17-Feb-2023
Dear Families
“The ultimate source of happiness is not money and power, but warm-heartedness.” – Dalai Lama
Thank you for taking the time to share insight about your child with their teacher during our conversations this week. This connection to our staff has been appreciated greatly and has certainly helped us to more deeply understand our students so that we can continue to provide a wonderful learning environment.
Our students are well and truly into the rhythm of school life and have shown great resilience over the last couple of days when the mercury has soared well past 35 degrees and we are truly appreciative of their efforts.
Instructional Model #2 – What are the components of a great Reading lesson?
Strong literacy skills, knowledge and understanding are the building blocks for success. We understand how important Reading and Writing is to support all learning and we use evidence-based practices to help our students to thrive in English.
Our School’s Instructional Playbook focuses on Daily Review, Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Comprehension, Vocabulary and Morphology.
We take into account the simple view of reading in that, learning to read requires two abilities – correctly identifying words (decoding) and understanding their meaning (comprehension). Acquiring these two broad abilities, requires the development of more specific skills. Effective reading instruction includes six essential skills for reading and our high-quality literacy program includes all six components.
Phonemic Awareness: The ability to identify and manipulate the individual sounds in spoken words
Phonics: The ability to decode words using knowledge of letter-sound relationships- decoding strategies include syllabification, segmenting and blending sounds together to read words.
Fluency: Reading with appropriate pace and accuracy ensures words/texts are understood, usually requiring words read in a minute. The better the fluency, the greater the comprehension.
Comprehension: Understanding the meaning and intent of the word/ text- With appropriate pace comes greater comprehension and understanding of information.
Vocabulary: Knowing the meaning of a wide variety of words and the structure of written language- word origins (etymology)
Morphology: The smallest unit or meaning of a word.-Prefixes, root/base words, suffixes and rules that govern them.
Our structured reading approach includes:
- Daily review of previously taught content – Phonological Awareness, Phonics and Morphology
- Explicitly taught phonics/spelling lessons
- Guided practice to improve fluency
- Teaching of comprehension strategies
- Vocabulary development which includes grammar, and structured Morphology from Foundation through to Year 6
EPS Twilight Market is back for 2023 – Friday 31 March
Our Twilight Market is starting to gain great momentum and we’re eagerly anticipating another highly successful event for our school and community. Attached is an information flyer that details what, where and when of our donation drive. There is no expectation or requirement for families to donate goods but any and all donations will be gleefully accepted.
To help us run this event we will be shortly seeking donations of different items for our School stalls.
Soon we will be requesting donations of the following:
Bottles of wine
Lucky Jars
Cans of Soft Drink
Blocks of Chocolate
Baked goods (to be brought in on the day of the market)
Easter eggs for our raffle
Twilight Easter Market Donations and Collections Flyer 2023
All money raised by our school stalls will be used to create an inviting and nurturing space around the new shade sails.
In the not-too-distant future, we will send a call out to families to try and get some help on the day to run a few of these stalls
Sunsmart
Skin cancer is one of the most preventable cancers. UV exposure during childhood and adolescence has a big impact on future skin cancer risk.
Reducing UV exposure reduces skin cancer risk.
From mid-August through to the end of April we invoke a ‘no hat no play’ policy to help protect our students and staff from damaging UV radiation. We have sunscreen in each classroom for students who may have left theirs at home that day and staff are asked to remind students to apply sunscreen before heading outside.
We’d love it if you can remind your child of the importance to do this each day and help them to apply sunscreen in the morning before school starts. In this way we can work together to teach them how to stay safe and protected from the harsh Summer sun at school, on excursions and on School Camps.
Edithvale Primary School encourages all staff and students to apply SPF30 (or higher) broad-spectrum, water- resistant sunscreen daily whenever UV levels reach 3 and above. Sunscreen should be applied at least 20 minutes before going outdoors, and reapplied every two hours according to manufacturer’s instructions.
