Return to School

It has been fantastic to welcome back our Preps and Year 1/2 students this week. We are looking forward to our Year 5/6 students returning tomorrow (Friday) and our Year 3/4 students returning next Tuesday. Thank you to all our families for all your support during this period of lockdown. It has been fantastic to see so many smiling faces and we are really impressed with how well the children are transitioning back to onsite learning. As students get used to the routine of a full day of face-to-face learning, interacting with peers and concentrating for a full day, they will probably be very tired. A remote learning program with live lessons will continue to be offered on the days a year level does not attend onsite, if they are tired, please do what you can, most of our year levels indicate the priority tasks on their daily planner so this is a good place to start.

A reminder that students in Grades 3 to 6 are required to wear face masks, unless an exception applies. Parents/carers of students who meet the criteria for an exception must provide an approval in writing for their child not to wear a mask to school. Face masks are strongly recommended for Prep to Year 2 students. 

The 5^th of November is still currently the date when all students will return to school full time. Up until this date, the staggered return will continue with students attending on the following days.

Drop and go in the morning from each year levels allocated gates will continue until further notice.

School Council Report

The following policies were approved by School Council at the meeting held last week:

• Yard Duty and Supervision
• Child Safe Policy
• Child Safe Responding and Reporting Policy
• Bulling Prevention Policy

These policies can all be found on our school website or by clicking on the title of the policy above.

The 2021 NAPLAN results were presented to School Council. Given the challenges our students have faced over the past two years, we are very proud of the achievements and growth in learning our students have made.

Year 3 results

Reading – Well above state mean

Writing – Above state mean

Spelling - Above state mean

Grammar and Punctuation - Above state mean

Numeracy - Above state mean

Year 5 results

Reading – At state mean

Writing – At state mean. Excellent growth from Year 3 to Year 5 NAPLAN results for the students who sat NAPLAN in Year 3 at Bonbeach PS.

Spelling - At state mean. Excellent growth from Year 3 to Year 5 NAPLAN results for the students who sat NAPLAN in Year 3 at Bonbeach PS.

Grammar and Punctuation – Above state mean. Excellent growth from Year 3 to Year 5 NAPLAN results for the students who sat NAPLAN in Year 3 at Bonbeach PS.

Numeracy - At state mean. Very good growth from Year 3 to Year 5 NAPLAN results for the students who sat NAPLAN in Year 3 at Bonbeach PS.

All Year level teams have looked at our 2021 data to identify areas where we achieved pleasing results, areas we need to work on and identify any trends. Our Literacy and Maths leaders have been working with their Professional Learning Teams to identify areas to develop and any particular learning areas that we may need to have a larger emphasis on in our teaching, learning and planning. This data will be very useful as we begin to prepare for our school review which will be occurring in Term 1 2022. The school review is conducted every four years, where we review everything we have implemented and achieved over the past four years and set goals and focusses for the next four years.

Leaving Next Year?

Much as we hate to see any of our wonderful students leave the school, we do realise that it is a fact of life.

People often have new career opportunities, buy a new house or move for a variety of different reasons.

If you are leaving the school next year, could you please notify the office to assist us with future planning?

Thank you.

Requests for 2022

It’s about this time of year that we get requests from parents about their child’s grade placement next year. If you are intending to make a request, please be aware of the following points.

1. We will not take requests for a specific teacher. You can request a certain type of teacher. Eg. Nurturing, strict, etc.
2. We will take into consideration friendship groups or peer issues.
3. The request must be in writing.

Stress o’clock 

by Michael Grose

A recent Australian study found that 7.00am is the most stressful time of the day for working parents. Dubbed stress o’ clock, this is a time in the morning when work and family pressures and the deadline of the clock converge.

Recent conversations held with parents indicate that children and young people experience stress o’clock too. This is a time soon after a child wakes when self-doubt, getting ready for school and looming fears clash. Children’s tummy-aches and heads-aches often prevail at this time of day.

“Mum, I don’t feel well. I think I’ve got a cold. I don’t want to go to school.”

How do you respond when you suspect there’s more worrying your child than a sniffle, and you’re hurrying to get ready yourself? Most parents don’t have a script to guide them when stress o’clock hits.

Pandemic induced anxiety

Since the pandemic adults and children are reporting higher levels of stress and anxiety. Morning is one of the worst times for anxiety to strike. Like a fox, anxiety comes in the night robbing children of their courage, replacing assuredness with self-doubt, apprehension and fear.

Dealing with a child or young person in the middle of their anxious moment is super hard, particularly when you’re still wiping the sleep from your eyes. In times of stress it’s always best to stay SOBER. That is,

Stop what you are doing and pay attention to your child and to yourself

Observe the emotional reaction you are having to your child’s distress and ask what your gut is telling you

Breathe deeply to remove yourself from panic mode (‘I can’t take this!’) and kick start your thinking brain that has succumbed to your survival brain

Expand your vision and look at the bigger picture. Perhaps your child is genuinely nervous but it’s important that they sit the test that makes them feel awful. Allow the bigger picture to guide your actions.

