Hello everyone,

STEM session.

This year two of our year 6 students, Bella and Maya, with Lilly as occasional attendee, have been attending the Discovery Girls in STEM program. On Monday, they shared their learning by running Sphero workshops for our grade 3-6 students. What is a Sphero? It is a programmable robot-you can make it change colours and make it follow a particular path. Bella and Maya with assistance from Lilly taught our students how to use the program on the iPads to program the Spheros. Our students had a lot of fun! Well done to Bella, Maya and Lilly who ran the sessions with confidence and patience.

How to support your under 16 child with the new social media age restrictions.

From 10 December 2025, the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024 will require social media platforms to:

prevent children and young people under 16 from having a social media account.
deactivate or freeze existing accounts held by people under 16.

Delaying access to social media protects the health and wellbeing of young people and gives them extra time to build real world connections and digital literacy skills.

The responsibility will be on the social media platforms, not parents, carers, children or schools, to implement these new restrictions.

Most popular social media platforms will be age restricted. These include Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter), Reddit and YouTube.

Messaging services and online games, as well as apps and platforms that support health and education, can still be used.

How to help under 16s prepare for the change.

Parents and carers play an important role in supporting their children to be safe online.

To help get under 16s ready for the social media minimum age requirements, you can go to the eSafety website to learn more about the social media age restrictions and find tips on how to talk about social media age restrictions with young people.

What the change means for our school.

At our school, most age-restricted social media platforms are blocked for student use on the school network. Our school allows student access to YouTube in a logged-out state. However, this access is restricted so mature content cannot be viewed.

To keep up to date about the new social media age restrictions, visit the eSafety website and subscribe to their newsletter.

warm regards,

Carolyn.

School banking details.

Westpac.

Bendigo Violet Street Primary

BSB: 033-688

Account number: 93-1292

Payment reference: use your surname and fees.

SWPBS

Respect, responsibility and kindness