Principal's Message

Welcome to Week 4, Term 4.

 

Thank you to Mrs Howlett, Mr Osborn and Mrs Farmer, who each stepped onto relieving positions within the school while I was away from school earlier this term. 

 

In the coming fortnight, we welcome more groups of 2025 Kindergarten students for transition, our current Kinders will go on the adventure that is the Teddy Bears Picnic, K-2 students will participate in an athletics carnival, Stage 1 students will continue their gymnastics program at the gym centre, our leaders will visit the Bupa aged care facility, Stage 3 teachers will meet with ASC staff to support planning for individual student needs for those moving into high school and a number of Ben Venue teachers will engage in further professional learning to support quality curriculum implementation and student self- and peer-evaluation.

 

Later this term, we have our Creative Arts Showcase, Step Up sessions for all Kinder to Year 5 students into their 2025 year level, open classrooms, final assemblies, Year 6 graduation dinner and more.

 

Please remember that the School Bytes calendar is regularly updated for your information.

Improving data analysis to better support student learning

At Ben Venue, teachers use a range of formal and informal sources of assessment data to identify next steps in learning for our students. In this fortnight, Mrs Wassman (Assistant Principal Curriculum & Instruction) and I will be meeting with Bruce Nield of the Teacher Quality and Impact Directorate, to pioneer new and more effective ways of triangulating assessment data to better identify students' strengths and areas for focus in literacy and numeracy. 

The first step in this process is using AI to support identification of related mathematics questions across NAPLAN, Check-in and PAT assessments, allowing us to identify areas consistently strong or weak for individual students across these assessments. This information will further enhance our ability to provide the right learning at the right time for our students.

I am excited to develop this analysis technique with Bruce and look forward to applying it across areas of literacy and numeracy for our students.

Student, family and staff feedback surveys

As part of regular evaluation of school performance, we are collecting information on the perspectives of students, parents/carers and staff over the coming weeks. The information collected will be used to help identify areas of strength and areas for development moving into 2025.

As part of this, I ask you to please find 5 minutes to complete a survey. The survey is very short, containing just 7 multiple choice questions and 3 short responses. Please take the time to help us understand what we are doing well and where we can make improvements. 

To ensure only one response per person and to help us understand your responses, your email address will be collected when you complete the survey.

Click here to complete the short survey, before the end of November.

2025 class placement requests

The deadline for requests regarding class placement in 2025 has now passed. This information is taken into consideration when classes are created; however, due to the complexity of a range of dynamics and competing priorities, not all requests can be met.

Supporting key transition points in young lives

Last week, I attended the annual state conference of the NSW Primary Principals' Association as the delegate for the Armidale Primary Principals' Council. I was fortunate to hear from many inspiring speakers addressing the theme of The Power of Legacy. In the coming newsletters, I plan to share a few insights gained from this experience.

Many young people in Australia struggle at key points of transition in their lives. This can include starting school, the move to high school, leaving school, entering the workforce and leaving home. Dr Arne Rubinstein spoke on the importance of structured rites of passage at key transition points in the lives of young people, to support positive progression into their next phase of life. While his focus is primarily on boys, he provides many insights that I hope to apply to our approach to transitions at Ben Venue moving forward. I also hope to share some of his insights on rites of passage in future newsletters. 

Dr Rubinstein also spoke about the transition in mentality from Boy to Man, outlining the key changes that we hope to see in our young males as they mature into men. This can happen at a wide range of points in a persons life (or not at all), but the sooner this shift occurs, the happier the person generally is and the better they function in society. As a father, I found this interesting and felt it worth sharing.

(From The Making of Men by Dr Arne Rubinstein and his address to the NSW Primary Principals' Association, 2024)

Cam Pryce

Principal