Principal News 29/05/2025

Dear Banyan Fields Primary School Community,

We hope the term is going smoothly for you. There have been a lot of exciting events around the school with excursions, incursions, swimming, plans for camps coming together and investigations and explorations within the classrooms as part of our regular school program.

Foundation enrolments 2026

We are now accepting enrolments for our Foundation 2026 grade. Families who have a child already enrolled at Banyan Fields Primary School are invited to complete an enrolment form at their earliest convenience. Your support with this is appreciated as we start to plan our staffing structure and recruitment processes. The earlier we work through everything, the higher the chance we will be able to find high quality teachers and integration aides to work with our students. If you know of any families who do not have a child already enrolled but are interested in Banyan Fields, please encourage them to book in for a tour.

https://www.bfps.vic.edu.au/enrolment

Parent Focus Groups - Values

Following our school review in Term 1, the students and staff have been reviewing our school values and how they relate to the expected behaviours at school. Your child(ren) may even have spoken to you about Tenacity, Equity, Synergy and Stewardship at home and what that means for us as a community. We are hoping to finalise our new values in the coming weeks and would appreciate your input. If you are available to join us for an online session at 6pm on Monday, June 2nd or Thursday, June 5th, please use this link to register. You will receive an email on the day with the webex link we will use for the groups. We will record and share the recording of the sessions so parents/carers who cannot join us for the live session can watch back and share their feedback.

Semester One Reports – Available Monday 23 June on COMPASS

Semester One student reports will be released to parents and carers via COMPASS on Monday, 23 June. These reports provide feedback on your child’s learning progress throughout the first half of the year. Teachers have drawn on a range of formal and informal assessments and classroom learning experiences to make well-informed, balanced judgements about each student’s achievement.

Mathematics Progression Point Update

Banyan Fields Primary School is now implementing the updated Mathematics Curriculum 2.0, developed by the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA). Previously, Mathematics was reported across three strands: Number and Algebra, Measurement and Geometry, and Statistics and Probability. Under the new curriculum, student achievement is assessed and reported as a single progression point aligned to the whole Mathematics achievement standard. As this is the first report using the revised curriculum, it will indicate your child’s current level of achievement only. Once a baseline has been established, future reports will reflect growth over time.

Reporting Platform Transition and Growth Data

Our school has recently transitioned from the Sentral reporting system to Compass. Due to differences between these platforms and how data is tracked, a growth score will not be included in this semester’s report. Once consistent data tracking is established within Compass, growth data will be reintroduced in future reports.

District Cross Country Results

A big congratulations to all students who participated in the District Cross Country event yesterday. Our school achieved some fantastic results.

We’re excited to announce that five students have qualified for the next round — the Division Cross Country in Hastings, which will take place on Wednesday 4th June.

Congratulations to the following students for their outstanding efforts:

● Abby (6W) – 6th place in the 12/13 Girls

● Shayla (6R) – 8th place in the 12/13 Girls

● Charlie (4M) – 4th place in the 9/10 Boys

● Krystal (4C) – 2nd place in the 9/10 Girls

● Emma (4C) – 5th place in the 9/10 Girls

Well done to all our runners for representing the school with great determination and sportsmanship!

NAIDOC Week – Celebrating First Nations Culture

Next week, we will be recognising NAIDOC Week, a time to celebrate the history, culture, and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Throughout the week, classrooms may engage in a range of special activities to explore and honour First Nations perspectives, stories, and traditions.

We encourage families to talk with their children about what they’re learning and to continue the conversation at home.

Friday 6th June- Curriculum Day

Just a reminder that next Friday there will be a curriculum day and no students will be onsite this day. Staff will be spending the day completing Professional Learning and collaboratively working.

Inside Our School - A Peek Into PLC

Work This Fortnight's Focus: Supporting Student Success Through Classroom Routines This fortnight, we’re focusing on establishing and strengthening classroom procedures and routines. These include structured steps for everyday activities like entering the room, transitioning between tasks, or asking for help. As part of our whole-school Professional Learning Community (PLC) work, we are developing agreed school-wide routines to create consistency across all classrooms.

Why This Matters

Routines create a predictable and supportive environment that helps students feel confident, safe, and engaged. They reduce classroom disruptions, increase learning time, and build positive habits like independence and responsibility. Consistent routines, used across the school, help all students know what to expect, no matter the setting.

Our next steps:

For our next meeting we will be discussing ways to encourage and practice expected behaviours and how corrective feedback can support routine implementation.

Staffing Changes

Congratulations to Miranda Archer who was successful in her application for a position at Kananook Primary School. Miranda transferred this week and has been replaced by Claire Kyle. Claire has been working with the students in 4S this term and was expected to finish at Banyan Fields last week. The students with whom she has worked were delighted when they heard she will be just down the corridor every Thursday and Friday for the remainder of the year.

Patrick Halpin - Principal

Jacqui Sampson - Assistant Principal

Jennifer Churcher - Assistant Principal

Sharleen Nason - Assistant Principal

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