Dear GIPS Community,

I hope this newsletter finds you well as we approach the end of a busy and rewarding term. There has been so much happening at Glen Iris Primary School, and I am excited to share some key updates with you.

School Buildings and Grounds Improvements Continue

We are thrilled to announce that construction on our new inclusive school playground is officially commencing! This exciting development is part of our continued commitment to improving our school’s buildings and grounds. The project is scheduled to be completed next term, providing a fantastic and accessible space for all our students to enjoy.

As we reflect on our successes at GIPS for these past five years, I want to thank our School Council who have helped us make significant improvements to GIPS, ensuring our school remains a welcoming and modern environment for learning and play. These upgrades include:

• A new oval, providing students with a fantastic space for outdoor activities.

• New junior toilets, enhancing facilities for younger students.

• A new roof on the main building, ensuring safety and longevity.

• Renovations of 21 out of 24 classrooms and office spaces, creating fresh and engaging learning areas with the other three classrooms scheduled for this year.

• A new fire service, ensuring the safety of our entire school community.

• Updated planting and landscaping, improving the natural beauty of our school grounds.

• New inclusive school playgrounds connecting the science of wellbeing with the importance of play during the school day.
  

Building a Stronger Community

The past few weeks have been a wonderful celebration of community and connection at GIPS. We take great pride in fostering strong relationships both within our school and beyond, and recent events this term have highlighted this commitment.

• Our partnership with the local United Church Kinder has provided valuable opportunities for collaboration and engagement with our students in our upper grades as they learn the important skill of being a buddy.

• We embraced Harmony Day, a special occasion that celebrated inclusivity and diversity within our school community.

• Mark your calendars for the upcoming community meeting on 3 April, where we hope to gather valuable feedback and ideas for the future of GIPS.

• Our Evening on the Green was a fantastic opportunity for families and friends to come together and enjoy a wonderful night of entertainment and camaraderie.

• Our Smoking Ceremony honoured and acknowledged the rich cultural heritage of our First Nations people, further deepening our respect and understanding.

Thank you to all the staff, students, families, and wider community members who continue to support our school. It is through these shared experiences that we strengthen the bonds that make Glen Iris Primary School such a special place.

Wishing you all a restful and enjoyable break as we look forward to an exciting term ahead!

Warm regards,
Maddie Witter
Principal
Glen Iris Primary School

Our school vision

This year our students have been learning our new school vision: "Growth through belonging; a community where every child thrives." Our assembly hosts each assembly have been coming up with different ways to teach the vision to our students. Does your student know the new vision?

In our prep classrooms

Prep students have been exploring numbers through hands-on activities. They have been using manipulatives such as dice, dominos, and tens frames to understand numbers in different ways. Prep students have also practiced how to write each number using poems such as our number 2 poem, “around and back on the railway track, 2, 2!”. This has been a very fun way to understand, write and visualise numbers.

In grade one

On Friday the 14^th of March, the Grade Ones took part in the Teddy Olympics. The children had lots of fun playing games on the oval with their teddies and making puppets and Tiny Teddy graphs in their classrooms. If you would like to find out more, come and read the fabulous recounts the Grade Ones have written about our special event.

In grade two

Next Thursday 3rd April, the Grade 2's will be celebrating the end of our Sustainability topic with a Green @ GIPS Day! The children are encouraged to wear a touch of green and pack a nude food lunch that day. We will also be having a visit from Anna who is a Secondary school teacher who is a trained kitchen garden educator and has a very keen interest in Sustainability and a degree in Permaculture. The children will have a session with Anna where they will create a habitat to increase the biodiversity at home and at school. They will make seed bombs, take lavender cuttings and strike them to make new plants and make a few embedded worm bins for our veggie garden. We're all looking forward be being green!

In grade three

In Year Three, students have been learning about length and how to measure objects accurately. This hands-on actively outside helped students to find and measure a range of things in millimetres, centimetre and metres.

In Grade 4

On Tuesday, March 4th, our Year 4 students enjoyed an exciting excursion to Werribee Zoo as part of their "Endangered Animals" unit. During their visit, they explored the zoo and participated in a special lesson with a zookeeper. This interactive session highlighted the threats faced by endangered animals and the vital role Zoos Victoria plays in combating extinction. Students also learned about the adaptations that predators use to hunt successfully and the features prey have developed to survive. We then finished the day off with a fun Safari ride.

In 5/6

Grade 5/6 have been revising and extending our knowledge of 2D shapes. We have used shape blocks, digital technology, and pencil and paper to create and draw tessellating patterns.

