CREATING A CHILD SAFE ORGANISATION

In fulfilling the new Child Safety guidelines for schools, I

have attached a copy of our Child Safety Reporting

Process Flowchart for your information and can be

found at the end of this newsletter. All schools are now

required to develop child safety policies and procedures

consistent with DET requirements. The publication of

our accompanying flowchart provides you with a

summary of the reporting process that we have in place

at Berwick Lodge. A copy of this flowchart will also be

uploaded to our school website. Please do not hesitate

to contact me at school should you require further

clarification.

ENROLMENTS FOR 2017

As we move into term 4, our enrolments for next year

continue to rise. In 2014 our total enrolments bottomed

out at 535 children, with a total of 65 children enrolled

in Prep. In 2015 our enrolments rose slightly to 545 with

Prep enrolments also rising ever so marginally to 69.

This year saw our enrolment momentum continue with

575 students enrolled at our school and 88 Preps

enrolled. Next year promises further increases in our

enrolments across the school with our Prep numbers

currently sitting at 108 and our total enrolment

increasing to 610. We currently have 25 classrooms in

total, which can cater for up to 630 students. We are

not interested adding more portable classrooms to our

school and, as we are in the interesting position of

having a relatively small local catchment area, the

majority of our students come from outside our neigh-

bourhood zone. There is no requirement that schools

must accept students from outside their neighbourhood

zone – such enrolments are conditional on the

judgement of the principal that out of neighbourhood

students can be satisfactorily Accommodated.

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT

NEWSLETTER N0 31 13TH OCTOBER 2016

CANTEEN IS OPEN MONDAYS, THURSDAYS & FRIDAYS

DIARY DATES

Thursday 13th October Garden Club Excursion Yellingbo Conservation.

Monday 17th October Grade 5/6 Regional Hoop time Regional finals

Tuesday 18th October Grade 3 Dinosaur incursion

Monday 24th October Kanga Cricket

Thursday 27th October Grade 3/4 Regional Hoop time Regional finals

Friday 28th October BLPS Halloween Disco

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT CONTINUED. . .

NOTICES DUE BACK

Friday 14th October Grade 3 Dinosaur incursion

Wednesday 19th October Kanga Cricket

Thursday 20th October Scholastic book club orders due online

Friday 21st October Grade 3/4 Hoop time Regional Finals

With the recent development of our school’s community garden and the under construction sensory garden, we

are not in a position to satisfactorily bring in more portable classrooms. As such, we will not be accepting any

more out of neighbourhood Prep enrolments for next year and will limit Year1 to 6 out of neighbourhood

enrolments so as not to exceed 630 students. This is the first time since we opened in 1990 that we are capping

our out of neighbourhood enrolments.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQ’s)

Q. Will we have composite grades next year?

A. In all probability we will not. Whilst composite grades of themselves do not disadvantage children in their

learning, they do pose additional administrative and planning challenges, none of which are at all

insurmountable. In fact straight grades are ‘composites’ of a sort. Children are at different points of maturity

and in their learning and in some cases to a substantial level in straight grades and good teaching practice has

teachers providing a differentiated curriculum tailored to the diverse needs of the children in their grades.

Composite grades is an extension of this diversity and good teachers acknowledge this in their teaching

practice. Nonetheless, we prefer to have as many straight grades as possible and at the moment it appears as

though we may well have all straight grades. Later, in November I will be publishing our grade and specialist

programs structure for your information.

QUOTABLE QUOTE

‘Better to be lost for words than for thoughts’

HAVE YOU CHANGED YOUR

ADDRESS OR PHONE NUMBER?

Please ensure you let the school office know if you have changed address or updated

mobile phones with new numbers. This information alleviates stressful situations

for students when they are ill and we cannot contact parents

NEW STRAIN OF NOROVIRUS

The Department of Health and Human Services has identified a new strain of norovirus that may lead to

gastroenteritis outbreaks. Norovirus is characterised by acute onset of nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea. Other

symptoms may include fever, headaches and muscle aches. Symptoms usually resolve after 48 hours, but if a parent

is concerned about their child’s symptoms they should seek medical attention. To help prevent the spread of

norovirus, everyone, including all staff and students, should:

avoid attending school when experiencing gastroenteritis symptoms and advise the school of their illness

stay away from school until they have been free of symptoms for 48 hours

Children will be reminded to maintain hand hygiene procedures at all times. Hands must be washed with soap and

water, especially after going to the toilet and before eating or preparing food

Futures in Mind Psychology Service provides assessment, therapy and individual counselling to children. The

service is available at Berwick Lodge, during school hours. If you would like more information, chat to your child’s

teacher about their needs, or contact Angela Maskery.

