Education News 

School Photos - Thursday 31st March 

Annual school photos including sibling photos will be taken at Moonee Ponds West Primary School by Arthur Reed Photos on Thursday 31st March 2022.

There is no need to return any forms or money to school.

Unique image codes will be issued to all students on/after photo day so families can register online to view images when they become available in the web shop. 

Registration is simple, just follow the 3 simple steps on your child’s personalised flyer once you receive it and remember to add the codes for all your children attending this school.

Even if you registered last year, it’s important that you do again this year using your child’s 2022 image code to link their images for the current year with your contact details.

When images are ready to view and in the web shop, all parents who have registered will be notified by SMS and email.

Once registered, please wait for notification that 2022 images are online to view before making your purchase. 

Mathematics

Here are some problems that might start a great discussion at your house. Look out for the answers in the next newsletter.

1. Which of these is equal to 3 x 4 ?

3+4

3+3+3

4+4+4

4+4+4+4

2. Oliver is colouring the multiples of 3 on this number chart.

When he finishes, he counts all the multiples of 3 that are also even numbers.

How many numbers does he count?

Respectful Relationship Initiative

This year, Moonee Ponds West commences the mandated Respectful Relationship initiative. This term our staff have started the professional learning with the Departments’ Respectful Relationship team in order to begin the implementation the initiative in 2022.

The Respectful Relationships initiative teaches children how to build healthy relationships, resilience and confidence. It also supports school leaders, educators and our school community to promote and model respect and equality.

Below is information about the Respectful Relationship initiative from the Department of Education.

ABOUT RESPECTFUL RELATIONSHIPS

The Royal Commission into Family Violence identified the critical role that schools and early childhood education have in creating a culture of respect to change the story of family violence for future generations.

In 2016, respectful relationships education became a core component of the Victorian Curriculum from foundation to year 12, and is being taught in all government and Catholic schools and many independent schools.

Everyone in our community deserves to be respected, valued and treated equally. We know that changes in attitudes and behaviours can be achieved when positive attitudes, behaviours and equality are embedded in our education settings.

Respectful Relationships is about embedding a culture of respect and equality across our entire community, from our classrooms to staffrooms, sporting fields, fetes and social events. This approach leads to positive impacts on student’s academic outcomes, their mental health, classroom behaviour, and relationships between teachers and students.

Respectful Relationships takes a whole-school approach, recognising that schools are a place of learning, a workplace and a key part of local communities. It embeds a culture of respect and equality across our entire school community, from our classrooms to staffrooms, sporting fields, fetes and social events. 

This approach leads to positive change in students’ academic outcomes, their wellbeing, classroom behaviour, and relationships between teachers and students. We know that changes in attitudes and behaviours can be achieved when positive attitudes, behaviours and gender equality are lived across the school community. 

IN THE CLASSROOM

Respectful Relationships acknowledges that children of any age have challenges to overcome, teaching social and emotional skills appropriate to their age and level of maturity. It is being taught in all government and Catholic schools and many independent schools from Prep to Year 12, as a core component of the Victorian Curriculum. 

In the primary years, Respectful Relationships focuses on treating everyone with respect and dignity. It is taught as part of the Health and Physical Education and Personal and Social Capability areas of the Victorian Curriculum. 

The supporting Resilience, Rights & Respectful Relationships teaching and learning materials have been developed by world-leading experts from the University of Melbourne. These age-appropriate resources align to the Victorian Curriculum and include lesson plans and activities that help students learn and practise social skills and apply them in a positive way to learning, life and relationships. 

The Resilience, Rights & Respectful Relationships resources begin with the following four topics for each year level throughout 2022.

Topic 1: Emotional Literacy

Topic 2: Personal Strengths

Topic 3: Positive Coping

Topic 4: Problem Solving

We look forward to more opportunities for staff, students and parents to learn more about the initiative and continue to compliment many of the existing practices and learning opportunities at MPW.

Visiting School Nurse for Foundation Students

A Visiting Primary School Nurse from the Department of Education and Training, will be attending the school early Term 2 to conduct the Foundation (prep) grade health screening assessments for children who have provided parental consent. The purpose of the visit is to provide all Victorian school entry aged children with the opportunity to have a health screening assessment; to link children, families and schools to services available in the community; and to provide information and advice about children’s health and wellbeing.

The School Entrant Health Questionnaire (SEHQ) will be coming home with Foundation students this week in a large envelope, completed forms and envelopes are required to be returned to the school office by Monday 4th April.

Parents are invited to contact the Visiting Primary School Nurse if there are any issues they wish to discuss. The contact number for the Visiting Primary School Nurse, Glenn Stewart, is 03 9059 4337.

Ongoing Reporting Tasks

As valued partners in your child’s learning journey, we want you to be informed of your child's progress throughout the year. MPW does this through the Ongoing Report process established over the last 3 years.

Throughout the term you will receive notifications from your child’s teachers when Ongoing Reporting tasks have been published. There are tasks for Reading, Writing, Numeracy and Specialist areas each term. As well as the Progress Report at the end of each term, focusing on behaviour and effort in the classroom.

These Ongoing Reporting learning tasks contain uploaded work samples and rubrics regarding different aspects of your child's learning. The work sample is a snapshot of something your child has completed in relation to that particular subject and the rubric highlights where your child is at on a continuum. This way you can see the developmental stages that come before and after as well. As teachers, we use these rubrics to plan for a differentiated classroom. The green highlighted section indicates where your child is performing for the particular learning focus, the next section in the rubric is the focus of next steps in their learning. All teams have been posting learning tasks for this year for you to access. You are able to access these tasks by clicking on your child’s profile, then selecting the ‘Learning Tasks’ tab. The commentary and downloadable work samples are in the ‘feedback’ tab of the learning task. 

The Ongoing Reporting tasks are best viewed through a web browser, as the Mobile App has limited functionality for this section of Compass.

6-7 Transition news