Newsletter Week 5, Term 3 2022 – Message from Administration, Senior Faction Athletics Carnival Results, Interschool Athletics Parent Helpers, Book Week Parade, MS Readathon, Chaplain Corner, Canteen, P&C News, Picture Plates

Message from the Executive Administration Team

Dear parents and caregivers

Term 3 is always full of events and celebrations such as athletics on the calendar for our students to participate in. Our students look forward to these and they are the stuff of amazing primary school memories, such as the carnival, Book Week, Massed Choir Festival and this week; Science Week!  We know it is a busy term for everyone and winter has been in full swing these past few weeks, so as you always do, monitor your child’s health and wellbeing, and balance those extra commitments as best you can. So many families have been struck by illness after illness this winter, so be kind to yourselves and each other. We are doing our best to do this at school for your children too. Thank you for supporting our community events this term and for all the hard work going on behind the scenes for our Wembley Family Fun Day. We feel fortunate to have such an engaged parent body who get behind the school for the benefit of the children. The P&C are working hard to support the school with technology leases so that we can fund access to a high ratio of iPads and laptops without going to a Bring Your Own Device program, and helping to fund the much needed canteen upgrade which, as with everything else, will cost much more than anticipated. The P&C also recently approved a contribution to the UV Meter which has been installed in the school and a new shade sail in Kindy. As a public school with limited funds, we just couldn’t do it without you and your voluntary contributions and fundraising initiatives. Thank you to the community and our hard working volunteers and class reps.

Community Engagement

Senior Athletics Carnival: Mr Bowman and Mrs Watson have included a fantastic summary of our Year 3-6 carnival later in this newsletter but what a wonderful day we had. The weather really turned itself on, and our students were just brilliant in how they embraced the different events throughout the day. We were very proud of their sportsmanship and resilience. It was such a great community effort to get the day organised, with almost 500 students participating, and so many events happening simultaneously around the stadium. Well done to all students for their efforts and to Farmer for taking out Champion faction. Our Phys Ed Specialists, Jon Bowman and Kathy Watson, spend hours outside of their normal teaching role preparing and organising the event. Thanks Jon and Kathy, you were under pressure with Mr Bowman being injured, but with assistance from your parent volunteers, we had a very successful event with minimal hiccups. The relays back at school on Friday afternoon meant we could take the time to run these as a group of events and this made these much more relaxed than trying to squeeze them in at the stadium.

Thank you so much to the massive parent/carer assistance to run the event, coordinated so amazingly by Roula Felekis. For many, this was the last carnival with their Year 6 child being their last at Wembley. Amy Suijendorp has been assisting with every carnival in the recording tent for years and we thank Amy so much for handling this high pressure role with laughs and smiles, partnering with Anna Teh to process a huge amount of results for hours on end! There are too many to mention, but thank you to every parent who took time out of work and their day to volunteer to run this event for your kids. It is so appreciated.

Wet Weather Traffic: When there is wet weather close to drop off or pick up, we are experiencing some major challenges with traffic and parking, particularly around the Alexander St Kiss and Drive and the Community Centre carpark. I understand that local traffic conditions are making it difficult around the school, with the half-finished traffic chicanes causing disruption and heavy traffic in the cul-de-sac. Student safety has to be the priority for everyone and I urge all parents/carers using this area to drive safely and follow road rules and Kiss and Drive guidelines in this area. These are the current issues, I urgently need parents/carers to address, particularly around Alexander St.

• The Community Centre carpark is a one-way system, please do not enter the carpark through the exit driveway.
• When using the Kiss and Drive, pull to the front of the bay and stay in your car while your child exits the vehicle. Keep bags with your child on the seat as getting bags from the boot holds up traffic and can be very unsafe with the amount of cars in the vicinity.
• Please do not stop to drop off or pick up in the cul-de-sac. Your child may need to walk further if you can’t find a spot in Kiss and Drive or the carpark, but this is safer and there have been so many near misses due to the hold-up created by unsafe stopping.
• Please be aware of the other cars and children on bikes when navigating this area; again near misses have been frequent.

There have been some heightened tensions among parents and with the Town of Cambridge ranger recently. Please remember that everyone’s goal is to keep children safe. If we all remain mindful of this, I’m confident we can resolve these issues. The Town of Cambridge has a new ranger patrolling the area and the school will keep working with the community and Council to keep students safely entering and exiting the school. We have a Kiss and Drive page on our school website here which outlines how to use these areas safely.

As the weather improves, we will hopefully have more parents leaving their cars at home and walking, scooting or riding to school. We have joined Your Move, a Department of Transport initiative, to promote a whole school approach to increase students’ active travel to school. Your Move always works best if there are parent volunteers to help, so if you’re interested in being part of our school’s Your Move program, check out this short video.  Please contact Tamara Doig if you would like to become a parent champion: tamara.doig@education.wa.edu.au. 

Teaching and Learning

Artist Spotlight: This week our Year 5 students are featuring in the front office art display with some amazing artworks in the style of Tim Burton animation. ‘The Journey of the Strange’ has inspired some highly creative and imaginative pieces. Make sure you come and take a look next time you are passing. The spooky and strange houses below are by Mark T, Aryan N and Shannon S. Great work Year 5s, incredible artistic talent.

 

Science Week: It’s National Science Week! Our Science specialist, Mrs Sue Webber, has a range of activities over the week to celebrate and get everyone excited about Science. It has become a tradition for our Year 3 students to plan and conduct before-school experiments. We invite everyone to come and watch. Our Year 3 scientists are doing a great job of conducting these and explaining the science behind their fun experiments. On Friday, we have Dr Bruce Webber, a CSIRO Research Scientist coming in to talk about his conservation work on the Ashmore Reef. Dr Webber is also a judge for our Science Photography competition and he will announce the winners for the competition at the end of his talk. We have had some outstanding entries and these will be displayed at the Inquiry Showcase on Friday, Week 9, when parents/carers will be able to visit open classrooms after school to see what their children have been learning and inquiring about. Thanks Mrs Webber for all your hard work for Science Week.

Maths Streaming: Year 1-6 parents received a communication regarding the teaching of mathematics, on Friday 5 August. The intention of the detailed information was to ensure the community were provided with all the research and evidence driving decisions about instructional strategies for our students. Within the communication, was a link to register for a parent Q&A. So far, there has been very few parents/carers wanting further clarification. However, it is important that after a thorough read of the document and links, you understand that there is the opportunity to have any further questions answered. Please try to be as specific as possible in the expression of interest, as the parent forum will be a Q&A rather than a presentation. The expression of interest will remain open until Friday. We will individually contact parents who have completed the form, should there continue to be low interest in attending. We value you being informed and involved. If you wish to attend an in-person Q&A, please complete the form here by Friday.

‘Collaborate, Connect, Communicate and Care’.

Yours in learning

The Senior Leadership Team

Tamara, Milani, Rachel, Stacey and Natalie