13 August 2018

Newsletter Articles

Principal’s Report

Welcome to our first main newsletter of Term 3. As you will see, it is a pretty full newsletter as we have had many events and items already happen, and also many more to come yet.

FACTION CARNIVAL HELPERS NEEDED

Our Faction Athletics Carnival is coming up on Friday August 17th and both our P & C Association and Mr Jason Bradley would like some help from parent volunteers. Mr Bradley is seeking help with judges and helpers with the rotational activities. If you can help please leave a message at the Front Office with Mrs Simpson or email Mr Bradley at Jason.Bradley@education.wa.edu.au

The Geraldton Primary P and C Association would like to thank all Parents, Caregivers and staff for their contributions to the exhibition night food stall. The donations of food items, time volunteered and support, helped to make it a successful fundraising event. Thank you also to Bakers Delight, WondaBake and Geraldton Fruit and Vegetable Supply for their generous donations and support.

Please find below photographs of the current P & C Office Bearers. The next P & C Meeting is on Monday 27 August at 3.30pm in the Art Room at Geraldton PS. All welcome.

P & C Fundraising Event

Come along and bring your inner bogan to the Year 5 2019 Camp Fundraiser group event of Bogan Bingo on Friday 31 August at the QE2 Centre. This is an 18 years plus event and funds raised go to support next year’s Year 6 camp costs. Tickets can be purchased from Leanne Mitchell. Please see the attached flier for more detailed information.

The Canteen Sub-Committee are very keen, as we at school are too, to jazz up the canteen exterior a (fair) bit. We will be running a competition for naming the canteen and also need your thoughts and ideas as to what we can do to jazz up the exterior. Here’s a before photo of the Canteen façade facing into the Undercover Area (yes I know, very nondescript indeed). Feel free to use this as a basis for your ideas and email to me at Jacqui.Quartermaine@education.wa.edu.au or drop into the school to discuss.

A canteen survey will be conducted with parent/carers, staff and students from Years 3 to 6 in the next few weeks to find out more information about what’s working well with the canteen and what would be even better if.

School Council

Thank you very much to Mr Mick Gibberd who has stepped down from his role as Chairperson of the School Council over the past 3 years. Please welcome Mr Craig Palmer who has taken over as the School Council Chair.

The School Council has some places available for parent and community representative and if you are keen to find out more please contact any of the School Council Members listed below to discuss. A nomination form is attached with this newsletter.

Chair: Craig Palmer
Principal: Jacqui Quartermaine
Parent representatives: Bradley Mitchell, Shane Day, Mick Gibberd, Chad Butler-Henderson and Cameron Todd
P & C Representative – Sherry Datta
School Representatives – Rachel Rutter, Jacinda Harries, Odette Luk and Dianne Westlake

Please find attached the minutes of the School Council Meeting Minutes held Monday 6 August and also a nomination form for parent and community representatives. Nominations are due in to either Jacqui Quartermaine or Craig Palmer by Friday 31 August by 4pm.

Staffing Update

Ms Haley Langman will shortly be commencing Maternity Leave as of the 27th of August. We wish her all the very best for the upcoming birth of her child and look forward very much to hearing wonderful news in due course. Mrs MacLeod will return to full time for the remainder of the term in Ms Langman’s absence. We are in the process of organising a teacher for Mondays in Mrs MacLeod’s class in Term 4 and also on Fridays in Mrs Fishwick’s class.

Congratulations of another sort we have happening too, as we farewell Mrs Jacqui Archdale who has retired from teaching after 43 years as an educator in Western Australian public schools, 31 of which were spent teaching at Geraldton Primary School and 33 in Geraldton. We will be having a Retirement Lunch for Jacqui on Monday 27 August to acknowledge her many years of service with and to education.

If you are happy to pen a few words acknowledging Jacqui’s time at Geraldton PS I would be most appreciative as it would be lovely to hear from parents and students what Jacqui meant to them as a teacher. Please email your thoughts and messages to Jacqui.Quartermaine@education.wa.edu.au or drop them off to Mrs Simpson at the Front Office.

Celebrating Successes

Congratulations to Jason Bradley, our Physical Education teacher who will, very shortly be flying off to Belarus as Australian National Head Coach for the 13th International Taekwondo Federation Junior and 8th Veteran World Championship, straight after the Faction Carnival commencing on Monday 20th of August until the 27th of August. Mrs Dee Bestry, PE Teacher will be Mr Bradley’s replacement whilst he is away for a couple of weeks. Good luck.

A reminder that we would love for our students to bring along any small Australian flags on the Faction Carnival Day on August 17 so we can take a photo of our students cheering Mr Bradley on before he goes to Belarus.

Congratulations to our 2018 Spelling Bee Competition participants listed below. All of our students acquitted themselves very well with Prisyasha Kshertri winning the Individual Year 4 Award, Priyasha Kshetri and Amelie Dumont winning the Year 4 Team Award and Claye Gilchrist and Enrico Luces winning the Year 5 Team Award. We are very proud of our students.

Congratulations to all of our Student Merit Certificate Winners and also our newly elected student leaders.

Semester 2 Student Leaders:
Pippa Johnson, Amber Ricketts, Sean Demalata, Aleea Amirizal

What a testament to the community spirit and feel at Geraldton Primary School. The annual Exhibition and Open Night was extremely well attended and the staff and students appreciated parents and families coming along to view their school work and their REACH themed artworks.

What a creative group of staff and students we have as evidenced by the amazing variety of artworks so carefully thought out and created.

The students used the artworks to engage in Art Responses work after the exhibition as part of the Arts curriculum.

