Dear Families

Who can believe that we have already been back at school for over a week!

I would like to begin this week’s newsletter by acknowledging and thanking the staff in our wonderful school for the incredible job they have done in preparing for the school year, setting up classrooms and the school grounds and making the start of the year as welcoming and inviting as possible. With many people feeling quite uncertain about what the start of this year was going to bring, it has certainly created additional pressures.

We have a number of new staff joining us this year. Miss Kate Gray, our music teacher, continues to recover from an injury last year and whilst she is hopeful of returning to our school soon, she is not yet fully recovered. We therefore welcome Mrs Sarah Tollner into our school as our Music teacher for Term 1. Mrs Tollner comes to us with glowing recommendations from her previous school in Queensland. Attached to this newsletter is some more information about Mrs Tollner as well as some Parent homework…that’s right kids, this time it’s your parents getting homework instead of you! ?

We also welcome Rebecca Greeves to the library as our new library technician. Mrs Greeves will be working in our school on Tuesdays and we all look forward to getting to know her better over the coming weeks and months.

Mrs Katherine Dewhurst has joined our cleaning team and had done a marvellous job working alongside Mr Hooper in getting the school looking clean and tidy. She has proven to be an absolute whizz at cleaning and is also refreshing the flowers in the front foyer, which you will notice if you pop into the office for something. Thank you, Katherine, this is such a lovely way of freshening up our foyer and welcoming everyone into our school.

Mr Daryl Watson has also joined our cleaning team, supporting us with some of the additional COVID cleaning of frequently touched surfaces and toilets. Welcome Daryl.

Finally I would like to welcome our new Kindergarten students for 2022 as well as Kyrie, Emaly, Riley, Ethan and Marlena who have all joined the Glen Huon Primary School ‘family’ this year. It has been lovely welcoming you into our school.

Change of day for newsletters

You may be wondering why you are receiving a newsletter today rather than a Tuesday.

We are going to change the Newsletter Day to Thursdays this year.

Hard copies will continue to be sent home with the eldest student in each family.

If you would also like to receive the Newsletter via email, please contact the school office.

COVID-19 update

Thank you to everyone for helping us to follow COVID guidelines and keep each other safe. Please continue to help us keep everyone as safe as possible by following COVID safe behaviours and a reminder to all adults, particularly those collecting students after school, to please ensure physical distancing of 1.5m is maintained.

Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) – Attached to this Newsletter is some additional information regarding access to and administration of RATs. The Department of Education has also alerted us to some incorrect information included with the RATs you received in your COVID Care Packages. In the information pamphlet contained in your rapid antigen test, under section 6.0 there is an instruction stating ‘you must take a laboratory PCR test immediately’ if your RAT test is positive. Public Health assures us that school staff and students do not need to do a PCR test if their RAT test is positive. If you have any concerns, please contact the Tasmanian Public Health Hotline on 1800 671 738.

Hay Fever and Asthma - There are some students in our school who may exhibit or display ongoing symptoms (for example due to hay fever or asthma). In these circumstances parent/carers are asked to seek a medical review and provide a medical certificate describing the symptoms to allow students to attend school. This information can be added to the student’s medical management plan.

If your child has symptoms other than those covered in the medical certificate, or their symptoms change, or there are other COVID-19 related concerns for your child, families should administer a rapid antigen test (RAT) prior to sending your child to school that day. If the RAT is negative (and only if your child is feeling well) they can attend school that day. 

 If throughout a school day a student’s condition changes, the school will communicate the changes to the family and ask the family to administer a RAT prior to return the following day. 

This decision has been made in consultation with Public Health.

Swimming Carnival

The Department of Education’s recommendation for the time being is that sports carnivals be cancelled or postponed for at least the first 5 weeks of this Term. Due to this, our Swimming Carnival has been cancelled, as has the Huon and Channel Swimming Carnival. Due to pool bookings, at this stage it looks highly unlikely that this will be rescheduled.

Breakfast Club and Canteen

Our wonderful Breakfast Club and Canteen has also been put on hold for the time being whilst there continues to be caution exercised over COVID-19. I know that several students have been asking about Breakfast Club and we hope to be able to reinstate this as soon as it is deemed safe to do so.

Allergies reminder

A reminder that we have a number of students within our school who have anaphylactic reactions to nut products. Reminder letters have already been sent home with classes who have a student directly impacted by this, however we ask that the whole school is vigilant in avoiding sending students to school with nut products in their lunch boxes. If you have any further questions or concerns please contact your child’s teacher or Mrs Lees.

WANTED: Plastic Bottle Top Lids

Mrs Munson is collecting plastic bottle top lids. If you have any please drop them off to her classroom or the front office. Please also ensure they are well washed so that they do not get stinky, thank you.

Mrs Lees’ Weekly Wondering

As a way of fostering and encouraging our students to be curious and creative thinkers, Mrs Lees is going to be including a ‘Weekly Wondering’ in each newsletter.

This is a great opportunity for your family to also engage in ‘wonderings’, build oral language and questioning skills and to perhaps find ways of exploring and discovering the answers to some of your wonderings. We would also love to hear about what you are wondering and discovering!

This Week’s Weekly Wondering:

Almost every day I walk past this happy sunflower outside our new Kinder Storage Shed there is a bumble bee busily visiting the flower.

I WONDER where they go after that and where they sleep at night???