Friday 17th March 2017

News from the Principal Waleed Aly Inducts 2017 School Captains Several weeks ago I wrote to The Project’s Waleed Aly to invite him to present our 2017 school captains with their leadership badges. I have always admired Waleed’s work, particularly around issues such as multiculturalism, human rights and politics. I thought that Waleed would be the perfect person to present our new school captains and vice captains to the school. I was well prepared for Waleed to turn down my invitation but much to the school’s excitement, he accepted and last Tuesday visited the school to induct our new student leaders.

We assembled together as a school and held a very special presentation ceremony lead by our special guest, Waleed. Before inducting our captains and vice captains, Waleed shared some thoughts around leadership.

This is what Waleed had to say:

Everybody has something they can offer... Something they can contribute. If you're not a leader it doesn't matter at all. What matters is there's something you can do to help somebody else in your class or in your year level or maybe it's a brother or sister or a friend or something like that to help their school experience be a lot better. When I was in school I didn't get to be school captain. I tried really hard to be school captain and they just wouldn't let me

do it. But I was lucky enough to have other things to do so I got to play in the footy team or the cricket team and I just made sure whatever I was doing I was the best at that. It doesn't really matter what position you're in. What matters is you do it really well and you make other people's lives around you better.

Annual General Meeting Parents and friends of Dandenong Primary School are invited to attend the school council’s Annual General Meeting which will take place this coming Monday from 5:30pm. The purpose of the meeting is to present the school’s Annual Report for 2016 and to welcome incoming school council members and thank the 2016 council for its hard work in making Dandenong Primary School a great school.

Dandenong Primary School Council 2017 The role of school council is outlined in the Education and Training Reform Act 2006. In essence, the role of school council is one of helping to set the long term future for the school and maintaining oversight of the school's operation. At this stage, our 2017 school council is made up of the following members: Parent Members Knowles Tivendale Narelle Jacka Lucy Calabro Hanima Haji (new) Emhudin Jelacevic Shilpa Dharmesh Dharmesh Chembaden Samantha Purton School Staff Members Daniel Riley (Principal) Anne Pereira (Assistant Principal) Terri Truscott (Leading Teacher) Svet Blagojevic (Leading Teacher) Sengjul Rasidovski (Education Support Staff) On behalf of the Dandenong Primary School community I would like to thank all members of the 2016 school council including those returning in 2017 as well as outgoing member Mr Brian Borg. Celebrating Harmony Day We have been invited to celebrated Harmony Day on THIS COMING Tuesday 21st March at the Dandenong Plaza shopping centre with a Hand Holding Ceremony taking place at 10:30am. Parents and friends who are available on the day would be very welcome to join us at the Dandenong Plaza. Please ensure you return your child’s permission form by Monday 20th March. An Exciting Project with La Trobe University Planning Students La Trobe University Senior Lecturer, Ms Julie Rudner, was in touch with the school late last year around the possibility of working with our students to put together a landscaping design for our school with the help of La Trobe University planning students. This work may lead into some development work in the school grounds which will be exciting to see unfold over time!

Dandenong Primary School in the 1940s Last week a past student by the name of Alan Robert dropped in on a visit from Queensland to see his old school which happens to be Dandenong Primary School. Alan attended the school from 1942 or 1943 through to 1948 and his mother was a student of the school in the 1920’s. Alan recalled several fascinating stories of his experiences at the school. You can hear some of what he had to share here: https://soundcloud.com/dandenongps/

School Review In Term 3 the school will undergo a Department of Education & Training Priority Review. This means that an independent review team, accredited and contracted by the Department, will be assembled to undertake a four-day intensive analysis of the school’s performance. The school will then set about writing its next 4-year ‘Strategic Plan’ based on the findings of the school review. Parents and other members of the Dandenong Primary School community may be invited to participate in part of the review process.

