Principal's Report

This Friday 2:30pm Finish

ENROL NOW FOR 2019

If you know of anyone who has yet to enrol please encourage them to put in their forms as this assists with our planning for next year. 

Our Prep transition sessions start in term 3.

Tuesday 24th July 9:15 - 11am

Tuesday 7th August 9:15 - 11am

Tuesday 21st August 9:15 - 11am

Tuesday 4th September 9:15 - 11am

Tuesday 16th October 9:15 - 11am - Meet the buddies session

Tuesday 30th October 9:15 - 11am - Optional parent session - stay and play

Tuesday 13th November - Stepping Up to School Parent Information evening inlcuding buddy BBQ Come along and meet your child's buddy and their family 

Tuesday 11th December - Half Day Step Up to school 9:15am - 1pm

Celebrating our students

Each week at assembly our students have the opportunity to share the awards and certificates that they receive out of school. This is a great opportunity for them to share their success and pride with everyone in our community. We also have students who work hard over a long period of time to achieve great things.

Finn has successfully achieved his Grey Wolf through 4th Knox Cub Scout Pack. He had to get 4 level 2 badges including, literature, collectors, birds and animals and First Aid. He then achieved his Gold Boomerang. Finn planned and organised a hike at Schwerkoldt Cottage and many more things. This is a great achievement as Finn persisted for 3 months to organise and achieve the Grey Wolf. Finn had a lot of fun and found the whole experience challenging at times. When he got to the end he realised that he could achieve.

'Under the Big Top' School Production

Once again a fantastic success. A great time was had by all! We have a school full of stars! Thank you everyone for all of your support.

School review

Last week saw the completion of our school review. The review gave us an opportunity to reflect on all of the great achievements that have been made over the last four years and to celebrate. The school staff, community, and students have all put in a great effort to make our school warm, welcoming and safe and happy.

The school review team visited classrooms, interviewed students and teachers as well as talking to parents from school council. Our list of success was many including:

• Our challenging maths program
• Our reading programs
• The Learning Environment
• Orderly
• friendly
• caring
• visuals
• engagement from students
• Use of technology
• classroom lessons
• conferencing with students
• student leaders

From this as well as celebrating our many successes we identified our goals for the future. This will include focusing on literacy, numeracy and student agency in learning. The goals for the future will form the basis of our next four years of professional learning and planning across the school. The teachers deserve a big congratulations as they have put in so much effort to help us achieve over the last foour years. I look forward to the next four as we move ahead. The review report will become available after July and will be shared with the community.

School reports

It is time to celebrate the learning of our students.

Reports can mean anxious times for children. Student reports also bring mixed feelings for parents. Pleasure and pride if they are performing well but considerable anxiety when children are not progressing as you hoped. Children of all ages take their cues from their parents, so your reaction to their school report can affect the way they see themselves as learners and as people.

Before you read the report, do a little self-check to see if you are in the right frame of mind:

1. Are your expectations for your son or daughter realistic and in line with their ability? Expectations are tricky. If they are too high, then children can be turned off learning. Too low and there is nothing to strive for. Pitch your expectations in line with your child’s abilities. 

2. Do you believe that children learn at different rates? Avoid comparing your child to siblings, your friends’ children and even yourself when you were a child. Instead look for individual progress. Remember we celebrate the growth of students no matter where they started. 

3. Are you willing to safeguard your child’s self-esteem rather than deflate it? Self-confidence is a pre-requisite for learning, so be prepared to be as positive and encouraging as possible. Regardless of the format, school reports should provide you with an idea of your child’s progress in all subject areas, their attitude and social development.

Here are some ideas to consider when you open your child’s report:

• Focus on strengths. Do you look for strengths or weaknesses first? The challenge is to focus on strengths even if they are not where you expected. Encourage growth mindset, if things aren't where you expected. Look at their goals and how they can be supported.

• Take into account your child’s effort and attitude to learning. If the report indicates that effort is below standard, then you have something to work on. If your child is putting in the required effort, then you cannot ask any more than that, regardless of the grading. 

• Broaden your focus away from academic performance to form a picture of your child’s progress as a member of a social setting. How your child gets along with his or her peers will influence his happiness and well-being, as well as give an indicator to their future. The skills of independence and co-operation are highly valued by employers so don’t dismiss these as unimportant.

• Discuss the report with your child talking about strengths first before looking at areas that need improvement. Ask for their opinion about how they performed and discuss their concerns. Children are generally very honest and will give a realistic assessment of their progress. They are generally very perceptive so take note of their opinions.

After reports are read and discussed, celebrate your child’s efforts. In this way, you will recognise progress and remind them that the holidays are just around the corner when they can forget about assessment, tests and reports for a while. 

We will have our 3 way learning conferences early in term 3. We use this as an opportunity for reflection and for goal setting. If you have any questions about your child's report before then please contact your classroom teacher.

Have a great week everyone. Enjoy the holidays.

Tabitha