Also, grade 5/6 have been learning all about space this term. We have worked in groups and individually on planets and topics about space that interest them.

In performing arts

Last week in performing arts, all students listened to and discussed the song “Treaty” by Yothu Yindi as part of Harmony Week. The song is a call to action regarding former prime minister, Bob Hawke, and the treaty that he accepted in 1988 called the Barunga Statement. Every student across each grade contributed to create a rich discussion about honesty, reconciliation, and the power of music to promote harmony in the world.

Updates in literacy

Our GIPS authors have been hard at work completing Stop and Pause during writing sessions. Stop and Pause involves each year level putting a ‘pause’ on regular choice writing and exploring a specific writing genre in detail. In the weeks leading up to Stop and Pause, students become 'experts' in the selected genre as they read, discuss, and analyse example texts with their teachers and classmates. Students are introduced to the text structure and language features of the focus genre while also considering the intended audience and purpose. This learning culminates in Stop and Pause writing week, where teachers and students work through each stage of the writing process: planning, drafting, editing, and publishing.

While our Prep students will take part in their first Stop and Pause next term, our Year 1 to 6 students have started 2025 with all sorts of interesting genres and topics. Year 1 focused on recount writing, sharing their experiences from the Teddy Olympics. Students used time connectives (e.g. first, after, finally) and were introduced to paragraphs as a way of sequencing events. Our Year 2 authors became experts on procedures after making fairy bread in the classroom. They learned that effective procedures require 'bossy verbs'. Year 3 students explored persuasive writing, aiming to convince their audience to share their opinion on what makes the best pet. In Year 4, students made connections with their inquiry unit, Endangered Animals, and wrote an information report on a chosen animal. Their recent excursion to Werribee Zoo provided great inspiration! Lastly, our Year 5/6 students created narratives centred around the theme of 'Discovery.'

Check out the attached pictures showing Stop and Pause in classrooms across the school. - Meagan Cofield, Learning Specialist

Student voice and agency

This week the Principal team and Miss Black met with student leaders and members of the SRC to get feedback on ways we can improve the school's learning, wellbeing, and voice and agency in preparation for our school review.

In Lisa's corner

“Emotions Are Neither Good Nor Bad” – Hugh van Cuylenburg (Resilience Project)

While planning a wellbeing lesson this week, I was drawing upon materials from The Resilience Project and I came across the above statement. I have come across it before (and most certainly will again) but this week it really prompted deeper thinking on my part.

Perhaps temporarily having all three of my adult children back in our family home was sufficient impetus, as I once again navigate evening discussions about their lives that have brought them either joy or challenge. Like you, I revel in seeing my children happy. It fills my heart and gives me such relief, I am in truth quite complicit in seeking out these ‘good feelings’ with/for them. On the flip side, it is such a struggle to resist my “make-it-better” compulsion when they are unhappy or hurting. I know the research and science behind building resilience yet these behaviors seem imprinted on my psyche.

As adults, most of us did not benefit from an explicit teaching focus on wellbeing strategies, in my case it was over many years that I assimilated life experience into “good” feelings or “bad”, in reality we know this is not a factual description. Experiencing a moderate feeling of ‘bad’ (which I now call ‘challenged’) works to keeps us safe, it protects us, it reminds us of our moral compass, it helps us be the best version of ourselves and when it is through no fault of our own at the very least it builds resilience. I am sure you can all think of examples where negative emotions have been unpleasant but ultimately beneficial or necessary. (Sadly, there are life experiences that prove overwhelming and I am not for a minute advocating that these are good for us.)

As a parent and educator I have had to challenge my language and shift schema to maximise the potential van Cuylenburg’s statement can contribute to the personal wellbeing of my students, my children, peers and myself. I still often find myself applying pre-learned habits with automaticity (labelling feelings as good and bad) particularly in the heat-of-the-moment, but I am doing my best to pause and rethink, substituting the language of feelings as messengers trying to tell us something important.

In your journey parenting, may I suggest a couple of tools to you.

1. Around the school you will find A3 posters with the title “All Emotions Are Welcome Here”, these are based on the research of Plutchik and provide essential vocabulary enabling students and teachers to communicate (with building sophistication) about emotions and feelings. If you would like a copy for home, simply search “Emotions Wheel” and pick your favourite image.
2. 
   
