MARCH 22nd

ATHLETICS TRIALS Last Thursday all students in Grade 3/4/5/6 enthusiastically took part in Athletics trials. The purpose of these trials is to select our team for the District Athletics Sports scheduled for Thursday 3rd May. A shortlist has been developed and further trials will be held over the next two weeks to finalise the Athletics Team who will represent The Basin PS at the District competition. REGIONAL SWIMMING COMPETITION Last Friday 5 of our students attended the regional Swimming Carnival at Aquanation in Ringwood. We were extremely proud of their efforts to reach this level and there is a report in this edition. TWILIGHT SPORTS A reminder that tomorrow evening, our school is holding the Twilight Athletics Sports event at the Knox Athletics Track, Bunjil Way, Knox-field commencing at 5pm. The sports are being held at this venue due to the building program at school. I am sure all families and students who are able to attend will thoroughly enjoy this event. CURRICULUM DAY Julie Shepherd ran our Professional Learning Day last Friday. This was a follow up to our Professional Learning Day last year on Writing and an introduction for new staff. We investigated the connection between reading and writing and The Nature of the Writing Process as set out in the Fountas & Pinnell Writing Wheel model. We are planning to im-plement VOICES+P (the Six+1 Traits of Writing) across the school and audited this against the Victorian Curriculum. The VOICES+P acronym stands for: Voice Organisation Ideas Convention Explore Vocabulary Sentence Fluency + Presentation. You will begin to see VOICES+P displayed in classrooms as the language and components are discussed with students. GRADE 5/6 CBL EXPO Parents and friends are invited to see a display of the Grade 5/6 CBL on Cultural Diversity in their classrooms on Monday 26th March from 3pm to 4pm and again on Tuesday 27th March from 8.30-9.30a.m. The students were challenged to work in teams to learn, share and cele-brate different nations and cultural groups within our community. This is a great opportunity to see fabulous examples of the work achieved by the Grade 5/6 students.

March 23rd Twilight Aths Knox Aths Track 5—7 pm 26th School Council 27th Prep Incursion 29th Last Day of Term 2.30pm finish NO LUNCH ORDERS April 17th Tabloid Sports 19th School Photos May 3rd District Aths 7th House X Country 18th District X Country TERM DATES FOR 2018 TERM 1 30th Jan—29th March TERM 2 16th April—29th June TERM 3 16th July—21st Sept TERM 4 8th Oct - 21st Dec

PRINCIPAL’S NEWS

VISITING PARALYMPIAN Tomorrow our Grade 3 and 4 students will be very fortunate and excited to meet Matthew Haanap-pel, a two-time Paralympian who will visit our school and share his experiences as a swimmer who has represented Australia at various events around the globe. This will be a great time to reflect on their CBL learning and how they have engaged in their challenge to ‘improve understanding of sporting diversity.’ As a way of supporting our Para Olympians, students in Grade 3 and 4 can come dressed in a diverse range of sporting clothes and bring along a $2 donation with all monies raised going to the Australian Paralympic Committee. EASTER RAFFLE A sincere thankyou to the families who have already donated Easter Eggs and other items for our Easter raffle as well as selling raffle tickets. The raffle will be drawn at our last whole school as-sembly on Thursday 29th March starting at 9:00am on the Junior side oval taking advantage of the cooler part of the day. We will have up to 30+ baskets of eggs for the raffle – not bad odds per ticket! HELP NEEDED In the next two weeks Chris Donaldson, Kristin MacDonald, Jill Stock and Jen Wiersema have to pack up their classrooms as their building is to be refurbished over the next school holidays. Every-thing has to be boxed with removalists taking most of the boxes on Wednesday 28th March and re-turning the following day at 2.30pm to remove all furniture. If you could provide some packing assis-tance to any one of these teachers, please approach them. I know they would be most grateful for any assistance. PARENTS AND FRIENDS ASSOCIATION (PFA) Parents’ clubs foster closer links between parents, teachers and the principal; facilitate parental participation in their child’s school; and work together with school staff and the school council to en-sure the best possible educational outcomes for the benefit of all students.

We have a new President who is very enthusiastic and, together with her team, already planning many exciting events and fundraisers. The PFA is also a valuable social club for parents, especially new families.

All interested parents (including dads) are welcome to attend meetings and I would encourage you to consider becoming a member of this very important group who support the school in so many ways.

The PFA office bearers for 2018 are: PRESIDENT: Lauren Croiset & mentor Marquita Telford

VICE PRESIDENT: Renee Burley

SECRETARY: Jacqui Nicholls

TREASURER: Sara Wood

COMMITTEE MEMBERS: Liz Wigney, Megan Foote, Sara Schulz, Sophie Dalton, Michelle Peak.

The next PFA meeting is on Friday 23rd March at 2.30pm in the Sue Goodall Building (Grades 5/6 building). END OF TERM Parents are reminded that Term 1 ends on Thursday 29th March. Children will be dismissed at 2:30pm. The Easter raffle will be drawn at our last whole school assembly on Thursday 29th March starting at 9:00am on the Junior side playground. The second term commences on Monday 16th April. Dale Goldsmith - Assistant Principal

March 19th Sebastian Matson Hannah Matthews 20th Lexie Bellis Callum White 21st Jasmine Kober 23rd Tori Thexton