Newsletter

Wangaratta District Specialist School

From the Principal’s Desk

Cont.

Date 28/03/’14 Ph. 5721 7424

wangaratta.ss@edumail.vic. Fax. 5721 8601

Dates to Remember

O.T. - Emma - 31st March Speech - Rachael - 2nd and 3rd Apri;l

Parent/Carer meeting - Tuesday 1st April at 2.00pm Last Day of Term 1 - 4th April, at 2.00pm

First Day Term 2 - Tuesday 22nd April School Photos - Wednesday 14th May

Welcome to the 2014 school Councillors: Council met on Tuesday evening and welcomed some new parents/carers

to the important role as well as welcoming back some experienced faces. As you know the school could not run

without the dedication of our Councillors who give up their time to make decisions on the running of the school. We

are a friendly bunch, and all ideas and opinions are always considered. President is Darryl Henwood, Vice President

– Noel Pearson, Secretary – Sharon Gambold, Parent Representatives are Jo Douglas, Mel Stone, Heather Naylor,

Ruth Crawford and Annalee Gardam. Staff Representatives are Sharon Gambold and Jodie Webb. Please contact

these parents/carers if you have anything that you wish to raise with the Councillors.

Rosa the new bus: Much to the delight of staff students and Rutherglen

families, a brand new 22 seater arrived last week. It is beautiful and we

are extremely lucky!! The new bus is given to us so that we can have a

self-managed bus run which will be used to transport students as far

away as Wahgunyah. It has arrived in the nick of time as the other Com-

muter was really not up to the job of travelling such distances, with no air

conditioning and many kilometres on the clock. It will still be used to

transport children to community access in the town. Now that our school

consists of 13 classes, buses are always heavily booked for student use. Kenny is about to head home on the new bus.

The Foundation students: (new name for Prep students beginning their schooling)

are trying out five school days a week, starting from last week. Up until then, most

schools ease the littlies into their exciting new lives by attending four out of the five

days, and having Wednesday as a rest day. It is very tiring for our youngest students,

some, who travel quite a way on school buses to arrive at school. It is also exhaust-

ing learning their new routines and learning how to play on the wonderful equip-

ment both in the Taminick classroom and in the yard. Despite the long travelling

time for some, all are making fabulous progress in their new class at their new

school, and all staff and their parents/carers are really proud of their efforts to date.

Cathy McGowan has posted a story on her website about the school and her visit here. Look at

cathy.mcgowan.com.au and follow the link to more stories – Wangaratta Schools Doing Great Work. There is a

Hansard report of her small speech in Parliament about her visit to our school.

From the Principal’s Desk cont...

Libby Hosking Principal

Principal’s awards:

Junior awards: Edwina Roper for Warm friendly greetings and good sense of humour

Brandon Alfieri for Keeping active at recess and lunch time

Senior Awards: Rhys Whitbourne for An outstanding writing piece on Danny McCaskil

Ben Henwood for Helping keep people safe in our yard

Uniform: With the change of weather it is noticeable that many students are keeping warm and/or wearing articles of

clothing which are not uniform. While I understand that it is important that children are warm, we have a school uni-

form and it is important that all students wear it, unless there are extenuating circumstances. Children can grow

quickly so if you have any uniform articles which are in good condition, and you no longer need, we have begun a

second hand uniform store. Please bag the uniforms and send them into the school with your name and we can either

sell the articles for you, or you can donate the items so that they can be given to other students. If it is too difficult for

you to buy uniform then we can support families through State School Relief funds.

New School Site: many of you would have seen the article in the Chronicle last Friday 23rd March. I hope that the

item didn’t alarm anyone. We are working towards a new school site but it will be some years away yet. Preliminary

talks are occurring with Wangaratta Rural Council and the DEECD. I will keep you informed.

Life Education Van has been at the school all this

week, with classes visiting to learn about their bod-

ies. It is a fabulous service and another way that your

fees support the programs which the students use.

End of Term: I wish all readers a safe and happy

holiday and look forward to seeing you all back on

Tuesday 22nd April.

What a great start we have made to this. Negative behaviours are at an all-time low while positive choice making is

similarly high.

We have revised our all-important Matrix for expected behaviours and our Junior School Council members have

played a terrific part in its formulation – well done to all of you!

Our end of term Goldie’s celebration will be held on the last day of term. The success of last year’s Talent Quest has

led the students to decide on the same format again.

You are invited to attend the WDSS Has Got Talent show on Friday, April 4 at 12.00.

Strap yourselves in for the joy and exceptional offerings of our students!!!

