16th September 2020

OUR SCHOOL VISION: “Wandong Primary School … Making a difference by developing confident, independent

and resilient learners who strive for personal excellence.”

‘The Puggle Post’

Congratulations to our ‘Students of the Week’

Foundation C: Georgia (Writing a detailed weekend recount which included the correct use of capital letters and full stops)

Foundation G: Mason (Demonstrating a solid understanding of addition)

Foundation M: Giaan (Making plausible spelling attempts and experimenting with different types of punctuation in her writing)

1/2B: River (Showing dedication and persistence towards his maths tasks)

1/2E: Benjamin (Challenging himself across all learning tasks and creating an outstanding presentation)

1/2G: Evie (Being more involved with her home learning tasks)

1/2L: Luca (Presenting his learning in an entertaining and exciting way by pretending to be a news reporter)

1/2M: Indianah (Creating an awesome presentation explaining why we should visit her café)

1/2W: Harrison (Using creativity, problem solving and procedural mapping to build a fort at home as part of his remote learning)

1/2Y: Jayda (Always trying her hardest with activities and remaining enthusiastic during remote learning)

3/4C: Liam (Consistently being proud of his efforts in writing)

3/4E: Riley (Taking advantage of every learning opportunity)

3/4H: Riley (Paying attention to his spelling and using the rubric to improve his persuasive writing)

3/4M: Cody (Always submitting his tasks to a high standard and challenging himself)

3/4P: Indiana (Improving her persuasive writing by using the rubric)

3/4S: Aaliyah (Creating a wonderfully persuasive billboard encouraging students to wear a hat to protect them from the sun)

5/6B: Corzo (Showing a positive attitude towards planning his ‘Dream Holiday’ and continuing to try his best on all learning tasks)

5/6H: Kyron (Showing Kindness and extending the 5/6H ’R U OK?’ Day challenge to the wider school community)

5/6M: Jasmine (Challenging herself and producing ‘Five Star’ quality work)

5/6R: Aaron (Always giving 100% effort and making the class smile in every class WebEx)

5/6S: Tayana (Shifting her mindset and approaching learning with a positive attitude)

Arts Award: Bella (Displaying enthusiasm to learn and create a new cultural dance)

PE Award: Kalle (Always smiling, being positive, accepting challenges and enjoying being active)

STEM Award: Kevin (Creating an amazing animal with interesting adaptations)

Indonesian Award: Harley (Always putting in an amazing effort with his learning)

Dear Families

Roadmap to a School Return

Last Sunday Premier Andrews outlined particular elements of the proposed roadmap to easing the COVID – 19

restrictions. I am sure that we were all pleased to hear some positive news about a return to onsite learning and

some initial information was sent out via Compass last week. We were advised that the first week of Term Four

would be remote learning with a staged return to onsite learning in week two. Our staff this week have all been

planning in teams to develop the best and most engaging learning leading into children starting back onsite on

Monday of the second week.

HOWEVER, as I write today, we have had changed advice as of 8.30pm last night. This is not ideal for anyone and

completely redeveloping our plan at this late stage and accommodating families that have also made plans is a

situation whereby no one wins. I can only encourage you by saying, #wevegotthis. As of this morning, the leadership

team and teaching staff are busy adjusting plans to accommodate this new advice from the Educational Minister

which states that children will be staggered back to onsite learning in week one of Term Four.

The following simply outlines what we know so far. Fingers crossed that there is no new or changed information

comes forward before next term.

Monday 5th

October (first week of Term 4) We are planning for all children to return to full-time on-site schooling on Monday 5

th October with some restrictions

and processes in place regarding pick up and drop off. All students are expected to attend on-site and normal roll

marking procedures will be in place. Our plan to minimise congregation of adults remains in place (this includes

parents/carers not entering the school). All children will go to class at 8.45am through the following drop off points.

