Dear Parents/Caregivers,
Welcome
Welcome back to everyone for term 2 and a special welcome to our new families. We’ve had a great start to term two and I have really enjoyed my visits to classrooms.
We have been able to welcome parents back on site, and although there are some restrictions we are creeping back towards operating as normal. We have to continue to wear masks for another couple of weeks at least and adults must still socially distance but we have been given the go ahead to have COVID safe assemblies. Unfortunately this means that parents are still unable to watch but we hope this may change.
Parent Volunteers
We encourage as many parents as possible to become volunteers at our school. If you are interested please contact the front office for further assistance.
School Tours for Prospective Families
We are ramping up our school tours as we know that we have a great school and want other students to get to experience all we have to offer. If you know of any interested parents of three, four and five year olds please encourage them to ring the front office to organise a school tour. Our children, who start in reception, do not need to live nearby to our school as long as we know by term three of the year prior to starting.
The New Playground
Many of you will have noticed that the new playground has been completed. It has been designed for our older students and offers some great physical challenges for this age group. For safety reasons we have decided that the playground is only open to year 5 and 6 students at recess and lunch. These students have come up with initial guidelines, which have been approved by staff, and we are continuing to monitor the safety aspects. Some teachers may elect to take their year 3 and 4 students for in-class fitness sessions if the safety guidelines can be met. OSHC are aware of the guidelines and have begun to use it for some of their students. The planned second fence should be erected shortly.
Starting Secondary School in 2023
Parents of Years 6 students are reminded that the online application procedure to start the transition process for your child to move to secondary schooling in 2023 is due to be completed by Friday 27th May. There are a number of applications that are still to be completed. If you are having difficulty with the process, please contact the office team for advice.
NAPLAN
Our students have been tackling the challenges of NAPLAN so well this week. One of the biggest challenges for our year 3 and 5 students is remaining seated for the duration of the test including needing to just sit there and wait for the allocated time to be up. We had an unexpected internet issue on Thursday but our year 5 students took it in their stride. The year 3s wrote their narratives in the supplied booklets and we were impressed with the endeavour shown by all.
We will notify you of results as soon as we get them which we understand will be around September. Next year there will be a change and the NAPLAN tests will occur in March in term 1.
From Monday 16th May until Friday 20th May the year 3 or year 5 students who missed any of the online tests will be able to do them in catch up sessions organised and supervised by myself and Jonathon Warren- White.
Term 2 Pupil Free Day – Tuesday 14th June
Staff will be training, plus planning curriculum and exploring other actions of the Site Plan. If you need child care, the OSHC will be open that day. Please contact Sally Mitchell on 8381 7577 to book in.
Parent/Teacher/Student Interviews- Week 9 Term 2
At this stage we are planning to have our face to face parent/teacher/student interviews from Monday 27th June until Friday 1st July. The late night will be on Tuesday 28th June until around 7:30pm. We will send out information regarding booking in about three weeks. We are giving you advance notice because these meetings are so valuable for the child, the parent and the teacher.
At this meeting the teacher will hand the parent the semester one written report. This will include a general comment, social capabilities indicators and grades for achievement and effort for each curriculum area taught by the classroom teacher. Our specialist teachers will award grades for achievement and effort in their curriculum areas as well as give a written comment.
At the interview the classroom teacher will explain the progress in each of the curriculum areas taught by them and areas for continued development. You will all be able to share strategies for continued improvement both in school and out.
Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD)
Information from the Department for Education:
Every year, all schools in Australia participate in the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD). The NCCD process requires schools to identify information already available in the school about supports provided to students with disability. These relate to legislative requirements under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 and the Disability Standards for Education 2005, in line with the NCCD guidelines (2019).
Information provided about students to the Australian Government for the NCCD includes:
• year of schooling
• category of disability: physical, cognitive, sensory or social/emotional
• level of adjustment provided: support provided within quality differentiated teaching practice, supplementary, substantial or extensive.
This information assists schools to:
• formally recognise the supports and adjustments provided to students with disability in schools
• consider how they can strengthen the support of students with disability in schools
• develop shared practices so that they can review their learning programs in order to improve educational outcomes for students with disability.
The NCCD provides state and federal governments with the information they need to plan more broadly for the support of students with disability. The NCCD will have no direct impact on your child and your child will not be involved in any testing process. The school will provide data to the Australian Government in such a way that no individual student will be able to be identified – the privacy and confidentiality of all students is ensured. All information is protected by privacy laws that regulate the collection, storage and disclosure of personal information.
To find out more about these matters, please refer to the Australian Government’s Privacy Policy (https://www.education.gov.au/privacy-policy). Further information about the NCCD can be found on the NCCD Portal (https://www.nccd.edu.au).If you have any questions about the NCCD, please contact the school.
With regards
Andrea Hayden
Principal