As we reach the mid point of Term 1 it has been pleasing to see great progress across all of our year levels. Our children have been working to improve their skills within the classroom and specialist areas and enjoying the grounds during their play and lunchtimes. A reminder that hats and full drink bottles should be brought to school everyday, especially with the hot weather events we have been having.

School Council

We held our first meeting of the year this week and it was great to meet the School Council members. I thank those that have completed their term and won’t be returning to Council and look forward to working with the new parent members from here on. In preparation for our School Review in Term 2 we passed a range of policies that are now available on our school website. Family engagement is an important part of policy so if you have any questions please let me know.

The policies that were updated and passed were: Child Safety Code of Conduct, Child Safety Responding & Reporting, Child Safety & Wellbeing, Anaphylaxis, Camps & Excursions, Mobile Phones, Photographing, Filming & Recording Students, Statement of Values & School Philosophy and Yard Duty & Supervision.

School Review

Our School Review dates have been set in May of Term 2. We are working busily to prepare for this 4 year event to ensure our school is in the best possible place moving forward. There are a range of compliance and curriculum documents that are required to be completed prior to the review and I have been working alongside Ms Kennedy, Ms Oates and Mr Wilton to complete these.

Easter Raffle

Thanks to all of the families who have already returned purchased raffle tickets and provided donations to the office for our end of term Easter event. There is still plenty of time to contribute to this school fundraiser.

Bayside Principal’s Conference

I will be attending the Bayside Principal's Conference on Thursday and Friday of this week where there will be educational guest speakers and workshops based on a range of current themes in education.

NAPLAN

The national assessment for Grade 3 and 5 children takes place in March from 13th – 25th. The children complete the following assessments, Writing, Reading, Numeracy and Conventions of Language (Spelling and Grammar). All assessments are completed online except for the Grade 3 Writing which is completed by hand in a hardcopy booklet. Parents and carers of Grade 3 and 5 students, you can find further information HERE.

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Spotlight

Hello Foundation families!

We cannot believe that we are already just over half way through Term 1! It has been a fantastic term so far, full of lots of learning opportunities and social/emotional growth!

We are now well and truly into the swing of weekly Buddies sessions and they are held each Tuesday afternoon. Each Prep student now has an assigned Year 6 Buddy and they are loving completing activities in the sessions. These activities include games, learning tasks and craft. The program has an extremely positive impact on both the Foundation and Grade 6 students.

Benefits of the buddy program include:

• Foundation students having another positive role model within the school
• Foundation students having someone to go to if they are worried/scared in the playground
• Foundation and Grade 6 children developing new and positive relationships

Take Home Reading

Foundation students are required to please read a decodable book on Wushka each night. Parents are asked to listen to their child each night, discuss what has been read, sign the child’s Take Home Reading Diary daily and return their diary inside their black take home book bag on Monday. Foundation teachers will review their Take Home Diary each Monday.

Just a reminder that students should be reading books at home that they can confidently read independently and parents are encouraged to read the book to their child if they are not able. The Take Home Reading Program is designed to build confidence and develop a love of books. Don’t forget to ask your child what reading strategies they can use for working out ‘tricky’ words such as ‘stretching the word out’ and ‘sounding it out’. As per our Intialit Literacy Program we please ask that we avoid asking the children to guess what the words say, based on the pictures but rather ask them to use their prior sound knowledge to sound the word out. Again, if they are unsure parents modelling, sounding out the word to them is always beneficial too!

Library

Just another reminder that students have a weekly scheduled Library session with both Prep A and Prep B attending the library on Fridays. We have now begun borrowing books, which the students were very excited about. During our library time they are able to search for a book with the help of the teacher and read their favourite books. They are allowed to borrow two books; one picture storybook and one non fiction book, which is to be returned to the library the following Friday. Please ensure your child has a named library bag(separate from their black take home book bag).

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Literacy

This week, we began our new and highly anticipated InitiaLit program, by MultiLit. We all feel very excited and confident about this literacy program and have no doubt the students will be making leaps and bounds in no time!  InitiaLit is a comprehensive whole-class reading, spelling, grammar and comprehension program. It includes an explicit and systematic synthetic phonics program as well as a literature component to enrich oral language, listening comprehension and vocabulary. 

InitiaLit addresses the five key components necessary for effective instruction reading:

Due to the nature of the program, we have mixed the students up into 3 target groups. These groups are fluid and may change from time to time. 

Home Reading

A reminder that home reading should be done nightly. As well as the school readers, we have also provided Wushka login details in your child’s Reading Diary. This is a fantastic resource with access to decodable books. Your child may use this alongside their take-home readers - please remember to also record these in their reading diaries. 

