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It is astonishing to think that we are one week shy of completing Term 1 2024. Our students have had a busy and productive start to the year, and we are incredibly proud of their application, determination, and drive to succeed and do their best.

Assemblies

Next term we are changing the way we conduct and host Assemblies for our families and our students. We are introducing a new structure where our Early Childhood (Prep-Grade 2) and our Primary (Grade 3-6) classes will come together separately once a month and will be a fortnight apart. The new day and time for this will be Thursday afternoons from 2pm.  Students from our elected Student Representative Council will be chairing each of these assemblies. Both assemblies will continue to showcase a range of class sharing, musical items and presentation of our Lindisfarne Learner Awards. Parents are invited to attend these assemblies and a timetable will be developed and shared on Schoolzine by the end of this term. At the end of each term, we will also host a whole school assembly where we can share musical items and Aussie of the Month certificates. We look forward to See you all at the first ECE assembly on Thursday 9th of May!

Attendance

Consistent attendance at school is critical to achieving positive educational outcomes and keeping students engaged in their learning. Research indicates that missing school can have negative impacts on students' emotional and behavioural well-being. They may experience social isolation, decreased motivation to stay in school and lower academic performance. Every day a student is absent from school may reduce a child’s chance to reach their social and education potential. At LPS we encourage all parents to reach out if they are experiencing any challenges with getting students to school -whatever reason. We have a wonderful support team who are willing and able to support both students and their families with strategies and resources to ensure that all kids are arriving on time and ready for learning. Please ensure that if your child be absent or late that you let the office staff know on the day or before the absence.

Spotlight on the Leadership team: Purdie Hudson

Miss Purdie works fulltime as an AST in our school and is our Support Teacher and Safeguarding Lead. Miss Purdie works collaboratively with teachers, parents, teacher assistants and relevant service providers to plan and implement a differentiated curriculum for our students. She also supports families and students by coordinating the service delivery for students requiring educational adjustments to their learning programs. Miss Purdie also teaches our both our Kinder classes their Physical Education lesson once a week. Some of her other duties include:

• Co-ordination of Relief for Teacher Assistants
• Line Manager of Teacher Assistants and ESS in the Teaching and Learning space
• Operational Leader for K/P Collaborative Team
• Lead Kinder and Prep PLC
• Induction of new staff in school process and procedures
• Supporting teachers to transition to full registration
• Coordinate small group explicit teaching in support programs
• Coordination of the timetable for the Flexible Learning Centre
• Coordinate professional learning for wellbeing
• Behaviour Support and response

Spotlight on Prep

Maths: We have been assessing the children’s ability to trust the count and patrician numbers to at least ten. Whilst completing this problem-solving task, we observed the students ability I count the correct amount, select a counting strategy, work methodically, patrician in different ways and explain their thinking!

English: We read ‘The very Cranky Bear” as a making meaning task to assess the student’s comprehension skills. The focus was on making connections, in particular how we could make a text-self connection with the character. We also used our knowledge of the Zones of Regulation and calming strategies.

We are undertaking an inquiry into Assemblies and what they will look like this year. Further communication will come home next week.

NAPLAN

This past fortnight our Grade 3 and 5students have been immersed in NAPLAN. We have been so proud of their courage and resilience, especially when the entire platform went down mid test Nation Wide on Monday! While we recognise that this is one test on one day, we really value this data set to help inform our planning and assessment and look forward to unpacking our results, especially our growth and gains when they arrive in Term Two.

Clubs

During break times at LPS we aim to cater for students with all sorts of interests. Along with regular play on our playgrounds and ball sports we offer lots of different “Clubs”. These are run by the staff at our school and have evolved from collecting student voice around the things they would like to do at school. At the moment we are offering a Garden Gnomes group, Running Club, Chess Club, Indoor Dodge Ball, Calm Kids Club, Lego club, Netball training and Rock Band! Coming into the colder months we will also be offering an Art Club, Indoor board games and a Dancing club (can’t wait to see this one! ?) If students have any questions about these please encourage them to check what days etc. they run with their classroom teacher.

Toys and special things at school

With all the wonderful opportunities for creative and indoor/outdoor play we offer during break times, at LPS we discourage students from bringing toys from home to play with at school. Not only does this cause anxiety and distress when they are damaged or lost but it also causes equity issues among peers. If you child requires a learning or support tool (e.g. a fidget tool or a weighted support teddy) this should be negotiated with their classroom teacher and be used in line with their learning plan. If your child brings items to school for sharing or to play with at OHSC, we ask that it remains in their bag for the entire school day. This also applies to collections of cards, and any sort of trading is not permitted at school.