3. If you are interested in further research about the Emotions Wheel try the following link; How To Use The Emotion Wheel To Improve Your Well-Being
4. Consider how to incorporate opportunities for children to identify what a challenging feeling may be trying to communicate to them, rather than on the feeling itself.
5. Try and model healthy wellbeing, show your children the importance of self-care and recognising your own emotions. One observation I have made over the years is that as parents our emotions often present to our children in the same manner which kids label as anger. Consider the following true accounts I have gathered over the years;

You get the idea! Tell them what you are experiencing and model the huge range of emotions available on the emotions wheel.

I send you my warmest regards,

Lisa Gough

Leading Teacher

News from the art room

We celebrated Harmony Week in Art with all the students creating detailed patterns on an individual leaf, to form one whole beautiful tree. Each intricately patterned leaf was sprayed with dye to create unique colours. The beautiful tree is on display in the admin building. Students also worked on a hand in class creating a colourful class flower which will be displayed in the library.

Year 4 students engaged in a live webinar hosted by the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) “Kaleidoscopic Creations Inspired by Yayoi Kusama presented by architect Louise O’Brien”. Students viewed rooms and installations from the current exhibition on Yayoi Kusama and then designed their own learning spaces inspired by her work. Fabulous work everyone! The Kusama exhibition is open until April 21 if you are looking for a fun activity during the school holidays! Let the students be your tour guides as they have all learned about this remarkable artist this term.

News from the STEM room

Students in grades 4-6 have been working together in teams building marble runs. This supports not only their critical and creative thinking, but their ability to problem-solve in groups.

Building marble runs introduces students to several fundamental physics principles, including:

1. Gravity – The force that pulls the marble downward, influencing its motion through the track.

2. Potential and Kinetic Energy – Students see how a marble gains potential energy when placed at a high point and converts it into kinetic energy as it moves.

3. Friction – The interaction between the marble and the surface of the track, affecting speed and movement.

4. Acceleration and Deceleration – How slopes and curves impact the marble's speed.

5. Newton’s Laws of Motion – Especially the first (inertia) and second (force and acceleration) laws as students observe how changes in the track design impact motion.

6. Momentum – How the marble's mass and speed determine how far and fast it travels.

7. Conservation of Energy – Understanding that energy is transferred rather than lost as the marble moves.

These concepts make learning physics hands-on and engaging!

In 2023, based on parent feedback, we introduced our STEM class to our curriculum school-wide. We love seeing how this addition to our curriculum helps our learners "aim high". Have a look at some of the team creations below.

Harmony Day

On March 21, 2025, Glen Iris Primary School celebrated Harmony Day with a vibrant parade that showcased the school's commitment to multiculturalism and inclusivity. Students and staff participated by wearing traditional attire representing their diverse cultural backgrounds, as well as the colour orange, symbolizing harmony and unity. The event featured music that highlighted various cultures within the school community, fostering a sense of belonging and respect among attendees. The parade not only celebrated the rich tapestry of cultures at Glen Iris Primary School but also reinforced the values of inclusiveness and mutual respect among its members. Thank you to our staff Ms Synman, Ms Laier, and Krista who helped lead this amazing parade as well as our murals and installations across the school.

Walk-a-Thon

Thank you to our House Captains and all of our students who helped participate in our annual walk-a-thon!

Can we kindly ask that the donation form and sponsorship money be returned to GIPS by Wednesday 2nd April. To make it easy for families sponsorship money can be made via Compass Course Confirmations, EFTPOS or in an envelope with the child's name and classroom to the office.

In our staffroom

This week we attended professional learning on ways that we can continue to build and embed structured and synthetic phonics within our curriculum in grades Prep to Six. We focussed on elements such as singular phonemes starting in Prep all the way to the elusive schwa in Grades 5/6. We enjoy stretching and extending our learners to find ways that they can better develop their morphology, phonological awareness and phonemic awareness.

We also spent time this past fortnight focussing on our school review to ensure our staff has a strong voice in what improvement areas we need to focus on for the next four years to lift student learning and wellbeing outcomes.

In our community

Compass tips

Download the Compass app

To make it easy for you to keep across communications and events at GIPS, we highly recommend you download the Compass app today from your app store.

Kinder Buddies

Each Thursday afternoon, a small group of Grade 5 students visits Glen Iris Road Uniting Kindergarten. This is a wonderful opportunity for our Grade 5s to practice their big buddy skills, and to help potential future GIPS students to feel a sense of belonging before they even start with us next year! It is beautiful to see our Grade 5 students step into this mentor role, taking care of the kinder children and joining them in their play. This is one way that we are connecting with our larger community. Thank you to the kinder teacher Kathy for welcoming us into their space.

Lael Stone "How to be a connected parent"

This is an event you can't afford to miss!

