8 February 2023

Newsletter Articles

Principal’s Report

Dear Parents/Caregivers

OUR SCHOOL VISION IS TO SUPPORT STUDENTS IN BECOMING STRONG, THOUGHTFUL AND INDEPENDENT INDIVIDUALS WHO ASPIRE TO BE THE BEST THAT THEY CAN BE. OUR ETHOS OFFERS STUDENT CENTERED EDUCATION THAT IS FOCUSSED ON BOTH THE PRESENT AND DEVELOPMENTAL NEEDS OF STUDENTS.

Welcome Back!

We would like to welcome everyone back to the new school year, it has been wonderful to see and hear all the positivity around the school. A special welcome to our new families who have enrolled at Somerly Primary School.

During the school holiday break, we were fortunate to have our drainage system upgraded. This will assist with water flow during the wet season, which will significantly reduce the incidents of flooding around the school buildings. You may notice the new drainage grates around the buildings.

As mentioned last term, the City of Wanneroo had proposed new parking restrictions surrounding Somerly Primary School that were going to be applied over the holidays. However, the City of Wanneroo are currently reviewing their proposal with the school community. If you want to have your say, please get in touch with the City of Wanneroo. They aim to have the plan finalised by the end of this term, to create safer parking around the school boundary.

We start the year with direction from our school Business Plan 2022 – 2024, with our school vision, to foster every individual’s academic and social development driven by high expectations for success and aspirations for them to become resilient, respectful individuals.

Staffing 2023

I have continued in the role of Acting Principal for this term, whilst Mrs Hadley-Hawley is on maternity leave. Miss Barnwall will be acting Deputy Principal alongside Miss Bue. Our Manager Corporate Services, Sue Rose and School Officer Pam Lok have continued in their roles.

We are very fortunate to have such dedicated, caring, and talented staff at Somerly Primary School. We would like to welcome the following new and returning staff:-

• Mrs Christina Davies – Room 6 Kindergarten
• Miss Aneka Rosielle – Room 5 Pre-Primary/ Year 1
• Mrs Lisa Hobson – Room 1 Pre-Primary
• Mrs Jo Hill (Mon – Wed) & Mrs Jess Dunn (Thurs & Fri) – Room 2 Pre-Primary
• Mrs Melinda Gane (Mon & Tues) & Mrs Sarah Berry (Wed-Fri) Room 3 Year 1
• Miss Jordyn Colleran – Room 4 Year 1
• Mrs Jo-Anne Avery – Room 15 Year 1/2
• Mrs Dyan Sutherland-Mundy – Room 16 Year 2
• Miss Nat Hobson – Room 17 Year 2
• Miss Zoe Hamand – Room 18 Year 2/3
• Miss Janelle Avins – Room 20 Year 3
• Mrs Leanne Sneddon – Room 12 Year 3
• Mr Daniel Gane – Room 11 Year 4
• Ms Lou Lipman – Room 13 Year 4 (Mon-Thurs)
• Mrs Julie Donohue – Room 14 Year 4/5 (Tues-Thurs)
• Mrs Amber Brown – Rooms 12, 13 & 14
• Mrs Jodie Brown – Room 7 Year 5
• Ms Ros McLevie – Room 8 Year 5
• Mrs Silvia Caratozzolo Room 9 Year 6
• Mr Cameron Robinson – Room 10 Year 6

Specialists

• Science – Mrs Renae Mulder
• Music – Ms Dee Ritchie
• PE – Mrs Belinda Ochieng
• Art – Mrs Lauren Defty
• Technologies – Mrs Nicolette Kilian
• LOTE – Mrs Rosaria McCulloch

I would also like to introduce and welcome our Chaplain for Semester 1 Ms Estelle. She will be replacing Ms Elle May who is on maternity leave. We congratulate her on the birth of her daughter Abbey-May - they are both doing well.

Our amazing Educational Assistants have returned to their roles this year. Christina Palioudakis remains on maternity leave this term and Christine Perrett is on leave throughout 2023.

