NEWSLETTER Wednesday, 3rd June 2020

2021 Foundation Enrolments are NOW OPEN

You can download the enrolment pack from the school website:

https://www.kilmoreps.vic.edu.au

Children must be turning five before 30th April 2021.

If you have any questions regarding enrolment, please do not hesitate to contact the school on 57821 268.

WEL

CO

ME

BA

CK

Spelling in

2D and 2S

Ethan & Liam — 2D

Xavier & Tyler — 2S Gen — 2D

Odern — 2S

Jayden — 2D

Beau & Blake — 2D

Locky & Amy from FF

Tian & Charlie from FJ

Some of our Foundation

Star Learners

James & Madison from FF

Bridie & Xavier from FF

Jack from FM

Darcie from FJ

Sophie from FM

Isla from FL

Lemmy FJ & Chelsea FM

Lacie & Emily from FM

Isabel from FM

Remote Learning - We Made It!

As we draw close to the end of the remote learning period I would like to extend an enormous thank you to all of our community for getting through this period together. It has been an enormous challenge but the most important point to reflect upon is that we have all worked together during this health crisis. I would like to acknowledge the great work undertaken by all of our school staff over the few months. At short notice, they have had to completely overhaul how they deliver learning and support for our students and they have done an outstanding job in adapting to their changed circumstances.

Congratulations to all of our parents and guardians for supporting our students during this time. Remote learning has looked different in every household but everyone has done the best they possibly could do in their circumstances. As I have said in a previous newsletter, maintaining family wellbeing and family relationships is our most important goal at this time.

There have also been a huge amount of successes and changes in practice over the last ten weeks. Our teachers have learned new ways of working which we will continue to implement with the return to onsite learning. Our use of technology such as Google Classroom is here to stay and this is just one of the many positive changes that we will continue to implement.

Quite rightfully, many parents are pondering the question” “has my child fallen behind and will they catch up?” The experience of New Zealand, which unfortunately has experienced much educational disruption due to natural disasters, is useful to reflect upon when considering this question. Professor John Hattie has studied the experiences of New Zealand students extensively, many of whom have missed terms of schooling without any prior planning due to the nature of natural disasters.

He makes the following points:

● Schools in Christchurch, New Zealand, were closed for weeks following the 2011 earthquake and did not have access to online learning available now. Student results actually went up in the final exams and high school students did not drop out.

Professor John Hattie also notes that Australian students could lose a whole term out of the school year without falling significantly behind international counterparts.

Professor Hattie says Australia has the "longest school year and school day" of any country in the world. Even if 10 weeks were removed, he said "students would generally still be getting more classroom time than students in countries like Sweden, Finland and Estonia. When we get back to the old normal the recovery will be reasonably quick."

Car Park Plan:

From Tuesday of next week, we will be introducing a staggered pick-up system for our families. The pick-up system will be based on the surnames of children to ensure that parents do not have to wait for children from different year levels. There will be two designated pick up times (2-50-3pm & 3pm-3.10pm) with collection points being zoned according to the surnames of children. Full details of the plan will be distributed to the community tomorrow.

Please note that morning drop-off will operate in its current format - there will not be allocated drop off times.

Mr O’Sullivan

Continued……

Birthday Rituals:

We are all well aware that COVID-19 has disrupted many of our usual rituals and the celebration of birthdays at school falls into this category. As a school, we absolutely acknowledge the importance of these “special days” for our students, but unfortunately our new guidelines prevent the sharing of food which is sourced from families. To ensure that we can still acknowledge birthdays, we have developed two options which our students and families can access. Mrs Smith has put together a special “birthday box” which has a singing cupcake, stickers and lots of other exciting offerings for students. We will make this available to all students. Families are also welcome to order from a special birthday menu which our canteen operator, Jodie Cloke, has put together. We are hoping that these two initiatives will help our students to share their special day with their peers.

School Photos:

With the return of all students to on site learning next week, we will be sending home school photos to families. I acknowledge that everyone has had to wait a little longer than usual but the patience that everyone has shown in our current circumstances is much appreciated.

Reporting:

Students will still receive a Semester 1 report before the end of the Term 2. Due to the disruption over the remote learning period, the Department of Education has changed the reporting format and reporting expectations for Semester 1. I will distribute a letter to our community early next week explaining the changes in the reporting format and changes to our usual Parent / Teacher interview practices.

Final Thoughts:

Next Tuesday, we will welcome the return of all students to onsite learning. All the staff of Kilmore Primary School have missed seeing their students, so it will be wonderful to have everyone on site again. While there will be some changes to the old routines, it will be fabulous to have the busy hum of student activity back at KPS again.

Wishing everyone a lovely long weekend with their families.

Neil O’Sullivan

Principal

Mr O’Sullivan

School Crossing Reminder

Please DO NOT move your vehicle until the Crossing Supervisor is behind the yellow line.

Please DO NOT park in the no stopping/parking areas directly adjacent to the school crossing.

Remind children to walk across the crossing.

Be mindful as you are driving through, that children may

spontaneously run out from behind cars.

Whilst waiting for students to exit school at the end of the day, please be mindful of social distancing and not congregate

directly outside the gate.

With the increased volume of students leaving school next week, please DO NOT linger around the gate once you have your

children.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Happy Birthday to the following students

who are celebrating their birthday in the

coming week.

We hope you have a lovely day.

June

4th Saige 1N

Jaiden 3M

5th Madison 3R

Montana 5F

6th Lucy 5M

7th William 3R

Shawn 5H

9th Logan 2J

Jessica 3M

10th Caleb 4B

Eden 4W

June

Friday 5th Conveyance Allowance Applications close

Monday 8th Queens Birthday Students don’t attend school

Tuesday 9th All students Foundation — Gr 6 return to onsite learning

Friday 26th CSEF Applications Close

School finishes for Term 2

July

Monday 13th Term 3 Commences Students return to school

Changes of Clothes

With the wet weather now upon us, could you please make sure all students have a change of clothes in their bags.

