Heaton Hotline - Week 5, Term 1
Fortnightly Heaton Public School Update - 2021
Mr Hilton's - Principal Message: Upgrade to school facilities
Good morning everyone,
I am pleased to announce that Heaton PS has had an application for the NSW Government's Regional Renewal program approved. This project sees a co-contribution between the school and NSW Government in order to upgrade facilities. The school was in the process of building a nature / sensory playground, however, we saw the opportunity to create more upgrades to the school site for our students and applied for this co-contribution instead. The project will see the following take place:
* A large nature playground with creek bed, bridges, platforms, stepping stones and mud kitchen built.
* A brand new sand pit with shade sail
* A mini astroturf soccer field
* A resurfacing of the basketball court with new swivel basketball and netball hoops installed
* Areas of synthetic grass for games
The P&C were also successful in obtaining a Community Partnership Grant worth over $24000. This will be used to build an outdoor learning space with a decking platform / stage and sandstone blocks in an amphitheater style seating pattern.
We are also upgrading our outdoor speaker system and hall speaker system to enable different sections of the playground to become learning zones where bluetooth microphones and music can be utilised.
I am also in the process of finalising quotes to have all internal classrooms painted and the entire school recarpeted.
We are also looking into revamping our school logo to represent our school and our vision 'We nurture and inspire every child to dream big'. Our Connections Team will be consulting our students, community and staff around the potential of updating our school uniform to reflect our new strategic plan. The school would be able to offer assistance to families to support transition to an updated uniform and the process of change will be slow, meaningful and involve deep consultation with every member of our community. We feel the school is in an exciting period of upgrade around our facilities, our teaching, learning and wellbeing programs are thriving and our staff are caring and committed to every student. This is why we feel now may be an exciting time to re-vamp the uniform. There is much research to suggest this process can be a wonderful way to instill even more pride across a school environment. We will be listening and consulting with our community around this over the coming months.
Community BBQ & Information Sessions
It was so wonderful to connect with you all at our Welcome BBQs and Information Sessions. It was challenging not being able to make connections with the community in 2020. We are grateful to have you back and sharing in the learning of all of our children.
Swimming Carvival + K/1/2 Water Day at school.
The Swimming Carnival and Water Fun Day were both huge successes. The children were so well behaved. They modelled the values of respect, responsibility and inclusion at all times throughout the day and members of the public made a number of comments praising the outstanding behaviour of the students.
Congratulations to our swimming champions:
* Masiale Tupou
* Chloe Kilham
* Liam Adams
We truly appreciate the parents that helped out on the day. Thanks must also go to Miss Anquetil and Mr Cattley for their organisation of the swimming carnival and to our K-2 staff for their Water Fun Day organisation.
Wellbeing Groups
To ensure we are targeting student wellbeing under our vision 'We nurture and inspire every child to dream big' our support staff have initiated wellbeing groups. These groups will evolve throughout the year to target identified students at a point of need.
Our groups include:
* Drama
* Cooking
* Space and The Galaxy
* Cappoeria
* In-school dance groups
* Stage 2 & 3 specialist dance group with the Callaghan College dance teacher
* Video production
* Art
* Robotics
So far we have had amazing feedback from students and parents. In our drama group we are seeing a huge improvement in the confidence in oral communication in some of our students who speak English as a second language. They are also learning 'Somewhere over the Rainbow' in sign language.
Attendance - Average school attendance so far is over 95%
We have mandated targets for attendance that are set based on historical attendance data. Our target for 2021 is to have more than 72% of our students attending greater than 90% of the time.
After 4 weeks we have 80% of our students attending greater than 90%, so we are above our target which is fantastic.
We are also trying to reduce the number of children arriving to school late as this has an impact on learning. Last week there were 52 occasions when children were late arriving to school. Missing 10 or 15 minutes of learning makes a huge difference over a period of time. We would love to see this number come right down and appreciate your help in this area.
The attendance class of the week was a tie. Well done to 1/2A and 3/4T.
Our attendance team has tweaked the Heaton Hero Attendance percentages to reflect the fact that students will have legitimate sick days during the year.
Our Heaton Hero attendance mantra for the school is Here Everyday Ready On Time.
20 Years of Teaching Service
Congratulations to Miss Pleash on receiving recognition of 20 years of service with the NSW Department of Education. You make children shine and are an outstanding teacher who is loved by all.
P&C meeting
https://uonewcastle.zoom.us/j/83594022682?pwd=anMzMEx3d3N6UUFvcHJKcjhwdXNadz09
Password: 849189
We would love to see you online.
Sports Captains
Well done to our new House Captains for 2021. You did a wonderful job at the swimming carnival. We know you will have a fantastic year in this leadership role.
Athletics
The Sports in Schools grants allows us to access high quality Physical Education programs. This term, the children are participating in Athletics Skills. They were having a great time on Friday.
Assembly
Uniforms
The uniform shop is now located at Lowes Jesmond and is no longer coordinated by the P&C. There is stock available in all sizes. Please speak to Lowes or contact the office if you require any information.
Heaton Public School
Email: heaton-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au
Website: https://heaton-p.schools.nsw.gov.au/
Location: Janet St, Jesmond NSW, Australia
Phone: 02 49526022
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HeatonPublicSchool/?rf=193922817306711