What a busy start to Term 3.

I hope everyone is staying warm and dry in this sudden burst of Winter weather.

Last Friday we were able to farewell Mr Langford in style. A great reflection from students, the school council and staff on his time at Carrum. It was great for our students to say goodbye and well done to Kai and Meila on their wonderful speech on behalf of the students.

    
            

Our Junior School Council also organised Pyjama Day and chose this year to donate to Guide Dogs Australia. This dress up day is a particular favourite of Carrum staff, and I know many students told me they just came straight to school after getting out of bed. I wonder if it made the morning hustle a bit easier for some families? It was great to see our teachers in their stylish and matching PJs too.

The school has been a bit quieter at the start of the week as our P-2 and Yr 5/6 students have spent the last three days participating in their first week of the swimming program. This program is a government initiative so all students can receive quality swimming and water safety education so primary school students can have the opportunity to learn how to swim and develop lifelong skills in water safety to reduce their risk of drowning and injury. This is an essential skill particularly for Carrum students to have living in a Bayside suburb close to water.

Congratulations to our Prep students as tomorrow they will celebrate 100 days of school. What an achievement and how fast this year has flown for our young students. I know the teachers have been busy planning for this day and have some great activities planned. As parents you must also be feeling very proud!

This week we have had some of our staff participate in Professional Learning to upskill in our whole school programs. We aim to have all staff educated in the Orton-Gillingham (OG) training which is an explicit synthetic phonics program that underpins our literacy programme and the Berry Street Educational Model. Both these courses are quite intensive, and our teachers are trained over four days. Like our students our teachers are continually learning to improve their practise which impacts student outcomes.

We have had our save the date flyer in the newsletter recently for the school performance, as a reminder this is September 8^th and 9^th stay tuned for costume requirements and more communication about official times.

Finally, a huge shout out to our Teamkids educators. Yesterday was Out of School Hours Educators Day and we are so grateful for the wonderful programmes Teamkids provide and the amazing support Renee and Declan give to our school.

Wishing everyone a wonderful weekend

Cassie Kennedy

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