Casa Mia Montessori Community School Newsletter from the principal Issue 59 22.05.2013 Welcome to two new students Amber Bonnie (Koomal class), parents Deborah and Darryl, and Oscar Ashton (Karak class), parents Eloise and Craig. NEW BOARD OF GOVERNANCE 30.05 03.06 19.06 24.06 05.07 Nature Day excursion to Woodbridge Riverside Park Foundation Day public holiday board meeting coffee morning term two ends The Annual General Meeting was held on May 8, and the school was also able to pass the Special Resolutions as needed for the Rules of Association. Congratulations and a big thank you to the parents who offered to take on School Governance. For those of you who were unable to attend the AGM, copies of the Annual Report are available at the trolley by the office. At our first Board meeting the newly elected members accepted the following positions: John Proctor; Chairperson; Fionna Wheatley, Vice Chairperson; Lynn Ollsen, Secretary; Mark Imrie, Orinary Member; and Jeremy Wray, Ordinary Member. We are still confirming the Treasurer position and seeking any members of the community with experience in this area. Belinda Johnson, our previous Chairperson, organised a professional learning session for the new Board which was held at the school on May 15 with Mike Horabin. This proved to be a very positive and informative beginning for the new Board. Many thanks to Belinda Johnson and Marc Canet for their time on the School Board. The School Board of Governance is now mainly responsible for developing, reviewing and ratifying school policies while the Principal is mainly responsible to see that these policies are carried out. This shows an important growth in the overall school management and the ongoing compliance expectations of modern schooling. This change was a ‘grassroots’ change for our small community school Board, who worked through current legislation requirements. At times there was considerable opposition from members of the community in regard to these necessary changes. Belinda steadfastly worked through the issues, did the research and wrote the policies to see that these important changes took place. I would like to thank Belinda for her excellent and hard work. Best wishes on your retirement from the School Board! Susan POLICY REMINDERS Before and Duty happy birthday! May Maea Amber June Lilit Amelia Alexis Aika 11 Hamilton St Bassendean WA 6054 After School of Care Student Drop-Off and Pick-Up Procedures The school does not provide teacher supervision in the playground before and after school hours. For courtesy and safety reasons, students will not be able to play in the school’s outdoor learning environment or on the outdoor equipment at these times. Under certain circumstances, such as parent – teacher conferences, students are permitted to sit at the outdoor tables for snack and games. To discuss concerns about or view school duty of care legislation and school policies, please see the Susan. It is important to see that children arrive and leave the school under appropriate parental care. Parents need to notify the classroom teacher via the classroom communications book or written note about changes in pick-up procedures. This may be afterschool-care changes, grandparents or other community members who will be picking up students. In an emergency, please ring the school to notify of a late change. School staff are not permitted to release children to unknown persons without parental permission. Office Hours Mon – Fri 08.30 – 14.30 Tel: 9279 2209 Email: [email protected] Web: www.casamiamontessori.wa.edu.au Classroom News Primary News (Karak and Maali) Welcome to term 2 everyone! Firstly, a warm welcome to the newest member in the Primary area, Oscar, who has joined the Karak class. This term the Primary classes will be continuing with their semester themes of Sustainability. Already work has begun on our own vegetable garden, for which we thank those who helped in the set up. Maali is learning about the Fairtrade movement and continuing with a geography focus this term. Karak is learning about Australia and its environments, the land and water forms, animals, emblems, events. On May 30 our school will be participating in an international Montessori celebration, Nature Day. To enjoy this day, we will all travel by train to Woodbridge Riverside Park. Families are welcome, and more details of this will be available shortly. We hope to see you there. Finally, just a reminder to please provide your children with a wastefree, healthy fruit snack only. We were commended last term for how little waste we produce as a school, and we should all try to maintain this, and eating healthy food will help us concentrate. All the best, Marta and Mechtild Additional recipe books ($10 each) can be ordered at the office, please see Lynette. 