Parenting can be challenging and exhausting.

We are thrilled to be hosting best-selling author and TEDx speaker, Lael Stone live at GIPS.

TOPIC: HOW TO BE A CONNECTED PARENT

Offering us tools and information to support
resilience, empathy and connection with our children.

- Supporting children through challenging situations
- Navigating big feelings
- Simple ways to create cooperation
- Navigating anxiety and worry
- Building resilience and authenticity

Wednesday 4 June 7-8:30pm, GIPS Library

$45 per ticket

This event will sell out. BOOK NOW: http://trybooking.com/DAHMS

Lael is a highly sought-after parenting educator. This event is open to the public so more families can benefit from Lael's insights.

Please invite your friends, family, neighbours and colleagues to join us.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Your Event Organisers,

Maddie Witter (GIPS Principal), Jacqui Williamson (Grade 4 & 6 Parent) & Tyla Millerd (Grade 2, 4 & 6 Parent)

Save the Date: Mother's Day Brunch

From our school council

Your School Council held an engaged and energising second meeting of the year. Here are 6 updates and 6 ways to help:

✅Our Treasurer highlighted great progress on parent payments - thank you to all those who’ve paid. Every dollar makes a difference.
📢If you haven't yet, please pay via Compass now.

⚠️We’re concerned about illegal parking and dangerous driving on Glen Iris Road at drop-off and pick-up. All our kids have a right to get to school safely every day. Please respect the rules, and remind others about them. Parking officers will patrol more often and issue fines if necessary. We don’t want you to get fined, we do want our kids to be safe!

🛝The Buildings & Grounds committee celebrated our Inclusive Playground construction starting today. They’re also working with the Department of Education on Facilities Evaluation, playground audits and tree safety audits.
🌻We aim to re-plant the front garden beds. We have great planting recommendations from a volunteer landscaper last year.
📢Do you have gardening or landscaping skills to bring this to life? Please email Alex.

💰Fundraising: save the date for our fabulous Mother's Day event on 9 May!
📢Each year level is responsible for organising one fundraiser per year: watch for updates via your Class Reps and please help make your event a success!

Our Principal Maddie presented the Annual Report for 2024 – summarising significant progress on strategic goals, student outcomes and engagement 📈 Maddie will present this to the school community on 21 May at 6:30pm. Attend online or in person for a concise snapshot of highlights and continued focus areas.

See who's on your School Council here. 📢You can join a committee without being on School Council – please email Kirsty if you’re keen.

📢 To volunteer at GIPS (in classrooms, on excursions, at working bees or fundraisers), you need a Working With Children check. This is essential for child safety. It’s free and lasts for 5 years. Apply online today. Then complete the GIPS volunteer induction checklists and you’re set to volunteer for the year!

Jacqui Williamson, Council reporter

Picture day April 2

Animal assisted therapy dogs

We are thrilled to share some exciting news with you! Our school has been awarded a 12-month grant of $43,000 to fund an Animal Assisted Therapy Dog program. We applied for this grant in 2024 with the goal of providing extra support for students who may need help with resilience, social skills, or managing anxiety.

After carefully reviewing many options, we selected the Lead the Way Animal Assisted Therapy Dog program as the best fit for our students. This program includes two unique offerings: Happy Paws and Comfort Paws.

Happy Paws (Group Program – Grades 2-6)

Happy Paws is a fun and engaging group program led by a certified mental health professional and therapy dogs. It focuses on social and emotional development, helping students with:

🐾 Social inclusion

🐾 Stress and anxiety management

🐾 Problem-solving and persistence

🐾 Teamwork

Through guided interactions with therapy dogs, students will learn important life skills, participate in play-based activities, and even try basic dog-training and agility exercises. Based on student survey feedback in 2024, the groups will be single-gender. This program will run for four terms, with each group running 4-8 weeks.

Comfort Paws (1:1 Support – All Grade Levels)

Comfort Paws offers individual therapy dog visits for students who may benefit from one-on-one social interaction, emotional comfort, or simply the joy of spending time with a friendly dog to help support their learning readiness. These visits are flexible and can be scheduled as needed on the days the therapy dog is at GIPS. This program will also run for four terms.

Important Notes & How to Get Involved

We understand that some students may feel uneasy around dogs or are allergic to dogs, so all therapy dog sessions will take place in designated spaces—never in open areas like the schoolyard.

