Principal's Report

What a week! Starting with the Box Hill Festival on Sunday, the Book Fair and lunchtime activities all week, Prospective Parents Open Morning on Tuesday morning, "Susaki Ai" a Japanese traditional story teller visited on Tuesday after recess and the highlight will undoubtedly be the Dress Up Parade on Friday morning. What an action packed week for us all!

Mothers’ Day with a difference

The inaugural Mother’s Day morning tea was well attended and it was so lovely to hear so much relaxed chatter. Taking an hour out of your busy days isn’t easy and we would like to again thank you for recognising all the work Mothers’ (and significant females) do in helping raise the Huntingdale children.

All classes created a flag as collective recognition and our school captains read a poem at the morning tea on behalf of all of the children for each of you, if you weren’t in attendance please read on below:

‘The Perfect Gift’

A gift to keep you organised?

A present to help you clean?

A gadget for the kitchen?

No, that would just be mean!

Pretty perfume just for you?

Something for the car?

All of these ideas,

won’t get me very far!

So much that you deserve,

was your favourite colour blue?

Oh, what is that one thing

to show that I love you?

I will make you something,

And of that I will be proud,

I know you will love it too,

It will be bright, it will be loud!

Here it is Mum,

In bed you should stay,

Breakfast and a card,

On this special Mothers’ Day.

School Visits

Our school often showcases our Japanese program and it truly is a unique feature of our school and one we hold in high esteem internally and externally. However, we must remember that our school is rich in more ways than just the Japanese program as was reflected in our DEECD Innovations and Excellence Award. The Japanese program and the bilingual program are quite different; we could have an excellent Japanese program yet struggle to have an effective bilingual program or vice versa. The bilingual program is the balance between the two languages in focus (in some cases more than two when we take into account children’s mother tongue and the value we place around proficiency in this language) and the ability of our English and Japanese teachers to link their programs and create continuity across a child’s day is essential in achieving this. This excellence in differentiation and teaching practice is something we have been reminded of over the past month with our visits from the Leading Teacher and groups of teachers from Clayton North Primary School. Initially the Leadership Team visited and then proceeded to bring teams of teachers through to view the outstanding Reading processes and explicit teaching and learning we have across the school. This was highlighted in a recent email which stated:

‘Can I say just how awestruck we have all been by the classes we’ve seen. The 3-6 team have learnt so much and we really appreciate the time you and your team have given us... We have been able to put some of what we saw into practice and hope to be as proficient as you are.’

2016 Enrolments

As mentioned in previous newsletters, if you have a sibling of a current student who is due to start next year please contact the office and complete an enrolment form as we have over 45 children enrolled for next year already! If you know of any parents who missed our Prospective Parent Open Morning, please ask them to make contact with the school to arrange a School Tour. We run tours on Tuesday and Thursday mornings each week by appointment.

Have a warm fortnight everyone! I know a highlight of my weekend was sitting taking statistics at the local football on Saturday with the sun on my back.

Kate Gray

Principal

Assistant Principal's Report

Happy Education Week! The last fortnight has flown by! Again we have had a lot events happening around the school…..

Box Hill Japan Festival

It was my pleasure to visit the Box Hill Japan Festival on Sunday 17th May. I have attended the festival over the last three years and each year it seems to get bigger and bigger! It was an excellent opportunity taken by our School Council Community Connectedness Sub-Committee members Karl Corkhill, Stuart MacPhee and Naomi Mori-Hanazono to have a stall to promote our school’s Japanese Bilingual Program. Along with parent volunteers Helen Cadzow, Minako Harris, Kaoru Lok and Eiji Nishikubo, they fielded questions from the public about our school and promoted our excellent programs. It was also terrific to see our school families come and say hello as well as ex-students. I’d like to thank Naomi Mori-Hanazono for her organisation of this, with assistance from our fabulous office crew of Gill and Rosella in putting together our display. Well done Team Huntingdale!

Book Fair

As part of our Education Week celebrations, we have had our annual Book Fair in the Library. Thank you to our many parent volunteers for manning the stall, taking sales and helping our children find books they like. Nathanael and Kinako in 1M had fun looking at the books and are pictured here with their favourites.

Working Bee

Just a reminder that our school working bee is this Sunday 24th May from 9.00-12noon. Many hands make light work as we embark on several gardening and maintenance jobs around the school. Of course there is the delicious sausage sizzle lunch which is always a winner. Thank you to our School Council Buildings and Grounds Sub-Committee headed by Ildiko Tarjan for organising this important event.

Story Teller Incursion- Susaki Ai

We were very fortunate to have an incursion with Japanese Storyteller Susaki Ai. Several of our parents saw Ai perform at the Box Hill Japan Festival and raved about her….so we just had to get her out to Huntingdale! Ai made time before her flight back to Japan to share her stories with our students and show a range of traditional Japanese instruments such as Koto and Shamisen. Thank you to Ildiko Tarjan, Kaoru Lok and Kaoru Kruithof for helping to organise and transport Ai and her group to the school and looking after her during the day. Thank you to our school leaders for their wonderful speech and presentation to conclude this incursion.

NAPLAN

Our Year 3’s and 5’s completed the NAPLAN assessments last week. Students sat four tests over the three day period including a Reading, Writing, Language Conventions and Mathematics test. Results of these will be released later in the year with each child receiving a report of their results. Thanks to Pete Magart for organising the running of the assessments with his team which is a huge job!

Photos

There were lots of smiles as we took our school photos on Friday 15 May. All students had class and individual photos taken. Many families also took the option of having a family photo with their siblings which is great. It’s not too late to order and pay for your photos online. Please see Gill at the Office who can help you with this.

Cross Country

This Thursday 21 May is the district cross country event at Norton’s Park. A contingent of our Year 3-6 students along with Mr Brett Herskope will attend the event. Mr Herskope has run regular training sessions throughout the week for students, along with their at home training they will be well prepared to run the event. We look forward to publishing the results in our next newsletter. Good luck Team Huntingdale!

Have a terrific fortnight. Stay warm! Winter is just around the corner……

Ruth Biddle

Assistant Principal

Huntingdale Primary School

Issue 8 · 20 May 2015

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