Please ensure you have called or emailed the office to book in for this special event.

Semester Two 2023 Reports

Teachers are currently assessing students and writing report comments for their 2023 Semester Two reports.

At Wandong, teachers collect a range of student learning samples and data from various assessments to inform their professional teacher judgments when determining each student’s progression points. (Progression points are the dots on your child’s report and reflect where your child’s teacher/s have judged their achievement to be against the Victorian Curriculum Achievement Standards).

It is important that teachers use evidence of student achievement and progress from a range of sources when making their judgements. This ensures that teachers have an accurate and comprehensive picture of each child’s learning. Our teachers aim to use at least three sources of data, as well as their professional observations to arrive at judgments, particularly in Reading, Writing and Number.

Teachers at Wandong rigorously analyse this data and to ensure consistency in and between our teams, teachers moderate in their year level and cross level teams to discuss the evidence of student learning to ensure that teacher judgments are consistent between year levels and across the school. What I mean by this is that what a Year 3/4 teacher believes to be an end of Year 4 level writing piece is consistent with Foundation, Year 1/2 and 5/6 teacher judgments of a writing sample.

Teachers will continue to make adjustments and finalise their judgements over the next few weeks as they incorporate more recent data into their decision making. Reports are then buddy read by a team member and someone from the leadership team before they are released to parents. This whole reporting process takes 6-8 weeks each semester. Our teachers used the Curriculum Day on Monday 6^th November for report writing to compensate them for the considerable time that goes into writing comments, analysing data and making judgements.

2023 Semester Two reports are due to be released to parents on Compass on Friday 15^th December.

Friendships

At this time of the year, with preparations beginning for 2024 class placements, parents often have questions and concerns about the friendships that exist amongst their child’s peer group.

Parents frequently worry about which friendships should be encouraged into next year and which friendships may need a break, if their child has enough friends or what to do if their child doesn’t always get along with friends.

The Raising Children Network has some great information about these questions and more. Learning how to make and keep friends is an important part of growing up for school-age children. Having friends is good for children’s confidence, wellbeing and ability to get along with others.

If you would like to find out more and put your mind at ease, you may like to read the information on Supporting your school-age child’s friendships.

Friendships help children develop important life skills like getting along with other people and sorting out conflicts and problems. Children with these skills are less likely to have social and emotional difficulties later in life.

Here are answers to 10 frequently asked questions about children’s friendships.

If you have further questions about your child’s friendships, please organise an appointment with their teacher.

Camp Week

Today is certainly a big day with our 3/4s heading off to camp. It is always a time to remember, with fond memories being etched into young minds from the moment bags are packed. Camp is such a special time and one that takes considerable work. A massive thank you to our staff who go above and beyond volunteering their time and our ever-amazing parents who put their hand up to help. A serious, heartfelt thank you to Fearny who makes everything happen and who would do anything for our Wandong extended family. Have a blast team! Special mention to Ms Trafford who is on her first ever camping trip…may the force be with you Ms Trafford

Transitioning to 2024

This week marks our start to 2024 transitions. We are delighted to be able to welcome our 2024 Foundation students into school as we begin the important formal transitioning process. This year is a little exciting as many of our new Foundation children have been attending fortnightly Launchpad sessions and have made great gains in their learning journey already. Our Launchpad students this year have grasped Term One Foundation Phonics expectations already. Later this term, every child will have the opportunity to step up into their new classroom, meet the teacher and spend the day with their new classmates.