Scoresby PS Whole-school Newsletter

From Our School Leaders

2024 Student Leaders 

Last Friday, at assembly, our new student leaders for 2024 were announced.  After a rigorous application process, including a written application, public speech and voting, our candidates for 2024 were chosen.  Congratulations to those who achieved a captaincy role.

School Captains - Milla Williams and Riley Caylock

Vice Captains - Keely Reeves and Ajay Jayanthan 

HEART Captains -  Delilah Murphy, Elena Faiz, Noah Neven

Cook House Captains - Lilly Bertram and Tenzin Wolokh

Chisholm House Captains - Mason Whittenbury and Edgar Kunst

Flinders House Captains - Yousef Nabizada and Sam Black

Macarthur House Captains - Sosefina Aiolupotea and Mahi Patel

 

We are very much looking forward to working with these students next year.  They have already had a meeting with Mrs Rheumer to plan out activities and dates for term 1 next year. They are enthusiastic and we are keen to hear their voices and help them develop leadership skills over the coming year.

 

Staffing For 2024

We have completed our staffing profile for next year, and we have several staff moving on to new schools and experiences, and 3 new staff joining our teaching team. 

 

Hannah Flintoff is currently working at Ringwood North PS, Larissa Holdsworth is currently working in a Catholic primary school, and Sarah Harper is a graduate teacher who did her final placement with us this year. We have welcomed all of these new staff to planning days last week and look forward to them working with us next year. 

 

Some of our well-regarded staff are moving on to different settings and experiences next year. Liz Dinakis is moving to Millgate PS, to be closer to home; Mark Butters is returning home to Beechworth and the Catholic school there; Jessica Reeves and Yasmin Bohn are both moving to new schools, and Angela Murray will be returning to CRT work next year. Emmerson Hickleton will be continuing in her ES role at another local school, and Shantelle Bellingham has also picked up a Learning Specialist role in the Yarra Valley. These people have made wonderful contributions to our school, some over many years.  We thank them for their input into Scoresby PS and hope they have gained valuable learnings from us as well. We wish them all the very best in their new schools and contexts. 

 

Below is the school staffing structure for 2024:

Classrooms For Next Year

There is a big move planned at SPS in readiness for next year. We are keen for our classes to all have a collaborative learning space. A collaborative learning space is good for a number of reasons : 

  1.  Year levels can work together, broadening and strengthening friendships across      the level.
  2.  Working together builds a community of learners.
  3.  Teachers can deliver lessons together – great for inquiry and maths investigations
  4.  Teachers can target individual needs (either for testing or extra explanation) while     other staff continue on with lesson delivery.
  5.  Teachers can observe each other, teaching and trialling new elements of their   practice.

Moving is also a great opportunity to have a sort and clean out. As teachers, we gather lots of resources; some might say we have hoarding tendencies! School days are full and busy, and little time is left and prioritised to sorting through resources, so we are taking the opportunity to do this as well.

 

Classrooms for 2024

  • Foundation........will remain in the Foundation Building.
  • Year 1/2..............MOVING to the main building into Rooms 9 & 8 (currently 3/4B &  3/4S). The collaborative space will be the Foundation room as we are running a F-2 level next year.
  • Year 3/4...............MOVING to Rooms 1, 2, 3 & 4 (currently the Year 5/6 space). The collaborative space will be the extra classroom in the double room. 
  • Year 5/6................MOVING to the BER building.  The collaborative space will be in the centre of the classrooms.

We are looking forward to working in these spaces alongside our colleagues and creating learning communities for our students. 

 

Work For 2024 

We are currently working on our Annual Implementation Plan for 2024. This is the document that sets out the work for staff in the year ahead. This year we have worked on building knowledge and practice for our staff in Writing, following the 6+1 Traits of Writing ideology.  This will be rolled out into our classroom next year.

 

2024 Work

 

Maths

  • Implementing the new Maths Curriculum 2.0
  • Implementing our Rainbow Maths skill development program (F-2 to begin with)

English

  • Implementing and embedding our Write to Read spelling program (the junior school have started this work already) 
  • Putting the 6+1 Traits learnings from this year into action in classrooms

Wellbeing

  • Introducing the U R Strong program (incorporating Friend-ology) to SPS,  to help students with friendship concerns and improve and strengthen established friendships
  • Improving our wellbeing tiers and practices throughout the school 

As The School Year Draws To A Close…

At this time of year, we all naturally spend time reflecting on the year that was.  2023 has seen us have incredible challenges with staffing and replacement teachers.  We have seen their strength, flexibility and resilience this year.  We have had to split classes, and staff have merged grades together throughout the year, but they have kept going with teaching and learning. They always have the students front and centre. We are immensely proud of, and grateful to, our staff for the committed and generous care they provide our students, and the care and support they provide each other.

 

To our parents and caregivers, we are so grateful for your support, and we greatly value our school community and look forward to building stronger connections and ties with you next year.

 

Finally, to our students, you are simply superstars! You have all worked hard to achieve the goals set out for you. Visitors to our school always say what a calm and happy environment we have here, and we do! 

 

Below is a snapshot of some of our fun events this year.

 

 

We would like to take this opportunity to wish all of our SPS families and community a very Merry Christmas. We hope you get to spend some valuable time with your nearest and dearest, and those most special to you. 

 

We look forward to seeing everyone back at school next year on Tuesday 30th January. 

 

Take care, stay safe and have a lovely summer break.

 

 

SUE HARTLEY AND NICOLE RHEUMER

Scoresby Primary School Leaders