Primary Update – Term 1 Week 8
Here we are at the end of Week 8 and with only 2 weeks to go of Term 1! Our Term so far has been a wonderful celebration of learning across so many domains.
Update to Front Office Procedures 鈥� Affecting All Parents
The Primary Leadership Team and Primary Administration have recently been reviewing our procedures within the front office, considering feedback from our teachers and students.
Currently, there are a large number of PA System announcements in our classrooms for reasons such as early collections and to pass on messages to students. These interruptions are having an unfavourable impact on our teaching and learning programs. As such, the following changes will now take place as of Monday 31 March.
- If parents need to collect their child before the 3.00pm school bell, parents will need to sign themselves in at the front office, wear the print-out visitor sticker, and follow the below:
- At Marian Campus: sign your child out as normal and be given a Signed Out card from Mrs Wiedermann/Mrs Scott and then head to the relevant classroom to collect your child and hand over the Signed Out card to the classroom teacher.At Lavalla Campus: sign your child out using the SEQTA Kiosk iPad, take the automatic printed Sign Out Sticker and head to the relevant classroom to collect their child and hand over the Sign Out Sticker to the classroom teacher.
- After you have collected your child, return to the front office to sign yourself out.
- Please note: Parents presenting to classrooms without the Signed Out Slip will be re-directed to the front office before taking their child home.
- If dropping something urgent to your child (i.e. lunch/forgotten uniform), front office staff will ask parents to take the item to the child鈥檚 classroom 鈥� please note you must go through the front office and sign in before going to the classroom, then return to the office to sign out once complete.
- Marian Campus only: When students are dropped off at school late, parents will need to sign themselves in first and wear the print-out visitor sticker. Please then sign your child in as normal and collect a Signed In slip from Mrs Wiedermann/Mrs Scott, and then take your child to their classroom yourself, handing over the Signed In slip to the classroom teacher. Parents will then need to exit through the front office and sign themselves out.
It is essential that parents go through the front office and sign in/out as part of our Child Safeguarding procedures, as well as ensuring we know who is on-campus at all times, which is particularly important during emergencies. Please ensure you wear your visitor sticker so staff can easily identify that you have signed in. We will trial this updated process for the coming weeks. Your support in reducing the interruptions to our teaching and learning programs is greatly appreciated.
Neurodiversity & Harmony Week 2025
Neurodiversity and Harmony Week was a huge success at 今日吃瓜 last week. Throughout the week, students learnt all about neurodiversity and harmony, and participated in a wide range of activities to understand each of these concepts at a deeper level. I hope your children came home talking about all the things they learnt last week.
Neurodiversity is a relatively new term that many parents would not have been exposed to in their own schooling. It is so fantastic that this generation of children are growing up learning about neurodiversity and celebrating the neurodiversity that exists amongst our community.
Hugh van Cuylenburg (founder of The Resilience Project) has recently shared a very thought-provoking reflection on what it is like to be the parent of a neurodiverse child. I encourage all parents to watch , to understand more about neurodiversity, what neurodiverse students experience and what it feels like as a parent. I would say this is essential viewing for all in our community.
4B and 2B Assembly
In the last fortnight, we have had 2 fantastic assemblies, where 4 Blue and 2 Blue shared their learning with us. Last week, 4 Blue shared a beautiful assembly all about celebrating our diversity as a multicultural Australian community. 4 Blue shared information about each of their cultural backgrounds and then presented a fun dance to the song 鈥楢bsolutely Everybody鈥� 鈥� highlighting the importance of coming together as one community in a kind and respectful way.
This morning, 2 Blue started their assembly by sharing their beautiful singing voices with us, singing the beautiful hymn Way Maker. They then shared with us their recent Literacy learnings about parts of speech. Our 2 Blue students used the book If You Were an Adjective as a base for their assembly, adapting the text and creating their own fantastic work and sharing many brilliant adjectives with us, helping us to learn all about these important parts of speech!
College Swimming Boardshorts
Please be advised that alongside the College Jammers, College boardshorts will soon be available for purchase by Primary families from the Uniform Shop for use during swimming at school.
KISS N DRIVE 鈥� Marian Family Name Tags
As we continue preparations for the move of Marian Campus to the Main Primary Campus in the coming months, we look to prepare for the new cars that will utilise the Lavalla Kiss N Drive once our Marian families move across. To prepare ahead of time, if you will utilise (or think you might) the Lavalla Kiss N Drive option once Marian families move across, please complete so that we can prepare a family name tag for you which you can place on your dashboard to assist us with smooth and efficient collection procedures once the move is complete. We are hoping to do this now, ahead of time, so all families are ready when the move occurs. Thanks to those families who have already completed this. Your family name tags will be sent home with one of your children in the coming weeks.
All Lavalla families should now have their family name tags if ordered. If Lavalla families still require one, please email Amanda.johnson@newman.wa.edu.au
The name tag system saves considerable time when collecting students so your support and use of these name tags is greatly appreciated.
