A warm welcome to our community

Welcome to our Newest Student

I have been keeping a big secret from the staff and students with the recruitment of a new student (best surprise ever!). On Monday, our students were astounded at assembly with our newest student, Chilli. Chilli is a therapy dog that will visit us each Monday. Chilli will be working his magic in classrooms spreading calmness and reducing anxiety for every student. He was a huge hit when he visited the rooms this week. The looks on the student’s faces were priceless and nearly everyone came to pat him and say hello. I actually heard some very quiet students speaking out loud …..amazing things are happening already!

Chilli is an 8 year old Male Standard Poodle. He is hypoallergenic as he does not shed. Most students with allergies to dog hair can pet and cuddle him.

Chilli meets and greets over 5,000 humans every month and is regarded to be the No. 1 Therapy and Wellbeing Dog in Australia. Therefore he will fit in beautifully with all of our amazing students.

Chilli’s handler is Luke and Luke will accompany Chilli in the classrooms. Weeden Heights PS also has two handlers in training, Charlotte and Coco and we look forward to training more of our students to support this valuable program.

There are some great photos of our classes interacting with Chilli up on our Facebook page and Instagram so make sure you take a look.

Amazing Naplan Results

Congratulations once again to all of our year 3 and 5 students who did their very best on NAPLAN this year.

These results are summarised below and you can see that Weeden Heights PS student out performs similar schools and more importantly all of our networkschools which are the schools in the local area and Whitehorse. Futures really are bright at Weeden Heights PS!

YEAR 3 % Strong and Exceeding

SUBJECT	% WHPS at Strong or Exceeding	% Similar Schools at Strong or Exceeding	% Network Schools at Strong or Exceeding
Reading	100	80	83
Writing	94	88	88
Spelling	100	72	78
Numeracy	88	79	81
Grammar and Punctuation	83	69	74

YEAR 5 % Strong and Exceeding

SUBJECT	% WHPS at Strong or Exceeding	% Similar Schools at Strong or Exceeding	% Network Schools at Strong or Exceeding
Reading	95	85	86
Writing	95	83	86
Spelling	83	78	79
Numeracy	90	81	83
Grammar and Punctuation	89	78	81

The attached document will explain some of the terms particularly 'strong' and 'exceeding'. So proud of this school and the students ...... amazing!!!!

Updates from Around the School

This week our sails in the outdoor learning space went up. They look amazing! Thanks to the contributions of our community past and present. The space is nearly ready to open up for the students to integrate into. We are awaiting beautiful wooden planter boxes to be installed at the top to create a visual barrier and these will ensure the students safety along with adding lovely plants to the space. Stay tuned!

We have also been left with an unsightly front entrance to the school. The concrete is a ‘hideous patchwork quilt’. This was already awful but adding in the fire service works that took place during the build made it worse. We will be having a concrete textured surface placed over the top. This will improve the look of the front of our school.

We are also moving forward with a new front fence and a much more welcoming front gate that will be large and allow a lot of people to walk through the gate at once. The small pedestrian gate has always been an issue for me so I am looking forward to the change.

Parent/Guardian Opinion Survey

Just a reminder that all parents were sent a link to the current Parent/Guardian survey via email. I did send out 113 surveys to families but only 3 families have completed the survey. This is your opportunity to participate in the DE survey to find out what parents/ guardians think of our wonderful school. The Parent/Guardian Opinion Survey is an annual survey offered by the Department of Education that is designed to assist schools in gaining an understanding of families’ perceptions of school climate, student behavior, and student engagement. We encourage all families to participate in this survey. Our school will use the survey results to help inform and direct future school planning and improvement strategies.

If you would like to help with completing a survey then please check your email.

Book Week

This week is Book Week! It was another chance for our school to dress up and we all had fun on Monday with the annual Book Week parade. Thanks so much to all the parents who came along to support and thanks for your assistance and input into the costumes…..they were brilliant! The week was also celebrated with a host of activities across the week within classrooms and online workshops with authors were featured. Much thanks also needs to go to Ms Crookes and the events team. A great week for our school!

Workforce Planning and 2025

Just a reminder that if your situation is changing for next year and your are moving then I would really appreciate know now as I am making plans for next year. The number of students at each year level directly impacts decisions that are being made across the school and it is very important that I actually get this right for the good of our sensational school.

Stay warm and well everyone!

Until next time……

Kylie Campbell

Super Proud Principal

PFA