If you're interested in enrolling your child in either program, please contact Acting Assistant Principal Shaye Bradbury at glen.iris.ps@education.vic.gov.au to receive an expression of interest form or speak with your child’s classroom teacher who will share your details with Shaye. We may also reach out to families if we believe a child could benefit from participating. Parental consent is required. Our team will form groups based on need. To ensure that the dogs are safe, students will be expected to sign an animal safety guidelines agreement if participating. This program will start later this year.

We are so excited to bring this program to GIPS later this year and look forward to seeing the positive impact on our students!

Florence Street gate closed

We’re excited to share that work on our Inclusive School playgrounds is set to begin this Friday! As part of the project, the pedestrian gate on Florence Street (NW corner of the oval) will be closed starting Monday, 31 March until the work is complete. Please use the gate by the kinder. The anticipated completion date for the works is a few weeks into next term.

Additionally, the builders will be setting up their site in the staff car park, which means the car park will be temporarily closed to all non-construction vehicles and front office cars starting 28 March.

We appreciate your understanding and patience as we make these improvements for our students. Thank you for your support!

Parking in front of driveways

Please do not park in front of driveways, including on Wayroonga Court and Glen Iris Road. Our neighbours need clear access to enter and exit their homes. Thank you for your support.

Garden

Thank you to the community of parents who are bringing in seedlings for our garden! We appreciate all of the help that we get during the weekends to help ensure the garden is looking beautiful. Our gardeners have recently planted seeds in our garden, and we look forward to the blossoming veggies, fruits and flowers soon.

Community meeting

📢 Community Meeting – We Want Your Feedback!

We invite all members of our parent community to join us for a Community Meeting on April 3rd from 3:45 PM to 4:15 PM in the lab (next to the library).

As we prepare for our upcoming school review in mid-Term 2, which occurs every 4-5 years in government schools, your input is invaluable. Our leadership team—Maddie Witter, Shaye Bradbury, Shanae Hill, Lisa Gough, and Meagan Cofield—will lead a collaborative activity to gather feedback on what the school is doing well and areas for improvement in key areas such as learning, student wellbeing, and student agency.

This is a great opportunity to share your thoughts and help shape the future of our school. We encourage all parents to attend!

📌 RSVP with the front office at glen.iris.ps@education.vic.gov.au. We look forward to seeing you there!

Supervision before and after school

Student safety at GIPS is our highest priority and the safe and appropriate supervision of students is an important element of our duty of care to students. Part of this duty is ensuring parents and students are aware of our student supervision arrangements before and after school.

Before school: School grounds are supervised starting at 8:45 am Monday to Friday. Classroom doors open at 8:50 am Monday to Friday.

After school: School grounds are supervised between 3:30 pm and 3:40 pm Monday through Friday.

Students on school grounds outside these times will not be supervised (unless they are attending a before or after school care program or supervised extracurricular activity. In this case, they will be supervised by that third-party provider). Parents/carers are requested to ensure that students do not attend school outside of these supervised times unless they are attending before or after school care, or a pre-arranged supervised activity (i.e. Tennis). Please do not drop your children off unsupervised before supervision commences.

This is also a friendly reminder that we ask parents to please monitor your child's safety of themselves and others afterschool. Please do not allow students to climb trees or play games with sticks that may hurt others.

Families are encouraged to refer to Glen Iris Primary | TeamKids for more information about the before and after school care facilities available to our school community.

A Reminder about Late Arrivals

A friendly reminder that if students arrive after the 9:00 am bell, they will need to sign in at reception. There’s a quick "kiss and go" area, and a member of our team will escort the student to class.

For any conversations with teachers, the best time is after school at 3:30 pm, as staff are busy supervising students during drop-off and are not available for check-ins at that time. Thank you for your understanding.

e-Safety

Every year, the eSafety Commissioner hosts a series of webinars for parents on a range of topics relevant to children and adolescents. These can be accessed at www.esafety.gov.au/parents/webinars. Please see the attached flyers for more information about sessions coming up in Term 1 and Term 2.

Ashwood High School Invitation

GIPS Container Scheme

GIPS now has a container deposit scheme donation code where you can donate your 10c container refunds to the school, this is a fantastic way to recycle while also raising funds for the school.

It is an easy 3 step process:

1. Collect eligible containers (can's, bottle and juice boxes) check for the 10c mark, often near the bar code HINT: you can keep lids on
2. Find your refund point HINT: CDS Vic Depot Oakleigh at 37-41 Oxford St Oakleigh is close by
3. Donate HINT: at the machine select "enter zone ID" and scan the GIPS barcode (the friendly depot staff can also help)

See attached poster for more information.

From

School Council

From our third party providers

Team Kids

Futures tennis holiday camp