From the Principal
It’s hard to believe that, at the end of the week, a month of school has already flown by.
School routines have been established, with the first three weeks of school seeing classes focus on developing relationships and the students establishing the conditions they want to see in their classrooms to promote a positive and productive learning environment. This week, we’ve seen students setting personal learning goals and diving into their new units of inquiry.
YEAR 6 LEADERSHIP TEAMS AND CAPTAINS
Dr Katie Allen, (Member for Higgins) attended our assembly on Monday and spoke to the students about the qualities of leadership. She emphasised that every student has the capacity to be a leader, whether they are wearing a badge or not. She explained that leaders demonstrate a positive attitude, embrace failure and use those opportunities to grow; they have a desire to learn and show responsibility. Even the little ones in the audience were captivated and nodding their heads in agreement. Maybe we have future politicians in our midst.
Dr Allen’s talk was the perfect prelude to the presentations of our new 2022 captains.
At our school, all year 6 students are involved in leadership teams, which are organised and run by the captains. Each team is responsible for various aspects of the school. Students decide which team they are most passionate about and then decide who is best suited to lead that team and drive action.
We congratulate our 2022 leadership team captains. The newly appointed captains and brief description of the teams are below.
Media Team Captains:
Rowen P and Brigitte S. This team is responsible for promoting the school by writing articles, taking and posting photographs and making the various activities our students engage in more visible.
Global Citizenship Team Captains:
Xavier D and Darcy L. Responsible for coordinating activities across the year, to acknowledge global citizenship, including Harmony Day and cultural celebrations, in addition to observing important Australian historical events such as Anzac and Remembrance Day.
The Arts Team Captains:
Sylvie S and Emma T. This team is responsible for providing students with opportunities to participate in, and develop, both the visual and performing arts.
Environmental Team Captains:
Sairam K and Rishan B. Responsible for promoting sustainability practices and responsible action toward the environment. This team will support Year 3 leaders to integrate their SAKG learning into every day practices eg (composting).
Sport and Wellbeing Team: this includes our house captains who lead the school in an array of sporting events across the school calendar and who run lunchtime activities to promote mindfulness and physical activity.
Congratulations to House Captains who recently displayed their ability to promote sportspersonship and encourage team spirit at our swimming carnival.
Red House- Dion K and Amalia Z
Gold House- Allegra D and Charlie J
Green House – Lillia G and Chiara R
Blue House – Hayden K and Lucas C-S
PREP PARENTS WELCOME EVENING
Last Friday, the Year 1 class reps hosted a welcome evening for the new Prep parents and what a brilliant turnout it was, with over 80 parents in attendance.
The Prep parents welcome evening is a wonderful way to meet other families and start feeling connected to our school community.
The evening would not have been the success it was without the organisation, time and effort given by the wonderful year 1 Reps - Megan H, Claire, Lanie, eleni, Lauren , Sophie and Megan.
SCHOOL PICNIC- Thursday 5:30 – 7:30pm
One of our favourite social activities in the school calendar is this week; our annual school picnic. It is a very casual occasion where families bring along a picnic dinner and enjoy meeting new friends and old. No doubt, the students will think a highlight is the ice cream truck selling jam donuts and ice cream, but we also have the staff from Soccerwise and TheirCare running informal games for the children.
As a special treat, at around 6:15pm, our year 6 students will be ‘on stage’ with an item they’ve been creating in their performing arts classes.
We hope you are able to come along and enjoy some social time at the picnic.
BUILDING STAMINA
The past two years has taken an enormous amount of energy from each individual, as we bounced between lockdowns and adapted to the constantly changing conditions.
Tiredness causes a decrease in self regulation and we are seeing this in the way some of our students are behaving toward each other in the yard.
Our focus over the past few weeks has been on re-teaching students how to monitor and respond to their own emotions, how to work cooperatively and how to respectfully let another student know when they are doing or saying something that is not respectful.
It has been incredibly pleasing to note that restorative chats with students who have experienced some difficulty in the yard have been reflective, with students being open to understanding the impact their behaviour has had on others. The best learning occurs when students take responsibility for their actions and are open to putting self-regulation strategies taught in the classroom into practice in the yard.
Having said the above, it has been most heartening to see those who love being at school even more enthusiastic, and their positivity rubbing off on their friends. Students have participated actively in the wellbeing programs already introduced and are keen to get started in their roles. For example, the Year 5’s have undertaken their training in ‘Peer Mediation’ and the Year 6 leadership teams are excited to start running their lunch time activities.
Our focus on wellbeing is vital to overall health, not to mention, increasing the ability to concentrate within the classroom.
‘Wellbeing is linked to improved academic achievement, enhanced mental health and responsible life choices.’ (https://studentwellbeinghub.edu.au/educators/about-wellbeing)
MOBILE PHONE POLICY (and personal devices)
Our students are exceptionally principled (learner profile). They have a strong desire to be responsible and follow the rules, including when it comes to the use of technology. Students are reminded to turn off the notifications on their ipads, phones and smart watches. It is now equally important that parents contact the office to have a message passed on, rather than texting or phoning the child during the school day.
The Acceptable Use of ICT Agreement outlines the actions the school takes to ensure we teach our students to use technologies ethically and how we manage the times when errors occur. The majority of ICT agreements have now been returned, but we ask families to raise discussions at home and, through Compass, sign the agreements.
SCHOOL CARNIVAL
Save the date: our school carnival is on Saturday 20 August and this is an event not to be missed.
Preliminary plans are underway and the social and fundraising ‘Carnival’ team have developed a calendar of activities to get the ball rolling.
Sponsorship
Carnivals are always expensive to run so we are now seeking sponsorship.
We are hoping that the families who are in a position to make a $1,000 donation, can contact us to discuss the sponsorship package.
We may also have families who work for companies who may be able to provide some financial support.
If you are one of these people, please email Jonathan at jdoncovio@gmail.com or call 0412 882 596 to discuss the promotional packages available for organisations that support the event.
Chellee Plumb