Newsletter
Friday, 19th May, 2023
From the Principal
This week has been Education Week, a week to celebrate everything in education! At Wangala Primary School, we have celebrated in a low key way by continuing to do what we do best: educate our amazing students!
On Monday we had a number of visitors to the school from Deakin University who worked with small groups of students to deliver science lessons. They will return on Monday for a follow up lesson with their groups. Thanks to the Deakin students for their time.
Curriculum Day
Our Curriculum Day on Wednesday the 10th of May, saw all of our educators attend professional development on responsive teaching, hosted at the ‘Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership’ in Geelong. The day was facilitated by educational consultant, Bronwyn Ryrie Jones, and saw everyone engaged in some fascinating work. In summary, we investigated the capacity of everyone to learn, looking at the impact our environment has on this, the role of working memory and long term memory, and the positive ways we can improve the learning process for the students in our classrooms. Our educators walked away with practical things to apply to their teaching and learning programs to ensure that we’re all being as responsive as we can to assist our students.
Celebrating our Education Support Staff
During the week schools across the state celebrated the amazing role our Education Support Staff play in schools. At Wangala Primary School we are really lucky to have, quite simply, THE BEST Education Support Staff who contribute to the our amazing educational community. We have postponed official celebrations for our Education Support Staff to next week when we know they’ll all be present, and will be holding a special morning-tea to say thank-you for everything they do, often above and beyond what is expected! You might like to recognise the amazing contributions of our Education Support Staff, Bec Rees, Kim Dugan, Georgie Melville-Sharp, Steph Sutherland, Liz Nicopoulos, Lauren Verhagen, Stef Morgan and Nat Kwiez. If you’re on Facebook, lookout for our special post on our official page late next week recognising the contributions they make, and leave a comment of thanks and recognition. From me, I thank each and every one of them for everything they do, often unseen. The Education Support Staff are incredible important cogs in the workings of our school, and we really won’t operate as smoothly without them!
2024 Prep Enrolments
My calendar has been full of tours for prospective Prep students starting in 2024. If you know of any families who are beginning their child’s journey through school next year, remind them to book in a tour. For our current families who have child starting Prep in 2024, make sure you call past the office to pick up enrolment documents and get them in soon.
Reminder
With school photos coming up this Thursday, this is a reminder that all students are expected to be in the correct Wangala Primary School uniform each and every day, including shirts, polos, jumpers and hoodies. Uniform is available through the office should you require any extra items.
All the best!
Steven King
Principal
Dates to Remember
May
Monday 22nd May
Deakin Science Teaching Program
Monday 22nd – Friday 25th May
Smile Squad Dentist
Scholastic Book Fair
Thursday, 25th May
School Photos
Friday , 26th May
Lightning Premiership for Grade 5/6s
Monday 29th May
Assembly 2.45pm
June
Friday, 2nd June
Newsletter
Monday, 12th June
Kings Birthday Public Holiday
Wednesday, 14th June
Grade 5/6 BioLAB Excursion
AFL Football Clinic P-4
Friday, 16th June
Newsletter
Monday, 19th June
Assembly 2.45pm
Friday, 23rd June
Last Day of Term 2,
2.30pm Finish
Wangala Primary School acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land we are on, the Wadawurrung people, and thank them for sharing their long lasting culture with us as we learn and grow together.
Star Students
Well done to our Star Student, Principal Award and Kitchen Garden Award recipients…
Prep – Issy, Fergus, Danielle, Johnathan
One and Two – Gabrielle, Zillen
Three and Four – Maycee, Cruz
Five and Six – Erin, Victoria, Riley, Curtis and Aria
GELC – Kriday, Andrew
Reminders
Smile Squad
The Smile Squad team from Barwon Health are coming to our school this coming Monday the 22nd of May.
Smile Squad is the Victorian Government free school dental program.
This means all students can get a free dental check-up, preventive services, and treatment at school.
How to access free dental car:
We need your consent before we can provide services. Consent is usually provided by a parent or guardian. Sign up to Smile Squad at: https://bit.ly/smilesquadvic
Please complete and submit the consent form online. The electronic consent form can be translated into more than 100 languages.
Do I need to attend my child’s appointment?
No, you do not need to attend your child’s appointment. If you would prefer, you can take your child to the community dental clinic.
School Photos
A reminder that school photos are scheduled for this coming Thursday the 25th of May. Please ensure your child is in full school uniform wearing the Wangala Primary School sublimated polo.
Photos can be ordered through the Compass App, please refer to the instructions below.
Before School Supervision
A reminder that students are to arrive at school no earlier than 8.45am, this is when the yard is supervised and our breakfast program opens. OSHC is available from 6.30am if required.
OSHC Update
Last week in OSHC we ran our first ever curriculum day OSHC session, and it was such a great day! We played so many games outside and inside, created some amazing crafts, watched the movie Inside Out and had incredibly interesting group discussions about our feelings and what connections we can make to the movie. For lunch we made homemade mini pizzas with a variety of toppings, and for dessert we made huge, cafe style chocolate chip cookies. It was such a treat! When our next curriculum day approaches, we will put out another expression of interest to our OSHC families.
