Wow, this year has flown by! Only 4 weeks left of the 2020 school year. Driving school improvement is a complex and collaborative undertaking. To move forward in some areas with relative speed we have created staff action teams to work across Term 4 on three key projects.

Transition – Led by Bec Welsford

The Transition Action Team is tasked with developing student-centred inclusive transition processes for students moving between year levels at Footscray Primary School. This includes developing the structures and processes for Step-up Day when students meet their 2021 teachers and classes. A whole school buddy system is being developed and documented and will run at the same time each fortnight with explicit social and emotional learning in the alternative weeks.

 Induction – Led by Emily Roberts

The Induction Action Team is tasked with co-developing an intensive induction process that guides new staff through a supportive and sequenced induction over the course of their first year at Footscray Primary School. This will include basics like a school tour and HR matters through to coaching in active supervision of the yard, wellbeing check-ins and regular check ins with leadership. The team will also develop an induction process for new students joining our school community. The programs need to accommodate new staff and students who join us at the beginning of a new year and also those who join at other points throughout the school year. 

 Start-up Program – Led by Julia Woods, Felicity Maxwell & Andrew Gray

The Start-Up Action Team is tasked with developing a start-up program for each year level to be enacted in Term 1, 2021. Learning sequences for Reading, Writing, Mathematics, and Wellbeing/Learning Environment will each have approximately 10 lessons planned. The program guides teachers through the development of school-wide consistent practices for creating safe and engaging learning environments, routines and structures that build independence and shared responsibility of the learning space, high impact teaching practices and pedagogy, and ongoing informal assessment of learning. The lessons can be supplemented by the 2021 teaching teams and timed to suit the cohort across the first four weeks. Elements of the PYP will be present across all learning sequences. 

 

School Council Public Reporting Meeting – November 25 – 7:15pm – Webex

We have our final school council meeting for the year next Wednesday evening.

Following on from the meeting, we will hold our annual public reporting meeting where we report on the proceedings of council since the date of the previous public meeting, and present the endorsed 2019 Annual Report (available here -  https://www.footscrayps.vic.edu.au/uploaded_files/media/annua_report_2019.pdf). The Webex details are below and also found in the compass post.

 WebEx Details

https://eduvic.webex.com/eduvic/j.php?MTID=me0b982c664a3018a8714252ec6c460a0

Wednesday, Nov 25, 2020 7:15 pm

Meeting number: 165 208 7743                 Password: meeting
Join by video system
Dial 1652087743@eduvic.webex.com
You can also dial 210.4.202.4 and enter your meeting number.

Join by phone
+61-3-8593-9167 Australia Toll (Melbourne)

Access code: 165 208 7743

Our School Captains this year have done a remarkable job of leading our student body through very challenging times.

It is hard to take on the captaincy in a year when children have only been on school grounds for a limited time. We were able to present Nina, Owen, Alex and Maeve with their official School Captain badges a short while ago and last week we added their photographs to the foyer. Our Captains have proudly represented our school in a meeting with the Minister for Education, James Merlino, and now two meetings with our local MP, Katie Hall. Thank you Alex, Maeve, Owen and Nina for your continued dedication to our school and your leadership positions.

Overexposure to the sun’s ultraviolet radiation (UV) during childhood and adolescence is a major factor in determining future skin cancer risk.

Melanoma is the most common cancer in young Australians aged 13 to 24 years. School staff have a duty of care and obligation to ensure that all reasonable steps are taken to minimise the risks to student health and safety arising from exposure to UV. You can support us by reinforcing this message at home.

Appropriate hat styles which protect the face, back of the neck, eyes and ears include:

• broad-brimmed hat
• legionnaire hat
• bucket hat.

We have observed a growing trend amongst students to tuck in the fabric of the legionnaire hat to convert it into a baseball cap. Whilst I do admire their creativity and resourcefulness, it doesn’t do the job of protecting those adorable little ears! We appreciate your support with this matter.

Universal Children’s Day is celebrated annually on 20th November. The goal of Universal Children’s day is to improve child welfare worldwide, promote and celebrate children’s rights and promote togetherness and awareness amongst all children.

At Footscray Primary School, we are promoting student voice and agency on Universal Children’s Day. Students have ‘taken over’ their learning by negotiating with their peers and teachers to design the curriculum for the day. Students were given some parameters, such as having to include one hour of literacy and one hour of numeracy, however, they could choose the focus for each of these hours. For the other learning periods, students chose their own curriculum focus based on their negotiations with their peers. Some classes are having extra numeracy, some are focusing on inquiry investigations, some have scheduled extra art or PE.