Marian Playground After School
A reminder that we ask parents to move off-site quickly after school with their children. Children are not permitted to play in the playgrounds before or after school when there is no teacher supervision. OSHClub utilise the outdoor play spaces after school and cannot go outside whilst there are parents on-site. As such, we ask for your support and cooperation in moving off-site quickly (and when asked by staff) and keeping your children off the equipment. We encourage parents to visit a local park to socialise and allow children to play together.
Community Mass
When your child鈥檚 Guild is invited to Community Mass on Thursday mornings at 8:00am, it would be wonderful if they could be there to support. To build Guild spirit, students that attend the Mass are able to wear their Guild sports top for the entire day. The remainder of the Guild Masses for Term 1 are listed below for Lavalla parents to mark on their calendars:
Week 9: Thursday 3 April – Romero
Week 10: Thursday 10 April – Camara
Easter Raffle
Our annual Easter Raffle will be held on Friday, 11 April. Thank you to all families who have generously donated Easter eggs and have returned their tickets and money. Please send all Easter egg donations to the administration by Monday 7 April.
If any parents are able to assist with the wrapping at Marian, we will be gathering in the hall immediately after the assembly on Friday, 4 April, to wrap the prizes.
Thank you for your kindness and generosity.
Newman Norms / Medals of Marcellin
Each fortnight at each Primary campus, one person will be drawn out of the raffle and receive a small prize for living out our Newman Norms. Congratulations to Taylor, Eva and Katelyn (Week 6 Lavalla) and James (Week 7 Marian), who were our recent winners! Each raffle ticket received is swapped for a token, and the Guild with the highest number of tokens at the end of the term wins a prize for the whole Guild!
URSTRONG
A reminder that parents continue to have access to a . We hope that as a URSTRONG Family, you will reinforce the important messages of empowerment, self-compassion, & kindness at home.
Homework Club – Lavalla
A reminder that Week 9 (Tuesday 1 April) is the final Homework Club for Term 1. Homework Club resumes in Term 2, in Week 2 on Tuesday 6 May.
Smartphones
Recently, one of our Primary parents drew my attention to an initiative called .
Wait Mate is a not-for-profit Australian movement empowering parents to hit pause on smartphones until at least high school. The website connects parents with like-minded families in your child’s school and year level and encourages you to take the pledge to 鈥榮ign the pledge鈥�. The aim of the initiative is to 鈥榗reate a world where kids can be kids for longer鈥�.
Why wait? Smartphones:
- are addictive,
- are changing childhood,
- increase the risk of anxiety and depression,
- put your child at risk of cyber bullying,
- may expose children to inappropriate content,
- interfere with relationships, and
- can impair sleep.
I strongly encourage all parents to at least visit to explore how it works. It sounds like a brilliant movement to support our children.
Primary Staffing
We have had some recent staffing changes, which we can now share with our community.
Miss Arden Lavelle (Lavalla Education Assistant) has resigned to pursue her studies in Secondary English teaching. Miss Lavelle developed a wonderful connection with our Years 3-6 students and was a valuable member of the support team.
Mrs Kellie Thwaites will be heading off on Maternity Leave at the start of Term 2. Kellie has transformed the Primary Performing Arts Program over the past 2 years and her contributions are truly appreciated. We wish Kellie and her husband well for the upcoming birth of their first child.
Mrs Tasha Richards has been successful in gaining a position at Prendiville Catholic College as a Secondary Physical Education teacher. Mrs Richards has been a brilliant Primary Sport teacher throughout her time at Newman, implementing a number of initiatives and bringing such passion and commitment to her role in promoting physical education to our Years 3-6 students.
Mrs Alison Le Dan, who is currently on Long Service Leave for Term 1, will be concluding her time at 今日吃瓜 after her Long Service Leave comes to an end. Mrs Le Dan has been an outstanding Teacher-Librarian, sharing her absolute passion and love of books and literature, and her gentle nature, with our Pre-Kindy to Year 6 students over the past 11 years, leaving a lasting imprint of the importance of literature on so many of our students.
We thank all of these Primary staff members for their time, dedication and commitment to 今日吃瓜. Whilst they will certainly be missed, we wish them well for the exciting new chapters in front of each of them.
As we say farewell to these members of staff, we look to the future and welcome some new members of staff.
Miss Holly Drinkwater (a fairly recent 今日吃瓜 graduate) has been appointed and has commenced in her role as Years 3-6 Education Assistant.
Mrs Samantha Wynne, who has a wide and varied background in the Performing Arts, has been appointed to teach Performing Arts when Kellie Thwaites starts Maternity Leave. Mrs Wynne has been our Library Teacher throughout term 1, so she already knows our students very well.
The process to appoint new Physical Education and Library Teachers is underway and will be shared in the final Newsletter of the term.
Wishing you a wonderful weekend.
Mr Ryan von Bergheim
HEAD OF PRIMARY
