Principal's Report 

Dear families and friends of MPW,

Welcome back to Term 4, I hope you had an enjoyable school holiday period with your families. There are some exciting events coming up this term for all year levels. We conclude our camping program with the F/1 activity night and teams have some exciting excursions and incursions planned including trips to the zoo, the city, the Botanical Gardens and CERES. We also have our 3/4 and 5/6 swimming program coming up in a few weeks, this is a great opportunity for our students to strengthen their swimming ability. Our teaching teams are also looking into opportunities to invite parents into the classroom this term to celebrate and see the learning that is occurring. Teams will be in touch with dates and times for these opportunities.

I would like to acknowledge the work of our classroom parent representatives and parent helpers throughout the year, for excursions, camps, sporting events, fundraising activities, in the classroom and in general support of the school. These events and activities are able to run because of parent support, and also provides an opportunity for parents to be part of the learning and activities as well. There will be more opportunities to help out with the planned activities for this term, teams will reach out when finalising arrangements for these days.

You may have noticed that the second, larger storage container has arrived onsite to support storage of the emptying of the Hall and Library buildings. The bulk of the emptying has been taking place over the last couple of weeks, we are aiming to be fully empty in the coming fortnight in preparation for the upcoming works to commence this term.  To ensure safety of all, we ask members of the community to keep clear of the storage containers. Please contact the school if a personal belonging gets stuck on top of these so we can retrieve it for you.

We are hoping to provide a significant update on the Capital Works once we have confirmation and finalised details from the Victorian School Building Authority.

A heads up that Camp Australia will be running their January school holiday program at Ascot Vale West Primary School at the beginning of next year, as we undergo some building works to the gym and surrounding play spaces over the school break.

2024 Transition Programs

Last term we began our Kinder transition processes by conducting some kinder visits to our future foundation students. Our Kinder to school transition program will run onsite starting Friday 13th of October over a four-week period. The program will allow for our new parents to come onsite for information sessions focusing on Literacy and Numeracy, while the future foundation children will have time to get a feel for the school, meet and work with some of our teachers.

The statewide transition day is on Tuesday 12th December. This day is where all students (including incoming foundation students) will meet their teacher and class for 2024 and our Year 6 students attend their secondary school. For parents of our Year 6 students, we are waiting for information from the secondary schools about upcoming transition opportunities. At times the schools will contact families directly with this information.

Leaving MPW in 2024?

We continue planning towards the 2024 school year, a reminder that if you are planning on your child(ren) not being at Moonee Ponds West next year that you please complete the form below and return to the office or to moonee.ponds.west.ps@education.vic.gov.au

This information will help the school to confirm enrolment numbers for next year. 

If you are not returning, I offer thanks to the student(s) and family for their contributions and partnership with our school. We wish all the best for those moving on to a new setting in their future learning journey.

Year 6 Graduation

The date for our Year 6 Graduation has been pencilled in for Friday 15th December, held onsite in the school gym. The 5/6 teachers will begin organising this event over the coming weeks and provide details to families when full arrangements have been decided. 

Semester 2 Reporting

As we move into a Report Writing Term, I wanted to provide an update on the reporting review that has occurred this year with staff and parents through the Education Sub-committee. We have taken onboard the feedback provided and have made some adjustments for this Semester’s reporting, in particular the formal Semester Report is to include more specific comments about student achievement and future learning needs.

In summary, the key changes to reporting are:

• A literacy and a numeracy Ongoing Reporting task in Terms 3 and 4
• Specialist Ongoing reporting task in Term 3
• End of Term Progress Reports (behaviour and effort) continue each term.
• The formal Semester Report will now have: 2-3 dot points of specific learning achievement commentary and 1-2 dot points of next steps for learning for Reading, Writing and Number; a general comment that covers personal, social, and overall learning dispositions for the semester; an Inquiry comment covering learning and achievement for Terms 3 and 4 Inquiry units; Specialist areas will include an overview of the units covered, 2-3 comments of achievement in Semester 2.

In the weeks leading into the Semester Reports being published, to support families in getting the most out of the report itself, we will be providing some clear documentation and a video that will explain the reporting elements, how to read the different components included in the report and how to access these on Compass.

We are hoping that these adjustments will provide families with a more meaningful Semester Report. 

Stay tuned for more information in the coming weeks. 

Upcoming Student Free Day in Term 4

A reminder that we have our final Curriculum Day for the year on Monday 6th November, which is followed by the Melbourne Cup Day public holiday on Tuesday 7th November.  On the student free day on the Monday teachers will be working on their Assessment and Reporting obligations for Semester 2.

The last day for students this term will be Wednesday 20th December, with a 1.30pm dismissal time. On the last day we will hold our final assembly for the year to conclude the year and farewell our year 6 students.

We are looking forward to an engaging and fun Term 4.

Regards,

Jarrod Sutton

Principal