Dear Parents, Families and Community members,

Welcome back for term 4 and we hope you and your family had a great school holiday break!

Leadership Team Inclusive Study Tour

As many people will be aware, during the break I had the great pleasure of embarking on a study tour to Canada and the United States of America with our Assistant Principals Dehlia and Kathryn.

If you have been following the school Facebook page you will have seen some the great professional learning experiences we had (we still need to add our last few days...), but if not here is a brief summary.

On the first Saturday of the holidays we left Melbourne and after about 30 hours in transit and a brief stop over in Los Angeles, we arrived in Toronto, Canada.

Day 1: On our first day we were fortunate to visit a relatively new school about 40 minutes out of Ontario and learn about their experiences and achievements in developing a new school community.

In the afternoon we headed across town to meet with District leaders to learn about the systems and supports they have in place to ensure that schools are supported and equipped to support all students and teachers.

Day 2: On this day we met with numerous key staff at the Ontario Ministry of Education (equivalent to our Central Office) and learnt about their systems approach to developing and maintaining high performing schools and improving outcomes for all students (which they have significant growth in in recent years).

During the afternoon we visited the Ontario College of Teachers who discussed their role in regulating the practice and licensing of teachers, as well as the work in supporting the professional development and capacity building of teachers in Ontario.

Day 3: Today we visited 2 more schools in two different districts. Both schools are well established and achieving great outcomes with their students. Both had degrees of similarity as well as great differences in their approaches to teaching and learning. This was largely as a result of their different demographics and based on the specific needs of their individual school communities.

Day 4: Our last day in Toronto. We visited a brand new school called Whaley's Corners Public School. Aside from hearing about their successes and challenges in starting a new school (so many similarities to ACS!), it was great to see their learning environments and how they use them to best support the needs of all learners.

Day 5 & 6: After calling past New York City for the weekend... we arrived in Boston for a 2 day Professional Learning course on Universal Design for Learning (UDL) at the centre for UDL CAST.

UDL is the brainchild of researchers at CAST who explored, tested and refined practices to improve educational outcomes for children with disabilities. As part of their research, they discovered that the flexible methods, design and materials actually helped to improve the outcomes of ALL learners.

Some of the key points we learned were:

* That disability is in design, not learners

* UDL helps to remove barriers which may prevent some individuals from learning

* UDL is an effective framework to improve educational outcomes for ALL learners, not just those with a disability.

Day 7: Our final day of the study tour! We had the great pleasure of visiting The Henderson Inclusion School in Massachusetts. This was a visit that we were able to co-ordinate late in our planning; and weren't we glad we did!

From moment we started speaking with Principal Patricia Lampron, we knew we had very similar visions, philosophies and practices. The school is 30 years old and was established as a result of the Community's desire to have a community school that was truly inclusive.

Originally only booked in for an hour and a half, such was the strong connection between our two schools, Patricia kindly spent over 3 hours touring and talking with us, before then allowing us to visit their other campus as well. It was amazing to not only learn from The Henderson Inclusion School, but have it reinforced that we are really doing great things at ACS!

We look forward to sharing even more about our trip with staff, students and community over the coming weeks and months.

End of Term Awards - Term 3, 2018

At end of term 3 we acknowledged and celebrated the many great achievements of our students across the term at our end of term assembly.

Congratulations to our School Values and Principal's Award winners on your wonderful efforts and achievements!

Prep End of Term Three Awards:

Students demonstrating the Armstrong Creek School values of:

Care: Savannah - For being a kind, helpful and resilient friend to her peers.

Collaboration: Harper – For consistently being a happy and thoughtful student by using his initiative to offer assistance to others at an appropriate time.

Commitment: Amira – For her outstanding commitment to her learning by never giving up and working super hard to achieve her learning goals every day.

Principals Excellence in Teaching and Learning Award: Murphy – For consistently displaying our school values and his amazing growth in using his initiative and being resilient.

Grade 1, 2 and 3 End of Term Three Awards:

Students demonstrating the Armstrong Creek School values of:

Care: Jamil Abdullah – looking after others in the yard

Collaboration: Iris Nguyen – including others and listening to their ideas

Commitment: Sonny King – always trying his best

Principals Excellence in Teaching and Learning Award: Leo Marston – application and achievement of learning goals

Grade 4, 5 and 6 End of Term Three Awards:

Students demonstrating the Armstrong Creek School values of:

Care: Manisha T – For developing strong friendships with others by being considerate and friendly.

Collaboration: Jemma H – For working hard in a range of groups to support others that she is working with and for also taking on feedback from others.

Commitment: Noah L – For a fantastic improvement in staying on task during learning time and working at his best effort

Principals Excellence in Teaching and Learning Award: Finley B - For a massive improvement in his learning, particularly in reading.

2019 Preparation and Planning

Term 4 will be a busy term as we review and reflect on our achievements in 2018 and plan for the 2019 year ahead. Over the coming weeks we will be doing a lot of staff recruitment and looking at our systems, processes and structures for 2019.

We know already that as a growing school we will welcome quite a number of new students and families to the ACS community. There also may be some students and families that will be leaving us for various reasons. In order for us to appropriately plan and resource for the year, we do ask that if you will not be returning in 2019, that you please let us know as soon as possible.

Aerosport Gymnastics

Yesterday the prep children started a 4 week gymnastics program run by Aerosport gymnastics. The program is designed to help develop the children’s locomotor skills, balance and coordination through fun and engaging activities. The children had an absolute ball yesterday and tried lots of new things. We are looking forward to the next 3 weeks.

Trivia Night - Save the Date!

Friday 26 October, 2018

from 6.30pm @ Armstrong Creek School Administration Building

Tickets $15 per person (how to purchase tickets TBA)

Pizza provided on the night

BYO Nibbles and Drinks

Have fun with Trivia Questions, Movie and Music Rounds

Silent Auction Items throughout the night

Games in between the Trivia rounds

Any Silent Auction donations can be given to

Janelle Levy prior to event (or left at the school)

Contact: janelleol@hotmail.com

ALL monies raised go directly towards the event costs for the Warralily Christmas Spectacular - a free community organised event which will include student performances, Christmas carols, family entertainment and a twilight Market!

Wishing everyone a safe and enjoyable weekend!

Evan Savage

Principal