Connection- how do we improve attendance and engagement at school?

Thank you, all our families, in Years 3 to 6 for helping us with all the washing, managing tired children and sometimes nervous children through our two successful weeks of Learn to Swim at Oceana.

We had the connection opportunity this week to spend time and support each class on the bus and at the pool. To hear their excitement about swimming and what is happening for them outside of school like football, sleep overs, favourite music and what they would like to see happen at school connects me to them in a broader sense.

We heard that the children are loving Run Club and would like to see us have a Glenorchy Primary Choir. Student voice is what drives our daily decision making when it comes to helping children want to be at school and helping them feel a sense of belonging to Glenorchy Primary School.

If we feel like we belong, then we can learn.

This week we are sending out a survey to our families and students to ask them a few simple questions.

What are the things we do at Glenorchy Primary to help you feel warmly welcomed each day?

What more can we do in our classrooms and in the playground to help everyone feel welcomed?

We also listened to student voice about Fridays, our attendance levels on Friday are much lower than other days. That needs to change. On Fridays, every class from Prep to Year 6 now teaches reading and Friday is when the UFLI and Word Origins lessons are reviewed to see if your child is understanding the work and sets them up for success on Monday.

We have also changed our weekly assemblies to fortnightly so that we can have a Connection afternoon every second Friday with Winter Sports, Choir, Chess, Drawing, Lego, STEM projects etc which will be something each child can look forward each fortnight.

How can we help?

As the cold weather hits, and beautiful kunyani is covered in snow, we know it sometimes feels, and is hard to get children to school for many reasons.

We are here to help.

Give us a call and we can chat about how we can support you to help you have your child/children come to school every day. You can see below how you can contact me and our staff. Save it on the fridge or in your phone so that you have help at hand when you need.

In this fortnight's newsletter you will see the following:

• Assembly schedule
• GPS Communication Model- how to contact us
• Farewells and welcomes

Happy Mother’s Day

To our Mums, carers, grandparents, Dads that are taking on both roles, aunties, family friends, older cousins we hope that you like the special items and cards your children have made at school and hope that you know that from all of us at school, WE SEE YOU!

We also acknowledge that for those whose mothers have passed, for those mothers who have lost a child, or live far way, or are unwell that this may be a hard day. Big hugs to you.

Thank you for loving our children and all that you do.

I want to thank my mum, sister, family, and the wider sisterhood for being the village that has helped me raise my three children. My mum has modelled resilience, kindness and being a contributor for me. She is also very funny.

I will be running the Mother’s Day Classic on Sunday morning, which I do each year, it is a lovely quiet reflective morning where I think about how grateful I am to be a mum. I hope my son will make me pancakes, and then I and my mum will watch my daughter play hockey and then there is always scones to celebrate with my sister and Mum.

UFLI in action!

Our students are loving learning about phonics in their UFLI lessons. The enthusiasm, excitement and joy I see during literacy time around our school is contagious! Our students are so proud of their reading and writing skills.

I have heard so many great comments about UFLI from our children as they are learning their new skills. Here are just a few, "My favourite part about UFLI is reading"- Aaniyah, "I like writing" - Harley, "I feel good about UFLI because it is fun"- Mehermah, "The best thing about UFLI is learning more letters" - Cillian, "I like the visual drill" - Delilah,  "I like word work because we sound out letters" - Conrad.

National Simultaneous Storytime

National Simultaneous Storytime is held annually by the Australian Library and Information Association. Every year a picture book, written and illustrated by an Australian author and illustrator, is read at the same time (simultaneously) in libraries, schools, pre-schools, childcare centres, family homes and bookshops around the country.

This years’ book is Truck Cat by Deborah Frenkel and Danny Snell, a heart warming story of belonging and identity. 2-3 Crowley and 2-3 Little/Smith will be participating at 12:00 at the Glenorchy LINC.

This will be followed by a whole school extravanganza at 2:00pm in the gym where we would love all our families to join us to celebrate the joy and magic of literacy and reading. Please come along - we may have a surprise or two in store!!

Please come along to the gym at 2:00pm on Wednesday 21 May.

Just a few things we need you all to know.....

Our assemblies will be held fortnightly now. Our first was today and dates for furture assembles are in the Key Dates section. We look forward to sharing our items with family and friends.

As you know our Miss Bacic left us last term - we are wishing her well at her new school.

And of course in farewelling Miss Bacic we also really want to welcome Mr Berry.

"Although we miss Miss Bacic, thank you Mr Berry for becoming our teacher and filling in the gap. We think you're very funny and we love that you are kind and how you love sharing stuff about yourself, and you listen to us as well."

We are also farewelling Mrs Fall after 16 years as part of our community and we wish her well on her new adventure.

Have you downloaded our Schoolzine App?

Following on from the incidents that were widely reported and read on Facebook last week we communicated to the school community about those events via our formal communication tool which is Schoolzine. It is highly recommended that you download the Schoolzine app. If you need any help, please see our friendly admin team in the office. It is a very handy and useful app to have when communicating with school. If your child is absent, it is so easy to alert school with the touch of a button! Our newsletter comes out on Schoolzine every fortnight.

I am so grateful for the connection I have experienced families in our face-to-face meetings and over the phone. There are many ways we can stay in touch and we always want to hear your feedback and help you as best we can.

We are also having another ‘Coffee and Cake Meet’ this term on Thursday 29^th May at 2pm. All welcome.

The ways you can connect with your Principal include:

• Work mobile 0448 225 179
• Michelle’s email - michelle.de.paoli@decyp.tas.gov.au
• Call the school office 6272 7574 to make an appointment.

Michelle De Paoli

Autumn is such a great time for creating art and craft. Our classes have been collecting the fallen leaves from around the school and using them to design an animal or create a scene. 3-4-5 Watson did a great job of their masterpieces.

Another colourful activity has been the gorgeous rainbow rays of sunshine.

Autumn in Kindergarten  

When we returned for the new term we were surprised to find the big tree at the end of our playground was nearly bare! We were delighted to discover that all the leaves had collected on the platform below and on the grass and we have had so much fun collecting the leaves up, laying in the piles and throwing them up in the air. 

With the new term and change in the season we have different rules for outside. We no longer need to wear our hats to protect our faces from the strong summer sun, but we do need to keep warm and dry. The wet weather in the first week gave us an opportunity to establish a routine for changing into our gumboots for damp outside play and back into our shoes when it is time to go back inside. We are so good at making sure the area is tidy and organised and making sure we keep our socks dry! 

We have continued our autumn investigations in the classroom. Exploring the colours, shapes, textures, sounds and smells of autumn in our play and reading books about the season.

Autumn is fun!  

Our students in years 3-6 have made a splash into term 2, participating in our Swimming and Water Safety program at Oceana Pool. Mr Gordon and Mr Pennicott were very impressed with the level of enthusiasm and participation our students showed - as well as remembering to bring their bathers and towel each day!

The first week focused on developing water skills; floating, blowing bubbles in the water and encouraging confidence in the pool.

The focus in week 2 was on survival swimming techniques. Students practised being safe while helping someone else in distress in the water, what to do (or not do!) if we fall in with our clothes on and how life jackets work.

Table Tennis

RSPCA Million Paws Walk

13Yarn