PARENT SKILLS REGISTER.

Throughout the year we have many events, activities and initiatives at our school that families can participate in to

support your child’s education. There are a huge array of skills and talents among our parent community that

could be a great resource for our school. From time to time, we have need of specific skills but often don’t know

who might be able to help. Helping out could mean anything from talking to students about your special area of

interest, assisting with a classroom activity or supporting specialist teachers in their field: sport, art, drama, or ICT.

From craft to composting, dress making or astronomy …we’re interested in a whole range of skills. The Berwick

Lodge Primary School Skills Register will help us to identify different skills. You can register your skills and talents

by informing the office and adding your details to the register. Your information will be kept confidential and will

only be accessed by the teaching staff for planning purposes.

SCHOOL WEBSITE

Our school website is updated regularly with information and is a great way to keep informed about things

happening at school. If you haven’t had a look at our website for a while, it is truly worth finding time to enjoy

seeing what is on your child’s classroom blog or read the curriculum outline for what your child will be learning.

There are lots of photos to look at, notices about events and information for parents. Thank you to Robert Kelly

for regularly updating our website and making it an inviting window into our school for both prospective and

current families and members of the community to enjoy. www.berwicklodgeps.vic.edu.au

YOU CAN DO IT

This term in the ‘You Can Do It’ program, all students will be learning about emotional resilience. Emotional

Resilience means being able to stop yourself from getting extremely angry, down or worried when something

"bad" happens. It means being able to calm down and feel better when you get overly upset, and bounce back from

adversity. Emotional Resilience also means being able to control your behaviour when you are very upset.

For more information about resilience and some tips to support your child to develop skills in this area, please

follow the link: http://www.kidsmatter.edu.au/mental-health-matters/social-and-emotional-learning/resilience

Sandra McCrum and Angela Maskery

Garden Club: Yellingbo Helmeted Honey eater excursion:

Today 52 very excited garden club members attended the Helmeted Honeyeater excursion at Yellingbo Nature

Reserve. This was a fantastic opportunity to learn about the critically endangered bird and also plant natives to

assist with revegetating an area. Thank you to our parent helpers who attended. Look out for our report in next

week’s newsletter.

Sensory Garden:

Did your child miss out on purchasing a plant for our ‘Adopt a Plant’ activity? We do have a few plants available to

purchase at $2 each and we will be planting these next week. If you would like to purchase a plant, please

complete the form below and return to school with payment by Monday 17th October at 9am. We do

require the assistance of approximately 5 parents to assist with the planting on Monday 17th October from 2pm

and also during the day on Tuesday 18th October. All parent helpers require a working with children check and

the planting is dependent on the weather. On Monday afternoon, our Prep and grade 6 students will be planting,

on Tuesday morning our grade 5 students will be planting from 9.15am, then our grade 1/2 students from 11.45am

and in the afternoon our grade 3/4 students from 2pm. If you are able to assist, even if for only an hour, please

come and speak to Mrs. McCrum.

Donations Wanted:

Timber – this is going to be used for the bridge, jetty, seating and outdoor classroom. Do you know of

anyone that works for a timber yard or if families would like to donate timber please come and speak to

Sandra McCrum.

Pebbles/stones – These will be used within the creek bed.

Thankyou to families who have already kindly donated materials, time or assistance in other ways.

Happy Gardening Mrs. McCrum.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sensory Garden – Adopt a plant Due by Monday 17th October at 9am.

Name:

Grade:

Number of plants @ $2 each:

Community Garden Working Bee:

Tomorrow – Friday 14th October 3.30pm – 4.30pm.

We are holding a working bee this Friday in the Community Garden. All

assistance is greatly appreciated as we will be weeding, mulching and tidying

the garden areas and boxes so our grades can begin planting new seeds.

Please come and join us in the garden from 3.30pm. All children need to be

supervised by an adult. It would be great to see some new faces!

See you there.

