FINAL NEWSLETTER

Welcome to the final newsletter for Term One, 2020.

This has been an interesting end to the term, to say the least, but I hope everyone can stay positive and reflect on everything we can be grateful for.

I am grateful for being able to be principal of such a wonderful school with amazing students. I am also grateful for the resilience of our staff, who have taken on lots of challenges and new learning at great speed and with such positivity.

We should also reflect on the term when there are so many wonderful things to acknowledge and celebrate such as:

The Prep children commencing school so confidently
The whole school dance and fitness sessions
Students focussing on their own goals and learning intentions
Our student leaders and classes running assemblies.

The list goes on.

HOME LEARNING

In these unusual times, we also want to discuss what home learning may look like.

At the moment, it is like any other school holiday period, but staff have put activities and work guidelines on our school website for each year level for last week and this week.

You are free to look at these with your children and this is a great opportunity to set up a time when children can focus on some of these tasks as you choose.

Please remember though, that this work will not be collected or assessed by staff, so please do not send this work to staff or email and ask for more.

We are currently working on new lessons and how we can best engage with students when home learning begins on Wednesday April 15.

During the home learning time, we also think this is a great opportunity for parents to get back to basics with their children’s learning and to concentrate on areas such as, handwriting, times tables, even learning to tie shoelaces!

We know we have a number of online formats that we are going to use, but it would be great if students came back all knowing the correct starting point and direction for each letter of the alphabet, knowing how to write their names in the correct format, first and last. Not all learning needs to be online.

There is a lot of research to show that students with a good grasp of handwriting also have strong reading and spelling results.

https://www.neeuro.com/eight-reasons-handwriting-essential-brain-exercise/

https://www.understood.org/en/community-events/blogs/expert-corner/2018/09/24/the-unexpected-connection-between-handwriting-and-learning-to-read

Teachers at Murrumbeena still teach handwriting, however it is often difficult to focus on each child one on one.

So here is your opportunity, as a parent, to work in partnership with us and teach some basic skills that will all make a great difference.

Imagine how proud the teachers will feel if students can post a photo of their beautiful handwriting.

Thanks to all our families, students and staff for a wonderful term 1 and we look forward to whatever term 2 may bring, with new learning styles, new technology and lots of activities.

Please all look after each other, be kind and I look forward to when we are all together again at MPS.

Lynne Foster

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