A huge thank you to our GPS P and C Association team who catered for the night and to all those who donated food, cooked sausages, served, met and greeted, set up and cleaned up and to those who just jumped in and volunteered.

Thank you to Brooke Harding, from Your Inspiration Family Photography who also took photographs of the evening for the school.

Special thanks to the Exhibition and Open Night Committee of Tessa Goddard, Rachel Rutter, Ashe Gough, Dianne Westlake, Judith Duff and Haley Langman.

Thank you also to staff, students and parents who helped before, during and after the event.

Rachel Rutter will get a mini survey out shortly to see what worked well and what would be even better if.

A huge job well done. Congratulations to everyone involved.

An album of photos from the Open Night and Exhibition Evening is in the Geraldton PS Facebook page.

Yvonne Goolagong Tennis Foundation Excursion

15 of our lucky students got to attend the Yvonne Goolagong Tennis Foundation excursion last Friday 3 August. They heard this amazingly humble living legend speak of her journey as a 4 year old child hitting a tennis ball against a wall with a wooden paddle bat to achieving the highest accolades in the tennis world. An amazing opportunity for our students. Thank you Makeesha Dalgety and Ashe Gough for coordinating and supervising. The students were complimented by several of the organisers for their exemplary behaviour representing the school.

Keeping Students Home from School When They Are Unwell

It's cold and flu season again. A reminder that it is advisable to keep children home from school if they are sick to prevent illnesses spreading. I have attached a number of guidelines to help make the difficult decision a bit easier, as to whether to keep your child home or not when they are sick.

We will be having a push on students using good hygiene practices at school for the next few weeks and would appreciate if you do so at home, as no doubt, you already do so.

Five simple ways to prevent the spread of influenza

1. Cover your mouth and nose when you sneeze or cough
2. Wash your hands
3. Don’t share personal items
4. Clean surfaces
5. Avoid close contact with others

Another newsletter out next week – It’s a Survey Special!!!

Keep well and keep a look out for a special Survey themed mini newsletter next week which will feature the following. Believe me, it will be a lot more interesting than it sounds and we will really appreciate your responses as they help us to continue improving. Surveys we will be running are:

• Canteen Survey
• School Creed Survey responses and call for interested staff, student and parent representatives.
• Homework Survey
• Exhibition Evening and Open Night Survey

BOOK WEEK 2018 and Celebrating GPS’ 140 Years Anniversary

There will also be a section about Book Week which we are planning on holding in the last week of Term 3. Why the last week of term? We think we’ve worked out that the 140th day of the year is Monday 17 September and our grand plan is to combine the Book Week theme of “Find Your Treasure” with acknowledging our 140th Year. We have some great ideas and one of them involves students dressing up in 1878 school uniforms to link with the theme. More on that soon so until then, keep well.

Regards

Jacqui Quartermaine
Principal

ROOM 1 NEWS

Our fence art project was a challenge, especially with all of the wet weather we have been having lately. Our class had to learn how to work with the materials and to work in a team by sharing the jobs and helping where they could. We are all very proud of how well it turned out.

Flowers – this section includes many different types of flowers. They are all growing in the same garden and reaching their full potential. They all look different but they are all special in their own way.
Tree – Trees grow tall and wide and some seem to touch the sky. They provide homes for many creatures and some grow fruit for us to eat.

Hands – they are reaching for the stars. This shows that we should all try to do our best and set big goals.

Here is a quiet moment where the students are reflecting on the Open night and responding to the beautiful art and amazing inventions created by the rest of the school.

This art work was inspired by the patterns in Klimt’s artworks. We started these last term and included some areas with texture and some with patterns.

Last term in science we were learning about how heating and cooling different things changes them. We really liked science with Miss Langman.

In maths we have been learning about mass and weight. This is the recording sheet for our classroom group rewards. We earn ‘grams’ throughout the fortnight then add the total. Our group records it in grams, in kilograms and we draw the needle on the scale.

Geography has been great! We have been slowly adding to our maps of Australia. We have included the states and their capitals, the seas and oceans around Australia and some large or well-known landmarks.

NOTES FROM THE OFFICE

Kindergarten enrolments for 2019 are now open. Please call at the office and collect your application form. This form can be completed in the office as long as you bring with you your child’s birth certificate immunisation details (these are available from the Australian Childhood Immunisation Register) telephone ACIR 1800 653 809 or email acir@humanservices.gov.au and something with your residential address on it.

Kindergarten parents wishing to apply for a position for your child in Pre Primary in 2019 remember applications close on the 31 August 2018. We will need immunisation details (these are available from the Australian Childhood Immunisation Register) telephone ACIR 1800 653 809 or email acir@humanservices.gov.au and something with your residential address on it and something with your residential address on it.

INSTALLING SZapp

If you wish to read the full interactive colour newsletter, please follow the below instructions to load the App or provide us with your up to date email address.

COMMUNITY NOTICES

AUSTRALIA DAY COMMUNITY CITIZEN OF THE YEAR AWARD

Do you know someone in our community who constantly goes above and beyond?

It’s time to recognise their efforts through the 2019 Australia Day Community Citizen of the Year Awards!

Nominating is a quick and easy process, and you can recommend people who live in both Geraldton and Mullewa. Go ahead and nominate now!

CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY

Choose how to add this event to your calendar:

Apple Calendar iPhone, iPad, Mac - Download .ics file

Outlook Desktop Outlook - Download .ics file

Android Calendar Android devices - Download .ics file

Other Calendar Google Calendar, Yahoo, etc. - Download .ics file

Download Event