Front office gate (Ms Pollock/Mr Fearn) – Families with surnames beginning A, B, C, D

Gate above office gate on Affleck Street (Mrs Beer) - Families with surnames beginning E, F, G, H

Rail Street (Mrs Morrow) - Families with surnames beginning I, J, K, L

Wandong Avenue corner gate (Mrs Castle/Mrs Kimber) - Families with surnames beginning M, N, O, P

Wandong Avenue portable side gate (Mrs Andrew/Mrs Williamson) - Families with surnames beginning Q, R, S, T

Church car park gate (Mr Warren) - Families with surnames beginning U, V, W, X, Y, Z

Children will exit in the afternoon at 3.30pm from the same gates, so siblings can meet and leave together. Please

support this process by moving on once you have said hello/goodbye to your child. Essentially we are attempting to

keep parents, students and staff safe and we thank you for your cooperation.

One thing that has been of benefit is the independence we have seen develop in our youngest students. The ability

for our Foundation students in particular to kiss their parents goodbye at the gate and make their way independently

to the classroom will continue to be a highlight.

The three core priorities for Term Four are:

1. Mental health and wellbeing

Our highest priority will be the wellbeing, particularly the mental health, of every student and member of staff.

2. Learning

Some of our students have thrived in the remote and flexible learning environment and others have struggled despite

their best efforts and those of their families and teachers. Our priority will be supporting all our students to make

learning gains.

3. Transitions

We will make every effort to ensure successful transitions for children moving from kindergarten into Foundation and

the Grade 6s moving into Year 7.

Other important points to note:

Visitors to schools, interschool activities and school tours

Visitors to school grounds must be limited to those delivering or supporting essential school services and operations (e.g Additional staff. student health and wellbeing services, cleaning and maintenance workers, including parent volunteers, must not attend school at this time).

Activities that involve on-site attendance by students from different educational institutions (e.g. interschool sport or interschool debating) must not take place.

Schools must not conduct on-site school tours for prospective students and their families at this time.

Camps, playgrounds and facilities

The following apply to all schools until further notice:

School camps and excursions cannot take place- please note that we have stopped the automated payments for camp and further information regarding these funds will be sent to those impacted within the next few days.

Community groups are not permitted to use school facilities (indoor or outdoor).

School buses The School Bus Program will continue to operate as normal.

Reading

Here, at Wandong Primary School, we strive to ensure that the programs we offer follow evidence-based practices.

For beginning readers to understand that the letters of the alphabet represent sounds and that these letter-sound

relationships can be used to read words, requires explicit and systematic instruction in both phonemic awareness

and phonics. Mastery of these allows students the skills to ‘crack the code’ of the English language and build a

repertoire of words that they can read by sight. Once students can read a large number of words by sight, their

fluency improves. This ultimately leads to greater comprehension. The ultimate goal of reading instruction is to

ensure that students read accurately and fluently so that they have the best chance of reading for understanding and

meaning.

We are super proud to have highly qualified staff working to ensure we have the best learning and intervention

processes in place. I urge you to watch the below link that has been made by our very own Annie Unger, with

feedback from our intervention team. This link has been shared far and wide over the internet as educational

specialists search for evidence based approaches to the Science of Reading

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0i7Plew1WA

Graduation

As much as I don’t have a crystal ball, I am pretty confident that our normal end of year events won’t look as they

have in the past. Graduation is an important milestone and our senior school team are passionate about making this

a memorable and exciting event, despite any restrictions that are in place. More information regarding what this will

look like will communicated in due course.

GRADE PLACEMENT FOR 2021 – Clarification

Process for Term Four when children are onsite:

Students will be asked by their teachers to nominate children they would like to be with in 2021. During the

process the teachers will ensure that every child is with at least one of these students.

Classroom teachers will categorise children according to academic ability and highlight behavioural/social

concerns along with any relevant information they have gathered throughout the year. All of this information

will then be used to develop the 2021 classes.

Specialists will check the lists for any anomalies and then the leadership team will then confirm grade

placements.

In the last weeks of Term Four, children and their new teacher will visit their 2021 classroom. The children and

new teacher will complete an activity in this session notifying parents of their new grade.