Respond to your child or young person calmly. Empathy and understanding are in short reply in the mornings, but if you have practised this type of response in low stress situations, you’ll be more than ready to respond appropriately, rather panic or over-react when your child is stressed.

Like everything in parenting, this plan sounds easy when there are no kids around, but it’s important nevertheless.

A lack of a plan you can follow when kids are anxious is the major cause of parent stress. In times of stress, it always helps to have a plan to follow. When dealing with children’s nerves, tension and anxiety at stress o’clock this plan will really help you.

Regards

Ken & Lisa

                         Message from the PE department: Term 4 2021

Whole School

Swimming

All swimming that was impacted due to the lockdowns in term 3 have now been cancelled for the remainder of the year. Due to ongoing restrictions and the likelihood of excursions not being able to take place this term, it’s been decided to rebook for next year. This impacts grades prep to grade 4, as some families have already paid. The office staff will organises a credit to go towards next year. If you would like a refund of money paid for swimming lessons, please contact the office.

House/District Athletics Day

Last term we were so lucky to have held our house athletics day on what ended up being the last regular onsite day for all grades before lockdown. Prep-2 competed in their grades and rotated around 7 different mini athletics events. The day was a first for prep and grade 1s and only the second time grade 2s would have had an athletics day!

Grades 3-6 competed in more traditional events, which doubled as their try outs to make the district team. Unfortunately, with the lockdown and ongoing restrictions, School Sport Victoria (SSV) have decided to cancel all remaining school sporting events for the year. This is very disappointing as it will be 2 years in a row students miss out. There is, however, a chance we can still hold a district athletics day event, but there will be no further progression. I attended a virtual district meeting this week and most schools seem to be keen on the idea, if restrictions allow. Watch this space!

Regardless of what will happen with athletics, students never found out their results as I was waiting to hold additional trials at school for events we couldn’t do on the House Athletics Day. Once we are back to school, I will look at holding some form of presentation and award 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd placing ribbons to each age group, for each event.

Grade 5/6

• Inter-school sport. It’s increasing unlikely that inter-school sport will be permitted this term, as was the case last year in term 4. If so, we’ll look at doing an intra-school sport competition involving all grade 5/6 classes on Friday mornings.
• When back onsite, during grade 5/6 Physical Education lessons, students will spend their first lesson back going through PE rules and expectations and fun engaging games. They will also be participating in a unit of Volleyball this term. Students will have the opportunity to learn about rules, skills and game play of Volleyball.

Grade 3/4

• Like the grade 5/6s, we will be trying to hold an intra-school competition for grade 3/4. This was very successful last year in term 4, and gets students ready to compete in inter-school sport in grade 5.
• When back onsite, in grade 3/4 Physical Education lessons, students will spend their first lesson back going through PE rules and expectations and fun engaging games. They will also be participating in a unit of Volleyball this term. As this sport may be new to many students, they will have the opportunity to learn about the basic rules, skills and game play of Volleyball.

 Grade 1/2

• This week is when Physical Education lessons can resume onsite for grade 1/2. This is very exciting and I’m sure all students are looking forward to being back in their class. This term, the grade 1/2 students will spend the first couple of weeks going through PE rules, procedures and expectations. Then they will continue participating in a unit of basketball and netball. All classes only had one lesson in of basketball before lock down last term, so I’ve decided to continue that for this term. Students in Grade 1/2 will have the opportunity to learn about basic rules, skills and some game play of both basketball and netball.

Prep

• Like grade 1/2, this week is when Physical Education lessons can resume onsite for preps. It’s such a shame preps have missed out on so much in their first year of school, but I’m sure all are very excited to be back playing games and learning new skills in their classes. For PE lessons this term, the prep students will be continuing their learnings of PE rules and procedures, play fun and engaging games and will also continue learning fundamental movement skills (FMS). They will complete a unit of jumping and balancing activities. Students will have the opportunity to learn about skills associated with jumping and balancing, experiment with new equipment and some FMS games that involve jumping and balancing.

‘The sky has no limits. Neither should you.’- Usain Bolt.

Mr Mac.

Physical Education Teacher.

October Newsletter

We have settled back into term 4 and getting very excited to slowly welcome back more of our friends. So far this term we entered the world of superhero’s design our own masks and making up our own hero. We Have also taken part in the ‘Backyard bird count’ counting and spot all sorts of birds that call our area home.

Please remind your child to bring their hats to Theircare, No hats No outdoor play


 

Come Join Us for the Spooky

Spectacular for the Student free day

Monday the 1^st of November

7.00am- 6.00pm

Come Dressed up as anything you like.

Join us on the day for

Cooking Games Arts, and crafts Dancing

Karaoke And much more fun….

(Please note Children in grades 1-6 families will need to have workers permits to attend, as per chief heath officer’s orders.)

E-mail us:                                               

Bonbeach@theircare.com.au   

Call us:

+61 439 392 221