PRINCIPAL UPDATE 

Welcome to everyone to Term 3! 

We loved hearing about exciting adventures locally, interstate and overseas that occurred over the holidays. It was equally as great seeing smiling faces re-entering our schools with an eagerness to get started for the term. 

This term is packed full of many exciting events, such as the excursions, incursions, District Athletics, Student Led Conferences and, of course, the School Concert! 

This term also brings about change as we embark on a new approach to our Friday afternoons. Whole School assemblies will occur in even weeks (Week 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10), with Wellbeing activities and House activities rotating on the other odd weeks. Change can be hard to adapt to, but we believe this new approach will help build greater connectedness with peers and our school. It will certainly help build our House pride!

Dates for the Friday celebrations are: 

Please see the calendar for other key events throughout the term and put these into your diaries. 

Special welcome to Charlie (1HS), Emy (3CE) and Thea (4KJ) and their families who have joined our school community at Chilwell PS this term.

Welcome to Mrs Sam Callan who is teaching 4JC this term while Mr Cole commences Long Service Leave. Welcome to Education Support staff, Taylah, Daniel and Sophie who will be joining our staff throughout the term to further support student learning. 

School Leaders: Thank you to our Semester 1 School Leaders, Minnie, James, Caden and Sayuni for their impressive leadership of our school. This semester, we welcome our new School Leaders with great confidence that they will proudly lead our student community for the remainder of the year. Congratulations to our following leaders:                          - School Captains:  Ella Modise and Finn McColl  

School Vice Captains:  Nikita Kukreja and Daniel Lim 

Please see the article within the newsletter for what they are looking forward to in their role. This is also proudly displayed on the school website. 

House Captain: Congratulations to Henry George for his well-deserved appointment to the House Captain role for Balyang (Blue House). Henry will lead his house proudly in the commencement of house activities. 

Specialists: The highlight of the first week of school was Busker’s Day. 

The Grade 4, 5 and 6 students demonstrated great courage, creativity and confidence to perform a variety of performances such as dance, comedy, live music, magic, singing and puppet shows to entertain the Prep – Grade 3 student and our school community. 

Gold coins were donated and the funds generated to support local charities selected by the year levels. The amount raised was $1,000.35.  Charities selected will be highlighted in assembly this week and the next newsletter. 

Special thank you to Performing Arts teacher, Meegan Baker, who provides these wonderful opportunities to our students.  

Recently students have been entered into the Geelong Gallery ‘Who’s Who’ Portrait Prize. We thank our amazing Art Teacher, Deb Fisher for opportunities provided within Visual Arts. 

NAPLAN: During this week, we will receive the Grade 3 and Grade 5 student NAPLAN reports. Students are now clearly identified in 4 proficiency strands – exceeding, strong, developing and needs attention. More information about the NAPLAN assessments will be provided to Grade 3 and Grade 5 parents and carers via Sentral email in the week ahead. 

Chess Club: Chess Club recommences on Wednesday. 

Last term at assembly the Term 2 winners were awarded. Congratulations to George Han (1st Place), 

Wilson Yip (2nd Place) and Leo Tian (3rd Place). 

This might be something students are keen to join this term. 

Our ‘Learning for Life’ value focus for Term 3 is Resilience. We look forward to explicitly learning how to demonstrate resilience when we hit challenges, our learning is hard or we are hurt. Resilience involves ‘bouncing back’ and demonstrating a positive attitude to overcome tricky situations. It’s so important that as adults we model being resilient to our children, to demonstrate that we can overcome and rebound from challenges that life can throw at us. We look forward to recognising great examples of resilience from our students this term. 

Student Lunchtime Clubs have become a great part of our school. Provided daily in the second half of lunch, they provide a safe, supportive and engaging space that students can attend. Some students attend for fun, others to escape the hustle and bustle of the school yard and others to explore new learning. At the end of Term 2, all students in the school were surveyed to seek their feedback on ideas for possible clubs. These ideas were taken and implemented, giving the students great agency to create positive experiences and change in the school. 

Please see the poster within wellbeing for the clubs on offer in Term 3. This is worth discussing with your child and encouraging them to give some of these great opportunities a go. Thank you to our teachers and Education Support staff for leading these clubs during their lunchtimes. 

Let’s have a great Term 3! 

We cannot wait to celebrate at our School Concert, ‘Music Around the World’ in the final week of term. 

Sarah Jeffreys