Principal's Report

Nihongo Sports Night

What a fabulous night we had on 10 March. We had a perfect night in terms of temperature and it was lovely to catch up with so many parents. Our students had a great time with all the different sports activities and Year 6 Leaders did an excellent job of leading, scoring and hosting the night. Thank you to Watashi Mo for selling icy poles during the night and to our parents and ex-students for running in the traditional relay race. It was an excellent community event. Congratulations to the red team for their overall win!

Curriculum Day

Planning for the School Review

On 6 March, staff participated in our curriculum day preparing for our school review. Staff looked at a range of data sets over the 2017-19 period, including Student Attitudes to School Survey, Parent Opinion Survey, Staff Opinion Survey, NAPLAN and Victorian Curriculum achievement data. They looked for trends, brainstormed enablers and barriers of achievement and discussed the highlights of Huntingdale PS over the last four years.

The information recorded on this day, as well as the feedback from the parent and student surveys help to form our Pre-Review Self-Evaluation (PRSE).

Our school review will occur in Term 2 and I have a planning meeting this term with our school reviewer.

If you have any questions about the review or would like to see the results of the student or parent survey, please contact the school.

Cultural Diversity Week

This week is Cultural Diversity Week. To ‘kick off’ the week, on Monday, students heard an aboriginal story teller. They learnt the meaning of different aboriginal symbols and how they relate to their dreamtime stories.

To continue the celebration, tomorrow students are encouraged to wear orange or their cultural dress and bring a gold coin donation to go towards the bushfire fund. The Student Leadership Council worked together to decide this. Unfortunately the parade has been cancelled. However, students will do a cultural based activity with their buddy grade.

Cultural Diversity Week is an important event on the Huntingdale PS calendar. With over 30 cultures represented at Huntingdale, we have a rich and culturally vibrant community. We encourage all of our families to celebrate the week!

Coronavirus

Thank you to the whole Huntingdale school community for your patience and understanding in the ever-changing landscape caused by the coronavirus outbreak. Overall, teachers, students and parents have remained calm and for the most part it has been learning as normal at school, with the exception of the cancellation or postponement of excursions and big school events. I am hoping to rescedule Camp Rumbug for later in the year and will keep you informed. I will keep the community informed of any changes of policy and direction from the Department of Education (who take advice from the Chief Medical Officer). I want to emphasise that we have NOT been advised of public schools closures at Huntingdale so far (Wed 18 March, 11am).

Notification of absences

Just a reminder to parents to communicate through FlexiBuzz of any student absences, not through See Saw.

Have a lovely fortnight

Ruth Biddle

Assistant Principal’s Report

End of Term 1 is fast approaching. Our Grade 6 leaders are getting confident standing up in front of the school community, trying hard to be a good role model and looking after the new Foundation students well.

This week we are celebrating Cultural Diversity week. Tomorrow, 19 March, everyone is encouraged to wear their cultural clothes or something orange.

School Fun Run

This year we’re holding the School Fun Run’s Crazy Colour Day as one of our major fundraising event! The event will need to be postponed to later in the year. We are hoping to raise $5000 or more which will pay for our Cultural Garden behind the hall and to develop the area around our new oval.

New Taiko Club Members

Congratulations to the following students who have been chosen to be part of the Taiko Club to represent Huntingdale Primary School. We appreciate the efforts of everyone who attended the audition for the Taiko Club and it was a close selection in the end.

Anastasia 34P

Leila 34P

Hanna 34T

Zeke 34T

Bianca 34W

Foundation and Year 1 Parent Japanese Classes

Foundation and Year 1 teachers Hisae Hatigan and Moe Osugi implemented a successful parent education session in which they explained how our bilingual program works and also some basic Japanese phrases. Our parents got to experience some of the activities, games and phrases our students use at school. It was a well attended session Unfortunately our next session on Thursday 19th March has been cancelled. Thank you Hatigan sensei and Osugi sensei for running these sessions. Thank you, Mr Thomas and Ms Wakana Karchnak for looking after the little ones.

Community Cultural Festival

South Oakleigh College Cultural Festival on 20th March has been cancelled. Thank you very much for the many submissions of art items for the competition. Children’s artwork will be posted on the school’s website.

Lunch Time Sessions

We have variety of lunchtime clubs throughout the week:

Mondays -Chess Club in 5/6M with Mr Pete Magart

-Organised Sports activities with Mr Herskope

Tuesdays - Chess Club in 5/6M with Mr Pete Magart

Wednesdays -Organised Sports activities with Mr Brett Herskope

Thursdays -Senior Choir (Grade4-6) with Mrs Tomoko Smith

Friday s -Junior Bilingual Choir (F-Grade 3) with Mrs Annika Matchan and Ms Moe Osugi

-Lego Club in Foundation T by with Dan Thomas

Students are welcome to attend these activities during lunch time.

School Uniform

During my stints on yard duty I have been reminding students about wearing school uniform, school hat and school bag. Students who have been wearing items that are not school colours have been asked to remove them and not wear them at school. On the whole, students’ uniform has been looking very good, with most students wearing school colours with pride.

We understand that from time to time children may not be in school uniform. If this happens, please write a note in your child’s diary explaining this.

Student Support

One of my main roles in the school is to coordinate the student support services in the school: academic, social and behaviour services. This includes programs we offer ‘in house’ as well as external services provided by the Department of Education and other external agencies.

Generally the process happens in the following way:

A teacher may have a concern with your child and will discuss it with you or you as a parent may have concerns about your child which you discuss with the teacher.
These concerns are then usually discussed with me so a decision can be made on which service can be accessed and is the most appropriate for your child. Permission forms are then signed.
Contact is made with the service provider who will then discuss the referral with parents and/or the teacher.
A decision will be made on what sort of support the child will need. This could be an assessment, therapy, home program, referral to another agency or in school support.

This process is confidential with only the key stakeholders - myself, the classroom teacher/s and service providers.

Often parent will show concerns about other children in the school. We as a school cannot discuss the educational, academic or social circumstances of other children who are not your own or detail support services they may be accessing. This is confidential. Please be rest assured that all efforts are made to support students in the school as much as possible.

Better Place Australia

Better Place Australia offers the counselling service in partnership with our school. Flyers and further information can be found at the school office. If you have any questions about this service please come and see me.

Medical Alerts

Some students at our school have health plans and medical alerts. The school needs to have up to date and correct information about your child’s health needs so we can plan and act accordingly for a range of school activities. It is the parent’s responsibility to:

Provide up to date health/medical plans to the school about your child
Replace expired medication such as epipens and asthma medication
Ensure that if you child needs to take medication at school you sign a permission at the school office
Alert the school if your child’s health needs change

We thank everyone for their cooperation with this.

Have a lovely fortnight

Naomi Mori-Hanazono

Assistant Principal