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Monday, 16 November 2009 15:23 |
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One of the major planning tasks our school undertakes in term 4 is to develop a provisional class organisation for the following year. Establishing a class structure to commence the 2010 year is posing more challenges than normal due to an expected large increase in enrolments.
At the moment Dunsborough Primary has 499 students enrolled, however based on the information already received the school is expecting to start 2010 with approx 560 students.
To accommodate this increase I have requested 3 more transportable classrooms be installed on site.
Work has already commenced to locate a purpose built Early Childhood transportable next to the existing Kindergarten buildings which will become a 3rd Kindy Unit in 2010.
Parents are advised that the P&C’s “Kiss & Drop” parking area at the top of the school may no longer be able to be used as a result of the installation of this building. The situation regarding the “Kiss & Drop” will become clearer once the building works have been completed.
Other complicating factors in establishing next year’s organisation are the school’s BER (Building Education Revolution) Program which will see a new 4 classroom teaching block and a new Music/Art Room built adjacent to the school oval and a number of new teachers being appointed to the school in 2010.
Unfortunately because the new BER buildings are not due to be completed until midway through next year, some disruption will result in 2010 with classes having to shift from transportable classrooms into new permanent classrooms during the year. It may also be necessary at this time to reorganise some classes in order to equitably accommodate all students and ensure class sizes are kept as low as possible.
Based on the number of confirmed students for 2010 I am provisionally planning to set up a 22 class structure based on the following groupings.
3 Kindergarten centres (2 x Full time units with 4 groups of 18 and 1 x Part time unit with 1 group of 19)
PP (26), PP (26) PP/1 (11/11), Y1 (22), Y1 (22), Y1/2 (10/12), Y2 (23), Y2 (23), Y3 (23), Y3 (23), Y3/4 (9/15), Y4 (28), Y4/5 (16/11), Y5 (28), Y5 (29), Y5/6 (9/19), Y6 (30), Y7 (24), Y7 (23).
Parents need to be aware that the mix of classes and the numbers in each class are totally dependent on the number of children who enrol and year level allocations and class numbers may need to change if more children enrol or leave.
It is vitally important that parents please let the school office know ASAP if, for whatever reason, your child/children will not be returning to our school next year.
POLICY ON FORMING CLASSES
The school’s policy is to try and form heterogeneous classes with a range of different abilities and social skills so that no class is seen to be any better or worse than any other class.
Under the Education Department’s staffing formula it is inevitable that no matter what our final structure ends up looking like, there will be a combination of straight and mixed level classes in 2010.
Parents should not be concerned if their child is placed in a mixed level class. Mixed classes have been a traditional feature of this school and virtually every other Government Primary School in WA for a long time.
As a result of our placement policy and the Education Department’s outcomes based curriculum which is aligned to phases of learning rather than specific year levels, I can assure parents that children in mixed classes will not be disadvantaged educationally and they will receive exactly the same opportunities to learn and progress as children in straight classes.
When provisionally forming classes for next year teachers take into account all known factors such as peer relationships, personality type, academic performance, learning style and interests.
The school does believe that our current class teachers are in the best position to make the appropriate professional judgement as to which class a child should be allocated, in the light of their knowledge of the child, the school’s resources and the teaching personnel that will be available.
However, parents are more than welcome, if they wish, to provide the school with additional information they believe should be taken into consideration when deciding their child’s class placement for 2010.
A note will be sent home to all families next week outlining exactly how parents can communicate this information to the school.
It is hoped we will be able to display provisional class lists for 2010 during the last week of this term.
Garry Jones
Principal
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Thursday, 05 November 2009 13:42 |
OUR NEW SCHOOL CHAPLAIN
I am very pleased to advise that Mrs Rae Witham has been appointed by Youthcare to take on the role of School Chaplain at Dunsborough Primary School from the beginning of this term.
Rae will be working 4 days a week (Tuesday to Friday). Rae’s extensive experience as a registered nurse, crisis care worker and a parent will ensure our children continue to have access to a very high level of pastoral care during their time at Dunsborough Primary School.
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Saturday, 07 February 2009 16:01 |
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Dear Parents and Caregivers,
What a fantastic day it was last Sunday! Congratulations to everyone on making this year’s Fete such an outstanding success.
A Fete is a huge undertaking for a school community to take on. It requires an enormous amount of commitment, creativity, time, patience, organisation and a lot of hard work from many, many people to bring it together as well as our school did last Sunday. (A list of Fete thank you’s is included elsewhere in the newsletter)
Everyone who is connected with Dunsborough Primary in any way should feel very proud of what was achieved. And I’m not necessarily talking about how much money was raised (although that was a fitting result for all the effort that was put in) but rather it was the opportunity for our whole school community to come together, have a great day with
their children and publicly demonstrate an outstanding level of positive school/community spirit.
Although it was a huge effort by a large number of people I would like to especially acknowledge the efforts of Yvonne Winchcombe and Helena Nicholson, and publicly thank and congratulate them on the unbelievably good job they did organising and coordinating this event.
A special thank you also needs to go to the staff of Dunsborough Primary, who once again showed their dedication and commitment to this school and the children they teach by supporting the organisation for their class’s stall and in some cases devoting the whole day on Sunday setting up, working on and even packing up their stall.
And lastly thank you to all the children, parents and others who spent their money at our Fete. As a result of your great support the P&C have raised in excess of $25000 for our school!!
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TEAM MESSENGER Issue No 18
