The Countdown is On!

When visiting classrooms this week there has been a buzz of excitement with students working diligently to complete their writing pieces for their writing celebration on Friday. The focus for the writing has been ‘to inform’. This has required the students to research and collate the information into factual sentences around a particular topic with the result being a published piece of writing that informs the reader. The students are looking forward to sharing their published work around a ‘campfire setting’ (not a real campfire 😊) with their peers.

It has been a treat to witness this week all our students in Foundation to Year 2 heading off to their swimming lessons at Huntingtower each afternoon. A huge thanks to all our parent helpers who assist with the program, without this support we would find it difficult to run the program. As we are all aware, being safe around the water is incredibly important in Australia. The program gives the students the opportunity to become water confident and to improve their swimming skills and it also gives the younger students an opportunity to strengthen their independence in self-care.

Going swimming each day is intense but the students are all loving it!

I love swimming because I get to go underwater - Octavia

Swimming is the best because I can put my head underwater and practice freestyle and backstroke - Dylan

Swimming is great because I get to learn how to float - Lin

I love swimming because we play games like ‘bobbing’ and getting the sinkies - Harvey

I love swimming because it’s fun to put my face under water - Maelynn

I have enjoyed learning how to swim on my back using the paddle boards, swimming backwards - Julian

I have learnt how to float on my back which makes me feel happy. I like looking at the ceiling of the swimming pool when I am floating. Swimming has been fun because we have tried lots of different things that I did not know before - Mithra

2023 Parent Payments

Next week Information will be forwarded to all families regarding next year’s Parent Payments. This documentation will be sent as a hard copy to all families on Thursday. The payments are described in several categories in line with the guidelines from the Department of Education & Training (DET). The curriculum contributions section covers all materials provided to each child throughout the year, including their book packs which will be waiting for every student in their classroom on the first day of school next January.

We look forward to your support with these payments so that we may continue to ensure an outstanding level of provision and support for every student. If you have any queries regarding these payments or would like to organise a personalised payment plan, please do not hesitate to contact Katie Forbes, Business Manager, on 9802 5277.

Class Planning for 2023 (repeated)

It is rapidly approaching the time of year when teachers start the formal process of student placement for the following year. However, in reality student placement decisions are shaped during the entire year as teachers observe and listen to students and parents/carers in relation to their wellbeing and learning needs.

Student placement decisions are not made lightly, as we recognise the importance of creating an optimum learning environment.  It is an extremely complex process to ensure that we have a balance and appropriate spread of ability, gender and social dynamics to promote learning and support all our students. 

Classroom teachers and specialist teachers are very well-aware of friendship groups and the dynamics within the classes which either enhance or impede the classroom climate. Teachers will use their extensive knowledge of how students interact and relate to each other when placing students.

We want to reassure all families that the teachers will be ensuring each student is placed in a class with other students with whom they are familiar (but perhaps not best friends with) and are able to build positive relationships to assist with their continued learning. All students either Thursday or Friday next week will be given the opportunity to nominate five friends that they would be happy to be with next year, the nominations are not viewed in any order. You might like to discuss this with your child before Thursday. This process reinforces our values of building relationships and resilience in our students.

We will be retaining our practice of accepting written information from parents regarding any specific learning needs which need to be taken into consideration when placing their child. However, we are not able to take requests for children to be placed together based on friendships or requests for teachers.

Some issues for parents to consider when thinking about making a request include:

• Younger children have fluctuating friendship groups. This is a perfectly normal developmental stage so a request for a particular ‘friend’ may become less important over time - especially over the Christmas holidays.
• How will a request support our shared work on building resilience in our students?

Teachers are sensitive to students with friendship concerns, and we ask that you trust your child’s teacher along with past teachers and specialists to make the correct decision on their behalf.

Should you wish to alert us to other learning related concerns, please put this in an email to myself helen.freeman@education.vic.gov.au by Friday 18th November 2022. Emails received after this date cannot be accepted due to the commencement of our process. Please remember and accept that, whilst parent concerns are noted, there is no guarantee that these concerns can be accommodated through the class placement process.

The SSPS staff would like to thank you in advance for your trust in our professionalism and our ability to create the best learning environment for your child and all our students.

Election Day Fundraiser – Saturday 26th November 

Yes, it’s fast approaching - the Election Day BBQ and the Cake, Jam, Chutney and Sauce Stall. Tomorrow each family will receive a paper plate with instructions as a reminder to start collecting your ingredients for that favourite cake, muffin, biscuit, or slice that you will hopefully be preparing for the stall. Thank you to the families who have already sent to school, a selection of home-made jam, chutney, and sauces to be sold.

We are hoping to make this the most successful Election Day fundraiser we can, so please if you can volunteer some time to assist on the day, please sign up to help here:

BBQ - volunteersignup.org/T4YRM

Cake Stall - volunteersignup.org/4XE3W

Working Bee

Thank you to all our families and the staff who attended the working bee on Sunday, we were lucky that the weather was clear so that the list of jobs we had for the morning were all able to be ticked off. George from 3/4AR was the lucky recipient of the gift voucher for his attendance at the working bee.

Parent’s Association

Last night I attended the Parent’s Association Annual General Meeting. It was a night of celebration acknowledging all the invaluable support that this important group of parents have offered over the year, which includes Spoil the Staff Day, Mother’s and Father’s Day Stalls, Icy poles at the Sports day, Easter Raffle, Election Day Cake Stall x 2, Helping Hands, Second-hand Uniform Shop, Footy Tipping competition and the sale of the Entertainment Books. All their hard work over the year has culminated into the Parent’s Association financing the purchase of ten new Library shelves for the new Library that is part of the upcoming capital works project, a wonderful achievement, thank you.

I would like to make a special mention of Deane Lam as this was her final meeting. Deane was our previous School Council President (2020-2021) and president of the Parent Association (2020-2022). Deane has been an inspiration to us all, her passion towards supporting the school community has been relentless. Even though Deane’s youngest child finished year 6 last year, she continued this year as president of the PA as a community member and has worked tirelessly supporting all members and other volunteers to perform their jobs, a true champion for the school.

Finally, Mr Riley is attempting the calendar club challenge this November to try and raise awareness and funds for Men's Mental Health.  The Calendar Club Challenge is where you run the amount of kilometers that correspond to that day of the month.  On 1st November Mr Riley ran 1km, on 2nd November he ran 2km and so on until the 30th November he will run 30kms totaling 465km for the month. If you would like to sponsor the fantastic Mr Riley click here.

Have a great fortnight!

Helen