From the Acting Principal, 

Elissa Campbell

We are quickly moving through Term 3, with only three more weeks to go before the end of term and we are looking forward to hopefully welcoming some sunnier Spring weather in Term 4. While still cold and frozen in the morning, we have occasionally had some glimmers of the sun breaking through in the past few weeks.

Yesterday we celebrated Book Week with our annual dress up day, literacy open morning and Book Week inspired learning throughout the day. Our students and staff proudly showed off their very creative costumes during our whole school parade and were cheered on by our families and their peers. We hope that all who were able to attend our open morning enjoyed learning alongside their child/ren as they engaged with some of the nominated books from this year’s awards. During the afternoon students participated in various craft activities that were linked to the nominated books. Thanks to Ms Courtney Lawrence, our Literacy Learning Specialist and our Literacy Professional Learning Team for their hard work in co-ordinating the day. We will announce the winners of our Poetry, Colouring and Costume competitions very soon. 

Today our Year 5/6 teachers opened their maths classrooms for several staff from Gisborne Secondary College to observe their lessons. Currently our Year 5/6 students are working on developing their multiplicative thinking skills. This followed on from our recent visit to GSC to observe their Year 7 Maths STEPS program. We often work closely with both primary and secondary schools in our region to share teaching practices, with the aim of constantly improving our instructional methods. 

Congratulations to Ms Libby Tobin and her partner James who recently celebrated the safe arrival of their daughter Harriet. We wish them all the best and look forward to meeting the new addition to their family soon.

A reminder to CU1 and CU3 students and families that on Monday, CU1 will be coming back to the Woodend campus and CU3 students will return to Carlsruhe. CU3 students will need to ensure they arrive at school on time to catch the bus on Monday morning.

We are continuing to undertake various facilities and maintenance works around both campus’ including roof works to repair some reoccurring roof leaks and window frame repairs/replacements. We are also awaiting final plans for our ‘Shelter in Place’ works that are being managed by the Victorian Schools Building Authority. These works are likely to be scheduled during a future school holiday period, to reduce the impact on school operations during the term. We are also anticipating notification of when our new shade sail will be installed at Carlsruhe.

Our fantastic PFA volunteers, lead by Sarah Chadwick organised 2 very successful Movie Nights for our Junior and Carlsruhe Unit students last Friday night and are preparing for another full night of entertainment for our Middle and Senior Unit students this Friday night. Next Friday morning we are inviting our dads and grandfathers for a Father’s Day breakfast of egg and bacon rolls, more information about this event can be found in the PFA update in this newsletter, please make sure you book your free ticket via the QKR app. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our PFA volunteers, without your support it would be challenging to run events like these for our school community. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact wpspfa@gmail.com.

Planning for our 2024 Carlsruhe Fair has already commenced, with a meeting being held this week on Tuesday night. We are always looking for more volunteers to contribute to this energetic team if you are interested in helping out with this event, please contact xx.

As we continue to plan for 2024, we are requesting that if you have a child commencing in Foundation next year and have not yet submitted your enrolment form that you do so as soon as possible. If your circumstances have changed and your child will not be attending Woodend Primary School next year it is important that you advise us by sending an email to woodend.ps@education.vic.gov.au.

We are looking forward to the final weeks of Term 3 and the many learning opportunities during this time.

Acting Principal

Elissa Campbell