Message from the Principal Team
Principals' Update
Principal’s Update
Welcome to Term 2. We have had a great start to the term and all of our students appear to be well rested and ready to learn. Term 2 is jammed packed with events and activities including NAPLAN (Years 3 and 5), the Student Attitude to School Survey (Years 4 to 6), Mother’s Day Stall, 5/6 Camp and 5/6 Earn and Learn.
Cross Country Years 3 to 6
Congratulations to all of our students from Years 3 to 6 who competed in the CNPS Cross Country yesterday. It was a chilly day at Princes Park but our students demonstrated great resilience as they ran the track.
Curriculum Day
Today, Literacy Consultant Lisa Keskinen, worked with our teaching staff to continue the work on improving student learning growth in Writing. Lisa’s research and evidence based approach looks at teaching Writing within strongly connected Literacy Context.
During the course of the day Lisa covered the following concepts with staff:
- The big picture – Victorian Curriculum, Literacy Teaching Toolkit, research, trends, programs, planning
- Knowing our students – Writing conferences and assessment - collecting data to inform our planning
- Example connected literacy planners Reading and Writing
- What can we improve in our Writing workshop planning and implementation?
- An introduction to Structured Word Inquiry
- Contexts for teaching Spelling strategies
- Planning a connected Literacy block
- Literacy block model and experience
- Literacy block - what can we improve in our planning and implementation?
- Writing, spelling – research and resources
Ramadan
It's currently Ramadan! Ramadan, observed April 12 through May 12 this year (the ninth month of the Islamic calendar), is of great significance for all Muslims throughout the world.
Professional Learning - Writing
Last night, classroom teachers continued to revisit the 6+1 Writing Traits which staff were first introduced to in 2019. Teachers have been working together in three multi-level teams to delve into a further one trait per team. They each produced an overview poster defining this trait, looking at how to assess this trait, and how to teach this trait from Foundation through to Year 6. Teams shared their final ‘expertise’/poster on this trait. These posters are now on display in the staffroom to allow everyone a chance to review them at their leisure.
Staff then broke off into their teaching teams in order to plan some tasks specific to the 6+1 Writing Traits which will be taught throughout the term. At the end of term, staff will once again come together to celebrate a ‘Sharing of Best Practice’.
During this time, the Specialist team continued their Word Wall displays which are specific to their curriculum area. This week the students started learning about Tier 3 words in their specialist classes. Tier 3 words are commonly defined as low-frequency, subject-specific words. The Specialist Team will be working with our students to identify and teach these words as part of the specialist lessons.
The Principal Team
Rachel Corben, Erin Brown & Jane Bilby