Snapshot on Learning – Kinder

Kinder Blue: Over the past couple of weeks we have discussed the change in seasons. Kinder Blue students chose a leaf outline that they liked the look of, covered it in their favourite Autumn colour and then had a go at cutting around the shape of their leaf. They look great! Week 5 also saw Kinder Blue students having some fun in the sun where the sandpit was popular, as well as the play equipment and the hoops. There were lots of opportunities to use those bigger muscle groups during outside learning time. Inside there has been Duplo building fun, beading/pattern making, drawing, puzzle solving and a last play in the ice-cream shop. There were lots of “sick or injured” patients presenting at ‘the doctors surgery’ when we introduced that last week (just pretend sick/injured of course)! We brainstormed some ideas for a new dramatic play area and the doctors surgery idea came from Daisy.

Kinder White: This week we have been celebrating Harmony Week in Kinder! We did pattern hands, talked about the things that are the same and different about us and how we can be kind to each other. We all belong in Kinder! Come in and read our kindness book. We have also had some fun in the Hairdressing salon where we even had some interesting objects incorporated- would you like a leek in your hairstyle? Very inventive! The leek was used as scissors and a hairbrush and rollers! We have also had a great visit from Nurse Penny last week to talk about the Kinder health checks she will be conducting in Term 2. She showed us all the equipment she will be using to check our eyes and ears! A session with our buddies last week saw us reading stories and do some buddy drawings! We drew each other!

Leadership Role Clarity- Spotlight on Mr Shae Hickey

This week’s leadership role is focussed on getting to know Mr Hickey. Mr Hickey works in our school every day. He is our Assistant Principal, and he is one of our instructional leaders. One of Mr Hickey’s important jobs is to step into my role when I am on leave or offsite.   Mr Hickey has a lot of other very important roles in the school, including but not limited to:

 

• Maintaining key structures, practices and priorities of the LPS Professional Learning Community (PLC).
• Supporting Whole School Learning Inquiries  
• Leading the collection, collation & interpretation of whole school summative data with an emphasis on tracking student growth and leading the Assessment Schedule 
• Coaching of teaching staff including Advanced Skills Teachers
• Operational Leader for 3/4 and 5/6 Collaborative Team 
• Leading Grade 4 and Grade 5/6 PLCs 
• Behaviour support and response 
• Teacher Relief

 

 

Duty of Care

Last week I talked about our duty of care and how we can’t supervise students before 8:30am. Thank you very much to the parents who have made alternate arrangements for children who were arriving early. We still have a number of students who are waiting outside classrooms before 8:30am. Unless they are accompanied by an adult, students are not permitted inside the gate until 8:30am please.

 

Grade 5/6 Band Program

Many of you would be aware that we have not offered the Grade 5/6 Band Program this year. I am still working with neighbouring schools to support our current Grade 6 students who were not able to continue with this valuable program. I will provide an update to those parents when I can finalise these new arrangements.

 

School Association Election Day BBQ

Tomorrow the SA will be holding a BBQ outside the GP Hall from 10am. Come along and show your support by voting onsite and buying a democracy sausage! Please feel free to spread the word.

Last night the School Association ratified our new School Uniform and Dress Code policy. I encourage you all to read it so that school and home can be on the same page. Our purpose is to ensure we promote equity, through a consistent, affordable school uniform that all students can access, regardless of their Socio-Economic Status or home environment. It is also designed to support parents if/when challenging conversations occur at home about what can and can’t be worn to school.

You can download the full policy here: LPS_School_Student_Dress_Code_and_Uniform_Policy.pdf

The policy aims to:

• Promote a shared sense of school identity and ensure all students are dressed safely and appropriately for school activities
• Strengthen the profile and identity of the school and its students within the broader community
• Assist school staff to easily identify students on school excursions and on the school campus
• Encourage students to take pride in their appearance
• Prepare learners for the expectations of the workplace
• Identify the process for establishing a dress code, or uniform and who is required to wear one
• Identify the process for granting exemptions to a dress code or uniform.

The following points outline exactly what students can wear to school. Please note that any plain, unbranded, unpatterned items in the appropriate colours are also acceptable. 

• Full-length navy pants,
• Navy sports shorts, sports skirt, or track pants
• Royal/Light/Navy blue polo shirt,
• LPS School dress,
• School rugby jumper or polar fleece,
• Navy Blue Softshell Jacket
• Navy, black, blue or white socks without patterns or other non LPS logos
• Navy, black, blue or white tights, leggings or stockings without patterns or non LPS logos
• Navy, black, blue or white long sleeve t-shirts can be worn under the school dress or polo if desired
• The footwear to accompany the Uniform must be suitable, enclosed shoes 

By the end of Term One, all classes will have had a class discussion where they will unpack the policy (in an age-appropriate way) to ensure that all the students are aware of what is required. After this, if any students continue wearing items outside these guidelines, teachers will have a reminder conversation with the student (where appropriate), if it continues after this teachers may have a conversation with you. 

