Healesville Primary School
NEWSLETTER
Week 3 - Term 1 - Thursday 11 February 2021
From the Principal's Desk…
School Council:
We are in need of a parent for our school council due to the retirement of Kylie Short from council as she no longer has students at our school. Please let me know if you would like to join us on school council - it is a great opportunity to have a deeper involvement in the School.
Curriculum:
The school leaders over the next few newsletters will be writing a short screed about the programs at HPS this year. We have a huge amount of new initiatives happening this year. In this newsletter you will hear about Literacy, STEM and Wellbeing at HPS.
Our Tutor Learning Initiative is starting this week. Bek Clarke has been working with Fenna Hogg to organise the groups of students who will be receiving the first round of support. Fenna is working with all classes and will be running her support within the classroom, focusing on the same learning intention as the class teacher. This means the students are not withdrawn, they still participate in the mini lesson with the teacher and then will work with Fenna in a small group. This will be such a bonus for all students involved in this initiative as it will help bridge the gaps in their learning. For term one our focus is on Literacy.
PACH:
We are looking for parents who would like to join our PACH team again this is a great opportunity to be more involved with the school and our fund raising efforts. Our first meeting is on Friday 19th February (Next week). It will be held in the staffroom at 9:15am. Please come and join us – everyone is welcome.
Parent Helpers:
Earlier this week we held a parent helpers meeting. We had a great turn out of parents, grandparents and carers who will be working with us in the school. If you were unable to attend but would like to be involved please come and see me and I can go through this information with you.
Community Playgroup:
This began this week on Wednesday afternoon. Again we had a great turn out of toddlers and parents. Fenna with the assistance of our school captains and art captain ran a great session. I do need to thank all of our staff who assisted in getting our room ready on time – we have an amazing team of staff here at HPS.
Parent Teacher Interviews:
This year we have decided to run things a little bit differently than previously.
Term One:
· We will be holding parent teacher interviews in the last week of term – Tuesday 30th March. These will be offered to parents from 2pm – 7:30pm. Our students will still finish school at the normal time – our specialists will be releasing the class teachers.
· These interviews are at the end of the term and will be the teacher giving you information about how your child is progressing, rather than the normal getting to know you interview. We realise that many of our parents will still wish to meet with our teachers to give them relevant information about their child and I encourage you to contact your child’s teacher and arrange a time for that very important conversation.
Term Two:
· School Reports will be sent home via the school portal.
Term Three:
· Parent teacher Interviews will be held.
Term Four:
· School Reports will be sent home via the school portal.
This means that parents will be receiving information regarding their child/children every term. We feel that this will further strengthen the partnership between school and home.
Tracey Robertson-Smith
Friday 12 Feb - Prep Information 9:00am
Tuesday 16 Feb - School Council Meeting
Friday 19 Feb - District Swimming
- Assembly
- Bookclub Issue 1 Due
Wednesday 24 Feb - Whole School Incursion - Hunchback of Notre Dame
Thursday 25 Feb - Newsletter
Monday 1 Mar - Division Swim
Friday 5 Mar - Assembly
Monday 8 Mar - Labour Day Public Holiday
Thursday 11 Mar - House Athletics
- Newsletter
Friday 19 Mar - Colour Run - TBC
- Assembly - TBC
Tuesday 23 Mar - School Council
Wednesday 24 Mar - SCHOOL PHOTO DAY
Thursday 25 Mar - Newsletter
Friday 26 Mar - CURRICULUM DAY - PUPIL FREE DAY
Monday 29 Mar - District Athletics
Thursday 1 Apr - Last Day of Term 1
- Assembly
Students of the Week
34W: 3/4W - Kendi LT – for being a maths champion and classroom helper.
45V: Archie H & Alyssa H
56B: Tyler VB
56SK: the whole class – for making a positive start to the 2021 school year.
A Note about Excursions/Incursions and Camp permission.
What a great day we had for our first event of the year – swimming sports. It was lovely to see so many smiling faces, both on the children and parents.
- A large number of parents were cut off from giving permission for this event once the portal closed. The portal always closes a week before an event (earlier in the case of camps) in order for the event organiser to organise buses, teams, entry numbers etc. It is not something that can be done the day before or even the morning of the event. Arrangements also need to be made at school for children who are not attending the event.
- We received a lot of late permissions for this event which we decided to allow as it was the first one of the year – especially after such a long break. However, in future, we cannot accept late permission. We ask for your cooperation with this as it can be very distressing for a child to miss out on an event for this reason.
- It is a legal requirement that written/email/Portal permission from a child’s parent or legal guardian is received before a child can attend an event. Verbal permission cannot be accepted under any circumstances.
- We cannot stress enough that, if you are experiencing difficulties with either dojo or the portal, to call or come and see us in the office and we will help you to get connected. These platforms are our main means of communication and it is vital that they are working for you.
- Prior to the portal permission system, a vast number of parents were not getting excursion information as children would either lose them, forget to hand them in – both to the parent or to the school once permission had been given. Our School Council met and determined the protocol for our excursions. The implementation of the portal system allows parents/guardians to be in control of payments and permissions.
Points to note:
Please do not download the Sentral 'app'. The app is clunky and very slow and is best avoided. Instead, use your phones web browser to type in the Sentral web address https://sentral.hps.vic.edu.au/portal2/#!/login and then save this address as a bookmark on your phone (if you are unsure of how to do this, please come and see us or a quick google search will show you how). We have noticed that the best functionality of Sentral is via a desktop or laptop.
Our process for excursions is as follows:-
- Information about the event is posted to class dojo along with a link to the portal. We do this so that parents/guardians can, with one or 2 clicks, give permission for the event. We will always try to allow plenty of time for you to give permission.
- A few days before the permission cut-off, a reminder is posted along with the portal link again.
- Once the permission cut off has passed, the event closes and parents/guardians will be unable to give permission. In turn, this means that the child cannot attend the event.
- Payment is required before an event, but, you can give permission immediately and make payment a bit later on so please don’t wait to give permission until you can make payment.
Louise George
BUSINESS MANAGER
LINKS FOR THE PARENT PORTAL - TO REGISTER & LOG IN
Please use this link to REGISTER for the portal:
(please note, you will need your access key to link your child.
https://sentral.hps.vic.edu.au/portal/register
You only need to register ONCE.
Once you've registered use the following link as your usual login.
Please use this link to LOGON to the portal:
(once you have registered).
School Fee Information for 2021
Please note Uniform Shop at the school open Friday mornings! (see below)
Password: HPS
About Us
Email: healesvilleps@edumail.vic.gov.au
Website: www.hps.vic.gov.au
Location: Healesville Primary School, 2 View St, Healesville VIC, Australia
Phone: (03) 59624053
Facebook: facebook.com/healesvilleps