Positive Behaviour Support

From The Chaplain’s Desk

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support

Goldie Trading: Over the past two weeks 62 students have traded 1,195 Goldies and two additional students

(Hayden Riddell and Corey Davis) reached the 100 Goldies Milestone (receiving a wristband, a presentation at As-

sembly and inclusion on the Honor Board). This fortnight we thank Bob and Donna, Edgar’s Newsagency and Jack

for their donations to the Goldie Trading Centre.

Postcards were sent to two families to share the especially wonderful work being done by their children.

Annual Review

On Monday I had my Annual Chaplaincy Review, so hopefully this won’t be my last instalment of “From The

Chaplain’s Desk”!

Chaplaincy Regional Day

Much to the angst of many students (as there was no Goldie Trading!) I attended a Chaplaincy Regional Day in Al-

bury on Tuesday. These days are held once a term and are part of the training in which I am expected to participate.

Junior School Council

We had our second meeting for the year on Monday and it was wonderful to meet with this group of students and

listen to their ideas on ways we can further improve our great school. The students whose ideas were agreed to by

Junior School Council now get to speak to the staff member in charge of the area (and Libby) and work out whether/

how we can make these ideas happen. They will bring reports back to next month’s meeting.

Parent/Carer Club

Out next meeting will be held on Tuesday, April 1 in the Meeting Room at our school. It would be great if you could

attend, meet other parents/carers, share information and experiences and have input into the content/form of future

meetings. A reminder of this will have been placed in your child’s planner. Please return the form (if you have not

already done so) re your attendance here.

Class Programs

Sessions for the remainder of this term will continue to focus on Bullying/Cyberbullying for Warby & VCAL Clas-

ses and Recognising and Responding Appropriately to Feelings in other classes. Sessions also reinforce good choic-

es in the allocated area for that week ( with last week being Hallways and this week being Classrooms).

Thought For The Week

Several parents have requested a reprinting of “101 Ways To Praise Your Child”, but as this is a long document I

have decided to break it up into fortnightly instalments of :

10 Ways to Praise Your Child.

1. “Wow!” 2. “You’re Special!” 3. “Outstanding” 4. “Excellent!”

5. “Great!” 6.“Good!” 7. “Neat!” 8. “Well Done!” 9. “Remarkable!”

10. “I Knew You Could Do It!”

P.S. Remember, a smile is worth 1000 words! Have a Great Easter and First Term Break!

Rose

Together we will make good choices. Together we will make good choices.

Feathertop - Rosie, Jodie, and Ashley

Buffalo - Lisa, Robyn, Jill, Stella, Luke

Money: students have been busy counting money. We have

learnt about 10c and 5c, putting money in order, and things that

cost a lot of money and a little bit of money. Thanks to Carmel

for all your great ideas.

Animals: To get ready for next Term’s theme which is “The Ani-

mal Kingdom” we have had some animals in the classroom. A

guinea pig called BB and a praying mantis called Mantis. We

love them!

Welcome back to all off our Feathertop followers. During the past fortnight the students of Feathertop have been

busy working towards gaining their Safe food handling, Occupational Health and Safety and Barista certificates.

The students have been completing work books relating to each module within these certificates. It has been very

exciting to watch the students grow and mature within this course.

Last Wednesday a contingency of VCAL students competed in the Hume Region specialist schools swimming

sports held in Mooroopna near Shepparton. There were lots of ribbons won by our students in various activities in-

cluding 33m races to 20m across the pool team relays. A huge thankyou to our sports teacher Hop for organising the

day. Fun was had by all.

Last week students had a break from their normal Monday routine and enjoyed a day at 15 Mile Creek Camp. The

students are looking forward to a day of teamwork and physical activities to strengthen their bond as a group. Fol-

lowing a day out at 15 Mile Creek on Monday the students will venture to Chiltern to have a socialisation day with

the VCAL students from Belvoir Specialist School in Wodonga. Keep in touch for news and photos in the next

newsletter.

Together we will make good choices.

WDSS Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Program

GROWING, HARVESTING, PREPARING AND SHARING

We are extremely close to finishing off an area for chickens, as

a part of the elective program on Tuesdays. The students have

recycled and scrounged for most of the materials, and come up

with ideas to house the chickens. I am looking forward to intro-

ducing to you 3 hens at the beginning of Term 2. We will have

to have a naming competition. Thanks to John for his great

building of the laying box.

