Waratah Whispers

Issue 81 Term 1 – Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020

Engadine Public School 1A Waratah Road Engadine NSW 2233 T 9520 8559 engadine-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au

Important Dates

Week 1 - Term 1

Tuesday 28th January: Staff return to school Wednesday 29th January: STUDENTS RETURN 2020

Week 2

Monday 3rd February: Kindergarten 2020 First Day 10.15- 2.45pm Uniform Shop Open 8.30am-9.15am

Tuesday 4th February: Kindergarten start 9.15 Friday 7th February: Assembly Year 3-6 (2.10pm)

Week 3

Monday 10th February: PBL Launch – BBQ Breakfast

Wednesday 12th February: Parent Information Night Friday 14th February: Red Mufti Day for the Red

Cross Assembly K-2 (2.10pm)

Week 4

Friday 21st February: Summer PSSA Starts Assembly Year 3 - 6

Week 5

Monday 24th February: Swimming Carnival Friday 28th February: Whole School Assembly

Dear parents/carers,

Welcome to the 2020 school year!

It has certainly been an eventful and for some a traumatic summer holiday period, with the catastrophic bushfires and extreme weather events. Even though our immediate community has hopefully not been personally affected, many of our families, staff and students have close connections with the South Coast and will be feeling a sense of loss and sadness. As far as our students are concerned, The

Department of Education has provided us with a suite of support resources including social stories, strategies for classroom discussions and links to relevant sites. As well as this we have our School Psychologist and our School Chaplain at school 2 days per week and ready to assist with support if required. Please let your class teacher know if you would like referral to our specialist staff.

Many of us as a community will doubtless be wanting to support and assist those in need and we have two ideas as to how our school can be involved. Firstly, during the holidays I received an email from a student who had seen some of the devastated areas first hand and was moved to suggest a student-led fundraiser as a means of supporting those in need. The suggestion was that we have our first mufti day of the year in which students can dress in red and bring a gold coin donation to raise funds for the Red Cross. This is an excellent idea and admirable that our students are active citizens who want to contribute in a practical way. We have set aside Friday 14th February for the mufti day and know that the fundraiser will be fully supported. A separate note will come home regarding the day. Secondly, as a school, I have registered us to be a ‘partner’ school with a school from the South Coast that has suffered loss due to the fires. The Primary Principals’ Association (PPA) is leading this initiative and once they have paired us with a school, I will be able to let everyone know what sort of support would be most useful to that community. I will be in touch as soon as I have heard.

To start the school year we have also been met with health concerns regarding the Novel Corona virus. We are, of course, following procedures as detailed by the Department of Education and I will keep you informed of any relevant information via the channels of school

Issue 81 Term 1 - Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020

Facebook and School Bytes. The safety and wellbeing of our whole community is extremely important to us and we will therefore continue to monitor the situation closely and take advice received from NSW Ministry of Health to ensure we are responding to the situation appropriately. I have attached the latest advice to this newsletter for your information.

As a welcome aside from the doom and gloom all around us, it has been lovely to see the huge smiles and enthusiasm from our students and our staff as school got into full swing yesterday! Children really do have the knack of celebrating life and being in the moment and it is a beautifully contagious trait. I was pleased to see the polite and mature manner in which students handled the transitions into their new classes and I am sure we will have a productive and exciting year of learning ahead of us.

This term we will be hosting our official Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) launch and we are pleased to invite you to attend our PBL BBQ breakfast which will be held on Monday February 10th at 8am. Thank you to the P&C and to our GA Paul who will be organising and running the BBQ. This will be a great opportunity for parents to meet and mingle and after the BBQ there will be an information session in the hall for all students and for those parents who are able to stay. The entire day is being devoted to learning about PBL – what it is, what it looks like at Engadine Public School and how everyone can be involved. Students will move through a rotation of activities throughout the day and by the end of the day everyone should be ready for a positive year of being Safe, Respectful, Responsible Learners!

On the PBL note, you may have noticed that during the holidays some of our signage has been removed and there are a few blank walls around throughout the playground. This is all part of our move to establish an environment that promotes consistency – in expectations, in the language we use, in the logos we use and in the colours that represent our expectations. As you are aware, last year the students designed and voted on a logo to represent our EPS expectations. The winners were chosen and our logo and new signage is soon to be designed and installed around the school. Our awards system will fundamentally stay the same,

with students needing to earn 10 awards in order to progress to a silver award and so on. However, there are no longer Key awards; they will be replaced by PBL awards. Students will still be required to earn 10 awards with at least one award from each expectation/colour area in order to be eligible for a silver award. This will all be explained in more detail at the PBL launch and don’t worry if you can’t make it to the BBQ, our PBL team will also be presenting at each of the parent information sessions on Wednesday 12th February.