As part of their negotiations, students elected to have Friday as a casual dress day. All students have the choice of wearing casual clothes or their uniform, and there is no donation required. Classes that have PE, or have negotiated extra sports session will need to wear runners so they can fully participate, and students may not wear thongs for health and safety reasons.

Reminder that we will be having our school photos next Friday 27th November. If you haven't already ordered please see below for ordering instructions. Why SchoolPix is no longer accepting cash.

With the ongoing threat of COVID-19 in our community and the risks that have been associated with the handling of cash SchoolPix has made the decision that we will NOT BE ACCEPTING CASH PAYMENTS.

The order flyer that parents receive does not allow for cash payments, it only contains information on our packages and on how to order using our
Online Ordering system.

If families don’t have access to the internet or a credit card perhaps they can ask a family member or friend for help. Visa Debit cards can be purchased at various locations and then used to make a payment online. We also accept PayPal which will enable the payment from a linked bank account. Our site is optimised for phones and tablets so it’s easy to order. SchoolPix is not
charging a surcharge for any online payments.

HOW TO PROVIDE THE ORDER DETAILS TO SCHOOLPIX.

You will need to make sure the selected package is clearly circled on the order flyer so we know which package they wish to order. We will need both sides of the flyer scanned so we have the name and product required. Email the scanned copies to smile@schoolpix.com.au for processing within 2 days of photography.

1300 766 055 • www.schoolpix.com.au • smile@schoolpix.com.au

For more information on any of our COVID policies please contact your Account Manager

If you require more information on how this works please email or call us.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause to your community but it is in the interest of the health
and safety of our staff and yours that we have made this difficult decision.

We have moved to the next stage in the planning and implementation phase for our nature playground.

We have shared student ideas and priorities with several playground design companies, and they are currently designing and quoting the play area. The most popular design elements chosen by our students are:

1. Rock climbing/rope climbing frames
2. Slides – particularly ones coming down the side of a ‘hill’
3. Balance logs
4. Tree stump area
5. Sandpit
6. Mini-forest
7. Tunnels
8. Wobbly bridge/log bridge
9. Tepee/ hut building/ cubby house
10. Yarning circle

Once the design is selected and we have costings for the whole design, we will identify the first stage to be built, using the money already fundraised by the school community. We hope to begin building as soon as possible.

Please remind your children that the staff car park is out of bounds and that no students should be entering there for any reason. Please use the gates located on Commercial road, Catherine street or Herbert street.

Our library is becoming such an engaging space for our learners. We have so many parents that help us out on an ongoing basis and the library is evidence of this dedication from our community.

Francine has been volunteering her time every Monday and some weekends to continue work on the mural created with the collective designs of our students. It is so eye-catching already! Clare provided us with framed copies of The Uluru Statement in English, Vietnamese and Bengali and these have been placed in our Indigenous corner. We have a large collection of Vietnamese texts in our library and we are in the process of purchasing Italian books to join the bilingual section. Along with Vietnamese and Italian, Jess is helping us to source books in the many languages represented in our community so all children will have an opportunity to access literature in a language that is familiar to them.

Lamont Online book fair coming 25th November 2020

Please see below for student of the week for week 6.

Class	Student name
Foundation A	Johnny L & Sarah H
Foundation B	Elise W & Elijah J
1A	Mina C & Harriet D
1B	Joanie I
1C	Marcus G
2A	Luke B
2B	Etta & Duy
2C	Josie W
34A	Ben S
34B	Ava J
34C	Paloma S
34D	Cristian D
34E	Zeno C
5A	Calab T
5B	Kase P
6A	Harly
6B	Maeve O
6C	Alex S
PE	FB Karen H
Art	Tesfaalem T

Please see below for Student of the week for week 7

Class	Student Name
Foundation B	Valentina & Shammo
1A	Jude & Theo
1B	Luken & Charlie
1C	Lily & Ava
2A	Abigail M
2B	Sia & Namsel
2C	Lasal
34B	Will D
34D	Mahad
34E	Megan L
5A	Violet Z
5B	Kim L
6A	Yuna
6B	Kinley & Diego
6C	Mina
PE	Elnatal T
Art	Ruby B