Porrgil's Patch
In Porrgil’s Patch this week we introduced a new compost tumbler and worm farm! Last term the 5/6 students raised funds as part of their inquiry to purchase these, we can’t wait to utilise the organic matter that is produced in our veggie patches.
We also drew up a large scale of our garden beds so that we can keep a note of our crop rotations and what’s growing where! the students really enjoyed being able to visualise the garden layout and learning the names of each plant.
A reminder to keep an eye out for our little market stall out the front of the office on Tuesday afternoons. We will be selling our excess produce including eggs (when available).
For all of our produce growing families, we will happily take donations of excess produce, cuttings or seedlings off your hands! This term we are going to try our hand at curing olives. We would love to try dehydrated citrus too, if you have excess figs, oranges, lemons or limes, please send them our way.
Grade 1/2
This term our Writing focus has been on narratives. The 1/2s were introduced to a story mountain and used this to brainstorm and plan their stories. Students got creative with their ‘Uh oh!’ (problem) and their ‘Phew!’ (solution) moments through the use of different picture prompts. Students also explored how to create a sizzling start by describing the setting or character, or with the use of onomatopoeia – a sound associated with the name: BANG! ZAP! POP! Check out the amazing writing from our authors in 1/2.
Focus on Curriculum
Story telling is a great way to extend your child’s language and listening skills, as well as expanding their imagination. Either you can tell the story, or encourage your child to tell the story.
Story telling might be about:
– A favourite character from a book or television program.
– Another family member.
– Your child’s favourite toy.
Here are some tips to start your storytelling:
– Make it exciting, with different voices, puppets, props or a finger play.
– Start with what interests your child.
– Create character and setting.
Doing Maths Together at Home
Playing Games
– Play ‘I Spy’ or other games to identify shapes, numbers and patterns.
– Dice are a great addition to any toy collection. Roll the dice and say, make or write the numbers identified. Roll the dice and add the numbers together to find the total.
– Play number games online with your child. Check out the ABC website ‘Count Us In’ for lots of fun activities and videos.
Making Patterns
Recognising and making patterns are important maths skills for exploring numbers, shapes and symmetry.
– Identify and explain visual patterns on clothing, wrapping paper, crockery, cards and furniture.
– Use coloured pegs, blocks, beads or cutlery to begin a pattern for your child to continue. For example, red, blue, white, red, blue, white.
– Encourage your child to draw, create and describe their own patterns. Use them for borders or greeting cards or on material.
Reminder: Lightning Premiership Sports Day is on Friday the 26th of May.
This is an exciting opportunity for the senior children to play competitive sport in the primary schools competitions. It is expected that ALL students attend. It’s so nice to be able to do this after the last couple of years. This year, we will be entering a soccer and netball team. I am still in the process of selecting teams. Once these teams are finalised, they will be communicated.
The cost of this excursion is $15. This will cover the cost of the bus, officials and affiliation fees. Permission and payment is due by Wednesday the 24th of May. It is essential that permission and payment is given to ensure that students are able to travel by bus to the event.
The kids and I are super excited about taking part in this event. It was a fabulous day last year! It’s shaping up to be a great day again and I’m sure a highlight of the year for some of the kids. Parents and carers are more than welcome to come and watch on the day. A note will come in the coming weeks with more details of the event.
Any questions please don’t hesitate to contact me.
Andrea Hueston
Stay and Play
Our stay and play program continues to run every day during recess and lunchtime.
There have been some incredible chalk drawings created, musical instruments played, sme fun competitive UNO games, beautiful mosaic dinosaur artworks, together with some very creative lego construction and drawings happening too. It’s been a really great addition to our school helping students engage with new friends or have a safe space to come to when they’re wanting to participate in quieter play
STEAM - Spinning Colour Wheel
This week in STEAM the 1/2 and 3/4 grades learnt about – The Science of Light and Colour. They learnt that : Light is made up of wavelengths of light, and each wavelength is a particular colour. The colour we see is a result of which wavelengths are reflected back to our eyes. The best part of the lesson was making a Coloured Spinning Wheel. The students discovered that Spinning the disc mixed all the different wavelengths of coloured light together, creating white light. The faster you move the disc, the more white light you see. This process is called colour addition.
STEAM - Bee Bots
This week in STEAM the Preps and the grade 5/6 students have been learning about coding. They used the Bee Bots to practise coding and computational thinking. The small robot can remember a sequence of up to 40 commands, directing it to move forwards and backwards in 15 cm increments, and to turn 90 degrees left and right. They had so much fun programming them and watching them move about.
A Note From Holly
We are well into Term 2 now and I wanted to say ‘Thank You’ for making me feel so welcome at Wangala. I am very much enjoying getting to know the students. It’s a joy to be at school with such a beautiful group of students, always smiling, waving and saying hello to me whenever I walk past. It is a wonderful community and I’m delighted to be a part of it.
I do however have one small problem…….the student well being office wall is very bare and we need some artwork to brighten it up.
Can you help?
If anyone in the school community love to draw or paint, please make some artwork for our wall!!
Our Positive Behaviour Matrix
