Thank you

Thank you to all in our community for their support with the unexpected Circuit Breaker lockdown and school being closed.

Well done on how well you managed the three days of remote learning this week.

Thank you to our staff who quickly put together learning activities for our students.

It was wonderful to have everyone back on site today, to be greeted with smiles and 'good mornings' from everyone, started us off well.

Get to know you conversations

Thank you to the parents who were able to take calls from teachers yesterday. We know it was short notice and if you did not have your conversation yesterday, your child's teacher will call you back at some point soon.

We appreciate you taking the time to share your knowledge about your child with us, to hear from parents what their child loves to do and the important things we should know about them sets us up to develop excellent relationships with child this year.

Understanding each child's social, emotional and medical needs also makes sure we cater for them effectively.

As parents you have a valuable insight into how your child coped during remote learning and what their ongoing needs may be.

Rights and Responsibilities

At Boroondara Park PS we have set Rights and Responsibilities that we all follow. Each year these are revisited as part of our Start Up program. These are on display in all classrooms and learning spaces.

The Rights and Responsibilities are our starting point for all conversations around behaviour and our expectations of each other at BPPS

Tutor Learning Program

The 2020 school year was an extraordinary and challenging one for every school community. Many Victorian students spent much learning remotely and Victorian schools and their communities made an exceptional effort to provide continuity of teaching and learning to our students during this time.

We know that the remote learning experience was different for every student. While some students thrived, some students may not have engaged as fully with remote learning.

For most of our students, regular high-quality teaching in 2021 will be enough to help them progress to the expected level of learning. Some students will benefit from additional intensive learning support in 2021.

In response to this, the Victorian Government has established the Tutor Learning Initiative to enable schools to engage tutor teachers in 2021 to support students who need extra assistance with their learning due to being impacted by remote learning. The guidelines provided note the program is for students who have not made the growth expected due to COVID and remote learning.

The Tutor Learning Initiative enables schools across Victoria to engage qualified teachers as tutors to work with small groups of students and support their learning. The initiative is consistent with Australian and international evidence, which shows that small group tutoring is one of the most effective educational interventions available to support students to progress in their learning. By engaging additional teachers to support children with intensive learning, classroom teachers will have greater capacity to ensure that all other students’ achievement, engagement and wellbeing needs are met, so that all students receive the support they need in 2021.

Boroondara Park has employed two tutors. Andrew Eddy will be working with students in the area of mathematics (number) and Karin Tsiandikos-Huf will be working with students in the area of reading. In Term 1 they will be working with students in Year 1/2. As the program has needed time to set up, their work with Year 1/2 students may continue into next term. They will be working throughout the year with Year 3-6 students based around the needs of students.

Andrew and Karin, in consultation with Shannon Reeve, have been analysing the schools data to identify students in Year 1/2 who may benefit from the small group tutoring support. This is based on achievement data and other measures of learning, which indicate that expected learning progress may have been impacted by remote and flexible learning due to COVID-19 in 2020.

They are now working with the students regular classroom teachers to minimise disruptions, ensure the program complements the regular curriculum and supports the lessons taking place in the classroom. They will support students in a small group setting by working with them directly in class.

This will be the same process for Year 3/4 and Year 5/6 students.

If your Year 1/2 child has been identified as suitable for the program you will receive a letter advising you of this. Letters related to Year 3-6 students will come later this year.

School Council Elections

You will have received a Sentral message this week informing you that the following parents had submitted a nomination form to be a member of School Council prior to the close of nominations. As there were only three nominations for the four positions the following parents are duly elected to School Council.

Greg Campbell
Sareena Sahab
Lisa DiCenso

A further call for nominations was sent to all in the community, these nominations close at the end of Thursday February 18th.

Class Directories and Class Reps for 2021

Don't forget to fill in the Class Directory form - you can find the link on the Class Rep page of this newsletter.

Assemblies and other whole school events

We were all disappointed to not be able to have parents at our assembly today. We are working on plans for our Year 6 Leadership Assembly so stay tuned, we hope to work out a way to have parents attend.

We are keeping a careful eye on all restrictions and changes, when anything is altered we will let you know.

Susanne Lowe

Principal

Diary Dates

Term 1, 2021

Term 2, 2021

Term 3, 2021