Warrandyte Primary School - Alert

Principal  Message

Hello everyone,

 

Today we had a special assembly for our Anti Bullying Day and participated in activities across the school to celebrate kindness, diversity and inclusiveness.  Today also links in with Harmony week and the students will continue to complete lessons and activities next week to expand on this very important part of their learning. Being kind, knowing how to help a friend, recognising bullying and understanding they can ask for help are all part of a building a child's toolkit of strategies they can use in life.

 

I conducted a 'think aloud' reading of the book Stick and Stone by Beth Ferry. Using great picture story books to teach students messages and explore their own connections with the characters helps students to gain a deeper understanding the text and the complex themes such as bullying. I listed some books that you might be interested in earlier today via Compass.

  • The Juice Box Bully by Bob Sornson & Maria Dismondy
  • Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell
  • The Recess Queen by Alexis O’Neill
  • You, Me and Empathy by Jayneen Sanders
  • Anger Tree by John H Cary
  • Willow Finds a Way by Lana Button
  • The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes
  • Crickwing by Janell Cannon (grade 3 up)
  • My Secret Bully by Trudy Ludwig (grades 3 and up)
  • Wonder by RJ Palado (grades 4 up)
  • Dear Bully by 70 authors who tell their personal stories of bullying (Grade 5/6)

We will also be purchasing these great books with the money that was raised today for our anti bullying day.  Spreading the message through our classrooms, the teachers will use these books to explore the concepts of inclusion, kindness, friendship, conflict resolution and bullying in their Literacy lessons.

 

Next week we will have completed our display in the Foyer where all students and staff will add their friendship hand to the whole school 'pledge/friendship tree'.  They will also be decorating their own friendship rock, to be waterproofed and placed in the garden. Each child and staff member in the school will create one to add to our garden as a symbol of community, diversity and friendship. Thank you to Nikki in 3/4N who has put together the activities for the school and passionately embraced managing the Anti Bullying day.

Hopefully you have had a chance to read the letter sent via Compass yesterday about my appointment as Acting Principal at  Warrandyte Primary School.  Having worked hard with the staff over the term and seeing how much they want to do their best for our school, I am thrilled at the opportunity to be able to continue with that work.  

Next Wednesday (23rd March) is our Term 2 Planning Day. This means the the following timetable changes will occur :

All F-2 classes will have rotating Specialists classes from 9am - 12:30pm. 

All 3-6 classes will have rotating Specialists classes from 12:30pm - 3:45pm 

This change in routine can be unsettling for some students, so please have a chat with your child and with your classroom teacher if you are concerned about this.  These days are a very important part of teacher preparing for Term 2.  As the teachers look to the curriculum being followed, they first explore any assessment data to gain a clear picture of what the point of need is and then plan from there.  

 

Have a great weekend.

Take care,

Nieta