Principal's Report

Final Newsletter

Welcome to the final newsletter for 2019! In 2011, Julia Gillard was Prime Minister, there were floods in Queensland as well as Cyclone Yasi. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip visited Australia and so did Barack Obama. Kim Clijsters won the Australian Open, Sally Pearson won the Women’s 100m World Championship, the iPhone 4s was the latest gadget, The King’s Speech won best picture and Toy Story 3 was the best animation at the Oscars. But the biggest news of 2011 for me, was the opening of Lyndhurst Primary School, the culmination of a long-held dream of mine to open my own school. It occurred to me the other day, as I was reflecting on the years that have passed since, that next year is the 10th year for our young school. What an incredible realization that was for me. Next year will be our 10th prep enrolment. It will be our 10th junior concert, our 10th graduation group, our 10th Harmony Day, our 10th Cross Country and many other opportunities to celebrate a wonderful 10 years at Lyndhurst Primary School. We will be putting together a 10th birthday committee to help plan what will be a wonderful year of celebration. If you have any ideas to help us with the celebration, please send them along to the school. We’d love to hear from you.

Looking back on 2011

Below you will find a small gallery of photos from our first year. We had 9 classes, 11 teachers and 157 children to begin the adventure of our wonderful school in this amazing community.

Summer Celebration Concert

I hope everyone really enjoyed the Summer Celebration Concert this year. I’ve had several parents come to me and say it was one of the best they’ve seen. Congratulations to all the teachers and children for the amount of planning and preparation that went into the event. Special thanks to our two amazing music teachers for their commitment to creating such a wonderful event for our community.

Step-up Day

Our annual step up day went very smoothly on Tuesday. Over 150 prep students arrived for the morning and successfully tripped off to their classrooms for their first real school experience in their own classroom with their own teacher. For the rest of the school, they were very excited to move to their new classrooms and meet their new teachers. We have a wonderful teaching team on board again for next year and I know all of the children are looking forward to having a fantastic 2020.

Student Leader Speeches

One of my favourite days of the year is when I get to listen to speeches from the year five students who have nominated themselves for School Captain or SRC Chairperson positions, our four senior leadership positions.

This year, 44 children out of 115, nominated themselves for those positions. This was a wonderful result for us to have more than a third of the children put their hand up to take on these important positions of responsibility. As we have mentioned before, we have been highlighting the importance of student voice in the school in both their learning and in their leadership and it is very gratifying for us to see so many children decide to use their voice to show leadership. They have made it a very difficult task as the speeches were well thought out, insightful and artfully delivered.

They showed a deep understanding of the characteristics of high-quality leadership and whittling down this amazing group to only four successful candidates will be a most difficult task. The positions will be announced at the final assembly next Friday. Of course, there are many more leadership positions available for students in 2020 and those will be finalized early in term one. As I tell our year six students each year though, I see them all as leaders. I see them all as role models for a school and I highlight their importance in setting the right example to the younger students to continue to make Lyndhurst Primary School the wonderful school that it is.

Year 6 Graduation

Of course, I’m also looking forward to the big event of next week which is our year six graduation. Over 100 of our students will graduate from Lyndhurst Primary School on Wednesday and it is always an incredibly emotional event. Just like the children, I’m always excited for them for the next part of their lives and for the possibilities that lie ahead but I am also sad to see them leave the school, many of whom have been with us for seven years.

Holiday Reading

Here’s an interesting article for you to ponder over the holidays. It’s by Occupational Therapist, Victoria Prooday. It raises some very relevant and contemporary issues related to our children and hopefully gives parents pause to think.

The silent tragedy affecting today’s children (and what to do with it)

There is a silent tragedy developing right now, in our homes, and it concerns our most precious jewels - our children. Through my work with hundreds of children and families as an occupational therapist, I have witnessed this tragedy unfolding right in front of my eyes. Our children are in a devastating emotional state! Talk to teachers and professionals who have been working in the field for the last 15 years. You will hear concerns similar to mine. Moreover, in the past 15 years, researchers have been releasing alarming statistics on a sharp and steady increase in kids’ mental illness, which is now reaching epidemic proportions: …. Read more

Have a great break!

Finally, I would like to wish everybody a wonderful holiday break. It is always a great time for me to reconnect with family and friends, not always having the time during the busy school year. I hope that you also take the time to connect with family and friends and you continue to build really strong, meaningful and loving connections with your children. It is a precious time in their lives and disappears so quickly. My own children are all in their late 20’s and early 30’s and it seems like only yesterday when they were graduating primary school. Treasure the time and treasure the memories.