Principal News 31/10/2025

Dear Banyan Fields Primary School Community,

We are thriving at Banyan Fields! It’s been another couple of exciting weeks filled with energy, teamwork, and plenty of smiles. The highlight for many was definitely the sliming of the Principal — a well-deserved (and very messy!) celebration of our students' fantastic fundraising efforts. Their enthusiasm, collaboration, and commitment to supporting a great cause have been amazing to see.

The fun isn’t over yet — our fundraising efforts are continuing, and there’s still more sliming to come! We can’t wait to see which lucky staff members will be next as our students keep working together to reach their next milestone.

Tenacity: We try, we learn, we never give up.

Every Day Counts

At Banyan Fields, we know that every day at school matters. Regular attendance helps students stay connected to their learning, build strong friendships, and develop the confidence they need to succeed.

Even small absences add up — missing just 10 extra days of school in a year can reduce a student’s chance of achieving key grades by around 50%. That’s why it’s so important for students to be at school every day, on time, unless they are unwell.

Together, we can make sure every student has the best opportunity to learn, grow, and thrive — because at Banyan Fields, every day counts!

Annual Implementation Plan (AIP)

The school improvement team are currently in the review stage of our AIP for 2025. We have identified a long list of successes and achievements from the year. In summary, we have reflected that:

Our school values (Tenacity, Equity, Synergy and Stewardship) and mascot (TESS) are now embedded amongst the students and staff.
Students have responded excellently to our schoolwide token economy, Class Dojo, with points being given to students who are observed demonstrating our school values.
Staff have been engaging in professional learning on positive classroom management strategies and our behaviour support continuum has been streamlined and provides greater clarity for the students and staff.
Our multi-tiered system of support is developing, with more tailored adjustments and supports now in place for our students.
Our attendance roadmap was revised to ensure student attendance is at the forefront of our conversations. High school attendance rates make a significant difference to the lifelong experiences of our students.
Our schoolwide planning documentation has been revised and streamlined.

As a result of this work, we have seen that:

Our students are becoming more able to articulate their understanding of the school values
Students who are working hard to demonstrate our school values are being noticed and celebrated for their contribution to our community
Classrooms are calm and engaging spaces, where students are excited to learn
Staff are reporting higher than average endorsement of our instructional leadership
The positive endorsement of our students continues to improve, particularly in relation to stimulated learning and emotional awareness
Students report a greater level of voice and agency in the school and this is demonstrated by their regular visits to the office with persuasive letters, outlining how we can further improve.

Term 4 Professional Learning Community (PLC)

We’re learning how to help our students learn even better!

This week, our PLC teams have been deepening their understanding of how the brain learns — particularly the roles of working memory and long-term memory in the learning process. We explored how attention and focus play a key part in helping students transfer new information into long-term understanding.

Through this learning, we’re identifying classroom strategies that strengthen recall, build stronger learning habits, and make sure students are not just learning for the moment, but retaining knowledge for the future.

School Spirit Day

Synergy: We listen, we learn, we grow together.

Australian Teachers’ Day – October 31

This Thursday, October 31, we celebrate Australian Teachers’ Day — a special opportunity to recognise the incredible dedication and impact of our teachers and school staff. The theme, “Hats Off to Teachers,” reminds us to pause and thank those who inspire learning, nurture curiosity, and make a difference every single day.

Students and education support staff are already preparing ways to mark the occasion, and we encourage families to join in by sharing a simple note, card, or message of appreciation. A small gesture of gratitude can mean so much to the people who bring their best selves to school every day.

Parent Association

The Parent Association met for the first time this week and drafted a constitution for approval by the Department of Education. Once approved, our aim will be to improve engagement opportunities for the families at Banyan Fields. Watch this space for more information.

Social Media

You may have noticed an increased social media presence by Banyan Fields Primary School over the past few weeks as we attempt to further engage families. Please follow us on Facebook and Instagram and support our work by liking, sharing and commenting on our posts. Together we thrive!

2026

Teachers are deep into their discussions in relation to our 2026 classes, attempting to find the perfect balance between personalities, abilities, preferences and talents. The teams consider all of the information they have on each student and make tweaks and changes over the course of Term 4 in order to come up with the best possible groupings on time for our transition day on December 9th. We are grateful to families for all the trust and support with this process. This is an important opportunity for our children to build the tenacity and synergy involved in re-igniting old relationships, negotiating past conflicts and working with a different set of learners.

If your child is transitioning to a different school in 2026, please contact the office as soon as possible. We have had a large number of enrolment enquiries recently so will be carefully monitoring our class sizes and structure over the coming weeks.

We are also working on exciting changes to our program in 2026 which may include Wednesday morning ‘Shake and Wake’ activities, more lunchtime clubs, and extension programs in literacy, numeracy and specialist subjects. All of these improvements are designed

to give every student at Banyan Fields an opportunity to thrive. We will provide more information later in the term.

Equity: We include, we respect, we support.

Melbourne Cup Public Holiday

A reminder that Tuesday, 4th of November, is a public holiday for the Melbourne Cup.

If you know your child will not be attending school on Monday (3rd of November), please let their classroom teacher know. This helps us with planning and supervision for the day.

Smith Family Learning for Life Program

The Learning for Life program works in partnership with families to support their children’s education and increase their chances of success at school. The program supports children’s education from primary to post-school studies, like TAFE or university. Jacqui Sampson worked with over 30 families in Semester 1 and now the Smith Family are ready to establish partnerships with more families. If you are interested in hearing more, please use this link to express an interest. The form asks for information on your healthcare card. If you do not have a healthcare card, please tick ‘Yes’ and include December 31st as the expiry date. The team at the Smith Family are keen to work with you regardless. If you have any problem with the form, please visit the school office for a hard copy that we can send to the Smith Family on your behalf.

Stewardship: We care for people, places, and possibilities.

Gardening Club

The team at Banyan Fields are constantly looking for ways in which we can improve the experiences of our students at school. We are working on establishing a gardening club this term, whose role it will be to uplift our school grounds. Mr. Halpin and Brad will meet students every Monday at recess outside the Foundation building. If any parents or other family members are available to help on Mondays between 11 and 11:30am, please contact the school office.

Policy Update

The Department of Education has recently updated their guidelines around school uniforms. Whilst this change did not impact us at Banyan Fields, we have taken the opportunity to review our Student Dress Code Policy. We welcome your feedback on our revised policy, which can be accessed on our school website.

Link to our School Policies

Patrick Halpin - Principal

Jennifer Churcher - Assistant Principal

Sharleen Nason - Assistant Principal

Celebrating our learning

Foundation

Grade 1

Grade 2

Art

Stem

Physical Education