Essential Student Learning Item Fees Paid

72%

Current Student Enrolment is 557

Conveyance Allowance — Applications close this Friday 5th June

Families in rural and regional Victoria can get help with the cost of transporting their children to their nearest school or campus. This is known as the conveyance allowance. The conveyance allowance is available to students travelling by:

public transport

private car

private bus

or to students whose nearest school is not serviced by a free school bus.

The conveyance allowance is a contribution towards transport costs and is not intended to cover the full cost of transporting children to and from school.

The conveyance allowance is available to families who meet the following criteria. Students must:

attend their nearest government or non-government school/campus appropriate to their year level at which admission is permissible be enrolled at a school/campus outside Melbourne’s metropolitan conveyance boundary

Live 4.8km or more by the shortest practicable route from that school/campus attended be of school age at the time of application, and reside in Victoria.

For more information and application forms, click on the below link:

https://www.education.vic.gov.au/school/teachers/transport/Pages/conveyance.aspx

Updated Reduced Service Timetable

Assumption College Bus Service 2020

The following dates throughout the remainder of 2020 indicate either Reduced or No Service on the ACK Bus Service.

Monday 8th June 2020 No Service Public Holiday

Monday 29th June 2020 – Friday 10th July 2020 No Service School Holidays

Monday 13th July 2020 No Service

Friday 14th August 2020 Reduced Service

Monday 7th September 2020 Reduced Service

Monday 14th September – Friday 18th September 2020

Reduced Service

Monday 21st Sept 2020 – Friday 2nd October 2020 No Service School Holidays

Monday 2nd Nov 2020 & Tuesday 3rd Nov 2020 No Service

Monday 7th Dec 2020 – Friday 18th December 2020 Reduced Service

Open Days

With the current climate, we are unable to offer Open Days or School Tours. If you would like to be added to our communication list for us to let you know dates and times, once we are

able to offer School Tours, please call the office on 5782 1268.

On Tuesday, our Year 2 students had fun blowing giant bubbles! They then wrote procedures about how to blow bubbles.

Our Year 3’s have written some

revolting recipes.

Scienceworks Melbourne

On the 29th of December me and my family went to science work. It is a historical and learning place. We started our journey to, science works. On the way my baby sister was sleeping me and my brother were playing the I spy game with mum. On the way I saw two big building and a bridge and the ocean. we reached around 11am and parked our car. We went through the door and waited our turn to get tickets to see the museums. Firstly, I builded my future and made my future car. I saw a little ball explosion, and so many things to discover. Then I checked my weight and length. We also went to a dark glassy place. So cool in the afternoon we went to the JUMBO CASTLE! The day was really hot so we got ice poles. Then we had our lunch. Later we checked out a bubble show. We went to the air playground and made paper airplane and flew them. We did boat racing and I won! We saw floating balls. Then we saw crystals at the gift shop.

On the way home we started receiving phone calls from my family in India everyone was wishing me a happy birthday I got lots of gifts. My parents bought me a halal cake it was coffee flavoured that night I cut my cake and said happy birthday Afizah. We ate dinner together and had Indian curry and rice and naan . I enjoyed my birthday!

By Afizah

Some Year levels will begin learning about poetry and rhyme in the near future, others levels will be learning about these next term.

Poetry Competition

ABC Education is running a haiku competition. A haiku is a Japanese poem of 17 syllables, written in 3 lines. The theme for the competition is Nature. If you are interested in participating, please see:

https://education.abc.net.au/home#!/competition/3538992/haiku-competition-2020

The competition closes at 19 June 2020, 5pm.

Last week our students participated in this event. Students read, or watched a reading of the story, then completed some follow up activities.

National Simultaneous Storytime 2020 Continued……

The Victorian Premiers’ Reading Challenge is now open and Kilmore Primary School is excited to be participating again. The Challenge is open to all Victorian children from birth to Year 10 in recognition of the importance of reading for literacy development. It is not a competition; but a personal challenge for children to read a set number of books by 4 September 2020. Children from Prep to Year 2 are encouraged to read or ‘experience’ 30 books with their parents and teachers. Children from Year 3 to Year 10 are challenged to read 15 books.

How to register for the challenge:

Once you have been registered you will receive a challenge username and passcode. You will use this to log into the challenge website to record the books you have been reading. You will be given instructions about how to do this when you receive your login details. It has been lovely to see all of our Foundation to Year 2 students back on site. We are looking forward to seeing all our Year 3-6 students next week! Have a great week, Emma White Literacy Coordinator

Prep, Year 1 and Year 2 students Email Mrs Jacobs or Ms Sloane jacobs.fiona.f@edumail.vic.gov.au

sloane.anna.m@edumail.vic.gov.au

Years 3 – 6 students Email Mrs Rowe rowe.tenille.r@edumail.vic.gov.au

Captain Marvel wants to remind everyone to please wash your hands for 20 seconds, which is 1/3 of a minute.

WORDS FROM WELBEING

Just a reminder that all students and families can access school based wellbeing supports. Kimberly can be contacted on 5782 1268 or at batsas-hill.kimberly.a@edumail.vic.gov.au

The following services are available outside of school hours:

** In the event of an emergency please call 000 **

Kids Helpline

Ph: 1800 551 800

https://kidshelpline.com.au/

Parentline

Ph: 13 22 89

https://parentline.com.au/

Safe Steps

Sexual assault, domestic and family violence Ph: 1800 015 188

https://www.safesteps.org.au/

Lifeline

Ph: 13 11 14

https://www.lifeline.org.au/