Dear Parents and Friends,

Walk Safely to School Day Friday 20th. The weather is forecast to be cloudy but no rain at this stage so let’s all rug up and head to the gardens for breakfast. There will be cereal, fruit, juice and a sausage sizzle. We hope to see lots of you there tomorrow morning.

Sunnystones Camp. We had a wonderful time at Sunnystones Camp. Thank you to Mark James for coming along to help. Our students behaved beautifully– of course! The staff at Sunnystones were very complimentary about our students, their behaviour and politeness. Thanks Rainer for being the other staff member and thanks to Emily, Angelica, Deb and Siobhan for keeping everything going smoothly back at school.

Creating a High Performance Learning Culture. The team from Glenroy Central PS came to visit our school this morning. They are also completing the Bastow course and we have been ‘partnered up’ to support each other with our projects. This morning they spent time in our classrooms observing our teaching. They then gave us feedback on things they noticed across all our classrooms that are working well and areas that are not consistent across our classrooms. It was great to hear their comments that our students knew what they were working on and could explain what the learning task was about. They also commented on how calm our students and classrooms are. Something they noticed we don’t yet have consistent across our classrooms is how we present the learning intention to our students and the clarity of that learning intention. We also need to improve the ‘timing’ of our lessons so we always include reflection time at the end of a lesson. Building consistent practices across our school is an important part of the work we are doing to make our high expectations clear to all our students and families. We want Malmsbury Primary School students to always be achieving their best and for us to always be improving how we teach and plan for our students.

Warm regards, Carolyn Tavener.

Principal tavener.carolyn.c@edumail.vic.gov.au

Thursday 19 May 2016- Issue #15

At Malmsbury PS we value: Respect, Honesty, Responsibility and Inclusiveness

Malmsbury Primary School

Newsletter

Learning, Sharing, Growing together.

Term 2 CALENDAR APRIL Fri 20 8:30am Walk Safely to School Day. Start with our whole school breakfast in the Malmsbury gardens! Sat 21 10am—12:00pm School Open morning. Tues 31 Grade 5/6 participating in the Berthe-Mouchette poetry competition at Alliance Francaise Melbourne. JUNE Thurs 2 School photos today! Tues 14 Curriculum day. No students at school. Wed 15 Grade 5/6 excursion to Kyneton Town Hall for Koorie Heritage Trust exhibition. Fri 24 2:30pm End of Term 2. Saturday 2nd July Election Day fundraiser at school as a polling place will be here.

TERM 3 JULY Mon 11 Start of Term 3.

Phone 03 5423 2284 Fax 03 5423 2044 Email malmsbury.ps@edumail.vic.gov.au Web www.malmsburyps.vic.edu.au Twitter @MalmsburyPS

Outside of School Hours Care (OSHC) We have enjoyed our two weeks of science fun and learning. Next week our OSHC room will be a construc-tion zone! Our program for next week is below. Monday– Fresh fruit platter. Building with boxes. Ball games. Tuesday– Cup of soup and toast. Wooden block con-struction. Games outside. Wednesday– Pancakes. Lego construction. Skipping. Thursday– Cheese and biscuits. Meccano building. Mon-key bars. Friday– Fresh fruit platter. Building with playing cards. Hula hooping! From Claire.

Tomorrow morning!!

Rug up nice and warm and meet us at 8:30am for breakfast in the Malmsbury gardens before we

walk up to school.

Gold coin donation towards the cost please.

If arrangements change due to

the weather we will let you know.

School banking details-

Bank Australia BSB – 313 140 Acc. No. 12074523 Reference – your surname

Student Absences. Please remember if your child is absent from school, you must inform the school the reason for their ab-sence. You can send a note, tell their teacher, contact the school or send us a message via http://goo.gl/i0dKiJ

Week Beginning-

Families rostered on

Jobs to be done

May 9 Jones (Sunday) Daly

*Tidying up the steps to the oval and soccer pitch (clearing off the weeds) **weeding the garden beds in the retaining wall near the dry creek bed.

