Mr Irwin's Message

Hi everyone, welcome back to Term 4. It’s hard to believe we are in the final Term for 2019. For our Grade 6 students it’s their final term of primary schooling and they’ll soon begin preparations for their graduation. At the other end of the school, we’ll begin to meet our new prep students for next year as they complete a number of transition sessions over the coming weeks. Across the school we’ll also welcome a number of new students who will be moving into the area to start at Teesdale in 2020. At this stage we are anticipating to start next year with an enrolment of over 190 students. As we plan and finalise arrangements for next year I will use the newsletter to keep you up to date. Because of the nature of having families building and moving into the area we will keep some arrangements open until late in the year. This is to hopefully avoid any variations to what we communicate with our school community.

Early in the year you may have completed a survey as we collected information to develop a healthy eating promotion policy. School Council has finalised this policy and it can be downloaded at the bottom of this page. The most important piece of information to communicate around this is with regard to confectionery. As we explored developing a local policy, Council discovered that confectionery items in schools were already covered by a state wide policy. This policy states that ‘confectionery should not be supplied through school food services’ and goes on to explain that this applies to ‘food services within the school environment, for examples school events such as celebrations and sports days, vending machines and foods used in curriculum activities’. This policy does not apply to student lunchboxes, however as always we encourage the provision of a healthy lunchbox each and every day. Healthy options ensure it is easier for your child to focus, concentrate and have more success as a learner at school. Teachers notice a stark contrast in behaviour and attention when students have a sugary treat.

The implications for parents occur at celebrations such as Christmas, Easter and birthdays. Eliminating confectionery at celebrations means we won’t accept the sharing of lollies, candy canes, chocolate eggs etc. at Easter, Christmas and birthdays. Birthday cakes are acceptable provided their overall nutritional value means they are not considered confectionery. Confectionery items aren’t permitted to be passed to other students at these types of celebrations throughout the year and we ask for your support in this matter. If a student were to bring these items to share, teachers will quietly explain they are not allowed to be shared at school and they’ll be sent home with minimum fuss. We’ll use Facebook and the newsletter to post reminders at times where parents may consider sharing confectionery. If you’d like to read the entire policy it can be downloaded below this video. Thanks for your support in this matter.

Finally I’d like to thank the community members who organised the 'Teesdale Celebrates' event and the Lantern Festival. I saw first hand the many hours that went into making and repairing lanterns for the parade. An event like this takes many hours to prepare and co-ordinate behind the scenes. So many thanks to the parents and community members who put hours of volunteer time in to make this event a huge success.

Walk to School Wednesdays

Take advantage of the nicer weather and start walking to school this term! It’d be great to see as many families as possible walking or riding to school in term 4! Each Wednesday fruit will be available to all students walking or riding to school and entering the school gate near the crossing.

Community Events

Parenting Support Programs - Term 4

Community