Murwillumbah East Public School

Newsletter Term 1, Week 11

9 April, 2020

Be Safe Be Respectful Be A Learner

45 George Street, Murwillumbah 6672 6781 www.murwillume-p.schools.nsw.edu.au

Great work

What a week it has been! All our 11 classes are up

and running on Seesaw and have had thousands

of interactions with our teachers. We have hosted

two virtual assemblies, distributed technology to

those who have requested additional devices at

home supporting remote learning, our staff have

made hundreds of phone calls to ‘check-in’ with

families, approved posts and learning activities

through Seesaw and Google classrooms, prepared

‘off-line’ learning packs and responded to emails!

The most rewarding part of this new environment

we find ourselves, is the human and personal

interaction with our students and to see their smiling

faces who are learning from home - please

continue to share your pictures with us!

Another huge thank you to our parents who are

navigating this new environment of remote learning

with us. You have pivoted under extraordinary

circumstances, providing continuity of learning to

your children and that is remarkable. We

understand there may be some challenging days

at times but this time will pass and we will make it

through with the support of each other. Thank you

for your support and patience while we respond

and adapt to this new delivery of learning.

Next term

Today (Thursday) is our last day for Term 1. While

there has been no formal advice provided to us

about what Term 2 will look like, Mark Scott

(Secretary of the Department of Education) shared

in a livestream with principals last week that the

Police Commissioner has announced the social

distancing laws are in place for 90 days and that

our current arrangements at school are likely to

take us ‘deep’ into Term 2. This means that the way

we are finishing the term this week (with fewer

students at school to provide supervision for

essential workers and remote online and offline

learning for students who can be at home) is likely

to be the way that we will start Term 2. I will

endeavour to keep you updated as information

becomes available. At this stage, school will

resume for teachers with a Staff Development Day

on Monday 27 April with the first day of Term 2

being Tuesday 28 April for students.

Continuity of Learning packs - Term 2

Our staff have prepared continuity of learning

packs for your families for the first two weeks of

learning of Term 2. As we would like to see

everyone taking a break from school work over the

holiday period, we have kept them here at school.

Drop off of completed work and collection of new

packages will be available from Tuesday 28 April.

More information will follow. For students in K-2,

these packages include additional hands-on

materials for students to use at home but will need

to be returned when we return next term. That you

in advance to our wonderful families for taking

such great care of these resources. It is important

that if our teachers are teaching you from a

screen, that you have the resources you need to

be a safe, respectful learner.

Zoom

Over the past week, we have hosted two virtual

school assemblies and a virtual Easter Hat Parade.

We as a school are working on some school

guidelines for Zoom to distribute to students and

families to ensure this is a safe and productive

environment. This will also include an online

permission note distributed through School Stream.

Please look out for this information when the

guidelines become available as we will be looking

to use this as an additional tool to communicate

with and teach students if required next term.

Device

If the current arrangements continue into next

term, it is important that all students have access to

devices for online learning. While we are providing

paper packs, it is incredibly important that we can

have ongoing communication with families and

teachers are providing student feedback for

learning and improvement. If you have not

accessed one of our school devices, and require

one for your child to complete school work, please

contact the front office.

Scheduled maintenance

This week, our school has been a hive of activity for

workmen with fewer students onsite. Scheduled

PREMIER’S READING CHALLENGE 2020

WOW! We have 4 students who have already

completed the challenge! Congratulations to

Bridget, Charlie, Emilie and Isabelle!

The Challenge does not end until August so there’s

still plenty of time.

I have put some book links and the link to the

Premier’s Reading Challenge Site onto Seesaw for

some classes.

All information for Premier’s Reading Challenge can

be found at - https://online.det.nsw.edu.au/prc/

home.html

Use your school log in name and password to log

on. Reading is the perfect activity to do when you

are stuck inside.

Happy reading!

Carmel Evans

(Teacher Librarian)

Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL)

Week Gotcha Rule

Dedicated approach to learning at home

Congratulations:

Stage 1 Kalilah, Mason, Josie, Loa, Finnegan, Emily,

Parker, Amelia, Bentley and James.

Stage 2&3: Mia, William, Kirat, Chelaes, Harper, Max,

Ivy, Ryenne, Bayley and Callie

“Happy Birthday” to these students

Olivia H, Melody, Ava-Rose, Jay-De, Dominic, Oscar,

Kirat, Caleb, Kahlea, Noah, Oliver, Chazz, Harper

and Khushdeep.

Be Safe Be Respectful Be A Learner

45 George Street, Murwillumbah 6672 6781 www.murwillume-p.schools.nsw.edu.au

maintenance and upkeep of our buildings have

seen new painting in a number of classrooms,

hallways and our front office areas. New drainage

at the front of our school and replacement roofing is

also happening this week. We can’t wait for you all

to see and enjoy these changes.

Infrastructure planning for holidays

Over the weekend, contractors removed the raised

garden bed and plants located between our

administration building and the car park.

The plants in this area had grown too large for the

existing garden and were starting to encroach on

the building.

This work is also an important first step towards

preparing for Stage 2 of early works at our school

which involves improvements to the car park

Please find attached further advice from School

Infrastructure NSW which outlines additional works

happening over this school holiday period.

Happy Easter

Another massive shout out to our incredible staff at

Murwillumbah East Public School. I am in awe of the

way we have banded together to achieve what

we have this term. Thank you to our office staff -

Colleen, Sharyn, Tanya and Livi who have done an

amazing job in fielding questions, working incredibly

hard to maintain ‘business as usual’ and supporting

families with the loan of devices. Thank you to our

teachers who have and continue to work tirelessly

to ensure learning is not disrupted any more than it

needs to be. For communicating so effectively with

our school community and for supporting our

amazing students remotely with the same

dedication, passion and commitment in times of

extreme new learning for all. Our School Learning

Support Officers have been an incredible support

and the engine room to help us ensure student

needs are being met at school and at home - mak-

ing calls, supporting students, pumping out tasks

and stars in our MEPS videos.

I wish to thank you, again, for the tremendous

support of our teachers and their work. I feel

gratitude seeing the way our community has come

together and are supporting each other to make it

through these most extraordinary circumstances. I

wish you all a safe and happy Easter and holiday

break. I look forward to seeing everybody regularly

next term - virtually or in person.

Joanna Henderson

Principal

Be Safe Be Respectful Be A Learner

45 George Street, Murwillumbah 6672 6781 www.murwillume-p.schools.nsw.edu.au

Congratulations to our Virtual Assembly

Award Recipients - Persistence in Mathematics

KW Naite and Yuvraj 4-5W Lachlan and Alyvia

K-1H Joshua and Charli 5-6N Drew and Emma

1-2A Airlie and Emily 5-6TC Blake V and Lomani

2-3K Mason and Kaida K-3L Jack M and Bentley

3-4C Sam and Ryenne 4-5R Tyson and Joe

3-4O’L Lincoln and Olivia H