Home Apps

Students now have access to Reading Eggs, Wushka and Matific. As a class, we have practised logging in and out of these apps and students should now be able to access these independently. We encourage you to log in to these apps and explore them with your child. Have fun!

Numeracy

We have been developing our simple addition skills over the past fortnight, working on different strategies and applying them to new maths games.

We are learning our friends of 10 strategy that involves two numbers pairing up to equal 10, our doubles facts and counting on, starting at the bigger number and counting on the smaller of the two.

We have applied these skills to the following games throughout the 2 weeks:

• Go Fish (Friends of 10)
• Memory match (Friends of 10)
• Golden Number
• Race to (Target Number)
• 5 Moves to 100

These games require either a deck of cards, Dice (6 and 20-sided), something to write with and on.

Encourage your child to teach you these games, they had a lot of fun learning them and we are sure you will enjoy playing them too.

Inquiry

We continue to focus on our school values: Teamwork, Integrity, Excellence and Respect. Students have enjoyed playing a range of Play is the Way games, focusing on working together as a team to achieve a common goal. Next week we will do a deep dive into Integrity and what it means to do the right thing. 

A big thank you to everyone who has bought back money for the Easter raffle!

Now that the students have all settled so well into school life, we encourage all parents to drop off and say goodbye at the big door and allow their child to enter the classroom independently.  Thank you for your support.

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Spotlight

Reminders

Fruit Break:

Each day we have 2 fruit break times at 10am and 12:30pm, to help feed our brains and improve our concentration. Please make sure to bring some fruit or vegetables to eat during these times.

Readers:

Middle school students are expected to practise daily reading at home. After reading, students can choose one of the questions from their reading journal response ideas to complete a written response. Readers are handed in each Friday, with 2 written responses completed. Students that have not completed 2 written responses, will complete these during lunch on Friday.

In Reading, We Are Learning To...Make text-to-text connections while reading to help us develop a greater understanding of what we are reading.

In Writing, We Are Learning To...Communicate our opinions on a topic using persuasive writing structure.

In Inquiry/Wellbeing, We Are Learning To...Identify the differences between a rule and a law.

In Maths, We Are Learning To...Estimate, measure, compare and convert object lengths using formal and informal units.

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It’s been another fun filled fortnight in the Senior School with the beginning of interschool sports, district swimming, Buddies for our Yr 6 students and some great hands on learning opportunities.

Below are some reminders for all students in the Senior School. Please take the time to go through them and discuss with your child.

Headphones

If you haven’t already, please bring in labelled headphones (either in ear or over ear) for use with digital technologies.   
NAPLAN begins in mid March and we only have a limited amount of spare headphones and want students to feel comfortable during testing.
Please do not purchase or send your child with expensive headphones (eg. airpods) as they need to be kept at school. If you are unsure about where to purchase headphones from, we suggest places like K-mart, Big W or Officeworks.

Hygiene

Due to the current weather, high levels of activity and some students going through hormonal changes, we urge students to consider taking greater care with their personal hygiene. We encourage students to wear deodorant (roll on only at school, no aerosols) and to regularly change and wash their uniforms.

Respect

A behaviour focus in the Senior School at the moment is treating others with respect, both physically and verbally. We are reinforcing the importance of respect not only to our peers but also to adults. We encourage regular discussions with your children about ways in which they can demonstrate respect at school and at home.

Interschool Sport

Students participate in interschool sport during Term 1 & 2 and we will have a variety of home and away matches on Friday’s. We travel by bus for any away matches and consent must be given via COMPASS. Please check that you have provided this. There is a cost for the bus, however we will charge it as a lump sum to cover the away matches across the 2 terms. The Senior School prides itself on its sportspersonship and we expect all students to conduct themselves in a friendly and supportive manner to avoid missing out.

Reading... Answer multiple choice comprehension questions by filtering through key words

Writing... Review the Seven Steps for Writing Success to structure for/against and open ended persuasives

Maths... Select and apply efficient written and mental strategies to solve multiplication problems

Bounce Back... Define and demonstrate kindness and supporting others

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Fri 1st March	Senior Inter School Sport
Mon 4th March	School Dentist Begins
Wed 6th March	All Foundation Students Attend
Mon 13th March	Labour Day Public Holiday
Thurs 21st March	Harmony Day
Thurs 28th March	Last Day of Term 1 2:30pm Dismissal

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The Department of Education and Mentone Park Primary School do not endorse the products or services of any private advertiser. They accept no responsibility for accuracy of information contained in advertisements or claims made by them.

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