May 23 Hoyne Kolanwoski Mangelsdorf Betts

*Whippersnipping the sloping edges around the basket ball court. *sweeping/leaf blowing undercover. *weeding the garden bed area outside P/1 and 5/6 classrooms. *weeding the garden beds in the retaining wall near the dry creek bed. (Between art building and 2/3/4SC room)

Vegie garden request. We are ready to do our winter planting. We would really appreciate donations of seedlings, especially if their heirloom, for any of the following- ☺ Cabbage ☺ Broccoli ☺ Carrots ☺ Garlic ☺ Snow peas ☺ Potatoes ☺ Beetroot ☺ Fruit tress ☺ Kale ☺ Shallots ☺ Peas ☺ Lettuce ☺ Fennel ☺ Parsley ☺ Asparagus ☺ Radish ☺ Sage ☺ Thyme ☺ Spinach ☺ Strawberries Thank you. From Ari, Angelica and the permaculture gardening group.

Grounds Roster. Thank you to Kaye and Geoff again for more work in our grounds! And thank you to the parents (I know I saw Kate and Margie but there could have been others), who came to school this week to clean around the class-room building, blue area and undercover area so things are looking neat and tidy for our Open Days. Thanks Mick for attaching the sleepers and pruning the roses. Please make sure you do a job on the list when it is your turn. Let us know when you have a completed a job and we will remove it from the list. When we all work togeth-er our school looks well cared for and loved.

LEARNING, SHARING, GROWING TOGETHER

Some Sunnystones Camp photos

Walking in to camp through Long Forest Reserve.

Checking out the big wombat hole.

Using a GPS to find ‘treasures’ hidden in the bush.

Bouldering.

Taking on the challenge of the low ropes

course.

LEARNING, SHARING, GROWING TOGETHER

Some Sunnystones Camp photos

Eight ways to help children with anxiety. Anxious feelings are fed by anxious thinking. It is important not to dismiss children’s anxious feelings, but to help children see that the situations they are worried about may not be as bad as they think. As early intervention is important, take note of children’s worries so that their difficulties can be addressed sooner rather than later. Here’s eight ways to help children with anxiety Parents and carers can help by supporting children to understand and express their feelings and seek help when needed. Encourage children to problem solve and have a go so that they gradually build up their confidence by taking on small challenges. 1. Help to recognise and understand anxiety A first step in helping children gain some control over anxiety is recognising when it occurs and how it affects them. 2. Model helpful coping Being a good model involves showing children how to cope with emotions (not just telling them). Show chil-dren how you cope positively with feeling anxious or stressed and remaining calm and positive (eg. “This looks a bit scary, but I’ll give it a go”). 3. Discourage avoidance Try to limit excessive avoidance and reassurance-seeking behaviours. Sometimes when children say they feel sick, they are describing feeling anxious. It is important that children do not avoid things like school or home-work unnecessarily. 4. Praise having a go Encourage children with anxiety to attempt new things and praise them for trying. It is very important to em-phasise trying rather than success, particularly when anxiety is an area of difficulty. 5. Introduce challenges gradually Children build strength and resilience by learning to face challenges. It is important to begin with small chal-lenges that children can meet. For example, a child who is frightened of dogs might start by walking past the house when the dog is barking without having to cross the road. This improves confidence for taking on more challenging steps. 6. Start small Help the child to choose goals for becoming braver and to take small steps towards achieving them. Celebrate his or her success at each step. Experiencing even small successes helps to reduce anxiety. 7. Practise coping skills Practise using coping strategies for challenging situations. Help children talk about problems and support them to come up with possible solutions. Avoid taking over as this stops children from learning how to cope them-selves. 8. Try not to get angry If a child simply refuses to do something even after you have encouraged him/her and broken the task into steps, it may simply be overwhelming at that time. Sometimes, it helps to back off and praise the child for do-ing as much as he or she could. Later, try again with smaller steps and encourage your child to have a go, one small step at a time. From the Kids Matter website https://www.kidsmatter.edu.au/families/enewsletter/eight-ways-help-children-anxiety?

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