From the Principal 

Dear Families,

Mother’s Day: Not only do I hope the mums, Grandmothers, Aunties, step mums and those who sometimes are more of a mum to you - had a great day, I hope you loved the presents your children made in Art. Andrea, Amanda and Donna have done a great job in teaching the kids and with the help of Kath Wade, managed to get these beautiful gifts ready for last weekend. Thanks so much team and I do hope you all enjoyed a great weekend. 

Curriculum Day: Last Friday Michael Minas challenged staff and had us out of our comfort zones and in the learning pit! He was great!

He discussed student engagement elements such as “Operative” (working hard) and 

“Affective” (feeling good) - students see how activities will be useful to their lives outside the classroom. The other elements include cognitive challenges (thinking hard) where tasks provide cognitive challenge for all students, no matter their ability. 

Michael posed this statement to staff:

“I believe it is an important part of learning to allow students to engage in productive struggle, thus allowing them space to figure things out for themselves.” It made me reflect as a parent too, do I give my own kids no struggle time and just get it done as we are busy? Do I allow productive struggle time and do I recognise if it is destructive struggle time? I’ll reflect on that and encourage you all to do the same. 

Michael talked about anxiety in learning. I wonder how many times we as parents have said “I wasn’t very good at ... either” 

Again, it made me think what do we do as parents and as teachers when our kids experience some anxiety and being uncomfortable in their learning? I encourage you as parents to reflect on what you do personally to manage your own uncomfortableness when your employer asks you to do something that is way out of your own comfort zone! Talk to your kids about it! More information from Ann Miller (math's learning specialist) in this edition of the newsletter.

In other news...

Change: the only constant thing in education is change! Some good, some unavoidable and sometimes some not so good. 

In our case I choose to look at a few changes as a positive. Ryan Baltetsch has been appointed to an Acting Assistant Principal role at Mirripoa Primary School and will begin there next term for 6 months. We will have Jo Chapman take over Ryan’s class for the remainder of the year. I know our community will congratulate Ryan and welcome Jo.

Jessie Clarke (Year 3) will be having another addition to her family soon and Liz Charles will take over Jessie’s role for the remainder of the year. 

Lauren Baker will be enjoying some well deserved long service leave in Term 3 and Sebastian Earle will join us for the term full time and come on camp too. Seb has done some great work around the school, especially in Year 6 and has a great relationship with the kids and staff. 

I’d love to say that’s all but no doubt we will have more and I’ll do my best to let you all know with various plans when we have them in place. 

Bike Ed: Last Thursday I popped out to watch the Year 4’s at Bike Ed. What a great program and great bunch of kids. Well done to all the staff involved too. Thanks so much for keeping the kids safe by explicitly teaching bike safety etc. Now we ask families to enhance their learning by helping the kids when out on the roads and streets to make good decisions as their spatial awareness and peripheral vision develops. 

Soup club: Thanks to Baker’s Delight (Kingston) for their generous support of our teachers on a Thursday. We have a soup club for staff and Anthony and Belinda Fisher have kindly donated rolls and bread for us to enjoy. Thanks so much!!! It filled the tummy nicely! 

Communication: I believe the key to high performing organisations is communication. I want to remind all families that there are so many ways we communicate outwardly to you and how you can communicate with us. 

• face to face
• Message teachers via Seesaw
• Use student diaries (not all year levels)
• Email the school and it will be directed to the staff member
• Phone calls
• Newsletters (weekly to the whole school)
• Class/Year level newsletters (start of term)
• Sentral (reports, book parent teacher meetings, see attendance data, etc)
• And did I mention face to face conversations???

Day camp: What a great day and evening our Year 2’s had on Monday. Our first ever Day Camp to begin their camping experience. So

much fun and excitement was evident when Kristy and I visited. The rain did not deter the kids and what a great way to capitalise on many of the SEL components. Many friendships would have been solidified and new ones formed. Thanks to the Year 2 team for organising and to families for collecting your child. 

NAPLAN: Years 3 & 5 are underway with the National testing program. The staff have helped the students prepare for literacy and numeracy testing and this is a snapshot of time in your child’s education. It’s really important to remember that while these areas are important for life, it didn’t test the physical

ability, the science ability, the art ability and a whole range of other abilities. We have so many talented students and we endeavour to develop the whole child. Please keep this in mind when your child’s results come back. 

NAPLAN continues this week and into next week. Eat healthy, rest well and do your best kids! 

Have a great week everyone. 

Scott McCumber

Principal