Heights Happenings – 2025 – Term 3, Week 6

Parent / Carer / Guardian Opinion Survey Reminder

Our school is conducting the annual Parent / Caregiver / Guardian Opinion Survey and is seeking your feedback. The survey, offered by the Department of Education, is designed to assist schools in gaining an understanding of families’ perceptions of school climate, student behavior, and student engagement.

We sent you an invitation to complete the survey. If you cannot find the invite, check your Compass News Feed.

The Parent / Caregiver / Guardian Opinion Survey will remain open online until Friday 19 September 2025.

Your opinions are important to us and will contribute to identifying areas for improvement and professional development needs in the school, to target school planning and improvement strategies. The department will use the results from the survey for research purposes and to improve outcomes for students.

The survey is being conducted online and only takes 20 minutes to complete.

If you require assistance in completing the survey or you require assistance in another language, please reach out to the school.

Book Character Dress Up Day

I was so impressed by the book character dress ups on Monday morning last week. The costumes were so creative!

Being a bit of a Star Wars fan, I absolutely loved what Hunter in Year 6 wore. He had the full Mandalorian kit with an official helmet and home-made armour. He even had Grogu attached to his belt.

The other costume I loved was worn by Elsie in Year 3. Her Aunty, Emma Gourlay, is a published author who has written two books, Kip of the Mountain and Kip of the Karoo.  You can see Elsie is dressed as the main character, Kip Boowitt. On Elsie’s shoulder’s is a creature named Buffel (hand-made by Leia Barrett). The name Buffel, in Afrikaans, means unicorn or mythical creature.

Elsie is so proud of her Aunty Emma and was so happy she was able to show everyone her book and costume at the book week parade.

Driver safety reminder around school

I recently received a message from Knox Council about driver safety around the school. Sadly, they have received complaints about community members who are driving in ways that might pose a danger to the students during school drop off and pick up times.

The benefit to being a school located in the middle of a residential estate is that it’s quieter and safer for families – there’s no busy roads to contend with. The disadvantage is that the streets around the school weren’t designed to cater for large volumes of traffic, which puts stress on traffic flow around the school. Mostly, the community are patient, respectful and super-careful. However, the council felt it important to remind people of local road rules which can keep our families safe:

• Regarding school crossings, all motorists must stop for any pedestrian waiting to cross when flags are displayed and to remain stopped until the crossing is completely clear.
• 40km/h speed-limit signs are installed on roads surrounding the school. All motorists must strictly obey the speed-limit.
• Children under 12 years (and accompanying adults) may ride on footpaths. Supervise children walking or cycling until they are old enough to navigate traffic safely.
• Motorists must slow down, and give way if necessary, when negotiate through a cross road intersection.

Thank you and enjoy your weekend.

Mat Anderton
Principal

WESTFIELD LOCAL HERO – VOTE NOW!

HELP US MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN OUR COMMUNITY BY VOTING FOR RAY

Congratulations to Ray Siegersma for being a finalist in the 2025 Westfield Local Heroes awards and recognition program for making a positive impact in our local community.

At a Boronia primary school, a unique program called the Youth Skills Shed pairs children with tradespeople and retirees to learn practical skills. Created by Ray, the initiative helps children struggling to learn in the school environment, while building intergenerational bonds and community spirit. Ray aims to expand the program to more schools throughout his local area.

If Ray is successful, the funds will be used to mirror the Shed program in another school, by providing the Shed, tools, workbenches, supplies and equipment.

As one of the finalists for Westfield Knox, Ray’s work will be promoted in-centre, on digital channels and potentially in the local media between 19 August and 8 September 2025. The community will be invited to vote for the finalist they would like to see receive a grant of $20,000 to their organisation to continue their community work. The remaining two finalists will receive a $5,000 grant for their organisation or group.

Please ask your friends, family and colleagues to vote for Ray by scanning the QR code below, scroll down to find Ray, hit the Vote Now red button and complete your name and email address to vote for Ray, then Submit and you’ve voted for Ray. The finalist with the most votes is awarded the $20,000.

All finalists will be notified of the status of the community vote from 14 October 2025.

Free Student Tables. Please contact Lori at the office to arrange pick up.

Prep 2026 Enrolments

Prep 2026 enrolments are due into schools by the 25th August 2025.

If you have been offered a place after enrolling online with the VicStudent porthole, and haven’t accepted or declined, could you please now.

If you have a child to enrol for 2026 and haven’t yet, please contact the office as soon as possible.

Attendance

Please remember if your child will be absent ALL day, you need to enter an absence note on COMPASS. The office will be following up all unexplained absences.

Compass will automatically generate an SMS at 10.00am if your child is not at school. Please note that if you are bringing your child in late, ignor this SMS as late arrivals get signed in on the COMPASS Kiosk at the office on your arrival.  However, if your child is going to be absent for a complete day, you must approve this absence with a ‘note’ on Compass. This will avoid you receiving additional correspondence from the office to follow up this unexplained absence.

Name Your Belongings

We know you treasure your uniform and books. Please remember to label all uniform, books and belongings coming to school. Like most years, we have had an incredible amount of lost property through the year. The majority was unnamed, along with illegible tags. We would love lost items to boomerang back to your kids.