Teachers will remind students to apply sunscreen before going outside and prior to Physical Education or Sport classes.
The school has SPF 30 (or higher) broad spectrum, water resistant sunscreen available in each classroom for times when students have left theirs at home.
At Edithvale Primary School students are welcome to attend the First aid room and office area to access sunscreen. Staff and students who may suffer from allergic reactions from certain types of sunscreen are encouraged to contact the school to implement a management plan to reduce the risk of an allergic reaction at school.
Family Notice – We are SunSmart
Attendance
There has been an increased focus on Student Attendance by the Department this year in response to the State-wide trend of student absenteeism. As well as a Department Information flyer that is attached, there are some tips and details provided here. We respectfully ask for your help in keeping our records accurate and ensuring our students enjoy opportunities for learning at school every day.
SCHOOL IS BETTER WHEN YOUR CHILD IS HERE
Why it’s important
We all want our students to get a great education, and the building blocks for a great education begin with students coming to school each and every day.
If students miss school regularly, they miss out on learning the fundamental skills that will set them up for success in the later years of school.
There is no safe number of days for missing school – each day a student misses puts them behind, and can affect their educational outcomes.
Each missed day is associated with progressively lower achievement in numeracy, writing and reading.
Getting in early
Attendance patterns are established early – a child regularly missing days in kindergarten or in the early years of school will often continue to miss classes in the later years, and receive lower test scores than their classmates.
It’s vital that students go to school every day – even in the early years of primary school.
It has been shown that poor patterns of attendance in the early years can lead to poor patterns of attendance throughout the school years.
Poor attendance also can make it difficult for students to form positive friendships with their peers.
As the table below shows – a 90% attendance rate might sound alright – but it still means that over the course of a child’s Primary and Secondary schooling, they would miss ONE FULL YEAR of face to face learning opportunities.
If your child is away
If for any reason your child must miss school, there are things you can do with your school to ensure they don’t fall behind:
Remember, every day counts. If your child must miss school, speak with your classroom teacher as early as possible.
Openly communicating with your child’s school about all absences is a good way to prevent attendance issues being escalated to a School Attendance Officer. A School Attendance Officer is a Department of Education and Training Regional Director who has authority to follow up attendance issues. Chronic or ongoing attendance issues that are escalated can lead to an Infringement Notice being issued to parent/s.
If you’re having attendance issues with your child, please let your classroom teacher know so we can work together to get your child to school every day.
Top attendance tips for parents
- Schools want to work in partnership with parents – act early if you have any concerns by contacting your child’s school and asking for advice and support
- Remember that every day counts
- There is no safe number of days for missing school – each day a student misses puts them behind, and can affect their educational outcomes and their social connectedness
- Talk positively about school and the importance of attending every day
- Open and prompt communication with your child’s school about all absences is a good idea
- Avoid making routine medical and dental appointments during the school day or planning family holidays during the term
- Seek help from your school if you are concerned about your child’s attendance and wellbeing. Schools want to work in partnership with parents to support student attendance and wellbeing.
Key dates in Term 1
- Monday 20 February – School Photo day
- Friday 3rd of March – District Swimming
- March 15 -27 NAPLAN (Years 3 and 5)
- Friday – 24th of March Inter School Sport Lightning Premiership Friday – Year 5 and 6
- Friday 30 March Easter Market 3:30 pm – 6:30 pm
Student Free days
I can confirm a couple of Student free dates that were ratified at our School Council this week
- Monday April 24
- Friday August 25
- Monday November 6
- Wednesday December 20
Have a wonderful weekend,
James Whitla
I wish to acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands on which this is being read – for most of us – the
Bunurong- members of the eastern Kulin Nations – and pay my respects to elders past present and emerging. I
wish to acknowledge our First Nations people and pay respects to them. I note further that these lands were
never ceded and are, and always will be, Aboriginal Lands.