In the garden we are seeing more variety in the veggies we har-

vest and an increase in the white cabbage moth caterpillars on

the brassica plants. I have introduced caterpillar crush to reduce

the damage done to crops. We have been harvesting cucum-

bers, tomatoes, beans, rocket, zucchini, radish, turnips, basil

and chives and sowing spring onions, broccoli, cauliflower,

kale, bok choy, brussel sprouts, beetroot, and artichokes. A big

thank you to Greg Fallon who brought in 2 full seedling trays

of vegetables, they have all been planted and we can’t wait to

harvest, cook and eat the produce.

Students have been clearing an area for a bigger and better compost system with 4 bays to really recycle our

garden and kitchen scraps, and enrich the soil with nutrients with little added cost.

Thank you to those who have filled out forms to volunteer. We will be in contact shortly.

DONATIONS PLEASE: This week we would love it if you could share some flowering plants from your gar-

den. Do you have any seedlings that have come up, or plants that need dividing? Flowers encourage bees, and

bees help to pollinate the flowers, and make seeds for next year’s crop.

Chocolate and Zucchini cake

Ingredients:

250 g Self Raising flour

60g cocoa

½ tsp salt

180g dark brown sugar

120g butter – room temperature

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tsp instant coffee

3 eggs

350g zucchini grated coarsely

Method:

1. Using the Kitchen Aid cream sugar and butter

2. Add vanilla, coffee and eggs mixing in eggs one at a

time

3. Add flour, cocoa, and salt, mix until just combined

4. Stir through zucchini with a spatula, being careful

not to overwork

Pour into a prepared tin (round or square ok –

greased and lined) and level the surface

Bake for 40 minutes on 180

Dust with icing sugar to serve.

Square cake can feed 16

Round cake can feed 12 – 16 (but wedges are getting

very thin)

Kosciusko - Kate and Sheydin

Together we will make good choices.

Wow, it’s nearly the end of Term One! One of the things we have been writing about in our Writer’s Notebook

was the Special Olympics to be held in October in Melbourne.

The boys are practising for the

Special Olympics in October.

They need to raise $2600.00. Jack

is talking to them.

–Shianne

Jack is talking to the boys in Mel-

bourne on Saturday 22/3/14. They

are having fun! It was cold for

them. They have to pay $2600,00

each to play. - Taylah Robbie is kicking the ball for the Special

Olympics in Melbourne in October.

- Josh

Stirling - Alysha and Sharon

Stirling students have been busy this fortnight counting money! We have been using 5c and

10c pieces to practice our 5 and 10 times tables. We are learning that 100c is the same as $1.

Many students have also been rewarded by all their good choices and have traded their 50

Goldies in for shopping vouchers. On our weekly community access visits those students

have been spending their Goldie shopping vouchers wisely – on pillow pets, remote control

cars, teddies and trading cards.

Students of the Week include Sam for

reading at home each night. Sam’s read-

ing has improved and he is becoming

more confident reading both his readers

and reading back his own writing. I

have included one of Sam’s writing

pieces in this article to share with you.

Keep up the good work Sam! Our sec-

ond Student of the Week is Mark. Mark

comes in every morning and after he

has unpacked his bag he goes about

completing his chore of the week. This

includes putting the chairs down, un-

packing the dishwasher, putting the date

on the board or handing out pencils to

the other students. You must be a big

help at home Mark! Brandon received our reading award for this term. Brandon

was given a $25.00 gift voucher for Collins book Shop for

reading a total of 34 books at home. Well done Brandon!! I

wonder who will win next Term’s voucher?

Mark enjoys playing

with the Tic Tac

Shapes.

Together we will make good choices.

Mt. Beauty - Lee and Lizz

Mount Pilot - Sarah and Fiona

The students of Mt. Pilot have discovered the joys of reading. A visit to the town library prompted all the stu-

dents to get a library card and they have not looked back since.

The pages are turning fast and furious with several students hitting major milestones.

Congratulations to the following students and their reading partners at home for all their fantastic work.

Brydie Kensington– 15 consecutive nights reading

Will J Simpson– 15 consecutive nights reading

Holly Heaney– 25 consecutive nights reading

Kaitlyn Cook– 30 consecutive nights reading

Zac King-Rooney– 30 consecutive nights reading

Aaron Mullins– 40 consecutive nights reading

Great

Job!

With Term One fast approaching its end, the Mount

Beauty Class has been a successful one. I personally

would like to thank all staff and parents for your active

input and participation into this class. Without your

ongoing support it would have not been as positive and

enjoyable as it has been.

