Principal's Message

School Philosophy

Orchard Grove Primary School is committed to providing a safe, nurturing environment that engages curiosity, promotes learning, personal growth and wellbeing for all students. We strive to develop adaptability and resilience so students can become valued members of the local and global communities and be prepared for future life experiences.

From the Principal

Hi everyone,

Well, the sun is shining and, as I look out my window, I can see blue sky and it definitely makes me feel better. Now what we need is some warmer weather and reduced restrictions. My crystal ball is not working that well at the moment, but my personal prediction regarding school return is that we would be looking at around Week Two or Three of next term, and it will most likely be a staggered start as before with the students from Foundation to Year Two returning first. It will be interesting to see if the Premier announces anything to do with schools on Sunday, however, once again, my belief is that it would be seen as too early to say anything about a school return.

Last night, we had our inaugural 'Meet the Principal' session on Zoom for our new Foundation parents for 2021. We had over 60 attend, which was terrific, and ran it as a Q&A session. The School Virtual Tour has been well received and, as we had hoped, is giving parents a general insight into life at OGPS and about our philosophy and culture. We plan to do some Zoom information sessions with our Foundation Team for our new parents; it is most unlikely that parents will be able to come onsite for our usual Story Time information sessions about the school and the Foundation program, and it is important to have this type of orientation to school life for new families.

Today I had a great time visiting online with the Year Two children and staff, as they had their 'Cooking With Billie' session. The children baked chocolate chip cookies and Billie walked them through the whole process like a professional. It was absolutely gorgeous. Mr Keen seemed to have an amazing production line going and I think that Isabelle made the most at 51 cookies. I did try to convince them to share with me, but we all decided that Australia Post would be too slow to get them to me on time. Such a shame, as my celery certainly didn't cut it this morning against the lure of a chocolate chip cookie.

We are getting so excited about the online junior school disco tomorrow. It starts at 1pm and I hope the children get dressed up and have a great time dancing to the special disco music just for OGPS.  If you can connect to your TV, that is probably the best way to view it. I look forward to hearing all the feedback in the children's Meet with their teacher following the disco. More details are available on the Performing Arts News page in the newsletter.

We are continuing to try and take advantage of the children not being onsite at the moment and getting some work done around the school in this COVID-19 environment.   When we are allowed to, we will be levelling out the area in front of the school and reseeding this patch, to take advantage of the spring rain and limited foot traffic. This is something we have wanted to do for years but, of course, under normal conditions, we would only be able to do this in the summer holidays when it is too hot.  So COVID-19 restrictions will allow us to get a head start and hopefully get the new grass to shoot and be established before summer.

We have also had a few water leaks around the school due to our aging pipes and, while the children have been away, they have become more noticeable.  We have leak detectors working at the school today to identify the cracked pipes so we can fix them. We work hard to save water at OGPS; our toilets are flushed by tank water collected from our roof, so to fix old leaking pipes will hopefully help us to be more sustainable and assist keeping down the cost of our water bill.

You will have received the Compass notification regarding the three-way conference online catch-up with your child's teacher on Thursday 17th September. This will give you an opportunity to check-in as to how your child is going in the remote learning space, and with their academic progress more generally.  We believe it is very important to keep the lines of communication as open as possible between home and school, particularly while in this time of remote learning. Online bookings for the conference will be done the same way as usual.

Well, everyone, that's all from me for this week.  Let's hope for a solid plan on Sunday from our Premier as we work towards a level of 'normal' that many of us are desperate to have.

Take care. Thanks again for your continued support, and feel free to reach out if we can assist you.

Take care everyone and stay safe.

Glenda Harry

Principal