Wellbeing

BREAKFAST CLUB: MONDAY, WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY

This term we continue our popular Breakfast Club program in the space at the side of the music room. This is a grab and go service offering fruit, milk, packets of cereal and now....toast!

The program operates from 8.35am—8.50am Monday, Wednesday and Friday—yes, just 15 minutes, but enough time to grab and eat on the way to class. Ms Naomi McMaster organises the program. We would love to have the help of some more volunteers, especially now that we will be cooking toast. If you think you could help to cook toast for 15 minutes on any of the mornings, please email me (debraanne.haddow@education.vic.gov.au ). You would just need to have your Working With Children Check and complete the Child Safe Training—as every volunteer does. Please let us know if you’d like to join our team.

SPOTLIGHT ON THRIVE

PLAYLEADERS

Thank you to our wonderful Year 5 Playleaders who give up one of their lunch times each week to run organised game sessions for our junior school students. The sounds of laughter from both the younger students and the Year 5s is delightful. It’s a great leadership activity, involving a lot of responsibility—so thank you.

VALUE-BE HEALTHY

Last week our value was based on being healthy. Discussions were held about getting enough sleep, being active and limiting the time we spend on devices. 

We’ve also got the Smile Squad here at school providing a dental care service to our families.

VALUE-RELATING WELL

This week the value has been about relationships. In class teachers are running their Welcoming Circles at the start of each day to check in with students and help prime them for their learning. Teachers work hard to build connections with their  students and families. We like to work as a team to support students.

A few year levels were involved in a Social Skill Intervention program. Last year we found a lot of students had exited the covid lockdowns having struggles with how to relate well to others and how to manage conflicts appropriately. We started this Social Skill program last year and targeted a few year levels each term. We’ve encourage children to use this language if there is a conflict:

I don’t like it when you……

It makes me feel……. 

Next time could you…..

We are trying to help students build a tool kit of skills and strategies to use, other than fighting. Those that continue to have aggressive conflicts have time with the Wellbeing Team to help them work through what happened and what would have been a better choice. Restorative discussions are held between the students to help repair the relationships and guidelines given for moving forward. We have a staged response Behaviour Management System visible and with very clear steps in every classroom. We’ve renewed our focus on this so students are well aware when their parents will be contacted about their behaviour. Some stages are escalated to Principals immediately and serious consequences are awarded. We have worked hard to try to minimise disruptions to classes and their learning. We’ve developed unobtrusive methods of gathering students to hold discussions which does not impact the learning of others. We hear each student’s version of events and compile our best version of the truth. We encourage students to tell the truth the first time so our time is maximised. Everyone makes mistakes, we  just need to take responsibility for them and make plans to make better choices in the future.

Our work with each student and their family is also highly confidential. We do not tell other families the consequences given, it is confidential. We would hope that our LPPS families know us well enough and trust us enough to know that we do follow departmental processes and work hard to support each student to help them realise their potential. 

The work in the area of Wellbeing is intense and very busy. Both Mrs Lane and myself generally spend 90% of our days working with students or their families. The need for our support has increased at least two fold since the return from Covid. We are focussed on helping every student be at their optimum and so prioritise spending the time to unpack situations, get all of the facts, restore the relationships, make plans for the future and try to contact parents. We have regular meetings with parents to provide support about behaviour, mental health concerns and attendance. We can honestly say there is never a dull moment, and rarely a spare moment as we have an intense focus on providing wellbeing support to every one of our students as they need it. We thank parents for working with us respectfully and with patience. We all want the same thing for your child—for them to be the best version of themselves.

If you have a concern about your child, the process is for you to work through this with your class teacher first. Most concerns can be managed at this level.. We encourage students to tell their teachers on the day it happens—so we can try to sort it out and repair it on the same day.  If you feel that concerns need to be raised to the wellbeing team—please let us know. We then check in with the class teacher and work with them and you to resolve the situation. We will try to get back to you as quickly as possible. Sometimes it may take a few days as we are working face to face with students giving them the immediate support they need to re-engage with their learning. As adults we need to work together to help our young ones develop the skills they need. If you have concerns, please let your teacher or the Wellbeing Team know so we can work with you to resolve it. If we have concerns, we will contact you.

THRIVE AWARDS

Term 2 - Week 9

Term 3 - Week 1 Thrive Value: Be Healthy

Term 3 - Week 2 Thrive Value: Relate Well

Wellbeing Contacts:

I have come across a few more contacts which might be helpful to our community members. So we’ll continue to build this resource for you.

Families needing food or support:

• https://askizzy.org.au/food/personalise/page/sub-food
• Peninsula Donations (check their page on Facebook)
• BK 2 Basics Melbourne (also on Facebook)

Deb Haddow