School Board

As an Independent Public School, we are governed by a School Board which plays an important role in ensuring that school resources are used efficiently, community expectations and the school’s priorities reflect the needs of students. The School Board meets twice per term on a Tuesday morning - times are subject to change dependent upon availability.

Our current School Board comprises of

• Arthur Venthum – School Board Chair – Community representative
• Mark Folkard MLA – Community representative
• Nikunj Chauhan, Kayleigh James, Alaa Abu Jayyab & Dee Bell – Parent Representatives
• Louise Carroll & Louise Lipman – Staff representatives
• Zoe Hadley Hawley & Katia Bue – Administration

The School Board takes both approval and advisory roles. Some of the matters Councils and Boards may make decisions on include fees and charges, book lists, sponsorship and dress codes. Councils and Boards make these decisions with the Principal and others who ensure the decisions adhere to legislative and policy requirements.

P&C

The P&C is representative of parent and community volunteers which operates under the banner of the Western Australian Council of State School Organisation (WACSSO). Parents and Citizens Associations are established under the School Education Act 1999 for the purpose of supporting a strong government school system for the benefit of all students. The P&C raise money to invest in services and resources to enhance the learning programs offered at schools. They work closely with the school to identify needs and direct funds to support those needs.

The P&C allows for parent participation and involvement in the school. It helps to promote and support communication and cooperation within the school community and to bring educational matters to the attention of the wider community.

We are very fortunate to have a successful and effective P&C. However, to continue the growth of our P&C, we require input from new committee members to be sustainable. This year we will be looking for parent representatives for each year level. These parents will help with communicating to parents and welcoming new families, assisting at school activities and events and attending P&C meetings each term. The P&C welcomes new members – even if you can’t make it to all P&C meetings, you can still be involved.

We hope you can attend these meetings to make informed decision about joining or ways to support our P&C. We need you to help with the inspiration and backing to create the best learning environment for our students.

Just as we ended last year with amazing festivities and celebrations, we begin this year with a hub of activity. Please refer to the Term Calendar to see what we have planned and what you may need to prepare to help prepare your children.

We are delighted and excited to introduce our Year 6 Student Leadership Team as they host the first assembly of the year - Week 2, Friday 10th February.

Swimming Lessons

In-term swimming is provided by the Department of Education and helps to ensure children develop vital swimming and water safety skills. Our Year 5 and 6 students will be undertaking their swimming lessons at Yanchep Lagoon in Weeks 3 and 4 of this term. Permission notes have been sent home. Please return them and make payment as soon as possible. Please contact the school if you require a payment arrangement, full payment is required before the start of lessons.

Swimming lessons for Pre-primary – Year 4 is scheduled Term 1, weeks 5 and 6, at Aquamotion in Wanneroo. Notes will be going home this week.

Assessments

Our Pre-Primary to Year 2 students will participate in assessments through the On Entry program, this is an annual assessment we have historically conducted with our students to provide us with baseline data, to determine each student's academic progress through the early years. This testing will occur during weeks 3-5.

Our Years 3 and 5 students will be completing their NAPLAN assessment during weeks 7 and 8. Notes will be sent out next week to provide parents with information about this assessment.

Communication to parents

As part of our improved communication methods, we initiated the use of the SeeSaw platform to allow ongoing communication between school and home. Due to technical issues, we were unable to access SeeSaw at the start of the Term. You should now have access to the platform, if you have not received any notification, please ensure you have initiated the SeeSaw app and Somerly Primary School has your current contact details.

In 2020 we also initiated parent interviews as part of our reporting to parents’ practices. On 24th March students will finish school at 11:45am to allow the parent interviews to take place. An invitation will be sent out closer to the date to provide you with an opportunity to book an interview.

Afterschool Care

We welcome our new afterschool care provider, TheirCare to our Somerly Primary School community. Please feel free to contact them regarding any questions about their services, you can also obtain information via the link below.

