25 October 2018

Newsletter Articles

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT

P&C ASSOCIATION INFORMATION

A massive thank you to all of our wonderful P & C Association for an extremely well run and successful Colour Fun Run Fundraising event last Friday 19 October.

Thank you to Fleur Thompson, P & C Secretary and Colour Run Coordinator for leading such a great team and ensuring everything was well coordinated. Thank you to Jason Bradley, Glenn Gregorini and the student Faction Captains and Vice Captains for the setting up of the activities, for Tessa Goddard for organising the music, Rachel Rutter and Judith Duff for managing the various administrative tasks associated with this event and to all our staff, students and parent and community members who pitched in and helped make this a day to remember.

Thank you also to Brooke Harding and Shane Day for taking photos on the day. An album will be created on the GPS Facebook page for the Colour Run event.

The online fundraising portal will be open until Friday 26 October and prizes can then be ordered. If you are using cash you will need to fill in the sponsorship booklet and give the money to P & C Members who will be at the Canteen this week to collect the donations.

If you have donated online there is no need to bring in the sponsorship booklets.

HALLOWEEN DISCO –

Is on next Wednesday 31 October and will be coordinated by the P & C Association and the school. It is a Halloween themed disco and will be held in the Undercover Area. PP to Year 3 students from 4.00pm to 5.30pm and Year 4 to 6 students from 6.00pm to 7.30pm. Entry cost is $5.00 which includes a sausage sizzle and a juice box. Funds raised from the disco will be going towards play equipment for students at recess and lunchtime. Everyone is invited to dress up and enjoy the music and fun with friends.

CANTEEN EXTERIOR DESIGN COMPETITION

As above, we have decided that the canteen exterior is decidedly ordinary and needs jazzing up with a creative paint job. Below is a picture of the current canteen exterior which is really pretty bland and does not indicate that area is a canteen. Have a go at transforming this area with colour. Drop in your design entries to the Front Office. Closing date for entries is Friday 9 November.

NAME THE CANTEEN COMPETITION

As part of the focus on the canteen we have decided that the GPS Canteen definitely needs a name and an associated logo. Please find attached details of the competition. Closing date for entries is Friday 9 November.

CANTEEN SURVEY

Thank you to all parent/carers who completed the Canteen Survey. We have had 54 respondents and the P & C and Canteen Sub-Committee appreciate the time you have spent providing valuable information.

The Canteen Sub-Committee will be meeting this week to analyse and then share the survey responses and outline the planned actions.

Students from Years 4 to 6 will be surveyed about the Canteen next week and staff have already completed a Canteen Survey.

NATIONAL SCHOOL OPINION SURVEY (Coming up in the next few weeks)

Australian Education Ministers have determined that all Australian schools will participate in parent, student and staff opinion surveys. The NSOS is a mandated survey for parent/carers, staff and students and administered every 2 years and Geraldton PS is scheduled to do this in 2018.

The purpose of this survey is to gather information from parents and caregivers to provide an overall picture about how people feel about our school and data from this survey will impact on future school operations and provide us with a clear pathway for improvement. All families are urged to take the opportunity to provide us with valuable feedback.

The survey link will be placed on the GPS Facebook page and also emailed to parent/carers in the week commencing 5 November.

SCHOOL COUNCIL INFORMATION

The next School Council Meeting is on Monday 5 November and this meeting is open to the public. The meeting will be in the GPS Library from 3.30pm to 5.00pm.

At the last meeting the School Council members attended a School Council Training Session with Nicci Godsman, Coordinator Regional Services from the Midwest Region Education Office.

Agenda:

• School Council Protocols – draft for consideration
• 2018 NAPLAN results analysis
• 2019 NAPLAN Online planning and preparation overview
• Draft School Information Pack
• School Creed Committee update
• School Improvement Plan Overview
• Science Lab application success

2018 NAPLAN RESULTS AND ANALYSIS OVERVIEW

The 2018 NAPLAN results were received at school at the end of last term. We are very pleased with how our Year 3 and Year 5 students performed. We are busily analysing the results and tracking progress made by students. This information will feed into the development of our School Improvement Plan.

It is relevant to remember that NAPLAN is only a small part of what happens in our school. It does provide us with longitudinal trends for focused planning and identifying and tracking individual students for support.

NAPLAN

The minimum standards and common scales for NAPLAN results across all year levels are illustrated in the picture below:

The following video presentation provides further information about how to interpret NAP results:

• View a video (5 min 39 s) that explains how NAPLAN results are reported, including the individual student report.

Standards

For NAPLAN results, a national minimum standard is defined and located on the assessment scale for each year level. Band 2 is the minimum standard for Year 3, band 4 is the minimum standard for Year 5, band 5 is the minimum standard for Year 7 and band 6 is the minimum standard for Year 9. These standards represent increasingly challenging skills and require increasingly higher scores on the NAPLAN scale.

Abbreviations used

MATHEMATICS SUMMARY INFORMATION:

Year 3 Results

• The Year 3 mean score has increased and there has been a decrease in the percentage of students achieving the Below National Benchmark Score. 0% of students were Below National Benchmark Score in 2018 as compared to 9% in 2017, 5 % in 2016 and 11% in 2015.

Year 5 Results

• The Year 5 mean score has increased and there has been a decrease in the percentage of students achieving Below the National Benchmark Score. 3% of student were Below National Benchmark Score in 2018, 12% in 2017, 7% in 2016 and 10% in 2015.

The Year 3s have significantly exceeded the Australian Schools Mean with all round improvements with all bands scoring higher and the the year 5s continue to show an upward trend as well.

