the win. Tal challenged the

Last week as part of the PE program the Year 3 students visited the Women's High Performance Gymnastics Centre and participated in two sessions. Under the guidance of trained coaches the students had fun experiencing a whole range of gymnastics activities using different types of apparatus safely. Some of these activities included rolling, balancing, handstands, bouncing, hanging from horizontal bars and jumping into the foam pit.

Come and celebrate the students' wonderful artwork at the 2015 VCE Visual Arts Show - Sunday 6 December, 1.00pm to 3.00pm. Enjoy the impressive visual art, design and media works that have been produced by our talented Senior students.