Welcome back to school for another year everyone and a VERY special welcome to our brand new families and little learners who are joining their formal learning journey for the very first time.

The beginning of the year is an exciting one for our learning as we look down the barrel of a big year full of learning opportunities and potential.

Over the last two weeks your children would have found out what they will be learning about over the term as teachers build the contexts for their different units of teaching and learning. This is an exciting time for our learners but it can also be overwhelming. When school starts back parents are keen to hear all about what their child has been doing and what they have been learning about and at times disappointed if their child cannot share much information with them. So, I suggest parents keep their questions simple but targeted to avoid the classic responses of ‘good’ or ‘nothing’ from your little ones. So instead of saying ‘What did you do today at school?’, perhaps narrow that down to ‘what writing did you do today?’ or ‘what was your favourite thing you read today?’ or ‘what was the favourite part of your maths lesson today?’.

Over the last two weeks teachers have been collecting some diagnostic information at the start of the year in order to:

- help them understand the support your child may need in their learning and

- choose the most appropriate class groups they can place your child in to target their learning needs from the beginning of the year.

Over the beginning weeks of school, teachers are also discussing and planning learning goals for this term with our students. It gives them small, continuous and measurable targets for their learning throughout the term. These learning goals are another thing you could ask them about their learning down the track. One way you can support your child around the area of goal setting is by helping them set other goals in their life this year such as goals for their sports or playing music etc.

I look forward to sharing information with you about the wonderful teaching and learning at Dayboro State School over this year.

Dee Mathiesen

Head of Curriculum