CARE Ticket Winners

Anxiety, worries and fears in children

Understanding Anxiety in Children
Anxiety is a feeling of worry or fear that something bad might happen. It can also show up as physical reactions—like “butterflies” in the stomach—or behaviours such as avoiding certain situations or looking for extra reassurance.

Feeling anxious, worried, or afraid is a normal part of life for children. These feelings usually come and go and often change as children grow and move through different stages of development.

What Children Worry About as They Grow

It’s completely normal for children’s worries to change as they get older. Here are some common fears you might notice at different stages:

• Babies and toddlers might feel upset when they’re away from you. They can also be startled by loud noises, heights, or unfamiliar faces.
• Preschoolers (under 5) often fear the dark or being left alone. Sometimes they might also worry about getting sick or hurt.
• School-age children may start to fear things like ghosts, social situations, tests, or being criticised.
• Children over 8 often start to worry about bigger things, like how well they’re doing in school or sports, family relationships, or even big world issues like the environment, pandemics, or wars.

Knowing what’s typical at each stage can help you support your child, offer reassurance, and remind them they’re not alone in how they feel.

Supporting Children with Anxiety

It’s normal for kids to feel anxious or worried sometimes — and there are many ways you can help them through it:

• Acknowledge their feelings. Let your child know it’s okay to feel anxious — lots of children do!
• Talk it through. Give them a safe space to share what’s on their mind.
• Encourage gentle bravery. Support them to face situations that make them anxious, one small step at a time.
• Offer help at the right time. Step in when they truly need it, but try to give them a chance to try first.
• Celebrate their courage. Praise their effort when they face a fear, even if it’s just a small step forward.
• Stay positive. Avoid criticism or labelling them as “shy” or “anxious.”
• Focus on healthy habits. Good food, physical activity, and enough sleep all help keep minds and bodies strong.

With calm support and encouragement, children can build confidence and learn to manage their worries over time.

The Step Ladder Approach

The stepladder approach is a step-by-step way of helping children and teenagers handle anxiety.

• The approach involves tackling little things before facing really scary things.
• The approach encourages children and teenagers to face their fears, rather than avoiding them.
  You can use the approach for different ages and anxieties.

You can read about this approach at:

https://raisingchildren.net.au/toddlers/health-daily-care/mental-health/anxiety-stepladder-approach

Here is an example for how the Step Ladder Approach could be utilised with an 8 year old:

All of the information above was taken from the Raising Children Network. You can learn more about anxiety in children here: https://raisingchildren.net.au/toddlers/health-daily-care/mental-health/anxiety-in-children

Tip:
If you’re unsure about how to do this stepladder – talking to a professional, perhaps a child and family health nurse, GP, or psychologist – or contact the school and I can support you to head in the right direction.

Have a great week!

Sarah Weichert

Mental Health and Wellbeing Leader

Monday, Wednesday & Friday

Year 5 Hoop Time

Last Friday, 38 of our Year 5 students travelled to Kilsyth Basketball Stadium to participate in a Hoop Time Basketball event. Although many of the teams didn’t get as many wins as they would have liked, the attitude and resilience to keep fronting up and trying their best was wonderful. A big thank you to Kristy Foster, Elly Turcinovic, Jen McNamara, Cristie Panagiotou, Matthew Weeks, Patrick Murrihy, Sarah Donald, and Barbara Ryan with coaching and scoring on the day!

Interschool Sports

Unfortunately, our Summer Interschool sports competition had to be postponed due to the heavy rain forecast as well as the condition of some of the venues. The event will be re-scheduled for term 4.

Shae Warren
Physical Education Teacher and Sport Co-ordinator

Year 3 Coil Bowls

Some of the beautiful Year 3 clay coil bowls are now on display in the library! Students hand-built their bowls by rolling different types of coils to form the base. They carefully smoothed and joined the clay on the inside to hold it together, before glazing their bowls with vibrant colours.

Prep 3D Octopus

The Prep students have been learning about sculpture and have created an adorable 3D octopus using paper magic clay. First, they made an armature out of foil, then rolled coils for the tentacles and finally added details to make each octopus unique. Come and see these wonderful sea creatures in the library display cabinets!

Tianah-3C

Tara Henstock
Visual Arts Co-ordinator

Chocolate Fundraiser

Thanks to those who have already returned the $60 payment for the box of chocolate and a massive thank you to those who have taken additional boxes.

All money is going towards the extension of the senior playground.

The chocolate money is due back Friday 28th August.

Upcoming Events

Father’s Day Stall will be on Tuesday 2nd September.

There is a call out for Parent Helpers on Compass today.

Save the Date for the great BHPS Trivia Night on Friday 17th October. All donations appreciated.

Trivia Night sponsors

Thank you to the following sponsors for sponsoring our Trivia Night on Friday 17th October.

Boronia

Spartans Reformer Pilates

Melbourne Football club

Metro Cinemas

Jackson Taylor

Boronia Hotel

Koko Lime cafe

Yarra Valley Chocolaterie

Motorone

Swift Caravan services

Leah Hodgson
Boronia Heights Hubsters