Dear families,

Well, the weather has certainly started to heat up which has allowed our PP-Year4 swimming lessons to run in such a smooth manner. I want to thank families for their support in ensuring that their children were well prepared for swimming. I’m sure you’ll agree that it has certainly made for tired children by the end of the week. Our Year 5/6 students will have their turn in week 9 &10 with a 7 day series.

Yesterday, we held an internal assembly for our students. The purpose of these assemblies is to be able to articulate a consistent message to our students about specific operational routines/priorities that may arise. One routine that was addressed was student and family expectations before school. It has become very difficult to manage students in the morning with students leaving the old undercover area and staff not being able to manage looking after them. From Monday, when students arrive at school they are expected to attend the new undercover area with their bags. A member of the Administration team will care for them there. I have concerns if students are onsite, and they don’t have a responsible adult monitoring them. From 8:20am, there will be a member of the Administration team in the new undercover area. We ask that students don’t arrive at school prior to this time. If parents are coming onsite with their children, student may wait with their parents. We do ask that students are monitored and don’t play on the playground equipment. We believe that this new routine will support the safety of our students. I do want to acknowledge our wonderful student councillors who ran this event. They did such an amazing job!

French

As many of you will know, we bid farewell to our long-standing French teacher, Mrs Janet Wilderspin, earlier this term. We are currently running a process to secure a permanent teacher for 2025. This will be reflected in your child’s end of year report with no grade being allocated to French. With a relief teacher currently teaching French and not having long term relationships with the students it presents as a difficult task to allocate grades.

AFG Interschool Numero Challenge

50th Anniversary Celebration

We have finally secured a date for our 50th celebrations. This will occur on Friday the 21st of February. We have locked in a formal assembly at 2.30 and later in the afternoon we will be hosting sundowner type celebration where the P & C will be involved. We will be sending out invitations to special guests before the end of the year. If you are aware of anyone that either worked or attended Duncraig PS in the past that would warrant an invite, please let the school know. Surely there’s some famous people that once attended this wonderful school! We have recently found out that the new Director of Education, Jay Peckitt, attended Duncraig PS and hopefully we can entice him to attend our celebrations.

Year 6 Solar Ovens

Our year 6 students finally test out their school made solar ovens this week and with success! Some of these amazing ovens hit over 80 degrees! I hear the nachos tasted pretty good as well.

WA Canteen Day

Today we acknowledged our wonderful canteen manager, Amelia, Nat and all of our wonderful volunteers.  The efforts of Amelia and the many volunteers who support our students and our school has been tremendous this year. Check out the board outside the canteen for some appreciation medals completed by students. Our canteen provides great food, a valuable service and is the heart of our school. We don’t take their hard work for granted, so thanks a bunch and Happy Canteen Day!