Parent Considerations:

Obviously the classroom teacher has the most information regarding individual children. As a first port of call,

please speak to your child’s classroom teacher if you wish to discuss anything about your child’s placement.

Occasionally we may not be aware of special circumstances that need to be considered during the class

selection process. Such special circumstances might include but are not limited to health, emotional or

learning matters, peer or sibling relationships or changes in the home situation. Selecting a particular teacher

does not fit within the realm of special circumstances. If parents want to provide extra personal

information to be considered in the process you will need to email the school office. Letters should be

addressed to “The Principal” and reach the office no later than THIS FRIDAY September 18. Please note this

is not about requesting or selecting your child’s teacher for next year. Please note that letters received

after this date will NOT be accepted.

This will exclude the friends the children will want to be with which WILL BE gathered by the teacher.

Finally, if you consider you have special circumstances, please make the request in writing EVEN if it has been

made before – as much as we would like to think so, we can’t remember everything from years gone by! We do

appreciate your trust in our professionalism in these regards.

Foundation 2021 – School Readiness Despite being restricted in the Covid madness that we are living, we have been engaging with our newest Wandong families through a number of remote ‘Story Time’ sessions. We were excited to hold a live WebEx for approximately 35 families last night on ‘School Readiness’. We are looking forward to running our transition sessions next term, however, this is likely to look somewhat different this year.

End of Term Students who are being supervised onsite will be dismissed at 2.30pm on Friday 18 September. Please ensure that

you all do some self and family care over these holidays. It looks like us regional folk might be able to get away on a

little regional holiday. We are ready for a big Term Four and staff are excited to be welcoming back kids– so rest,

relax and do something fun. School will resume Week One Term Four on Monday 5th

October.

Kelly Morrow - Principal

WANDONG PRIMARY SCHOOL IS PROUDLY SUPPORTED BY

Wallan & Kilmore Community Bank® branches

RECENT NEWSPAPER ARTICLE WHICH MAY BE OF INTEREST

PARENT

PAYMENTS

RECEIVED

70%

What’s gone home recently?

The following notices/information was sent home between Thursday 10th September to Wednesday 16th September:

2021 Team Shirt order form (Grades 3-6 only) 2020 Grade 5/6 Bike Ed information Week Nine Assembly and SOTW Awards Transition WebEx - Week 9 1/2Y Weekly Webex 9th September 2020 NL & Remote Learning Weekly Schedule T3 W9

The majority of information/notices that are distributed by the school

are now available through Compass.

Should you have missed any details in relation to the items listed above

please speak to your child’s teacher or the school office.

WOW! … WHAT’S ON & WHAT’S DUE @WANDONG SEPTEMBER

Friday 18th Foundation Wild Action Zoo’s Animal Workshop incursion due date (if already actioned consent and payment has been carried forward)

2021 Grade Placement Parent Consideration letters due End of Term 3 (school finishes at 2:30pm)

OCTOBER

Monday 5th Start of Term 4 (school starts at 8:55am)

Tuesday 6th POSTPONED School Photos today

Monday 19th Foundation Wild Action Zoo’s Animal Workshop incursion

Monday 26th School Council Meeting

Friday 30th 2021 WPS Team Shirt orders and payments due today

WANDONG PRIMARY SCHOOL

SUPER READER’S CLUB:

Congratulations on 50 nights reading:

Congratulations on 100 nights reading:

Congratulations on 150 nights reading:

Congratulations on 200 nights reading:

Declan.

BLACK DOG INSTITUTE

One of our Grade 6 students Jack Brundell is raising money for the Black Dog Institute by growing

a ‘Mullet for Mental Health’.

Donations can be made through the Black Dog Institute website, by clicking on the donate button

and searching ’JB’.

Please support Jack with this kind gesture and donate

if you can.

BENDIGO BANK SCHOOL BANKING UPDATE

We have recently been advised that Bendigo Bank have decided to

withdraw from offering school banking programs nationally .

Students can continue to bank with their local branch. All accounts

held will continue to operate and students are most welcome to bring

their regular savings to the branch with their parent or guardian.