Month: August 2021

Hello Beaconsfield community,

I hope today is a good day.  How lovely was the weather on the weekend!  I hope you were able to get out and enjoy it.  The sun shining giving me vitamin D and the exercise, certainly helped my wellbeing.  It also gave a sense that Spring is not far away – which is exciting. It is sad that our playgrounds have closed for our families, but I am sure that our families will think of new and creative ways to exercise and have fun.

Tips from students for students

Last week, Mrs Mollard and myself, met with our Student Representative Council (SRC).  We discussed how they were going with remote learning and what works for them.  Some of their strategies and benefits of learning for them were:

• Choosing when you work and what order you do the work
• Being at home, don’t have to get up so early, wearing pjs
• Taking breaks and go outside
• Spending time with family and pets
• They were divided – doing the work you like first or doing the work that challenges you first
• Watching the teacher videos to help with understanding the work, seeing their teacher and making them smile (there are some very informative and entertaining videos!)
• Being able to take their time to complete the activity – do not have to pack up because the bell rings for lunchtime.

They are such an amazing group of students and represent the resilience of our school community.  It was very enjoyable meeting with them.

Here are a couple of supports for parents and carers, as we know that it is important to ensure that you are looking after yourself.

Here is a link from Vikki Ryall from Headspace with tips for parents and carers during lockdown.

I have also placed a link for a document from the Department of Education for parents and carers to support your child’s mental health and wellbeing.

https://blogs.beaconsfield.vic.edu.au/Newsletter/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/quick-guide-to-student-mental-health-and-wellbeing-resources.pdf

PJ day – postponed

SRC have decided to postpone the PJ day until we are back on-site.  They feel that wearing your pjs to school is lots of fun.  As soon as we know we are coming back on-site, we will let you know what day to wear them. 

Appreciation Day – Friday 20^th August

The SRC have decided on a fun day for us this Friday 20^th August.  They felt that our families and community are doing such a fantastic job during our current challenge, that we will host an appreciation day.  The idea of the day is to stop and acknowledge someone or people in our lives that we admire and are thankful for.  They thought it would be fun to acknowledge them by letting them know, do something special for them but also you could dress up as them.

Today we have shared with you some ideas that they have come up with that your child could show their appreciation and gratitude to others.  We have sent out their ideas to families as well as putting on Seesaw.  Students could then share how they showed their appreciation.  We also have appreciation themed learning tasks on Friday.

SRC are also organising something with our teachers that they will share with our community on Friday.

Virtual Book Fair

We are hosting a virtual book fair if you wish to purchase books for your child or gifts for family and friends.  As we are unable to go out to shops, we thought we would bring online shopping to you.  There is no pressure to purchase but if you would like to, instructions on how to do this is written further below in this newsletter. Your purchases from the book fair will go towards purchasing books for our school.

Next Tuesday 24^th August, we have the Paralympics commencing.  I know many of us enjoyed the distraction of the Olympics and missed it when it finished.  It is not long now before we can support our athletes again and be part of some inspirational events.

Hope to see you soon,

Heidi Inglis

Eden S, Alexis S, Jack S, Kai M, Kaidyn J, Amelie B, Louis K, Olivia R, Eliza C, Oscar H, Roman R, Riley F, Saylah D, Ben P, Ariana P, Louise F, James R, Lucy S, Maeve S, Oliver C, Billy C, Keira W, Christoffer H, Shelby P, Theodore M, Rafael K, Joshua K, Matilda T, Kodah S, Emma W, Harry B, Sienna W, Zach K, Liam C, Zye A, Zoe M, Miranda A, Abigail D, Connor D, Alfie T, Mason M, Jacob C, Blake D, Liam R, Zack P, Cohen B, Shayla M, Declan W, Fletcher M, Indi J, Ella G, Matthew R, Tahlia K, Radin A, Aston G, Coby H, Ethan M, Brock A, Luca S, Jack S, Billy R, Julia B, Isabella A, Ollie C, Oscar C, Edan W, Paige R, Skyla K, Lincoln C, Olivia J, Sam B, Toby T, Madelyn M, Regan G, Miles G, Jonathon S, Lucas T & Noah J.

Welcome to week 4.  It is so nice that we have all our students back on site – with our families finishing their quarantining.  Once again, I thank them for doing their part to keep us all safe – quarantining is a very challenging situation.  It was lovely to hear from parents and students how their family, friends and neighbours supported them – what an amazing community!

Congratulations Mrs Airdrie

During lockdown, Rochelle welcomed her new daughter.  It was such exciting news to hear of the safe arrival of Niah Alice.  I know Rochelle is enjoying these special moments with her daughter – even if she is not getting much sleep!