Finally, I would like to extend a big, warm EPS welcome to all our new families and Kindergarten starters! I am sure you will all feel part of the community in no time at all. There are many ways you can choose to get involved, from joining the P&C to helping in the classroom or canteen. There are also opportunities to come along to meetings, join in with excursions as volunteers or help out with working bees. Whatever your capacity, we are happy to have you as part of our community and look forward to working with you and your children.

Enjoy the weekend and stay cool. Keep smiling!

Sara Swift, Principal

Issue 81 Term 1 - Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020

Swimming Carnival 2020 The school swimming carnival will be held on Monday 24th February at Engadine Leisure Centre. All students in year 3 – 6 will be expected to attend. Students in year 2 who are turning 8 this year can attend the carnival only if they will be participating in their age race. Notes will be coming home with students with information and payment details. Please ensure you return the permission note which details your child’s swimming ability. No child will be permitted to attend the carnival without this note! We are currently in the process of restructuring our House Groups due to an inbalance of numbers. Please do not purchase any new House coloured items for your child until we have confirmed the new groups. Red Mufti Day for Red Cross A student led fundraiser for Bush Fire Relief will be held on Friday 14th February. All students are welcome to come to school dressed in red and bring a gold coin donation. All proceeds will be donated to the Red Cross. More details will be coming home soon. PBL Launch & BBQ Breakfast Look out for the note coming home next week with details on our PBL Launch and BBQ breakfast. Save the date – Monday 10th February! School Photographs This year we will again be having our school photographs taken by Don Wood Photography. Photos are scheduled for Wednesday 18th March. All students are requested to wear full school uniform and black school shoes on photo day. Envelopes with order details will be coming home in a few weeks. There will once again be the opportunity for family portraits to be taken on this day. Year 6 2020 Shirts All students who ordered a year 6 shirt should have had them sent home today. Students in year 6 are welcome to wear this shirt to school from Monday as part of their regular school uniform. Many thanks to Mrs Payne for organising these again for our students. Friday Assembly Our Friday afternoon assemblies will commence from next week 7th February. Year 3-6 assembly will be

from 2.10pm in the school hall. The first Kindy – Year 2 assembly will be on Friday 14th February from 2.10pm in the school hall. Our whole school assemblies will be held on Friday of Week 5 and Week 10. All parents, carers and friends are welcome to join us for these assemblies. Please enter via the school office from 2.00pm. Bike Pass Application 2019 All students in stage 3 are eligible to apply for a bike and scooter pass to ride to and from school. If you are interested in getting your child a bike licence please ask them to collect a form from Mrs Franke directly. Younger students are welcome to ride to school under the supervision of an adult, however they cannot leave their bikes or scooters at school as we do not have enough secure storage. Important Notice to Parents Our duty of care is to ensure students are picked up from school by parents, family members or adults who are nominated as contacts on our records. If you wish to arrange for an alternate person to pick up your child from school we require a written letter of permission. In the coming weeks we will be sending a form home to all families so they can advise and update the details of their children’s regular pick up procedure (OOSH, bus, pick up by parent etc). If there are any changes to your child’s regular afternoon pick-up procedure please advise the school in writing. Safety Reminder A reminder to our school community to please be aware of the high traffic in our area. Also if you are dropping off or picking up a student please be aware of the pedestrian crossings and take caution – arriving safely always takes priority. Also a reminder to our students to always use the pedestrian crossings that are around our school entries.

Issue 81 Term 1 - Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020

Mobile Phones A reminder to all parents that students are not allowed to have mobile phones at school. If your child brings a phone to school they must leave it at the front office and can collect it at the end of the school day. If you need to contact your child at school please phone the office and a message can be passed on. Interrelate Interrelate will be coming to Engadine Public School on Wednesday 4th March – please save the date if you are interested. These sessions were very popular last time they were held at our school. We will be sending home information on the sessions very soon. Please note we will NOT be taking payments for these sessions on the evening, this event must be prepaid by Wednesday 26th February. Bell Times For your information our school bell times are as follows: 8.45am School gates are open 9.12am Warning bell 9.15am School commences 11.15am: Recess eating time 11.25am Recess playing time 11.47am Warning Bell 11.50am End of recess 1.20pm Lunch eating time 1.30pm Lunch play time 1.58pm Warning bell 2.00pm End of lunch 3.15pm End of school

Issue 81 Term 1 - Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020

Issue 81 Term 1 - Week 1 Friday 31st January 2020