Welcome back for Term 3. We are over half way through the year and we are already starting to think about 2024 and what that might look like at Thornhill Park Primary School.
Relocatables
You may notice that we have some works occurring at the rear of the property. This will most likely be a common site over the next few years as our numbers continue to grow. We are getting 4 new relocatable buildings delivered and installed to house 6 more classes and to facilitate a further space for The Arts. During the installation of these relocatables, the staff car park and gate at the rear of the school will be out of bounds. We would ask that all students and parents enter through the front gates during this period.
Traffic Issues
I was visited by Cr Steve Abboushi and members of the Melton Council Traffic Management Team to discuss solutions to maintain safety for our students as they arrive and depart from school each day. We thank all those who ride bikes or scooters to school each day as they are minimising the impact of traffic congestion each day. I would remind these students that helmets are required to be worn, by law if these vehicles are to be ridden.
A reminder to parents to observe signage and park in areas that are safe to do so. The area at the front of the school is a drop off and pick up zone, so if you leave your car unattended or if you park in the space for longer than a couple of minutes you may be fined. Law Enforcement Officers will be patrolling the area to ensure we are keeping students safe. Please do not ask me to assist you if you are fined, as I have no authority to help you if you are not following the road rules.
Please use the controlled crossings when crossing the roads each day. I have spoken to the Council and the situation with the traffic lights should be fixed soon. There were technicians out on Wednesday assessing the situation.
Please refrain from doing U-Turns at the front of the school as it can cause dangerous situations for our children, try to maintain a slow speed out the front of the school and be courteous to drivers who are waiting to pick up their children. Most days the area out the front of the school is cleared before 3.10pm, so a bit of patience will go a long way. We thank you for your continued support with this.
Culture of Kindness
At Thornhill Park Primary School we continue to promote and inspire a collaborative culture of kindness. We still have a long way to go in this as we sometimes have students presenting with less than desirable responses to interactions with others, in the form of hurtful words, racist remarks and poor choices. We deal with these issues successfully on a regular basis and feel confident that we are instilling the values that you would want to see in your own children, as we move through these processes. We are working hard, through our Values Education Programs and commitment to Respectful Relationships to provide our students with the necessary tools to cope in challenging situations. We provide Social Skills sessions for a number of our Prep students to provide them with the necessary tools to be successful when a challenging situation presents. The term ‘bullying’ gets used a lot by parents and students when we discuss isolated incidents within the school. In the first half of this year, I can confidently say that our school has experienced minimal ‘bullying’ and most incidents have been isolated and dealt with swiftly. We acknowledge that bullying can and does occur at schools, but it is not rife at this school and we would like to work with the community to understand when things require an elevated response due to potential bullying behaviour. Majority of what we deal with is not bullying. Therefore we encourage all of our community to continue to be a part of making this school a wonderful space for our whole community. I am buoyed by the number of students who used manners within our school and say ‘Hello’ every time they see an adult. Our classroom environment is calm and we provide ongoing support to those who need it. Please continue to assist us to promote a Culture of Kindness at Thornhill Park Primary School, by encouraging your children to have positive interactions with others and to seek the assistance of teachers if they need to work through a situation with another student and can’t do it themselves.
Enrolments for 2024
We currently have over 70 Preps enrolled for 2024. We are expecting a lot more students, but there seems to be quite a few who are yet to enrol. If you have a child who is coming to our school next year, we would ask that you enrol before the deadline on July 28th. If you know of any neighbours who are transferring from other schools to us, we would ask that you encourage them to enrol as soon as possible also, so that we may start to hire teachers and support staff for 2024.
NAPLAN Data 2023
We have just received our NAPLAN data in our first year as a school. We are pleased to say that our students are performing quite well compared to like schools in areas such as reading, writing and maths. We were very interested in this data as we, as a school have been yet to influence student outcomes to a great extent at this school. We will analyse this data and investigate areas of improvement that we can then use to plan into the future and to help our students be as successful as possible.
Reports
Reports were handed out through Compass at the end of Term 2. Please run through this and organise for a meeting with your child’s teacher to discuss progress at your earliest convenience.
Have a great weekend
Darryl Spiteri
Principal