2/3 Children’s House News (Koomal) School Wear Welcome back to term two. We hope you enjoyed your break and the recent Mother’s Day celebrations! We are sure you will have plenty of ideas of what to cook for a while. This term we are welcoming a new student into The Children’s House; Amber. Our theme this term is Australia and Antarctica. So far we have been learning the names of the states and capital cities of Australia. In Science we will be focusing on weather, and in Maths, geometry and pattern. One of the virtues we will be focusing on this term is respect. If anyone have any interesting items related to Australia or Antarctica please let staff know, or bring them in as additional news. If anyone has didgeridoos, aboriginal artwork, handicraft, etc., which they would like to lend to us for display in the classroom this term, please see a staff member regarding this. We hope to have an industrious and happy term. Katja, Astrid and Karen I currently have a few outstanding orders from families, but am unable to place an order with our suppliers as we don’t yet meet their minimum order. I am also waiting on the school Board and P&F to finalise uniform/school wear policy documents. I am unable to do any ordering until this process is complete. Apologies to any families who have paid and are waiting on school wear items. Please contact me if there are any problems or concerns with this delay. School Uniform Pre-Orders If you wish to purchase hats, polo shirts or dresses, you need to fill in an order form and submit along with payment. Order forms are located on the trolley by Lynette’s office. Lynette is happy to take money for this and to provide you with a receipt. Please contact me if you have any queries relating to orders or school wear in general. Best wishes, Shane Mazandarani [email protected] Doctorate Research Request My name is Susan Smith, and I am a Doctorate of Psychology candidate at the University of Western Australia. I am researching separation anxiety in kindergarten children across Australia, and how this predicts anxiety when children enter school. I am looking for parents of Kindergarten aged children who are interested in participating by completing a short online questionnaire. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you would like to ask questions, or let me know that you are participating and would like me to send out the study results when they are ready later this year. My phone is 6488 2644. The link to the study is http://tinyurl.com/kindykids Grounds and Maintenance Wow! We had our best turn out ever at our May 5 busy bee. Thank you, thank you, thank you to the following people: Maddy and Wendy Shoebridge, Sylvia and Cambell Lindsay, Marc and Steph Canet, Leonie and Lorenzo Wight, Kelly and Clay Barnes, Greg and Fionna Wheatley, Rob Karl, Nicolas Broughton, Edwina Ryan, Shane Mazandarani, Emily Migdale, Chian Ghosh and Jodie Cooper. Many were first-timers which is really great. We all shared in the lovely morning tea prepared by Jodie and the new families were able to meet some of the school community. We really achieved a lot and I hope to see you all again next busy bee! Thank you also to Nick Sibbel who always does an excellent job at mowing the lawn and to Emma Saurus who waters the pot plants during the school holidays. There are still a few jobs to do this term: •Jacob Lehrer is going to sand and oil the remaining four wooden benches; •we need help to assemble a shelf unit (easy) for the outdoor play equipment shed and arrange the equipment into it; •path sweeping job is available for Monday, Tuesday and Thursday; •next big project will be to sand and oil/varnish the wooden fort. There are also two positions available: Parent Liaison and Secretary for the P&F group (Parents and Friends). Please see me if you are able to help out with these tasks or positions. Rachel Seeds Grounds Coordinator School Care Hours Coordinator [email protected] 0417 772 838 parents and friends Our P &F kicked off its first meeting for the year on Friday May 17 May having spent the first term establishing a Constitution to work within. The 9 am meeting time seemed more popular with parents and it was lovely to have so many attend with such thoughtful input and enthusiasm that goes such a long way to establishing a functioning P & F committee for our community. Ideas for P & F activities are on the pink notice board by the office door if you would like to know the items being discussed by your P & F. All are welcome to participate in these discussions and if you have any ideas that are not on the ‘Ideas List’, we would love to hear from you. Please email or phone me and it will be shared at the meetings. We are looking forward with much anticipation to launching an online social networking system that Megan 3/3 Gill, Edwina Ryan and Mark Imrie are working on. This is very near to completion and will be launched very soon. Congratulations to all that have worked so well behind the scene working on this and being so sensitive to parent’s views, needs and concerns. It is anticipated that this will be a better tool to give parents enough time leading up to events and generally keep everyone more informed about school activities so no one is missed out. From all accounts it seems that the P & F are off to a good start for the year with some P & F run activities that our families can be excited about and keen to participate in. P&F Coordinator Leonie Wight [email protected] 0404 942 443