The following areas we will be focusing on in Term 1, and we will continue to educate students over the next twelve months on different areas as required.

1. Any socks that are novelty or patterned are not to be worn at school.
2. LJFC football jumpers and football logo shorts are not to be worn as substitutes for school colours or school logos.
3. Hair longer than shoulder length must be tied back for the school day.

 Any questions or concerns please contact me via emial or through the office.

Grade 3-6 Athletics Carnival

Congratulations to all our amazing students in Grade 3-6 today who demonstrated their courage and resilience by participating in the Athletics Carnival. Today I saw so many examples of wonderful sportsmanship along with such well-mannered and well-behaved students across the whole day. A big thank you to Mr Kamano for all his organisation today.

 

School duty of care

Just a reminder to all parents that our duty of care is from 8:30am until 2:55pm. Could we please remind all parents that students are not to be on school ground either before or after these times without an adult.  The Clarence City Council provide before and after school care onsite form 7:30-8:30am and 2:55- 6pm. Please call them with any enquires. If you do arrive before this time, please ensure your children are being safe and are closely supervised, particularly on our ovals both before and after school.

 

Snapshot on Learning – Grade 2

Grade 2 Blue have been taking their reading outside and into the sunshine this week! They are practising their reading fluency, which means to read with appropriate expression, volume, smoothness, pace, and phrasing. Mrs J and Mr A have been providing feedback and students have also been self-reflecting on their reading and setting goals to work towards in order to improve fluency and ultimately their comprehension. In science they continued their thinking skills and learnt that good science inquiry involves posing questions to explore patterns and relationships and making predictions based on experiences. They brainstormed to decide the ways in which we should conduct our science learning fairly, so that they are able to observe experiments that are valid and reliable. This included thinking about how we can sort information to compare observations with predictions and consider if investigations are fair. This is setting the foundations for our exploration of electrical energy. In HASS (Humanities and Social Sciences) they are learning about the significance of local places, buildings, and people. They learnt about landmarks and spent time identifying and locating landmarks in our community.

Grade 2 White Had their first buddies session this week, their buddy class is 5/6 Navy. They started a Harmony Day activity about belonging with their buddies. In Maths, they have been focusing on explaining their thinking and which strategies they use to figure things out. They did this through Number Talks, and their Prove It Board. Their HASS focus for terms 1 and 2 is History. They have started learning about how we can find out about what happened in the past. They learned about a Venn diagram and saw some pictures in the office, of what our school used to look like. In English, they are learning about suffixes, specifically plurals. When to add s, or es. When do we change a y to ies? They have done a noticing with these words and students picked the pattern- We change the y when a consonant is before the y! They are also learning about syllables, and simple sentences that need a subject and a verb.

Leadership Role Clarity- Spotlight on Mrs Andrea Curran

This week’s leadership role is focussed on getting to know Mrs Curran. Mrs Curren Works 0.8 in our school, from Tuesday to Friday. Mrs Curran is our Quality Teaching Coach and is responsible for leading our whole school priority of Reading. Some of her other leadership responsibilities include:

• Coaching (co-plan, co-teach, co-reflect) of teaching staff 
• Induction for new staff for Essential Assessments and Diagnostic Tools 
• Maintain whole school literacy resources 
• Operational Leader for 1/2 Collaborative Team 
• Lead Grade 1, Grade 2, and Grade 3 PLCs 
• Behaviour support and response  
• Co-management of Facebook

 

School Association Easter Raffle

Easter is coming soon – Drawn on Thursday 28 March! Get set by going in the draw to win an amazing hamper of chocolate delights. Never carry cash? Now you can pay for your tickets on the QKR! app! And if you prefer cash, that's still an option too. Either way, you'll need to return your raffle books to the school office to go in the draw.

Good morning families,

Our next School Association meeting is our AGM and will be followed by our first general meeting for 2024. These meetings will be held on Tuesday 27^th February at 6:30pm in the library. As per the SA constitution, we need to call for nominations for the following roles as all office bearers have been in the role for the past two years.

 

Chairperson

Vice Chairperson

Secretary

Treasurer

Parent Representatives

Community Representative

 

The School Association are an integral part of our school community. The meetings are usually held on a Tuesday night, once per term and go for around 60 minutes. If you would like to nominate for any of the listed roles, please email the Returning Officer, Andrea Loh for a nomination form (also available in hard copy at the office) and return either via email to andrea.loh@decyp.tas.gov.au or in person at the office by 3pm on Tuesday 27^th February.