School Uniform

It has been so delightful to see all our students in uniform, please refer to our Uniform Policy on our website. All uniform is available from Uniform Concepts in Clarkson. Please do not forget we are a SunSmart school, so all students are required to wear a sun safe hat or play in the shade. Black bucket hats will be available from the school office for $5. We have currently sold out and are awaiting delivery of a new batch. Once they arrive, a message will be sent out to advise families.

We hope you have a wonderful start to the new school year and enjoy all that we have to offer, as we continue to strive to uphold our values of being safe, respectful and responsible.

Louise Carroll
A/Principal

Behaviour Focus

Our behaviour focus for Week 2 is:-

We always walk quickly, quietly, and respectfully around our school.

Students Late to School

If your child arrives late to school, they are missing critical morning routines and learning activities. The school day begins at 8:40am and students will be considered late if they do not arrive by this time. If your child arrives after 9:00am you are required to enter through the front office and provide us with a reason for the lateness. A late slip will be printed for you to give to the class teacher.

Not Feeling Well?

If your child is not feeling well before school, please keep them home and notify the office by phoning 6206 4200, sending an SMS to 0437 480 486 or emailing somerly.ps@education.wa.edu.au.

Late Collection of Students

Somerly Primary School has a student finish time of 2.45pm each day. If your child has not been picked up before 3pm, you will be required to come to the front office to sign them out.

Term 1 Schedule

Road Safety

Just a reminder to please take the time to discuss road safety with your children, especially crossing our roads and using the designated traffic wardens who are available before and after school at the dedicated crossing area on Connolly Drive. Connolly Drive is an extremely busy dual carriageway.

Also, parents/carers and students should keep to footpaths when arriving and leaving school, avoiding cutting through car parks. Our car parks get extremely busy and congested and are not safe to cut through. Remember our students’ safety is of paramount importance.

Car Park Safety

The school is aware of the continuing and ongoing concerns being raised regarding the school car park at pick up times.

According to the current Department of Education standard the school contains an adequate percentage of car parking places available according to student enrolment numbers. This does not change the fact that parking is still an ongoing and difficult issue.

We ask parents to read the attached document to see how you can support safety within our school car parks.

Waste Wise Schools

Thank you!

A big thank you to our local Bunnings Warehouse for donating our new classroom FOGO bins (Food Organics and Garden Organics) for our fruit and vegetable scraps to go into. Thank you again for supporting our school’s waste management and gardening programs!

Gardening Club

Welcome back everyone! Gardening Club continued today, and we had a few enthusiastic Gardeners to help us to harvest some corn that had ripened over the holidays and we started our big clean out to make way for some new produce.

Don’t feed the fill!

Zooper Dooper Challenge!
Bring in 10 Containers
Get a Zooper Dooper icy pole
on Thursday
Repeat!

Help stop containers from going to land fill by bringing your containers to school and receive a Zooper Dooper Icy pole!

Shout out!

We are looking for some local small businesses to support our containers for change fundraising so please parents and carers if you know of any small businesses that could support our fundraising by donating their containers, please let us know.

Thank you for helping us to help you!

Learning Focus

Block 1 is having a fantastic time settling into the school year. The Kindergarten students have been learning about Space and they have thoroughly enjoyed playing in the space rocket area. The Pre-Primary students have spent some time learning about their teachers and fellow classmates and have been completing 'get to know you' activities. We are looking forward to an exciting year of learning.

Block1

Chaplain’s Chat

Hello Somerly!!

I am so excited to spend some time with you as your Chaplain, while the beautiful Mrs Elle-May Wong who had her little baby girl in the holidays, is spending some time with her kids.

I am passionate about helping kids develop into kind-hearted, resilient kids. Taking every obstacle or hardship and making it into steppingstones to become more.

My own daughter attended Somerly Primary School when we moved her from South Africa, so I might be biased, but do think this is an amazing school with amazing staff.

I’m looking forward to meeting the kids and walking alongside you and them on their journeys.

Please say “hi” when you see me and feel free to contact me if you need any assistance.

I will be at the school on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Blessings.

Estelle van Niekerk

Kindness Makes You Happy… and Happiness Makes You Kind

P & C