READING SUMMARY INFORMATION:

• The Year 3s mean score has increased with a reduction in students below the National Minimum Score and an increase in students above the NMS. 8% of students were NMS, 0% at NMS, 92% Above NMS.
• The results were similar with Years 5 with 3% of students Below NMS, 14% at NMS, 84% Above NMS.

WRITING SUMMARY INFORMATION:

• The Year 3 were above all Australian School scores mean with a decrease in the BNMS and a high increase in the AbNMS scores. 3% of students were BNMS, 3% tNMS and 94% AbNMS.
• The Year 5s had a mean score decrease and a BNMS increase and an AbNMS derease with 12% of students BNMS, 21% of students ANMS and 67% of students AbNMS.

GRAMMAR SUMMARY INFORMATION:

• The Year 3s have shown a growth in the mean score with a decrease in BNMS and an increase in at and above NMS with 3% of students BNMS, 10% ANM and 87% AbNMS.
• The years 5s have shown growth in the mean score but with an average BNMS and ANMS with 5% of students BNMS, 15% ANMS and 80% AbNMS.

SPELLING SUMMARY INFORMATION:

• The year 3 mean score is steady with an increase in ANMS with 8% of students BNMS, 13% ANMS and 79% AbNMS.
• The Year 5s means score increased with a decrease in BNMS with 5% of students BNMS, 10% ANMS and 85% AbNMS.

Overall we are very pleased with the NAPLAN results and will continue to focus on areas to improve.

SPECIALIST SCIENCE LABORATORY

I am pleased to let you know that our school has been successful in our application for a specialist science laboratory. Work on converting and existing room will occur during 2020 or 2021, depending on construction schedules.

We will also receive $25000 to purchase science resources to equip the laboratory. Funding will be allocated to our school on completion of the refurbishment.

These new facilities and resources will allow our science program and motivate and engage our students to excel from Kindergarten through to Year 6 and beyond.

GIFTED AND TALENTED SECONDARY SELECTIVE ENTRANCE PROGRAMS INFORMATION

These unique academic, arts and languages programs are available at 20 select public secondary schools. Children in regional areas have the option to:

• Study at our regional school – Bunbury SHS
• Study online while attending their local public school
• Board at City Beach Residential College (and apply to receive the boarding allowance) while studying in Perth.

Children in these programs are taught alongside like-minded peers, studying an extended curriculum delivered by teachers with expert skills and knowledge.

Families can apply online at the link below from 8 October 2018. Closing date for applications is Sunday 10 February.

SOME GOOD NEWS

Also, some very good news to those of you who had children in Kindergarten last year with Eoin McEachern. He has moved overseas to the Phillipines with his Aunty Noime who has guardianship over him since his parents’ deaths in the car accident in January. Eoin is thriving and has recovered exceptionally well from his injuries.

Moved, moving or have changed your contact details?

Please let us know so that we can have the most up to date information for the planning of our classes for 2019 and also have the most up to date records for when we need to contact you.

Additionally, we really appreciate you informing the school of any extended periods of absence that your child/children will be having during the term. This is particularly important during our Census dates in February and August as we require specific absence and return date information so that we can count your child in the Census, the total of which determines the allocation of funding for the school.

Term 4 this year is exceptionally busy for everyone this year and there are a couple of dates that we would like you to save in particular – Friday 30 November is our End of Year Presentation Evening, Monday 10 December is our Year 6 Graduation Assembly and our Final Assembly on Thursday 13 December.

Thank you also on your condolences and support on the passing of my father in Week 1 of this term. Your thoughts and support have been much appreciated.

Regards

Jacqui Quartermaine
Principal

HALLOWEEN

This wonderful poster for our Halloween Disco has been designed by Year 6 Student Avril O’Brien

ROOM 4

The delightful Year 4/5 students in Room 4 have had an enthusiastic and responsible start to Term 4.

We are really trying to be REACH students and demonstrate our PBS focuses as well as the values shown above.

Individuals have set their Literacy, Numeracy, Social and Own Choice goals for the term and many students have enjoyed sharing these with family members during our Three-Way Meetings.

Room 4 have started preparing for our assembly which is on Friday 2nd November (Week 4). We’ll be singing ‘Count on Me’ by Bruno Mars. Our morning fitness activities are helping us to develop our understanding of the lyrics of this song as we organise and participate in a range of rotational activities that develop teamwork, perseverance, cooperation, concentration and self-awareness.

Our amazing ‘Island’ Project, which involves us working in teams to design and make our own island, is another opportunity for all of us to truly understand the lyrics of our assembly song! We’ve had some interesting conversations about how we will organise our island and have had to think about the climate, vegetation, location, population, size, animals, resources, government, power source, buildings, transport, facilities, materials … We’re looking forward to finishing these by continuing to be dependable, encouraging, helpful and creative students who use their initiative.

We think our family members will be proud of the results of our focus and effort.

*We can’t wait to enjoy our Year 5 class mates presenting their Councillor and Faction Captain posters and speeches during Weeks 6 and 7 and wish all students who are nominating the very best!

SCHOOL COUNCIL

P & C NEWS

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GERALDTON SENIOR COLLEGE NEWSLETTER

COMMUNITY NOTICES

WAAPA Summer School 2018/2019

This Summer WAAPA at ECU, Mt Lawley is offering an exciting performing arts program for students from Years 1 to 12. The Summer School includes classes in RAP, Acting, Dance, Drama, Screen Performance, Music Theatre and of course, how to perform Shakespeare. For information about the fantastic courses on offer please visit WAAPA Summer School or contact Gabrielle Metcalf at g.metcalf@ecu.edu.au.

Parenting

Geraldton Golf Club

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