Wellbeing & Engagement
Harmony Day
Coming up on Friday, March 25th is our annual Harmony Day celebration! The theme for Harmony Day this year is Everyone Belongs. This special day provides our school community with a wonderful opportunity to celebrate diversity, foster respect, inclusiveness and an understanding of our different backgrounds, and the idea that all cultures make a highly valuable contribution to our wider society.
Students (and staff!) are encouraged to come to school dressed in traditional clothing that represent their own cultural heritage. If you are unable to source a traditional outfit, all students are asked to wear as much orange as they possibly can! This is the colour that represents Harmony Day, so orange t-shirts, shorts, hair ties, and so on, would be fantastic to see!
Across the day, we will run a range of activities celebrating the theme, Everyone Belongs. Buddy grades will get a chance to partner up, choirs will perform and a highlight will be the costume parade. More detailed information will be provided closer to the day.
In the meantime, get thinking about those costumes!
The Resilience Project
As a school, we are very excited to begin our work with The Resilience Project (TRP) this
year. Some of you might already know about TRP and you may have even seen its founder, Hugh van Cuylenburg, speak about this program. If you haven’t yet - we highly recommend it.
Our teaching staff have been undertaking professional learning focused on TRP over the past 5-6 weeks, and we will begin rolling it out to students in classrooms in the next week or two. TRP focuses on the key concepts of Gratitude, Empathy and Mindfulness. There is a significant pool of research that has shown improving capabilities in these areas leads to more resilient and emotionally literate individuals. Personally, I have first-hand experience working with TRP as my previous school used this program for years - the benefits I saw in not only our students, but staff and community members, were incredible. I can't wait to see the impact at Rangeview.
Over the course of the year, there will also be opportunities for parents, carers and other school community members to engage with aspects of TRP.
Gratitude Tree
To coincide with the launch of TRP at Rangeview, we will be creating a Gratitude Tree at the front entrance of the school. This will be a great visual display, allowing students and staff to reflect on all those small things that we appreciate in our lives. Look out for this over the coming weeks! Thank you to our ever-creative Art teacher Mrs Geilings for ‘planting the seeds’ for this tree to grow!
MAT Program
Our Year 5 and 6 students are participating in the MAT (Martial Arts Therapy) Program across the first term. This program is based around the philosophies of ‘be strong, be calm, be kind, try hard’. Our students are learning about mental wellbeing and emotional literacy through traditional martial arts training. A key learning outcome of this program is understanding the ‘Dichotomy of Control’. Every situation has two types of things: the ones you can control and then ones you can’t control. Just focusing on those you can control (being mindful) is a fundamental strategy in building resilience and self care.
Running Club
It has been fantastic to see a large number of students take part in Running Club on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. These ‘additional extras’ at school help greatly with student engagement - and some physical activity to start the day promotes improved personal wellbeing! Exercise is the easiest way to release endorphins - or ‘happy hormones’ - which trigger a positive feeling in the body and improve a person’s ability to cope with pain or stress. So - get out there and get running! Huge thank you to Mr Clark, Mrs O’Connor and all the other staff members who have been regulars out there supporting the students!
Liam Sommers
Acting Assistant Principal