Curriculum Day – Friday 13^th August

On Friday 13^th, the staff will be attending a professional learning day.  Whilst we cancelled our term 2 curriculum day, we will be going ahead with our term 3 day.  We have invited a speaker, Bronwyn Ryrie-Jones to speak to our staff about the working memory, assessment practices and responsive teaching techniques.  Some of our staff have already heard presentations from Bronwyn and she has inspired us to reflect and change some of our practices.  It is great that we now have the opportunity for all the staff to hear from her.

This is a student-free day so if you require care of your child on this day, OSHClub is open.  Please go onto their website to book your child in.

SRC Pyjama Day – Thursday 19^th August

One thing that we love about lockdowns is how easy it is to wear PJs all day.  Our SRC (Student Representative Council) have organised a day for us to come to school wearing our PJs.  This day is to support the research and support of Cerebal Palsy. Cerebal Palsy is a physical disability that affects movement and the most common physical disability in childhood.

On Thursday 19^th, please send your child to school dressed in their pjs and even a dressing gown.  Please make sure that they are warm enough and if they choose to wear their slippers, that they have shoes to change into to wear outside.  Donations can be made through the QKR app.

Book Week Dress Up Day – Wednesday 25^th August

The love of reading has always been something that we have encouraged and celebrated at Beacy.  On Wednesday 25^th, we are asking our students to dress up for Book Week.  This year’s theme is Old Worlds, New Worlds, Other Worlds.  If you are creative and able to find a book to represent this theme, that is great.  Otherwise, feel free for your child to choose a favourite book or character to represent.

Traditionally, we have held a Book Week assembly to parade our costumes but due to COVID and restrictions we will mostly likely hold a virtual parade.  We will share photos of the day with our community.

COVID restrictions

These are our current restrictions at Beaconsfield Primary School:

• Only attend school or come on site if well.  This applies to all students, staff and parents.
• If your child is able to walk into school and leave school independently, this is encouraged.  Do not congregate in our school grounds.
• If you need to come onto our grounds, all adults to leave our site by 9:10am at drop off time and do not enter our grounds until 3:15pm at pick up time.
• Do not enter classrooms or buildings.
• We encourage you to email or phone the office.  However, if you need to have a face-to-face interaction, adults can enter our office area.  You will need to check in with the QR code and wear a mask.
• Currently masks are compulsory indoors and outdoors.

I thank all our families for working with our restrictions.  I know many families are allowing their child to enter the grounds in the morning without them and to walk out on their own – and the students are so excited to be given this responsibility.  We have areas and times of the days that it is very hard to reduce the congestion of people so I thank everyone for their efforts.

Secondly, I thank our families for not sending students to school with symptoms.  I understand that this is very challenging when we are in winter but the Department of Education and Training is stating that if a child is unwell, even with the mildest of symptoms, they must stay at home.  If children have persistent symptoms due to underlying conditions or prolonged post viral symptoms, please speak to your doctor about providing the school with a medical certificate to ensure they are not contagious.

At the moment, many workplaces are not allowing their employees to attend when they have symptoms so we are trying to stop the passing of symptoms to our teachers, nurses, paramedics, supermarket workers, health care workers, etc so they are able to keep working at their workplace every day.

I hope you are enjoying the Olympics.  I know I am loving hearing and seeing the great accomplishments that these amazing people are achieving.  It is great to hear about the stories of people and how they respond during the good and hard times – great learning lessons for our students and us all.

Heidi Inglis

DATES TO REMEMBER:

Friday 13th August – Curriculum Day

Thursday 19th August – Pyjama Dress up day

Wednesday 25th August – Book week dress up day

CLOTHING:

With the wet and cooler months here it may be a good idea to keep a spare change of clothes in your child’s bag as they can come back from playtimes with muddy, wet clothing. We have very limited spare clothing at school, phone calls to parents will be made requesting dry clothing to be brought to school.

Please ensure all items of clothing are clearly labelled so any lost uniforms can be returned to their rightful owners.

ATTENDANCE:

Last week we sent out attendance letters to families. If you receive one of these it is important that you update all unexplained absenses as this is required for the 2021 Census. Thank you for your assistance.

BOOK CLUB:

Issue 5 has been delivered to school and all orders will come home with your children this week. Issue 6 will be sent out before the end of term. Thank you to everyone who supports our Book Club 🙂

This year is the 75^th Celebration of the Children’s Book Council of Australia.

Since 1945 the CBCA has brought children and books together across Australia through CBCA Book Week. During this time schools and public libraries spend one glorious week celebrating books and Australian children’s authors and illustrators. Classroom teachers, teacher librarians and public librarians create colourful displays, develop activities, run competitions and tell stories relating to a theme to highlight the importance of reading.

Beaconsfield Primary School has a grand tradition of celebrating this week with a Book Week Costume Event.  Children and staff from all year levels get involved with wondrous colourful costumes depicting their chosen book character.

This event will be held on Wednesday August 25^th and we encourage you all to get behind this day.  All you have to do is get creative and come to school dressed in your costume! Prizes are awarded for best dressed from each year level.