Last week students took a journey to Beechworth and

showed me what the wonderful town had to offer. We

looked through a variety of shops (including the fa-

mous lolly shop) and I was amazed at how wonderfully

the students behaved themselves to the owners and

people in the community.

In Physical Education students have been using their

road safety skills practicing their bike riding. Three

students from Mount Beauty have been invited to join

the Great Alpine Bike Ride. Good Luck to those stu-

dents. From all the Staff in Mount Beauty I wish you

all a safe and happy holiday. Take Care.

Hotham - Sam and John

Together we will make good choices.

Buller—Allan, Suzanne, Mab and Peter

In the So safe Program our students have been busy learning the difference

between public and private. While in PBS, we have been learning all about

the different rules and things to be aware of in different locations around the

school and community.

In English students have continued to improve their writing with the use of

full stops and capital letters.

While in Maths, students have been learning about money, place value and

time.

Next Monday our students are lucky enough to go on an excursion to

Lake William Hovell. They will get the opportunity to have a fish, go

for a bush walk and ride the bikes and we will enjoy a BBQ for lunch.

It should be a really nice treat to reward all our Hotham students for

their hard work this term!

The Life Ed Van is at WDSS all this week and as usual all the stu-

dents have enjoyed their visit and have learned some very interesting

information to help keep our bodies safe and well.

Chocolate Cracklers

Everybody loves a chocolate crackle and the Buller kids are no excep-

tion. So, when we cooked up an industrial size batch of them last

week there was certainly no lack of willing consumers. Of course, the

only drawback was the industrial size stack of face-washers we need-

ed to use so everybody could go home with their dignity intact!

Kara-Lea has her own special table and chair so that she can play with the

toys she enjoys most and also have some games like table soccer with the

staff or any willing visitors. One of her favourite visitors is the ever

cheerful Kaitlyn. She always brings a smile with her and Kara-Lea just

can’t help smiling back

Together we will make good choices.

Students of the Fortnight

CLASS WEEK ENDING March 14 WEEK ENDING March 21st

Buffalo Noah Antonello for helping other students

and for good behaviour.

Reaver Guyomar, for being happy

and working hard.

Mt Beauty Jack Davies trying all new activities in the

class.

Matthew Cole for overcoming

personal challenges and becoming

a stronger person.

Bogong Jye has begun travelling on the bus. Will Dods has shown excellent

number recognition skills and

counting to 100.

Kosciusko Jesse for being helpful in cooking. Brodie for great math’s work.

Hotham Simone for being a fantastic help around

the classroom

Zach for fantastic attitude towards

work

Stirling Sam for reading each night at home. Mark for always remembering to

complete his classroom chores.

Buller Jason for enjoying singing. Emily for being brave when she

was sick.

Warby Travis Andrews for excellent behaviour

and full participation in the senior swim-

ming sports.

James Bryant for completing his

breakfast routine within the

timeframe.

Stanley Taylor H G for being a great help, doing

the shopping and handling the money for

the Stanley class.

Keenan Darcy for showing a great

work ethic when doing meals on

wheels.

Feathertop Lincon Mc Kibbin for obtaining a work

placement at Wangaratta Stock Foods

Emma for obtaining a work place-

ment at the North Eastern Hotel.

Taminick Matthew Bickerdike for doing a 24 piece

puzzle.

Matthew Alfieri for having a great

week.

Emu Vincent Gercovich for making good choic-

es.

Daniel Henwood for persevering

with his school work

Pilot Will Simpson for knowing and indentify-

ing vowels.

Brydie Kensington for mastering

the mountain and warrior poses in

Bluearth.

Sport James Bryant for giving his best efforts

during the swimming sports.

Millie Longfield for listening to instruc-

tions and enjoying participating in P.E.

activities

Tyreece Orton for always giving

his best efforts during Physical

Education.

Sarah Lord for persevering during

her bike riding session.

Please phone (03) 9269 0408 for an appointment or 1300 792 387 during business hours.

Date 15th April 2014

Time: Free half hour sessions between 9.00am and 4.00pm

Venue: Upper Murray Family Care 33 Mackay Street

WANGARATTA VIC 3677

Stanley - Donna, Jacqui and Simon

Together we will make good choices.

Taminick—Phillipa, Marley, Keetah and Chloe

We’ve had a very busy two weeks in Taminick! We

all really loved painting outside with Sue for Art last

week and we had a lot of fun going to the shops for our

first community access.

Happy 19th Birthday Chloe!

Painting

quickly

turned

into fin-

ger paint-

ing.

All tuckered out after a hard

week at school! Enjoying our new bucket from K-

mart.