Addi 3S Oscar 3S

Lilyrose 3S

Taj 4W

Ava 4W

Will 3S

Luke 4K

Jess N 3K

Alex 4W

GRADE 2H REFLECTIONS

On the school holidays I got to go to the AFL Grand Final because I was the

Auskicker of the year for round 14. As the Auskicker of the year for round 14 I

got to stay in a fancy hotel with my mum for 2 nights before the big Grand final

day. Two days before the Grand Final, all of the Auskickers had a special dinner

at the MCG with some famous footy players. I got to meet Jack Gunston of the

Hawks (my favourite team) and Joel Selwood the captain of the Geelong Cats!

The next day we woke up early and got dressed to go to the Grand Final

Parade. The parade was so crowded and very loud.

On the big day we had to get on a bus to go to the MCG. When we arrived we

were able to take a photo with the Swans mascot and the Bulldogs mascot. At

half time, all of the Auskickers were allowed to go on the field and play footy.

There were a lot of people in the crowd but I wasn’t feeling nervous. Finally,

when the Bulldogs beat the Swans, I got to give a player a medal. His name was

Joel Hamling of the Western Bulldogs. When I gave the medal to him I got a Western Bulldogs hat and on the

back of the hat it said ‘Premiership Cup’. I loved my school holidays.

By Shanay- Angel 2H

Dear Parents, Students, Guardians and Readers,

On the Friday 21st October 2016, the JSC representatives are holding a Pyjama Day in aid of Windermere. In Australia there are more than 105,000 people who need our help and almost half of them are under 25 and 9.8% of the residents in the City of Casey are homeless. These people sleep on the streets at night and we believe everyone has the right to have a home.

We ask that the students and teachers of Berwick Lodge Primary School dress in their favourite pyjamas and bring a gold coin donation. Please donate to fight homelessness,

they’re homeless but not hopeless.

Thank you for contributing to this great cause! Written by Kyra and Josh on behalf of the JSCs

SCHOOL FUN RUN—NEW DATE SET! As you are all aware the Fun Run was cancelled last term due to terrible weather conditions. The new

date is now scheduled for Wednesday 26th October 2016. In case of adverse weather conditions, the

alternative date will be Wednesday 2nd November 2016. A reminder notice will be sent home to all

families closer to this date. We are seeking any volunteers that can give up their valuable time to help with marshalling and

attending to the BBQ. If you can help with this please let us know either by email: blpspfa@hotmail.com

or leave us a message on Facebook or with the office.

SCHOOL FUN RUN PRIZES As we don’t want any students missing out on prizes, if you still have your forms at home please don’t

despair bring them back ASAP and we will do a final prize order, this way no student will miss out.

** Please note, if you have not raised any funds, then you DON’T need to return the Fun Run form ***

SCHOLASTIC BOOK CLUB ORDERS

Scholastic book club brochures have gone home today and all orders must be placed ONLINE by

Thursday 20th October 2016.

HALLOWEEN DISCO

Yes, it’s that time of the year again for our spooky Halloween Disco. Join us on Friday 28th October

2016, it’s only $2 for the students to come. So get the kiddies dressed up in their favourite costume.

There will be prizes for the best costume and best dancer. So kid’s lets have some screamin scary fun!

Please return form and payment to your child’s classroom teacher by 9:00am Thursday 27th

October 2016.

IMPORTANT DATES TO REMEMBER

PFA Meeting – Friday 14th October, 2016 @ 2:15pm

Uniform Shop – Wednesday 19th October, 2016 3-4pm

Scholastic book club orders due - Thursday 20th October 2016

School fun run—Wednesday 26th October 2016

Halloween Disco forms due back—Thursday 27th October 2016

Halloween Disco—Friday 28th October 2016

Berwick Lodge Primary School is excited to offer the Commonwealth Bank School Banking program to all

students. The School Banking program provides children with an opportunity to deposit money into their

Commonwealth Bank Youthsaver account at school each week on a Tuesday. The program is about how

often your child makes deposits, not how much they deposit.

To encourage regular savings behaviour the program offers an exciting Rewards Program. Every deposit earns

your child a silver Dollarmites token, and once they’ve collected 10 tokens they can redeem them for a

reward.

Please note, the Flying Snake Tail, Mud Splat Handball and Wildlife Writer set are now out of stock. Below are the following items you can order now.

The Backtrack Eraser Pen and Jump & Skip rope are very low in stock.

New items available in term 4.

Transition information

COMMUNITY ADVERTISING

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT