I can’t believe it is nearly December.  The weather hasn’t exactly matched this time of year, but I’m sure it will start to heat up as we approach the last few weeks of school.  In the next few weeks we will have our Awards Night, Year 6 Graduation and Step Up Day.  We are working feverishly to employ enough teachers for 2026 and hope to have this all sorted before our Step Up Day on December 9th.

Awards Night – Thursday 4th December

We will be having our Annual Picnic and Awards Night on Thursday 4th December from 4pm.  We will have special presentations from local cultural groups, food trucks and a celebration of the wonderful work that has taken place in 2025 at Thornhill Park Primary School.  We hope to see all of our families there to help celebrate this wonderful school and the students who are part of it.  This will be a fairly casual night and parents will be expected to supervise their children on the night.  We will have awards given out across the night, so it is important to listen out for announcements to ensure children are not missing out on any awards.  Parents are encouraged to bring a picnic rug or chairs to enjoy the festivities.  It will be a great way to connect with the community.  Our raffle will also be drawn on this night with all proceeds going towards improvements at our school.

Year 6 Graduation

Our Year 6 Graduation will be taking place on Wednesday 10th December.  Students will be receiving their certificates on this evening to celebrate the completion of their Primary School education.  Year 6 teachers have sent all the information out for this and it is always a highlight of the school year.

Step Up Day

Step Up Day will be held between 9am – 10.50am on Tuesday 9th December.  On this day, students will spend 2 hours in their new classrooms with their new teachers.  It is always an exciting time for our students and families.  Prep students for 2026 will also be present on this day.

End of Year

School finishes for 2025 on Friday 19th December at 12.30pm.  A further reminder will be placed in the next newsletter.

Have a fabulous weekend.

Darryl Spiteri

Principal

Congratulations to Prep A who achieved the best attendance for the week ending 21st November, 2025.

Congratulations to 34F who achieved the best attendance for the week ending 28th November, 2025.

PRIMARY SCHOOL ATTENDANCE

Going to school every day is the single most important part of your child’s education. Students learn new things at school every day – missing school puts them behind.

If your child is sick or absent, you are required to notify school as soon as possible on the day of absence using one of the following methods:

1. Online: log the absence directly using Compass.
2. Telephone: the school office and let the staff know your child’s name, class, date of absences and reason.

Notifying the school of your child’s absence either prior to, or on the day that they will be away, helps ensure the safety and wellbeing of children and will fulfil your legal responsibility.

Why do I need to notify the school if my child is absent?

Schools need to know when and why a child is absent and you need to know if your child isn’t at school.

If your child is absent on a particular day and you have not contacted the school to explain why, the absence will be marked as unexplained.

This system also promotes daily school attendance. Going to school every day is the single most important part of your child’s education, they learn new things every day – missing school puts them behind.

What is your responsibility?

You are legally required to ensure your child attends school every day or you must provide an explanation for their absence. You should let the school know in advance of any upcoming absences or let them know in the morning if your child won’t be at school. Avoid making routine medical and dental appointments during the school day or planning family holidays during the term.

Recognising great attendance and punctuality.

Our attendance target is 96%.  Each week, we reward the class with the highest attendance (which includes getting to school on time!), with our school mascot, Ripwell in their classroom for the week.

Please join Thornhill Park Primary School for our End of Year 2025 Celebration, featuring music, awards, a food truck, and a raffle.
The event will kick off at 4:00pm on Thursday, 4 December 2025.
The raffle will be drawn at our End of Year Celebration.

Raffle tickets will be sent home with your child this week.  We kindly ask each family to purchase or sell these tickets for $2 each.
All tickets — sold and/or unsold — must be RETURNED to school, along with the correct money, by Monday, 1 December 2025.
Please write your name and contact number on the LEFT side of each ticket, and KEEP the RIGHT side as your receipt.
If you wish to purchase or sell additional tickets, please speak with the front office.  We are looking forward to seeing all our families join us for this wonderful event!

Our Learning in Prep

Term 4 has been very busy in Prep with the students enjoying a range of engaging and hands-on activities in the key areas of Literacy and Numeracy. 

LITERACY

In Speaking and Listening, students have had opportunities to build their skills in forming sentences and expanding on their ideas by learning how to use adjectives and conjunctions to build upon a simple sentence. Our weekly Grammar lessons focus on building their oral language skills through using visual prompts to guide our discussions. Students have become more confident to share their ideas and understandings with their peers.

In Handwriting, we have continued to go through all the letters of the alphabet and  write short simple alliteration sentences using dotted thirds paper to guide the position and size of letters. This has seen great improvements in our students’ handwriting. We have also been focusing on incorporating our UFLI heart words in our Handwriting sentences as well to further strengthen our spelling knowledge. 

In Writing, students have been busy developing their writing skills, focusing on information reports and learning how authors share facts through titles, introductions, labelled diagrams and simple sentences. They have enjoyed choosing familiar topics to write about and using their phonics knowledge to stretch out words and record information. We have also begun an exciting author study on Nick Bland, exploring his stories such as The Very Cranky Bear and noticing patterns in his characters, settings and illustrations. Students have loved discussing their favourite parts, comparing different “Bear” characters and creating their sentences. They have also been participating in rocket writing, where they write for a set amount of uninterrupted time to help build their writing stamina, confidence and independence each week.

Through daily reading, students have continued to work towards their reading goals and practiced segmenting and blending new words. Students have built on their decoding skills by using picture clues to help them read new words.  Some students have been using their monitoring skills to ensure what they read makes sense.   Students have enjoyed reading a range of decodable texts in class and have shown improvements in their reading stamina. 

 In our UFLI Phonics sessions, students have been continuing to work hard at segmenting and blending sounds to write and read. We have now covered all short and long vowel sounds and common digraphs such as th, ch, sh, ck, ng and nk. Students have been shown improved confidence and stamina in reading short decodable texts in lessons. 

Numeracy 

This term in Numeracy, we have been learning about patterns through skip counting, developing our understanding of subtraction, and collecting and interpreting data. We have also revisited number concepts, including identifying the numbers that come before and after. To support our learning and understanding, we have been using devices during some numeracy sessions.

Inquiry

Our Inquiry unit for this Term is “Master Chef”. So far this term, the prep students have learnt about food and goods production. Students have had the opportunity to design what a healthy lunchbox would look like as well as design and make their very own fruit kebab with fruit such as strawberries, melons, pear, mango and pineapple. They were able to enjoy eating their fruit kebab and taste different fruits. Students also took part in planting their own basil seeds to take home and watch them grow! To deepen their learning we also went on a local walk to the Supermarket and talked about all the different types of fruits, vegetables and foods and where they came from.  

Wellbeing

This term, we have been learning about ‘Gender and Identity’. Students have reflected on their own identity, recognised differences in others, and discussed how to interact in positive and respectful ways, particularly through play. We have also revisited our school values of Respect, Integrity, Persistence and Wellbeing, and talked about what these look like in and outside the classroom.

AUSLAN 

Students have been continuing to expand their growing knowledge of Auslan by thoughtfully connecting emotion signs with the feelings explored by characters in their literacy author study. Auslan is more naturally woven into classroom routines, with students confidently engaging with the alphabet and greetings, using their dominant hand to sign and pairing each sign with an appropriate facial expression to show each emotion clearly.

Sincerely,

Prep Team

Congratulations to the following students who received awards during our assemblies!

Keep up the great work!

Students of the Week – Ending 21st November

Students of the Week – Ending 28th November

Congratulations to the following students who are celebrating a birthday in November!

We hope you had a lovely day!

Alojz

Mary

Arafeen

Ruby 56B

Kiana 34A

Ahmad PE

Bakari  56D

 Riley 56A

Gurshaan PF

Delisha 1E

Christian PE

Matthew 56C

Athania PC

Marta 1D

Asees Kaur 1G

Ayansh 1C

Merina 34C

Durre 2A

Emaan 2B

Nethaniah 34F

Jasmine 34F

Kuol 56D

Braylon PB

Dorrain PD

John 34C

Jenny 56E

Rhea PH

Trinity 1A

Dhanvi Sri 2E

Ripandeep 56A

Emilia PD

Akira 34E

Liem 56B

*Please note that birthdays are only published up until the date of publication.  

Important Dates – Term 4

• Wednesday 3rd December – Funfields Excursion – Year 6 students only
• Thursday 4th December – End of Year Celebration & Awards (4pm – 6:30pm)
• Tuesday 9th December – Whole School Transition Day
• Wednesday 10th December – Year 2 Westgate Indoor Sports Centre Excursion
• Wednesday 10th December – Year 6 Graduation (4pm – 6pm)
• Friday 12th December – Pyjama Day Fundraiser
• Friday 19th December – Term 4 ends @ 12.30pm

Free Soccer Trial at

Thornhill Park Primary School!

Families are invited to join a free soccer trial session on Sunday 14th December, from 10am to 12pm at Thornhill Park Primary School.

Join us for a fun and active morning!

This is a great opportunity for students to get active, build confidence, and have fun while learning new skills in a supportive team environment. The session is run by an established organisation; Football Star Academy, with over 15 years of experience, working in 390+ schools across Australia and empowering more than 100,000 children through sport. Their programs are also delivered internationally in the USA, UAE, India, and Hong Kong.

Exclusive discounts will be available on the day for upcoming school holiday programs and Term 1, 2026 enrolments.

Come along and try Karate! Increase your confidence, learn new physical skills and have FUN in a safe and nurturing environment.

THORNHILL PARK PRIMARY SCHOOL GYM – WEDNESDAYS 4PM (AGES 4+)

To register for 2 FREE SESSIONS, please call 0407320333 or visit our website www.artofdefence.com.au