 

Kind Regards

Kel Innis

WELCOME BBQ AND OPEN CLASSROOM AFTERNOON -Wednesday 21^st February 2024

Dear Parents and Guardians,

We are excited to invite you to our upcoming Open Classroom Afternoon and Welcome BBQ at Lindisfarne Primary School. This event is a wonderful opportunity for you to experience your child’s learning environment and connect with the school community.

Date:   Wednesday 21^st February

Time:   Open Classrooms – 3:30 – 4:30 (in your child’s classroom)

           Complimentary BBQ – 4:30 onwards (In the Kitchen Garden space)

Open Classrooms provide an opportunity for parents and guardians to talk informally with their child’s teacher about classroom routines, Seesaw and other relevant class programs, experiences and expectations you might have questions about. Students can lead parents on a tour of their classroom, and you will have the chance to participate in a fun, interactive activity with your child.

Following the Open Classrooms, we invite you to join us for a complimentary Welcome BBQ starting at 4:30 in the Kitchen Garden Space. This casual gathering is a chance to meet other parents, teachers and school staff and is a wonderful opportunity for staff to get to know all our families and interact outside the business of drop-off and pickup times. We will be providing sausages in bread (with a vegetarian option) and an area for refilling water bottles during the BBQ. We ask that you please bring your own drinks to the BBQ.

We look forward to seeing you!

Kind regards,

Jacquie Moore.

AST & Classroom Teacher

In line with the Department for Education, Children and Young People’s Social Media Policy, we remind you that sharing images of other children without permission from their parents or guardians is not permitted.  You are welcome to take photos or videos of your own child or children, but please do not take or share photos of other children.  We would like you to enjoy the event, but sharing images or video of others on social media without appropriate consent is not permitted. Please respect the safety and privacy of out learners.

Good afternoon and welcome back to the 2024 school year! It has been so lovely to meet and greet all of the students back today and hear all of their wonderful holiday stories. From what I have seen they have had an amazing day getting to know their new teachers and classmates. Look out for some photos on Seesaw and Facebook later today!

Communication

This year we have welcomed lots of new families to Lindisfarne Primary School. For those who are new, and as a refresher for returning families, we use Schoolzine for whole school messages and passing on important information; Seesaw for student learning updates; and Facebook to showcase and celebrate student achievements and what is happening around our school. In 2024, I will also be sending regular communications like this one, and this format will replace the monthly newsletter. Our admin staff will also be sending out an overview of our school calendar at the end of each month that will include regular updates and things to remember.  

Staff titles

We had a lovely whole school assembly this morning and it was fabulous to see everyone looking so fresh and eager in their school uniforms. We introduced all our new staff and let the students know from today, some of our staff will now be known by their first names. Classroom teachers have a list of all new titles and have shared these with students, and it’s been great to see how the students have embraced this -especially some the grade 6’s who have gotten lots of giggles calling me Kel!

Shared birthday items

Something we would like to re-visit this year is birthday treats. Towards the end of term in 2023 we shared that we are discouraging parents from sending lollies, chocolates, and other “sometimes food” in to share for birthdays. During COVID we were not able to share homemade treats/cakes so for a time, packaged foods were the preferred option. Now that we have less restrictions, we are asking that you do not send lollies or chocolates to school for birthdays and consider checking with the classroom teachers before send food items. While we are not saying no to cupcakes or shared birthday cakes, but to ensure that we are considering those students with allergies and/those parents who do not wish their children to have food not sent by them, we would appreciate your cooperation with this.

End of day

At times we all experience circumstances where we may arrive late to pick up our children from school. If this is the case, in the first instance could you please call the office and let us know so that we can communicate this with classroom teachers and students. Students who have not been collected (excluding those students who walk home/catch buses/meet parents offsite etc), will remain in the classroom with their classroom teacher (not the office) until someone has arrived.

SAVE THE DATE

Our Welcome BBQ will be held on Wednesday 21^st of February in the Kitchen Garden. More communication will come home next week about this.

School Association

We are looking forward to seeing all new and retuning members at our first meeting for 2024 on February 27^th at 6:30pm. Please consider coming along and see how much of an impact you can make by becoming a member!

Kind Regards

Kel

Principal

Just a reminder that children are to arrive and sit with parents toight at Christmas on Henley and we kick off right on 4:30pm! Please find a comfy spot with your family, listen and be ready for when classes are called up and duty of care is with parents at all times.