There has been a lot happening in Stanley over the past two weeks. We have been very busy in the kitchen. Last

week we made a decadent Mars Bar Slice which was loved by all. This required lots of chopping, melting and stir-

ring and a lot of self-control too! We were all desperate to try that delicious tasty treat. This week we made a sa-

voury dish, a creamy pasta bake. There were many students asking for a second serve, it was a definite winner.

The students have also been enjoying their Art classes and have really liked seeing their work displayed around the

school. It looks fantastic.

Bogong - David and Kat

Together we will make good choices.

Mt. Emu - Leanne and Jack

We have been extremely busy for the past fort-

night. As well as many other things we have

been learning to recognise our classmates

names and several other sight words.

Suzanne has been helping us with our literacy

development.

During our Maths sessions we have been con-

centrating on learning to count and recog-

nise numbers all the way to 100. Will Dods

receives our Student of the Week award for

counting all the way to 100.

Emma, our O.T. has

given us much infor-

mation to help develop

practical programs for

each student.

Jye and Bridget share

our school’s new “pea

pod.” This is to allow

calming deep pressure

experiences for our stu-

dents.

This week we were thrilled to visit Harold

and the Life Ed van. We learnt much about

how to look after our bodies. Of course Har-

old was the star of the Show.

Jye was our other Student of the Week for

travelling on the school bus.

Last Thursday Mt. Emu visited Murrumbung Plains

Farm for a B.B.Q lunch. Murrumbung Plains is a

Community Access and Accommodation Support

Services. CAASS provides a range of programs that

offer people with disabilities the opportunity to par-

ticipate in either facility based community group pro-

grams or individually based programs. All the pro-

grams are structured and designed to meet the educa-

tional, vocational, recreational and therapeutic goals

of the client via the use of an individual plan. Jenny

and Darren the supervisors explains many examples

of the programs, which include, Independent Living

skills, Skills Development programs, Art and Craft.

Jenny gave us a tour of the farm, while Darren was

cooking lunch with the assistance of some of the cli-

ents. Murrumbung Plains farm offers a range of farm

activities and horticulture programs on the rural prop-

erty. All students were engaged with the operation of

the farm. The students all still talk about the farm

with a lot of amusement, especially about one of the

pigs whose name just happens to be Leanne. Oink

Oink!

Excellent Emu awards! Vincent Gercovich & Dan

Henwood.

Vincent has become aware of the importances of tak-

ing responsibility for his learning. Well done!

Dan has been persistent with his learning within the

classroom with some fantastic results. Excellent

Hop’s Sports Column

Sports Award

With our swimming sports now concluded many of our students have been training hard on our school bikes to

take part in the Great Alpine Bike Ride with students from other Specialist Schools all over Victoria.

We have students from Kosciusko, Mt. Emu, Mt.Beauty, Hotham and Warby participating in these rides along

the bike trail from Bethanga to Bright. This will be another great experience for all participants.

James Bryant—For giving his best efforts during the swimming sports.

Millie Longfield– For listening to instructions and enjoying participating in P.E.

activities.

Tyreece Orton-Always giving his best efforts during Physical Education

Sarah Lord –for persevering during her bike riding session.

Last Saturday Jack McNeilly and Kate Edgar drove Nathan

Campbell, Robbie Campbell and James Elkan to Mel-

bourne for Special Olympics Soccer Practice. After a great

training session Kevin Milstein from the Reagan Milstein

Foundation presented the team with a complete set of soc-

cer uniforms. Kevin, through the foundation, is assisting

with fund raising to help these boys achieve their dream

of getting to the Special Olympics Nationals that will be

held in Melbourne later this year. The boys are helping

raise funds themselves by washing staff members cars.

Students of the Week: Warby- James Bryant- For his punctuality and organisation in the mornings.

-Travis Andrews for his behaviour and participation at swimming sports

VCAL and Warby were lucky enough to have Leon Higgins, Wangaratta Police Youth Liaison Officer, visit last

week.

The Youth Resource Officer program is a framework that increases the capacity of police to deal with police and

youth issues; meeting the needs of modern policing and helping teenagers with issues that may affect them.

It also-

•Identifies youth issues in their area.

•Develops mentoring relationships between police and young people.

•Interacts with youths of all ages, races and socio-economic backgrounds.

•Establishes early intervention programs

Leon talked about a variety of youth issues concerning our senior students, and was kept busy answering the

many questions from the students.

Warby - Elise and Chris

Leon Higgins

with Feathertop

and Warby Stu-

dents.

Leon answer-

ing another

question.