Free Dental Check Up & Treatment at School Next term eligible children will have the opportunity to receive a free dental check-up, treatment and dental plan at our school provided free under the Federal Government’s Child Dental Benefit Scheme. This service will be provided onsite at school. Stay tuned for more details Student Attendance From Week 3 of this year, the school has managed to maintain a reasonably good rate of attendance averaging over 93%. It would be great to see this figure rise closer to 95% which is the minimum expected rate of attendance for all children. Most children are averaging well over 95% which is fantastic news for their education and their future success. Unfortunately, there are some students who bring down the overall average by missing too much school.

NAPLAN Preparation Underway Students in Year 3 and Year 5 have begun their NAPLAN preparation work. NAPLAN is a test of student ability in reading, writing, spelling, grammar and punctuation and mathematics. Testing will take place right across Australia over May 9, 10 and 11. Some Important Dates for Your Calendar

Thurs 30th March - Year 3/4 Expo

Fri 31st March - Whole School Harmony Day Concert - Last Day of Term 2:30pm dismissal

Tues 18th April - Term 2 Begins - 2nd Essential Items payment due

Home Reading – Make it fun and make it every day! This week the Prep teaching staff put on an information session for Prep parents about home reading routines. If you didn’t pick up an information sheet from this session, speak with Miss Curnow and she will gladly supply you with one. I am the dad of an 8-year old boy who is in Year 3 this year as well as a 6-year old boy, who has just started Prep in 2017 and a 4-year old daughter (pictured right). Sometimes it’s not easy with how busy life gets but one thing I do make sure of is making the time every single day to read to my two youngest children and to listen to Ned, my oldest, read to me. Trying to make the time and space to read to three different children can be like herding cats in my house so I find it works best when I do two things:

1. Make home reading FUN 2. Make home reading EVERY DAY so

that it’s part of my children’s every day routine

Every child is unique and every child will learn to read at different ages. This is true for children in a class but also for kids in a single family. My 8-year old took to reading quite quickly as he progressed through Prep and Year 1 whereas my middle child will likely to take a little longer so for now I work on reading to him, showing him the skills I use as a reader (e.g. pointing to the words, using the pictures for clues, sounding out letters etc). With my 4-year old daughter it’s mainly just about having fun reading together Daniel Riley Principal

News from the School Captains Below is an introduction from each of our new School Captains and Vice Captains…

MANYA My name is Manya and I am from India. I came to Australia when I was 8 years. I can speak Hindi, English and Kannada. I am 11 years old and it is an honor to be given the position of school caption. I hope to be the best captain that I can be! RAMIN My name me is Ramin and I come from Afghanistan and I am Muslim. I can speak Dari, Urdu, English and Hindi. I like to play soccer plus my favorite player is Ronaldo. I am 12 years old and being a captain is cool. ZAHRA Hi, my name is Zahra and I am 11 years young. I was born in Iran but my background is Afghanistan since my parents were born there. I came to Australia a little a little under 2 and a half years ago also I can speak Dari and English but am on my way to learning 2 more, French and Arabic. I am honored and delighted to be a Vice Captain and couldn’t ask for more. LUKA My name is Luka Pecer and I was born in Australia but my background is Serbian since my parents were born in Serbia. I can speak Serbian, English, French and Croatian. I am 11 years old. I love soccer and play for the team SWE (Springvale White Eagles). I have been given the opportunity and will do my best to fulfil this position. We look forward to helping the teachers and other leaders with the help of students to make

our school environment a safer and happier place.

House and Area Captains The Year 5/6 team are proud to announce the following captains… House Captains Hawdon - Junior and Zulikha Clow - Feda and Nilofar Langhorne - Najeeb and Aleshanee Lonsdale - Suhail and Tania Wellbeing Captain - Bintu Committee members - Jovan and Poppy Library Captain - Sahla Committee member - Vidhi ICT Captain - Ben Committee members - Anaheita and Braeden Art Captain - Raihaneh Committee members - Fou and Soraya Sports Captain - Monika Committee members - Junior, Ma'a and Lexy

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