Dear families and friends,

Thank you to the families that completed our quick survey about the newsletter. We always want to ensure that we meet the communication needs of our families. Our survey results show that families are really satisfied with the present format of weekly newsletters and we will also attempt to send more information/reminders through the Parent's 'WhatsApp' to assist in families organisation.

Staffing

We are very pleased to announce Mrs Rachel Huf and Mrs Xanthie Girdwood have both accepted teaching roles at Cavendish Primary School for 2023. Mrs Huf will be continuing her Music and Performing Arts role. She will be teaching one morning a week and the students will have a one hour lesson with her in their classes. Mrs Girdwood will be our Student Wellbeing and Health teacher for 4 hours per week. She will also teach each of the three classes covering the Department of Education's program 'Resilience, Rights and Respectful Relationships', where students will continue to develop their personal and social capabilities including self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and social management. Many families will know Mrs Girdwood, as her children attend the local Kindergarten and she lives in the local area.

School Play

Mrs Huf, students and teachers having been putting in daily practises of the upcoming play, "The Golden Plan' and it is coming along nicely. We will be heading to the hall when the senior campers return next week for more practises. Mrs Huf will be sending or emailing home a note next week to clarify costumes. The students will need to arrive at 6pm and the play will begin at 6.30pm. The early start allows our younger students to have a reasonable time to go home and get ready for bed.

Senior Camp

We wish our Year 3/4/5/6 campers all the very best for next week and we look forward to seeing lots of pictures and hearing about their adventures. The weather looks promising at this stage. Any school camp is not possible without lots of background work that allows the camp to run smoothly. So a very big thank you to:

Tammy for all her financial work and booking organisation
Paul Quinn and Chris Price for attending and assisting with supervision
Mrs Brabham and Miss Thompson for their planning and preparation
Our Parents Club for their financial support in subsidising the bus and camp costs

Fleece & Flower show

The students and staff have been busy finalising their entries into the Fleece and Flower show for next Friday. Each student will be entering a piece of writing, a project based on their Humanities or English class work, a 2D and 3D piece of Art. The students have put many hours of class time and effort into ensuring their work is of a high standard. We look forward to seeing all their work on display at the Hall.

NAPLAN national results

The 2022 NAPLAN national results were published this week. Of course, NAPLAN results are not everything. They focus on two particular aspects of learning – literacy and numeracy – not the full range of knowledge, skills and attributes that we seek to develop in our students. While not everything, they are one important measure we can use to assess the progress of our school, and the learning of Victorian students relative to their peers across Australia. While our key focus is on each of our individual students, you may also be interested in what the NAPLAN results show about Victorian schools overall.

The Department of Education and Training has analysed the results for Victoria, and found that Victorian students have achieved some of our highest results ever, maintaining our place as one of the highest performing jurisdictions, along with NSW and ACT. For example, in 2022, Victorian Year 3 students achieved their best ever Reading results and were again the strongest readers in the country. Indeed, Victorian students performed particularly strongly at the primary level, with Victoria ranked first or second on eight out of 10 NAPLAN assessments, including all five assessments at Year 3. Writing results also showed improvement across Years 5. After analysis, the department has identified areas where further work is needed. These priority areas for improvement are shared with other states and territories facing similar challenges, such as lifting numeracy results.

Have a great weekend and hopefully the sun continues to shine.

Lisa Ferrier

Awards for this week