11-August-2021
Dear families
Today’s announcement by the Premier was a bit of a kick to the guts, but one that was not completely unexpected. It means that nothing changes for us for the next 6 school days. Continuity for every student in metropolitan Melbourne remains a challenge and we’re hoping that we can, in part, offset the frustration by providing something for our students to look forward to when they return- hopefully next week.
“Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.”- Desmond Tutu.
The sensory garden is now complete and it looks and smells amazing. This quiet space helps to finish off the landscaping along Edithvale Rd and French Avenue that we targeted in the last Master plan and offers a calm and serene space for students.
We’ll also be in a position to unveil the new oval surface next week and students will be able to enjoy this new space when they return. We will send some photos through tomorrow that might put a smile on our students’ faces.
We’re also a hatching a plan for an Edi Scavenger hunt for students to complete on Friday and over the weekend with parents. We’re hoping that this might be a bit of fun for us all and who knows, there may be other students and families out and about at the same time that you might bump in to.
We will again provide very limited on-site support and learning for students who meet the DET criteria below again next week. This includes:
Children where both parents and or carers are considered authorised workers who cannot work from home, work for an essential provider and where no other supervision arrangements can be made:
- Where there are two parents/carers, both must be essential workers, working outside the home in order for their children to be eligible for on-site provision.
- For single parents/ carers, the essential worker must be working outside the home in order for their children to be eligible for on-site provision.
- Vulnerable children, including:
- children in out-of-home care
- children deemed vulnerable by a government agency, funded family or family violence service, and assessed as requiring education and care outside the family home
- children identified as vulnerable or at risk, (including via referral from a government agency, families in stress or funded family or family violence service, homeless or youth justice service or mental health or other health service)
The French Avenue gate will be opened at 8:45am for those who qualify. These will be closed again at the end of the day – 3:15 pm
The link to the form is https://forms.gle/zjHnewvCXgm3hiFEA
Student Free Day has been postponed
At our School Council meeting last night, we agreed to postpone the proposed August 20 Student Free Day and reschedule this for Friday September 17. Our best guess at this stage is that we’ll be back on-site on August 20 and we’d love to see our students as soon as we possibly can. We are hopeful that the change in date will cause less disruption to student engagement and learning and believe that this decision will give us the greatest chance of seeing our students back on-site next week. The opportunity to have our students at school to connect with their peers and teachers is a driving force behind this date change.
Team Kids will be running a full day program for families who may need to access this service.Get Active
From last night’s Department communications under the banner of Student health, safety, wellbeing, and engagement comes the following.
Keeping students active while they learn from home
During COVID-19 restrictions, it’s important that students stay active and get moving.
When children participate in regular physical activity, it boosts their physical and mental health and improves academic performance.Physical activity throughout the day also improves concentration, and the ability to retain information and solve problems. To help support your children to stay active while learning from home, families can access a range of free COVIDSafe ideas to stay active and games through Get Active Victoria.
Registration only takes a few minutes and once registered, you can access many different activities
There are many benefits to being active, including improved wellbeing and concentration.
Get Active Victoria has a range of activities families can do at home to stay active, including:
- COVIDSafe activities, such as pilates and chair exercises
- physical challenges, such as juggling and hula hooping
- dance classes.
- 15 minutes 4 times a day is all it takes.
Swimming Program
We’d hoped and had planned for the provision of a modified F-3 swimming program to run next week and unfortunately with the lockdown extension and the lack of available dates later in the year, we have had to cancel this program. We’re hopeful that the Year 4-6 program can run a modified program later in the term (August 23- September 2)
Concert 2021.
We have run out of time to do justice to the performing skills and talents of our students and staff that get showcased during our school Concert. Restrictions at the venue over at Monash University also make it tough to offer tickets to all family members who might want to attend and enjoy the show. We have a tentative booking for next year’s concert at the Robert Blackwood Hall scheduled for late in Term 3 in 2022.
Take care and keep strong
James Whitla